I've been in London for just over a week now, away from home for about three. And there's still five to go!
London has been so good for my brain and my body, I think, I've really loved being here again. Since Jes got in, we've done a lot of fun stuff. I picked her up from Heathrow, running from the Tube because I was SURE I was going to be late and she would be there waiting and furious. As it was, she was held up at customs, and didn't come out for ages. Seeing her little head bobbing out from the doors was wonderful.
Friday, her first full day here, we went to Trafalgar Square, to the National Gallery. We met up with some of Jes' friends who were in town, and did the gallery with them. There were Van Gogh's and the Rembrandts and all the stuff on Jesus. I don't think I much fancy German or Flemish paintings, I really don't. They all look a bit odd. Italians just do it better, to be quite honest - they get the proportions right, the colours right, everything looks much healthier and normal.
Friday night, we caught the train out to Reading to see Simon Amstell (a comedian). The train took us just over an hour, and we managed to find the theatre without any issues. Amstell was hilarious and adorable and terribly inappropriate. His thing is that he says 'wrong' stuff - Madeline McCann jokes, Kylie cancer jokes, yada yada yada - and it's often quite distasteful, but he's hilarious when he does it, and he takes the piss out of himself too which I guess helps. Anyway, he was great. A lot of Brits seem to hate him. What WAS kinda refreshing is seeing this little skinny white gay Jew up on-stage talking about his past relationships in a non-gay context. As in, he was joking about partners and stupid sex stuff, and it wasn't made special for the fact that it was with a boy, it just was. I don't think you hear a lot of that in the mainstream, especially not from someone who is on TV the way that Amstell is, hosting a very popular show. The train home was interesting. The races had been on, so everyone was getting trains about, all drunk, all tarted up. The girls were prime candidates for that 'Ladette to Lady' finishing-school TV show, where they turn tramps into ladies in four weeks. Trashy ho's, the lot of them. And one couple were having a very public break up, she was crying like there was no tomorrow, sobbing so loudly I think it woke Jes up at one point.
Saturday morning was Portobello Rd markets with Jes' friend Anthony. We got off at Notting Hill Gate and wandered up towards the markets, through the antiques part and through the fresh produce part - I got a big donut which was tasty tasty from this cake stall with HEAPS, literal heaps, piles, mountains, of cakes and donuts and pastries and slices. It was like a treasure cave. It was very nice to be back at the markets, they were very familiar, and weird to remember where stuff was! We had lunch at Grain Shop, and ate it in Mau Mau Bar down the road over a beer. So good. People say you can't get good food in London, that's it's all stodgy shit, but if you hunt it down, you can find some good stuff. Grain Shop is all really good hippie shit, lots of lentils and stuff, all vegan/vegetarian.
Saturday night there was a bit of a crazy party at Beth and Georgia's place, which started small and got quite large. There was a guy there who reckons he was in 'Once', the film, in the background, and he played 'Falling Slowly' on his guitar and did a pretty good job of it too! We didn't get to bed until very late, and as a result missed the Camden markets. We did venture out for the Spitalfields markets, but decided halfway it was too far to go, so instead we wandered around Covent Garden, and then went to meet some of my friends from Interplay, Suzanne and Elinor and Natalie. It was so lovely to see them, just to sit in the park in the sunshine and have a chat with some friendly faces for a few hours. You do get a bit sick of being an observer after a while, a 'tourist', it's all a bit draining and boring. You look around and think, 'I should be absorbing all of this' but then you're tired and have a headache and your feet are sore and, really, you can't be at 100% all the time. So this catchup was a nice little interlude or something. We wandered back to Victoria station via Buckingham Palace and Jes got all fired up about colonialism. They have big archways, actually, surrounding the palace, that bear the names of all the different places they're colonised. Australia is there, with a kangaroo and a sheep as the symbols of our nation. That night, Beth made tasty noodles and we fell asleep watching 'Enchanted'. LAME.
Monday, yesterday, Jes, George and I hit the TATE Modern. Loved it. Picassos and Mondrians and Lichtensteins ... really sweet shit. You can wander and stare at that stuff for hours, and we did, until we got heaps hungry and went to find food. There is a massive sandwhich culture in this country, which gets Jes very excited. Me too. She suggested that we would be terrible travelling buddies, as we both get so aroused by food. We spend half the time looking at food and thinking how good it would be to have it in our tummies. So for lunch we went to EAT which is one of the many chains of sandwhich shops around here. Pret-a-Manger is pretyy much sandwhich heaven, but EAT was pretty good too. The girls got hippie shit, falafel wraps and roasted veggies, I got a BLT (yay bacon!) and a little Banoffee pie which was WOW. It's basically a banana and toffee pie, banana custard laced with toffee on a biscuit base. All three of us had some, and Jes acutally had to go inside and LOOK at the other ones in the case because she wanted to have more so bad. We're terrible. After the TATE we hit Oxford Circus - Topshop, H&M, Urban Outfitters and Primark left us very tired and our feet very sore and out wallets very empty. I got a pair of jeans, which I needed anyway, but they were £75 which is a little terrifying, but not much more than you'd pay at home. Then after alll that shopping and wandering and people-watching, we went to see Tegan and Sara at the Shepherd's Bush Empire. I figured it was just going to be a whole lot of whiny lesbian music, and it was. So many lezzies all in the one place! This scalper out the front, this little Jamaican dude, was like "Where is all the men? Why is there so many ladies, where is all the men?" No-one could bring themselves to tell him where the men were.
Today is... I don't know. Internet. Then George is going to make us some lunch, or brunch. It's still early. I think I'll head into the city later and go to the Globe, maybe try to get some Wicked tickets. I have a cold, my throat is all sore, and my snot is green. And there's a lot of it. And my head is all groggy and cloudy. I don't know, I just want to sleep and not move anywhere at all. But I'll push through!
Thursday to Paris. More of George & Beth's friends arrive tonight, so the house is going to get more cramped - there's six of us in a four person space right now, and tonight there'll be seven, and tomorrow nine. I think. Excellent...
Love you all.
x
