Today Mom and I kicked off my last weekend in Iowa with a day of shopping and dining in Des Moines. After picking up necessities like a computer charger and other "necessities" like a new pair of skinny jeans, we stopped to visit Alyssa and Chris in their beautiful new home in West Des Moines. It was so great to see them, since I didn't get a chance to talk to them for a long period of time at the going away party my mom threw for me on Labor Day. Speaking of which, for those of you who were able to make it, thank you so much for stopping by. It will be a long year without all of you, and it meant SO much that so many people made time on a holiday weekend to see me off. There have been far too many goodbyes in the past couple of weeks, but it's a good feeling to know that I'll be back, and while I'm away there's modern technology to keep me in the loop.
On the way home, we stopped at Hickory Park in Ames, which is one of the best restaurants in the state and the kind of place where they serve heaping portions of hearty heartland food. I'm sure this will come as no surprise to any of you who know my mother, or my love of bacon, but I've been stocking up on pork, corn, butter and all other artery-assaulting hometown delicacies. I'm looking forward to Tuesday night, when my mother has promised me her famous peach cream pie for my last dinner at home.
Now back in the bustling Metropolis of Kanawha, I've been reading my parents' coffee table books on London and watching BBC miniseries to get me excited for the year ahead. Right now I'm into "Cranford," which is a fantastic 5-part series based on the novels of Elizabeth Gaskell, who was a brilliant Victorian writer and in no way related to our illustrious local politican, Thurman. For anyone who loved the Colin Firth version of Pride and Prejudice, I highly recommend Cranford. It's fitting that the miniseries takes place in a small town--I'm starting to see vague parallels between life in Cranford and life in Kanawha--so maybe my bridging the gap won't be quite such a feat after all.
Speaking of town, I know I've told some of you this story, but my first bit of cultural exchange with Londoners has already happened. Rotary gives us a host counselor, and I was lucky enough to be assigned to Nat, a lovely gentleman from North London who has graciously invited me to stay with him (and his wife Betty) for my first few days in London. When I explained to Nat that I come from a "town" of 700, he was surprised that I used such a word and did not call it a village or hamlet. Apparently in England, a hamlet has fewer than 500 people, a village has 500-5,000 people, and any bigger than that is a town with an actual charter. In order for a town to graduate to a city, it must have a cathedral, abbey or minster within its borders.
Terminology lesson #1: I come from the village of Kanawha, which is very nearly a hamlet.
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