Harrods Can Order Any Emotional Response
Buy 1 get 1 free says the Tesco 2 quid 50 label - pepperoni or spinach ricotta pizza. No spinach ricotta, of course, but the pepperoni is noted for another time. Red pepper hoummos or plain? Plain's 30p less but 20 fewer mL but I usually have more hoummos than I need for the 6 inflating-in-stomach pitas and the red pepper doesn't add 30p's worth of flavour. Whole wheat pita for certain, though. Citrus washing up liquid too or else the plastic structure next to our sink will overflow with soiled cutlery. Am I going to run out of money?
Yesterday was The British Museum, Forbidden Planet, Covent Garden, tea at the Orangery, Harrods, Soho/Chinatown pubbing-clubbing (Trash Palace). Today was Cock and Bull, goat cheese/pesto tortellini and sitting around after sleeping till 2. Tried to start Blood Wedding which looks great but generally procrastinating-inclined. Indeed. I'd first point out that, should Nate find himself reading this, he may want to make the jaunt to Forbidden Planet's website and/or visit it when he comes to London again. Elvis-dressed Cthulhu = Hours of endless entertainment. But for the most part, as awesome as that store was, it seemed more apt to go around noting things that one should try to obtain state-side rather than purchase anything there. Money, she is a tight mistress.
Covent Garden = spicy chicken Cornish pasty, yum (however the Dutch apple is in its own right a king amongst deliciousness). Plenty of street performers out, of course, including gold-statue kazoo-voice man. Visited two very amazing stores and blew a lot of money at Pollock's, a toy store specializing in things for theatre-minded individuals (i.e. matchbox theatres, marionettes, dell'arte miscellany, jumping jacks, Jacob's ladders, and so forth). Also enjoyed Erik Snook's toy store, which featured quite a lot of raunchy and goofy things of humor (chattering wind-up teeth, penis pasta, glow in the dark rubber duckies).
But I'm getting ahead of myself. I haven't even been to the British Museum yet. That was a delight in the way museums are often delightful; they're excellent at riling up my creative impulse so I really should try bringing a notebook next time so I don't have to write down ideas on my hand. I'll probably have some pictures Lucia took stolen soon enough. Fragmented Greek statues = fascinatingly twisted and beautiful. Clock room was also time-tastic though anticlimactic when it comes to on-the-hour choral dinging. Rosetta Stone? Rosetta Stone. Touring the museum brings up fascinating questions of what it means for an imperialist nation to pirate the very evidence of your past and display the evidence of conquest under the pretense of knowledge to be globally disseminated. Though, upon touring a museum of dubious quality, one wonders whether the right of control over your nation's history extends to a right to let artifacts fall into disrepair to the loss of everyone else. Shproinga.
Skipping ahead a bit to the Orangery at Kensington Palace in Hyde Park... you can imagine my horror when I, trying to be proper, poured milk into my cup before pouring the tea. Now usually I prefer to add the milk afterward, if nothing else because I often am brewing my tea in the very vessel from which I intend to drink it. A side note, best value of the weekend goes to the Chinese lantern, Year of the Ox mug, and package of jasmine green tea purchased in Covent Garden for just over 3 quid. That's in the past. I poured milk into my cup, thinking the black currant tea I was receiving was going to be a flavored black tea but - alas! - it was herbal. As those twisted amoebas of milk globules rose to the surface of this purple concoction, a lump rose in my throat. The woman attending on us asked if I wanted her to change the cup since I poured milk in it but, the horrible swirlings of horror at my faux pas, disdain for her pointing it out, embarassment/shame, difficulty in understanding what she was asking, and unwillingness to admit I had indeed done such a dirty deed... I just smiled and pretended like I didn't think anything was wrong. I smiled like a stupid, tea ignorant plebian.
