Tuesday 23 August 2011

The Visa Story (and also a house story)

Hi, all. The last post was a while ago, so here are some updates:
1. I leave in a mere 24.5 days.
2. I am not getting a visa.
3. Holy crap, I leave in less than a month.

About the visa. I had acquired a CAS number (confirmation of acceptance of studies) as required by the points-based system for UK visas when I finally found the fee page. It costs £255 for a student visa (general sponsored adult), and that works out to over $400 with the current (crappy) exchange rate. If I was staying for the full year, this would be worth it. As it stands, however, I probably wouldn't be able to make enough money to cover the cost of the visa. So, no visa. I'll try to be more frugal than I tend to be when presented with stores.

Also, I leave in less than a month.

My housing situation has improved, apparently. I will be living in a house off campus, probably in the room that the person who hooked me up with the house will vacate in December. In a fit of irony, she's the only one living there that I know beyond casual, visual acquaintance.
The house is awesome. It's got columns and a basement (already dubbed "The Cohab Cave") and a million bedrooms and a fireplace and a freaking conservatory. Also a washer, dryer, dishwasher, and refrigerator. I'll be on the ground floor, by myself and the kitchen. There's also a patio, two bathrooms, and two living room areas (the entry and the, what, parlour?). It's maybe a mile from campus, and at least one of my future housemates has a car. With some boldness on my part, I should be able to get a ride in on particularly awful mornings. On halfway decent mornings, I should be able to walk in easily enough. Hopefully, I don't have any 8 AM classes.

In other news, I leave in less than a month.
I've stopped having dreams about being unsure of my placement by ISEP (those involved a rainboot store where I never managed to try on any boots) and moved on to dreams about missing my flight (one involving hijacking another plane to catch up at Reykjavik and another about leaving the Tri Cities about half an hour before my flight leaves Seattle). Happily, my subconscious is free of fears about real, terroristic hijackers, so there's one less massive anxiety focus... With the riots in London I've spent a bit of time worrying about not being able to go for safety reasons and having to take random filler classes at Whitworth and not having a place to stay... In fact, I had planned to take random filler classes this semester anyway (just in England instead of the US), and I think there is an extra room at the house.

Wellp, see ya later.