giddy

So, that festive spirit I was talking about? Well, it's well and truly hit. Seriously, thinking about Christmas-related joys has had me scrunching my toes with glee for days.

So, we decorated our (somewhat bijoux) Christmas tree the other day - in a much similar vein to last year, but with the promise of additions - and we've got a house Secret Santa on the go. Tonight is the English Department Christmas Party, and one of my tutors said she'd be bringing mince pies to our seminar next week (softening the potential blow of getting our marked essays back...). I am literally so excited!

I had my first mince pie of the year on Sunday night at my church's first carol service of the season - there was a brass quintet! I have truly regressed back to the mentality of a child; all thought of social etiquette went hurtling out of the window at the sound of "Hark The Herald" and I whooped and clapped at their instrumental encores as we were munching mince pies. And there's more.

The snow. Oh, the snow.

We've had pretty much continual snow for over a week - I'm talking icicles over a metre long, snow drifts up to my thighs, -17 degrees C, the whole caboodle. It's bloomin mint! Even in my little studenty house where I can see my breath in my bedroom, I'm loving the snow. And that in turn has made me fall in love with the North East even more. When the snow hits London, virtually everything stops. When the snow hits the North East, they send men out with shovels in front of the buses to keep them running. Well, almost.

I just love the hardiness of the North Easterners - and I think it's catching. I find myself going out without a coat, going barefoot in the snow to take the bins out, and climbing over next door's wall to get out of my house because my gate is blocked with snow. There's a spirit of "let's just get on with it", and man it's refreshing.

So, here I am in our little winter wonderland - with numb toes but aching for Christmas.

chilled

First frost this morning! Had me slipping and sliding all the way to the Metro station... Felt incontrovertibly twee in my tweed coat with a little thermos in my leather satchel, but hey, I'm a third year.

I'm getting so genuinely excited about Christmas now - Fenwicks has unveiled its Christmas window display (an annual festive event) and Starbucks have started playing their Christmas mix. Now, I did have a moment - lasting all of about five minutes - during which I bemoaned the commercialisation of Christmas and how outrageous it is that the Halloween sweets were, for a surreal week or so, displayed alongside the Advent calendars. But, needless to say, it didn't last. I'm as giddy as a kipper wearing a Rudolph nose, and am biding my time before I put Christmas music on my iPod (1st December is reasonable, isn't it?).

We leave uni for the Christmas holidays on 17th December so I reckon we'll put our decorations up on the 1st-ish. So exciting! My new housemates seem well up for the festivities, so I reckon we'll be increasing our supplies of Christmas decks and spreading the joy throughout more of the house.

Eee! It's actually making my heart beat faster.

well and truly

in the Christmas spirit now. I trotted off to Wilkinsons on Friday with a view to buying some serious decorations (well, as many as my impoverished student pocket could afford) - and this was the result:

Not bad, eh?