Did the Victorians Say "Freakin'"?

Well, it seems the infernal Mrs. Gaskell has done me a good turn, even after all my slights on her writing ability. Dr. Loughlin-Chow called my paper on North and South "absolutely freakin' storming."

Here's how I wanted to respond: BWAH haha haha haha!!!

This is Oxford, is it not? "Freakin'"? Don't get me wrong--it's gratifying to know I'm doing something right. (Though I don't know that anyone wouldn't be able to write a good paper on Gaskell; her themes are so artlessly blatant they jump off the page at you--and not in a good way.) But I still wish my tutor was an eccentric, 62-year-old man, with white hair and a pipe, who lives in an office filled with dusty books and knows nothing of the outside, modern world.


*edit* I feel that I should insert here a warning to any of you potential visitors to England: British light poles are not to be trusted. They move. Into the middle of the sidewalk. Yesterday evening one such wayward pole may or may not have had, let us call it a run-in, with yours truly. So keep your eyes open, fellow Americans.