Canals, music, friends and too much uni...

So much for the promise of more regular blogging... It's already been three weeks again and much has happened. A lot of it too boring to describe, as I don't have much of a life at the moment with uni still taking up most of my time. The end of term is approaching, with next week looking like an absolute madhouse for making my deadlines. But there are still some things worth mentioning!!

Over two weeks ago now, I got a call on Monday from Pat, my good friend Kyle's dad. That he would be checking in for his flight to Holland in an hour and if I would like to catch up with him some time that week while he was here. Little did I know I would be sitting on a boat cruising the Amsterdam canals (how Dutch :D) and have dinner with him and his Dutch half-brother and wife the next evening!! When I told my housemates where I was going that night they joked about me having a date with an older man, haha. To be honest, I wasn't sure what to expect either, but I just thought it would be nice to catch up with Pat. Plus I couldn't think of a better excuse to have a break from studying than be touristy with a tourist :) And I ended up having a really good time, it was really nice.

The next day was my housemate Maaike's birthday, so we had an old-fashioned girls movie night with all the roomies while enjoying cake :) Good times...

Then fast-forward to last Monday, which is when I went to Amsterdam again. This time to see one of my favourite artists in concert: Ani DiFranco :) Had bought a ticket earlier in the day, coz for a long time I wasn't sure if I wanted to go, but eventually decided I didn't want to miss it. So off I went :) Now I wouldn't be me if I didn't get lost trying to find the venue. I had drawn a map for myself before I left, asked someone in a shop for directions when I got off the tram and couldn't find my way (who, by the way, also drew me a little map) and still had to ask a second person for directions coz I was still completely lost despite the two maps. In my defense though, the venue wasn't very clearly marked :) I thought so anyway, haha. But I made it eventually and Ani was once again amazing and inspiring and I just loved it!! Her music is just something special to me :) And one of her opening acts, Anais Mitchell, was pretty good too, so that was a nice bonus... Gotta love live music :)

The rest of my time has pretty much been filled up with working on my thesis and writing my essay for my other subject. I'm playing more guitar again these days, coz it's a perfectly relaxing break from studying all the time and I'm loving it. My photo boards are finally hanging on my wall, as my parents came over to Utrecht one morning last week and brought the tools to make that possible. I'm pretty excited about that :) And tomorrow night I'm catching up with my friend Coen, which I'm also pretty excited about, haha. It's been a while since the last time I saw him, so it should be good. Friday I'll have lunch with my friend Roselyn, who I shamefully haven't seen yet since I got back from Australia, so we have a lot to catch up on!! Really looking forward to that :D And then there will be a week in which I'll really have to knuckle down to get everything finished on time. Definitely NOT looking forward to that, but it has to be done!! Hopefully once next week's over I'll have more time to keep in touch with you all again. Please know I think about all of you lots though and wonder what you are all up to and how you're doing. I just don't always have the time right now to ask... So leave a comment if you like, coz I love hearing from you even if you don't always hear from me!! Anyway, I hope you're all really enjoying the approaching summer if you are one of the Down Under readers or loving the autumn colours if you're not :) Those with high school or uni exams, I wish you lots of good luck!! And I hope you're all well :)
Love Carine