Somehow I managed to live with myself a few moments longer to gulp down the orange sponge cake, cucumber sandiwches, and clotted-cream-slathered fruit scone. After that we went to Harrod's for a short tour of only 50 minutes. Quite frenetic and wild but interesting in the "I'd never buy anything here because I have to live still" sort of way. Came back to the flat, bummed around a bit and guzzled a bottle of cheap sparkling white wine with quiche before going out (stupidly enough, at 10:30, but that was out of my control) to go gay pub-clubbing. The first pub wouldn't let us in because it was closing so we snuck in the back (badoom ching) but the bar had stopped serving. Then we went to the pub nextdoor which seemed to cater to an older crowd. Had a tonic water-based drink for the first time in a looong time (i.e. barfing up gin and tonics freshman year) and watched as one of our gay quartet (boy's night out!) got hit on by a 24 year old employee of an MP. After the pub closed up and there was much equivocation about pissing in the public urinals (basically a small plastic cone with four holes along the side) we followed MP boy and his friends to another club more in Chinatown, Trash Palace. A small place with a postage stamp dance floor, but well worth it for some of the observations of interest. For example, there was a woman in the lounge area just sitting there, painting faces. Guys would be like "You in the queue?" and they'd wait until they'd sit down next to her and she's glam them up, mostly around the eyes. I don't know of they paid her, but it was fascinating, especially since a lot of the guys (post glam) put back on their glasses or their bones all cracked when they stood up. It's not that I'm trying to pull the ageist card on older gays but I'm a believer in taking advantage of what you can do based on your age, so I'd give a sideways look likewise to the 30 year old woman who dressed like a 16 year old. But that aside. Also found a cigarette package with the warning of "Smoking can cause a slow and painful death." Priceless. I must truly applaud Britain for their excellent scare tactics:
"If you want to know how much an unliscenced taxi cab costs, asks a rape victim."
"Don't give money to people on the street. They'll use it to buy drugs."
"They're after your cell phone. Don't use it."
"Some people think the internet is a bad thing. Orwell was right. Discuss."
(Happy Pepsi-esque commercial of a camera speeding through London streets, before a body flies up and cracks the now-apparent windshield. Shot of driver getting out of car and looking at the crumpled figure)
"SLOW DOWN."
But anyway, Trash Palace taught me the joys of being bumped into repeatedly while attempting to dance because of the idiots who kept entering and leaving the 4 by 4 dance floor. Plenty of bewildered gazes/hasty rearrangement whenever one of us had a pass made at us by a passer-by. Brrr.
Today was only Cock and Bull Story, which I saw alone but gave me great pleasure. Naomie Harris is a superb actor - and in the next Pirates. Yummy. Qutie delightful I say again, not quite quirky enough to enter into my top movies of all time. The plot and the digressions and all were quirky and joyous but the characters were very... human. Which was lovely. Anyway, I'd write more but I need to go to bed like, right now. Toodle pip.
P.S. Phling was this weekend - and as much as I wish I were there for the amazing company I can say with little doubt that I probably had more fun at one of the Covent Garden shops than both Phlings I've attended combined. Phuck Phling - drunken clubbing is fun, drunken pubbing is fun, drunken chatting with friends is fun. Frat parties and lamesauce awkward dances with high expectations isn't. What's so depressing, I think, about them, is that if you're in a city even the lamest of things can turn into an adventure. There's so much possibility, so many unknown people, so many crazy guys on the tube who try to foist booze-laden Coca Cola and awful American accent imitations on BADA girls. There's not enough quirk at Kenyon, not enough variety. I think I'm starting to understand better (in a still-rather-sheltered sort of way) what people who grow annoyed with Kenyon are talking about. Of COURSE it has lovely things - many lovely things. Maybe it's the contrast of being in a place like this. And it's certainly not the PEOPLE at Kenyon. That said, I also think that I could never manage a Kenyon-size workload if there wasn't a lack of things to really DO around me. And I could stay here for years and not even come close to exhausting what this place can provide. But I'm babbling too much, and I'm sleepy. I didn't mean for this to be an attack on Kenyon as the bubble, but you have to understand that this is coming from someone who's been pretty relatively bubbled for a long time. What a difference the pubs make. I'm becoming addicted to adventure...
P.P.S. Love to everyone. I hope being nice and generous isn't a luxury that I can only afford with time and well-established buddies. Maybe being out of the midwest makes me fear I'll turn mean. Ridick, I know - mayhaps it's the gossipyness of the surrounding drama queens, maybe it's the still-ongoing quest for ass being undertaken by everyone except like 3 of us, maybe it's the presence of genuinely unfriendly people. I love it here, I miss home, this is how I get in new environments, it's just a lack of hugs, it's the people, it's me, it's nothing everything.
