Well, heavens to Betsy!

For a long time, it was but a blip on the horizon, an oasis in the desert... "in the summer I'll have a roommate!" And then Elizabeth arrived, armed with duffel bags and German grammar books, ready to take the medieval academic world by storm.

She really made the most of her fellowship, traveling to the far reaches of the East and the North and the West of this country, soaking up German life, German culture, German church, and managing to get some Luther studies in on the side whilst also cavorting with the local Doener boys and buying discounted shoes.

I thought about choosing a few summer highlights to share in this space, but the list got too long. Suffice it to say, we had lots of fun with my friends (and made some new ones, thanks to Elizabeth's charm), we broadened each other's horizons (isn't that always the way with roommates?), we ran countless miles, and we came up with several quotable quotes of questionable ethical character which were duly recorded on the quote sheet and laughed about later.

I don't feel so much like laughing right now, though. :-( When I say goodbye to her tomorrow, Elizabeth's duffel bags will be filled with gifts for her friends, brochures of every museum and cathedral from here to Timbuktu and discounted shoes... and my eyes will be filled with tears. I'm gonna miss you, Betsy!

P.S. I am going on vacation (with my dad!) for the next two weeks. Seven days of it will be spent on the Mediterranean island of Mallorca, on an übertypical German package holiday. I highly doubt I'll be on the internet much, so my blogging will be either highly sporadic or possibly entirely nonexistent until the 22nd or so, when we return to this esteemed city... in the meantime, enjoy yourselves and think of me. :-)

P.P.S. "Heavens to Betsy" was, for some unfathomable reason, the phrase that my sister and I used to chant repeatedly and delightedly after inhaling the helium from our day-old balloons. Are we completely nutso, or was this a cultural thing?