london bridge has fallen

...victim to unabashed tourism yet again.

monday (yesterday) was some weird cantonal holiday ("jeune federale" = the federal fast), and so conlin, dena, and i hopped a plane to london for the weekend. it was cool, but good god, i just spent a *lot* of money.

perhaps the most unexpected portion of my little adventure came at the very beginning, on saturday morning, when i first got myself to the airport. now, i didn't think i was one to really hold grudges, but it seems i might (to my chagrin and shame) still be related to my late grandmother after all---the moment i saw those big orange signs in the corner where i was heading (the easyjet counters), i was involuntarily overcome with the most intense sense of pure visceral hatred i have perhaps ever felt (though a certain incident involving a ms. cheri buck-perry and a shakespeare script comes to mind, and could probably give it a run for its money... i prefer not to dwell on it, so we'll let them stay tied for now). i sincerely hope that i never ever have to fly easyjet ever again. if some foolish person had put an automatic weapon in my hand at that moment, i have no doubt that "postal" would not have even begun to describe the atrocities i would have visited upon them. suffice it to say that it's been a good long time since i actually lost my temper, but i was damn close right then, and i was reminded with painful clarity why i originally needed to learn to control it.

moral of the story: no more easyjet--- my blood pressure couldn't take that again.

but surprisingly, the flight went basically without incident, as did my prepurchased express train ticket, and i found myself in victoria station, beaming away like a kid in candyland.

the weather was downright fucking gorgeous, and so i decided to hoof it the ~2 miles from the station through hyde park to our hostel. got there around 10:00, found dena and conlin, and we were on our way. well, almost.

the girls at the front desk convinced us (well dena, but i went along with it, trying not to be the "cheap-anchor" i usually am) to buy these hideously expensive tickets to a hop-on/off bus tour for 24 hours (it was 16 pounds [gulp]). the girls were obviously getting a commission, and were not particularly honest about everything. for instance, i asked if there were any other similar services in the city, and what they cost, and she said "no, it's a monopoly." as it turns out, there was another identical company, who was not only two pounds cheaper, but had more busses more frequently, and covered more area. probably i should have gone back and given them hell about it, but i let them off the hook because the one i was talking to was stunningly attractive. yes, i am weak. it was awful. i have no idea why i was so taken with her, but seriously, she would easily make the list of most beautiful people i've encountered in the past several years. but no, even worse, i'm such a pansy that i didn't even do anything about it (well, really, what was i supposed to do, seeing as i was only going to be there for about two and a half days) except talk with her for a little while while she was running the desk the next morning and i was waiting for dena and conlin to come down.

now is probably as good a time as any to mention that this particular hostel is apparently run by a very large family of russians. i'm pretty sure everyone that worked there was russian, and most of them were probably at least cousins, if not immediate family. as expected, i feel really dumb for having forgotten all my russian. (i actually spent a decent amount of time trying to remember something to say, in the hopes of impressing the aforementioned pretty girl; good grief, i'm even grossing myself out now...)

but yeah, so the bus tour thing. it actually wasn't so bad after all. in fact, riding around on the top of the open double-decker bus was rather cool, and made me miss my little convertible. and in any case we would have had to buy two day cards for the metro to get around if we didn't have it to take us places, so for the extra six pounds we got a great laugh out of making fun of the retarded stuff the recorded guide on the red line was saying about the things we were passing (the live guides on the yellow line were actually really good), and there was also a free guided boat ride up the river, which was really cool, even if unforgivably touristy.

saw a bunch of cool stuff, including westminster abbey, and they really got into shopping for a few things (there were gaps everywhere, and since they don't exist in switzerland, i guess it was necessary for them to pick up a few new items). i looked at the prices and about had an aneurism. it was every bit as bad as switzerland, if not worse. in all seriousness, the prices were basically the same numbers as i would expect to see in dollars in oregon, except that they were in pounds, which are worth twice as much. unbelievable. definitely going to be having a shopping spree when i'm home in december.

the food was awesome. we had a chinese buffet lunch the first day, and terrific indian food that evening. i ate so much it actually hurt (for the record, this is not a good thing, but the food was that tasty). yeah, i went off my diet for the trip, but i don't regret it too much. in fact, that bad feeling from overeating helped to remind me why i am doing it. sunday, i took it a little easier; soup at the cafe in the crypt for lunch (under "st-martin-in-the-fields-church" on trafalgar square, yes, that whole thing really is the real name), and fish and chips (yumm!) in a fancy bar that evening.

in between, though, was probably the most excellent part of the trip---we got discount tickets to see "stomp." now, i didn't really know anything about it, and so i wasn't terribly excited beforehand, but after seeing it, i was (no joke) bouncing down the street dreaming about joining the cast. it was _that_ incredible. so the deal is that it isn't really a play or a musical so much as it is a 'music performance' i guess i would have to call it. they used all sorts of ordinary things, like push brooms, match boxes, basketballs, sparklets bottles, big plastic trash cans, and basically anything else you can imagine---to make really really cool music. it really defies description.

monday morning we wandered around a different market area, and (amoung other things) into a tea shop. unfortunately, i didn't buy any, because it was (surprise) ungodly expensive, and---get this---they have some sort of fucked up licensing system in britan that prevented them from selling me less than 125 grams at a time. and you might not realize it, but in perspective, 125 grams is a freaking boatload of tea. like for me, it's probably easily a year's supply, if not more, and i've taken to making myself a pot 3-4 evenings a week, if not more. and i like a little variety, so i wasn't ready to commit to buying a shitload of only one kind, no matter how good it was. but not to worry, i eventually got a big box of loose leaf pgtips (good stuff!) in a sainsbury's grocery store, which i'm just as excited about, and only cost my like one pound, instead of the 7.99 that the tea shop lady wanted.

and interestingly enough, tea is also the subject of the very last thing that happened, and unfortunately, it is a rather sad story. we had planned to try taking high tea at the orangerie behind kensinton palace around 3:00, but we had trouble finding it, and didn't actually get there until 4:00, which wouldn't have been so bad except that literally as the clock was striking four o'clock, we were walking up the steps and reading the sign stating that "due to a private event, the orangerie will be closing at 4pm today." it was pretty disappointing; dena was really looking forward to it, and was basically devastated by the realization that not only had we missed it in this particular location, there wasn't even enough time remaining to go anywhere else, and so we had effectively missed it for the whole trip. somewhat disheartened, we went to dinner at a pretty cool little "world food" restaurant call "giraffe" which was tasty and good, but not quite high tea.

even so, though, the weekend was really cool, and i enjoyed myself immensly.