P.P.P.S. I fucking need to go to bed. But I can't resist mentioning that tomorrow I'm buying tickets for a March 30 performance of Partick Wolf in London not too far from where I go to school... he's going to be debuting some stuff from his new album. Excited much, Anthony?
Yesterday was The British Museum, Forbidden Planet, Covent Garden, tea at the Orangery, Harrods, Soho/Chinatown pubbing-clubbing (Trash Palace). Today was Cock and Bull, goat cheese/pesto tortellini and sitting around after sleeping till 2. Tried to start Blood Wedding which looks great but generally procrastinating-inclined. Indeed. I'd first point out that, should Nate find himself reading this, he may want to make the jaunt to Forbidden Planet's website and/or visit it when he comes to London again. Elvis-dressed Cthulhu = Hours of endless entertainment. But for the most part, as awesome as that store was, it seemed more apt to go around noting things that one should try to obtain state-side rather than purchase anything there. Money, she is a tight mistress.
Covent Garden = spicy chicken Cornish pasty, yum (however the Dutch apple is in its own right a king amongst deliciousness). Plenty of street performers out, of course, including gold-statue kazoo-voice man. Visited two very amazing stores and blew a lot of money at Pollock's, a toy store specializing in things for theatre-minded individuals (i.e. matchbox theatres, marionettes, dell'arte miscellany, jumping jacks, Jacob's ladders, and so forth). Also enjoyed Erik Snook's toy store, which featured quite a lot of raunchy and goofy things of humor (chattering wind-up teeth, penis pasta, glow in the dark rubber duckies).
But I'm getting ahead of myself. I haven't even been to the British Museum yet. That was a delight in the way museums are often delightful; they're excellent at riling up my creative impulse so I really should try bringing a notebook next time so I don't have to write down ideas on my hand. I'll probably have some pictures Lucia took stolen soon enough. Fragmented Greek statues = fascinatingly twisted and beautiful. Clock room was also time-tastic though anticlimactic when it comes to on-the-hour choral dinging. Rosetta Stone? Rosetta Stone. Touring the museum brings up fascinating questions of what it means for an imperialist nation to pirate the very evidence of your past and display the evidence of conquest under the pretense of knowledge to be globally disseminated. Though, upon touring a museum of dubious quality, one wonders whether the right of control over your nation's history extends to a right to let artifacts fall into disrepair to the loss of everyone else. Shproinga.
Skipping ahead a bit to the Orangery at Kensington Palace in Hyde Park... you can imagine my horror when I, trying to be proper, poured milk into my cup before pouring the tea. Now usually I prefer to add the milk afterward, if nothing else because I often am brewing my tea in the very vessel from which I intend to drink it. A side note, best value of the weekend goes to the Chinese lantern, Year of the Ox mug, and package of jasmine green tea purchased in Covent Garden for just over 3 quid. That's in the past. I poured milk into my cup, thinking the black currant tea I was receiving was going to be a flavored black tea but - alas! - it was herbal. As those twisted amoebas of milk globules rose to the surface of this purple concoction, a lump rose in my throat. The woman attending on us asked if I wanted her to change the cup since I poured milk in it but, the horrible swirlings of horror at my faux pas, disdain for her pointing it out, embarassment/shame, difficulty in understanding what she was asking, and unwillingness to admit I had indeed done such a dirty deed... I just smiled and pretended like I didn't think anything was wrong. I smiled like a stupid, tea ignorant plebian.
