Southern Comfort

A few weeks ago (3rd - 7th October) I went to Greensboro, North Carolina to see Emma and her college friends at UNCG! I was so excited to finally experience the 'college life' and see if it really was like how it's portrayed in movies; mainly she's the man..

Before me and Caitlin (Emma's cousin) drove down, we visited Caitlin's best friend Sara and her toddler Sonia who I've kinda fallen in love with cos she's such a cutie!! It was nice to have a little catch up with her cos she's such a down to earth person and reminds me of the girls back home :)
It was a 5 hour drive to Greensboro, but luckily me and Caitlin love a sing song so it was practically just a 5 hour karaoke session before we arrived on campus and met Emma and her room mate Katie to unpack and tour round!!
American college life seems to be on the other end of the spectrum in comparison to English Universities and their student lives - luckily I've now experienced both of them! I don't think I could handle sharing a room with someone constantly though cos I do like to have my own space every now and then. American dorms fit 2 people to a room and in Emma's case, 'Mary Foust House' was a 2 floored big student hall which has a girls and boys bathroom on each floor (so you're sharing all those toilets, sinks and showers..) and ONE kitchen!! It was hard enough keeping track of everything whilst sharing a flat with 5 other girls, let alone the whole of the student block! 99% of the college students eat at the 'food hall' for breakfast, lunch and dinner, but it all seemed to be really fattening food so it's not as simple as in the UK where you have your own shared kitchen and cook for yourself. In that sense, I felt like it wasn't as independent as when I was back in Nottingham where you had to sort of fend for yourself and make yourself cook, so I think I do prefer Uni back home rather than here but it's just like a whole new world!
After Emma introduced us to all her lovely friends, we went to her favourite coffee shop called 'Tate Street Coffee' which is this rustic little coffee shop along the student strip of shops really close to campus. The only way to describe it is it had the same kind of feel and atmosphere as the Lizard at home and Spanky Van Dykes in Notts! So I loved it but it was so small and obviously I don't like coffee.. haha. One of the nights it hosted Jazz night so we went along to that and that was nice and chilling :)
Whilst there we also went to a vintage shop which was amazingggg, the cinema to watch Pitch Perfect (the second time for me because it's so bloody hilarious - Rebel Wilson is definitely going to be huge) and we went to downtown Greensboro which has a really unique musuem called Elsewhere!
Elsewhere is a museum of things hoarded by an old lady for years and when she died her grandson took all her collective pieces and put them in a shop for people to explore. It's $1 to get in and you can touch and move things about wherever you want to. The best bit about it though is that it has no glass windows at the front and there are 3 swings so we were swinging in the shop window haha it was so weird. The whole of downtown Greensboro seemed so rustic and I've never seen so many vintage and antique shops in my life! It was lovely though and is such a pretty little town.
On the last day we were there, literally an hour before me and Caitlin set up to leave was when I fell over and fractured my ankle so that was a nice ending to match the beginning where Emma needed an emergency root canal hahaha so dramatic. It was a lovely trip though so can't complain about anything else, although I'd have appreciated my time there a lot more if it wasn't for my injury!!

Greensboro in snaps.....

Life couldn't be more different here. So excited to be home in 5 days :)

Stay tuned for NY!

Casting a spell

Originally, I wanted to blog about my time spent in North Carolina with Emma, but I've got a huge headache from the painkillers I've been taking which make you feel sleepy and nauseous so I'm not in the best state to be uploading and editing pics, so I'll tell you about my ankle.. ha!

I'm so upset that it's happened because 

1) It's super expensive - missing the NHS

2) I'm bed ridden feeling sorry for myself

3) It's going to be painful hobbling around New York and the Whitehouse

4) I might not be able to fly on time

5) I can't get a Christmas job when I'm home

6) I might need surgery

7) I'm stuck down in my room cos I have to crawl upstairs and go downstairs on my bum

and
8) Not only did I miss my Dad's birthday for the second time running, on his 50th when all attention was supposed to be on him, I took all the limelight and had to break it to my parents that I had a cast on my ankle. HA.
I could go on, but I don't want to seem moany.. ;)

Basically, it's a huge inconvenience - have you ever tried having a bath with only use of one leg? It's not fun.

When I explain what happened, it seems so boring and pretty hilarious but it was literally the most dramatic thing ever to me and I've never been in so much agony :(

I was on Emma's bed, getting ready to leave and it was just me and Katie in the room cos we were gona carry some stuff to the car cos Emma and Caitlin drove it closer to the halls, so I literally slid off her bed which was quite high and I already had my shoes on. When I got off, because of the rubber on my Vans, it caused some friction on the carpet and I must not have picked my foot up high enough to step ha and I tripped and at that the same point I heard and felt something click/pop in my ankle and I fell to the floor. That's it. I FELL :| needless to say, because of the crack I felt, I came over all faint and sick and nearly passed out. Caitlin, who works at a physical therapist place and is studying for it, propped my foot on a chair higher than my heart and iced it for a good 2 hours, which made us leave later to get back to VA. When I attempted to put weight on my foot I literally couldn't, so Emma found some crutches in the library and that's how I slowly got to the car ready for a 6 hour journey back to Reston! 

When I got back, my ankle was ridiculously swollen so we just iced it until Jen took me to a walk in clinic yesterday morning to get an X-ray. It was so scary waiting for the results and this Indian doctor came in who I could hardly understand and the same with him to me told me I've 'spiral' fractured my fibula and I might need surgery. HOW WONDERFUL. I had to then go to a different clinic to have a temporary cast put on and tomorrow have an appointment with a specialist doctor to have a proper hard cast put on and to see about if I can still fly home when I'm supposed to and whether I need surgery.

This is so shit and I wish it could've just been this time next month when I'm home with free health care!! It's so annoying and I've been sleeping all day cos of my tablets and feeling sorry for myself :(

Here's my X-ray. The right bone beneath my ankle bone is the fracture :(

Sat in the car yesterday whilst waiting for Jen to finish shopping in Giant. Gutted I couldn't go in cos I love any chance to go to the American supermarket haha :(

Wish me luck for tomorrow! I'll blog about UNCG when I can be bothered xx