too darn hot

Oh Lord almighty, spring was here for literally two days and then the unforgiving blazing rays of summer took over my sweet little home of Oxford. Although the four seasons consisting of: almost summer, summer, mostly still summer, and Christmas, are very common to me, being with out a working air conditioner is not. I would hope by now that it is no shock to any of my loyal readers that I do not like to struggle, especially on human necessitates (and yes air is a necessity). Although the air would come on, it was not cool and since my room is upstairs AND facing the sun, it was down right miserable. I felt like a southern debutante in the 1920s walking around with a cool cloth at all times wiping the "glow" off of my newly powdered face. Sleeping was by far the worst. I've tried every place in the house and the downstairs is by far the best but does not make for a good night's rest. The landlord came over today and determined that the ancient air conditioner needed to be replaced and would hopefully be done sometime in the next few days...SOME TIME?! Seriously a couple more days of this and I will need a constant flow of margaritas or a lobotomy. Maybe both. In good news though, I keep telling myself that all of the "glistening" around my house is making for a hot new diet. We'll see.

In other news, I was finally able to enjoy a great weekend of Double Decker festivities. Double Decker is an arts and music festival on the famous square of Oxford and is named after the Double Decker buses given from Oxford, England to Oxford, Mississippi. The square shuts down to traffic and artists from everywhere come and food from basically every restaurant in Oxford is there as well. Due to papers, performances and rehearsals in the past, my Double Decker experience has been severely limited in the long time I have resided in Oxford. The weather of course was very warm but we prepared and brought a cooler of necessary items. We decided to walk so we would not have to find a place to park and at the four corner intersections the double Decker itself stopped (pictured right) and of course we decided to hop on! I believe this ride was supposed to be paid for but the driver did not seem to mind so we got on with the rest of the festival goers. The ride on the Double Decker is fun, but I believe the bus is getting up there in age and I was kind of scared on the hills but no worries, we got to the square and looked around all of the booths. Although there were over 75 food booths outside, we opted to go to Ajax diner (inside pictured left) for some air conditioning and a good bathroom. Joined by : Ann Marie, Nabil, Kelly, and Philip, lunch was very fun and it is safe to say we were all feeling great. Next we walked around the square some more and feeling that midday heat of course we were instantly in need of some more refreshment which brought us to Funky's, a new New Orleans style bar on the square. We enjoyed frozen drinks and a very lively atmosphere. Finally we walked to Square books (pictured right) and scored the best seats in the entire town on the balcony of the book store. We overlooked the stage and despite a rude security guard and frequent sighting of me trying to be normal by my students, for the most part were able to sit on benches and just relax. Amazing.

Well that is all for now, I hope everyone had a wonderful beginning to the week. For Natalie's News this has been, Natalie-Corinne.