Somehow I managed to live with myself a few moments longer to gulp down the orange sponge cake, cucumber sandiwches, and clotted-cream-slathered fruit scone. After that we went to Harrod's for a short tour of only 50 minutes. Quite frenetic and wild but interesting in the "I'd never buy anything here because I have to live still" sort of way. Came back to the flat, bummed around a bit and guzzled a bottle of cheap sparkling white wine with quiche before going out (stupidly enough, at 10:30, but that was out of my control) to go gay pub-clubbing. The first pub wouldn't let us in because it was closing so we snuck in the back (badoom ching) but the bar had stopped serving. Then we went to the pub nextdoor which seemed to cater to an older crowd. Had a tonic water-based drink for the first time in a looong time (i.e. barfing up gin and tonics freshman year) and watched as one of our gay quartet (boy's night out!) got hit on by a 24 year old employee of an MP. After the pub closed up and there was much equivocation about pissing in the public urinals (basically a small plastic cone with four holes along the side) we followed MP boy and his friends to another club more in Chinatown, Trash Palace. A small place with a postage stamp dance floor, but well worth it for some of the observations of interest. For example, there was a woman in the lounge area just sitting there, painting faces. Guys would be like "You in the queue?" and they'd wait until they'd sit down next to her and she's glam them up, mostly around the eyes. I don't know of they paid her, but it was fascinating, especially since a lot of the guys (post glam) put back on their glasses or their bones all cracked when they stood up. It's not that I'm trying to pull the ageist card on older gays but I'm a believer in taking advantage of what you can do based on your age, so I'd give a sideways look likewise to the 30 year old woman who dressed like a 16 year old. But that aside. Also found a cigarette package with the warning of "Smoking can cause a slow and painful death." Priceless. I must truly applaud Britain for their excellent scare tactics:
"If you want to know how much an unliscenced taxi cab costs, asks a rape victim."
"Don't give money to people on the street. They'll use it to buy drugs."
"They're after your cell phone. Don't use it."
"Some people think the internet is a bad thing. Orwell was right. Discuss."
(Happy Pepsi-esque commercial of a camera speeding through London streets, before a body flies up and cracks the now-apparent windshield. Shot of driver getting out of car and looking at the crumpled figure)
"SLOW DOWN."
But anyway, Trash Palace taught me the joys of being bumped into repeatedly while attempting to dance because of the idiots who kept entering and leaving the 4 by 4 dance floor. Plenty of bewildered gazes/hasty rearrangement whenever one of us had a pass made at us by a passer-by. Brrr.
Today was only Cock and Bull Story, which I saw alone but gave me great pleasure. Naomie Harris is a superb actor - and in the next Pirates. Yummy. Qutie delightful I say again, not quite quirky enough to enter into my top movies of all time. The plot and the digressions and all were quirky and joyous but the characters were very... human. Which was lovely. Anyway, I'd write more but I need to go to bed like, right now. Toodle pip.
P.S. Phling was this weekend - and as much as I wish I were there for the amazing company I can say with little doubt that I probably had more fun at one of the Covent Garden shops than both Phlings I've attended combined. Phuck Phling - drunken clubbing is fun, drunken pubbing is fun, drunken chatting with friends is fun. Frat parties and lamesauce awkward dances with high expectations isn't. What's so depressing, I think, about them, is that if you're in a city even the lamest of things can turn into an adventure. There's so much possibility, so many unknown people, so many crazy guys on the tube who try to foist booze-laden Coca Cola and awful American accent imitations on BADA girls. There's not enough quirk at Kenyon, not enough variety. I think I'm starting to understand better (in a still-rather-sheltered sort of way) what people who grow annoyed with Kenyon are talking about. Of COURSE it has lovely things - many lovely things. Maybe it's the contrast of being in a place like this. And it's certainly not the PEOPLE at Kenyon. That said, I also think that I could never manage a Kenyon-size workload if there wasn't a lack of things to really DO around me. And I could stay here for years and not even come close to exhausting what this place can provide. But I'm babbling too much, and I'm sleepy. I didn't mean for this to be an attack on Kenyon as the bubble, but you have to understand that this is coming from someone who's been pretty relatively bubbled for a long time. What a difference the pubs make. I'm becoming addicted to adventure...
P.P.S. Love to everyone. I hope being nice and generous isn't a luxury that I can only afford with time and well-established buddies. Maybe being out of the midwest makes me fear I'll turn mean. Ridick, I know - mayhaps it's the gossipyness of the surrounding drama queens, maybe it's the still-ongoing quest for ass being undertaken by everyone except like 3 of us, maybe it's the presence of genuinely unfriendly people. I love it here, I miss home, this is how I get in new environments, it's just a lack of hugs, it's the people, it's me, it's nothing everything.
P.P.P.S. I fucking need to go to bed. But I can't resist mentioning that tomorrow I'm buying tickets for a March 30 performance of Partick Wolf in London not too far from where I go to school... he's going to be debuting some stuff from his new album. Excited much, Anthony?