Halloween in Foggy London Towne

So my new month's resolution is this: DO BETTER. With blogging. Obviously. So it's been a while, and I suppose I've got some back story to catch y'all (note: Y'ALL IS A GREAT, ALL-PURPOSE, NON-GENDER SPECIFIC WORD, AND I'M GOING TO USE IT. NO SASS ON THIS SUBJECT WILL BE TOLERATED) up on. Here goes...



I forgot to add this in my last post, but I took it from the bridge while I was walking to see Hamlet at the National. The Ferris wheel is called the London Eye, and you can see Parliament and Big Ben as well.

 Wednesday's class sessions took us out to the great beyond, AKA Suburban London. We were out looking at communities built with the idea of having a classless social structure, where lower and middle class people could live side by side in respectable looking homes. Interesting topic, but we were a long way from Bloomsbury, and had to scuttle to get back in time to eat and head on to Shakespeare with Jean. Her class period was spent discussing Hamlet (did I mention how FABULOUS that performance was? It was great. They were stellar. I know I already mentioned it, but I needed to reiterate how much I enjoyed sitting through what very easily could have been a painful 3.5 hour theater marathon event). We were all pretty much in agreement that it was a smashing hit, except for the Shakespeare purists (AHEM HAYES AHEM) who weren't in love with its modern portrayal or the insinuation (SPOILER ALERT: read no further if you intend to fly to London to see this performance before it ends around the end of December) that Ophelia was murdered (GASP!). In any event, most of us liked it. And even those nay-sayers enjoyed it, they just happened to also be nay-sayers.

Wednesday means pub quiz night, so we were back at the College Arms for that. The boys headed over before me, and I arrived to find that...they had gone somewhere else. So I befriended one of the barmaids (Michaela), and she helped me out with the Halloween-themed quiz until they arrived fashionably late. Hayes gave us a much better team name (American Werewolves in London, appropriate for a Halloween quiz, but definitely one that we'll keep. Due to its superiority over our last team name "Team Robot Unicorn Attack." That was courtesy of John), and the pub quiz guy acknowledged us by throwing in a few more American questions (I'm working on be-friending him. I think this week'll do it). Fun.

Riddley Walker presentation on Thursday went well, if you allow for the fact that this is Dr. King's favorite book of all time and he's never had the opportunity to teach it, and so completely usurped my moment of glory and ended up teaching for my entire "presentation." Which was fine and all, but it did mean that my prep work was pointless. Came back to the flat and had a lovely chat with the Momma, and ALMOST dawdled enough to miss going to the pool, but not quite. So I grabbed the goggles that Said Momma had just ever-so-kindly mailed me, and went for a swim. It was actually really, really nice to get in and stretch out, and I am not looking forward ONE BIT to going back for winter training, but at least I'm swimming again. Thursday night we hung out around HQ and were lame.

Friday morning (hah, who am I kidding. Afternoon) when we rolled out of bed, Nick, Hayes and I decided to be productive Londoners and to take advantage of the freebies the city has to offer. So we headed to the Victoria & Albert Museum and tooled around there for a few hours. I loved it and could've stayed longer, but the boys had enough of trinkets and snuff boxes and wrought iron and really really cool theater costumes, and so we headed out.

Wrought iron flower

I spent a long time in the iron gallery.

Just a bouquet of flowers, right? WRONG! All made of SEASHELLS!

The vase was all shells, too

Hayes and I decided to walk through Hyde Park (the V&A is right by it), and Nick tubed it back to the flat. So we had a lovely stroll through the park, and we kept meaning to just hop on the tube somewhere along our walk, but we ended up walking all the way back.

It's really fall now

The Serpentine, flowing through Hyde Park

The Park

This is an important memorial, and I should remember what it commemorates, but I don't.
Maybe Waterloo? When in doubt, Waterloo.

Seemed appropriate to take this picture since MomMom was moving the next day.

Piccadilly Circus

We stopped in Soho for dinner at a nice little Italian place and I had some really yummy ravioli and asparagus with melted cheese on it, and tartufo for dessert. Mmmm, I'm doing my happy food dance right now just remembering it. back to HQ and we all hung out for the rest of the night. Watched a movie, and the others watched another, but I was feeling sociable and went outside for some air for a bit and met a bunch of Bucknell kids living in the flats two doors down. We had a lovely chat, they're mostly engineering students, and they invited me to hang out with them the next day for the NFL rally that was happening in Trafalgar Square (BIG DEAL. I didn't make it, but Jack said it was massive. Like, the whole square was taken up completely by NFL fans in London).

Next day, Saturday I think we're at, got up eventually and headed to Camden Market with Hayes, Nick, John, Chase and... I think that was it. Nick needed a Halloween costume still, and the other three hadn't been yet, and I wanted to go back for some quality wandering about time. We split up pretty quickly, and I found a lot of really cool shops. Speaking of...



Mom, do you like this chicken? I had long moments of agony over whether or not
you would like her. Let me know if you DO like her. Thanks.

 Back to the flat for the afternoon, and then it was time to get ready for the Big Halloween Club Extravaganza! I mean, something along those lines. I watched Jack and Ruthie get ready; they were heading to a party with some of Jack's cousins who live in London, and had really spectacular fake blood effects going on (they were zombies).

I stole these next few from Ruthie. In fairness, I DID take this one. 

The rest of us were not this dedicated (with the possible exception of John) to our costumes.

Nick (Curious George), Hayes (Frat Boy with multiple popped collars),
John (robot/cosmonaut), me (Manly, Manly Lumberjack)

John, Nick, Chase (Miami Vice), Me

We went to this pub near Oxford Circus called The Phoenix, and met up with Jacob there. It was 60s/70s rock music themed, and there were films being screened the entire time that were of a... disconcerting... nature. I won't go into specifics, but clothing was not a priority in the filming. Catch my drift? It was awkward, but we persevered and sang our hearts out, and danced our butts off, and I spent much of the evening enjoying not being hit on by creepy old men because 1. I looked convincingly (I heard from multiple people that night) like a man and 2. was the only female with 5 guys at a club. John won a bottle of rum for having the best costume at the club (he told me PRIOR to going out that I could have the bottle if he won. He changed his tune after actually achieving this accomplishment, and I've seen none of it. Jerk), and was basically a celebrity the whole night. It took us forever to get home because he was continuously stopped and high fived. In all, it was a fun night, and I loooved having a classic rock club night. So win all around.

Sunday was lazy. Woke up late and literally spent the day in bed skyping with people. Had some excellent conversations, but my butt was TIRED. Finally got up at 7 and had some dinner, and then hung out in HQ and watched this creepy movie called The Others. Low key.

Today I was up early, went food shopping, and have been reading the Buddha of Suburbia for most of the day. Spent a few hours doing research for a trip that we're planning for either next weekend or the one following, but didn't come up with any conclusive plans. Went back to reading. I've got about 50 pages left, and this blog post was my study break. I believe that I ended the last post with this sentiment, and am not afraid to do it again... book must be read by tomorrow... so here it goes:

Back to the grind.