I am the WORST

So, guess who is making me blog again this time?

Of course it's Peny Turner. I think her exact words were, "So... you've got all this time to blog for your job but you CAN'T EVEN UPDATE YOUR OWN BLOG??"

I imagine Peny is making the same face as this snarky golf club topper.

(If you'd like to see my work blog, check it out here: Ardgowan Hotel Blog)

Lots has happened since I last updated you on my life. It is now December, which means cold, dark days. The sun now comes up at 8:39am and goes down at 3:34pm. I'm not even kidding. The sun barely comes up, is directly in front of the window at Reception pointing INTO MY EYES around noon, and then conveniently ducks back down behind the trees around 2:00pm. Romantic sunset at 2:00pm people. The struggle is real.

Other than that, Clay has finally matriculated (as of LAST WEEK?) and we've got most things settled... in December. What a ridiculous ride this has been! What has even happened the last few months??

The Lade Braes in October!

September and October were absolutely beautiful. I think one day, I actually wore shorts. ONE DAY! And I remember saying to myself, "I better actually wear shorts once this year, just to say that I did. Otherwise, my life is too ridiculous."

I've lived most of my life from March to November in shorts. Oh, Scotland.

In October, Clay got to legit speak words to Bill Murray, I got hit on by a grown up French guy, and we drove around Fife trying to find a cow for me to touch. In November, we drove as far north as we've ever been, to the base of the Highlands in Pitlochry, and drove around looking at lochs and sheep and cows.

Standing in someone's sheep field! RIGHT TO ROAM!

This is how far north we got!

Life has been good. I'm enjoying my job, we're enjoying our friends, and we're exploring more around Scotland. God is definitely using this time to stretch us. We're learning to live on less, and it's been frustrating but much needed - character-building even. I have a job that I love, that pays us to live without me killing myself, and we are living on less than half of our income from the States and we're fine.

I'm not gonna lie, I spent a lot of pity parties over the last year and a half being bitter about how other American St Mary's students can have kids and no jobs, and still seem to have all this money to go buy cars and go to Spain and travel home every 6 months, and yes, I'd love to live that life, but that's not where we are now.

These cows don't care that I don't have any money!

All of that being said, we are skimpy on Christmas presents this year. We've bought ourselves new boots (with no holes!) and decided we're going to get a projector for our living room. After the all-day Harry Potter Marathon last month, we decided life would be more fun with a giant TV screen on one of our massive walls. Especially when we have our Lord of the Rings marathon in January... and so we can watch The Walking Dead on a giant screen!

So, if you'd like anything special from Scotland, please let us know. Otherwise, you're just getting Rowes for Christmas. No seriously. I keep having these moments of panic, thinking about disappointing people who will be expecting us to bring them goodies from Scotland. If you're expecting anything from us when we come home,  please ask for it.

If I could bring you Jasper in a field, I totally would!

Oh yeah, and we're coming home in A WEEK! I still can't believe it. I'm getting 3 weeks off from work (Scotland makes sure everybody gets paid vacation, y'all) and we're bussing to Leuchars, training to Manchester, and flying to Atlanta. It will surely be a great Christmas. I will be sure to document in pictures with Moo.


So, I always leave with a funny story. So here goes: Whenever we walk to get groceries, we pass the Kinnessburn, which is a little river that runs all over St Andrews and empties into the North Sea. It runs alongside this little path called the Lade Braes (which is beautiful ALL THE TIME). There's a little bridge we have to cross (which is pictured up at the top of this post) and I always look out at the Kinnessburn whenever I walk across it and think about Jurassic Park 2 when that one guy gets eaten by all those tiny dinosaurs on that little river while his buddy is listening to Mexican Restaurant music in his headphones.

**Insert pterodactyl sound here**

Wait! Here's a video of my boss sucking a giant Scotland Spider into this fancy contraption called a Bugzooka.

Ok, Now I'm done.

Carm