Till Seattle

Some things can be awfully cyclical. When I arrived in Leicester I was maddened by my clocks. All my clocks were off, I continued having to add eight hours to everything until I had the proper time to set them, or to get them connected to a device that would syncronize them to UK time. There I have officially set my laptop's time back to Vancouver time. I am... almost... home.
At the moment I am writing this from Seattle, when I post it I will be home, having slept and eaten and said hi to a few of my loved ones. But, while I have this rediculous stall period in the lovely, and well decorated for the holidays, Seatac I thought I'd relay some o my travel experiences for you. I know I know, how terrible I've been at blogging! You didn't get a thing about Liverpool or Nottingham (wait, Liverpool...) or any of the sundry posts I thought to write about Leicester and English culture. If they keep me in here long enough, and if my battery lasts you most surely will though, get these posts. I have nothing better to do.

Well today's travel has been long and I still have about nine and a half hours until I'm officially grounded in Vancouver. Wow. I started off by waking up at six thirty in the morning, an unheard of event for me, and I'm still disgusted at the necessity, but feel that I gave myself the perfect amount of time, unlike Bethany who I heard was seriously rushed. Poor doll. Got up, got dressed, ate and did all those boring things, and was waiting outside my door at seven ten in the morning for my cab. I'd called using a flat mate's phone the night before, took two tries before I found someone with enough time to loan out, but I figure that it was worth it. Beth had warned me, from Vancouver, that walking from our old dorms to the Leicester train station was by far the worste part of her trip--hm, she got the worste part over with first, good for her I say--I had told her of course that it would be a nasty process, but little miss girl guide wanted to tough it out. Of course, her toughing it out nearly convinced me to do the same and save the six to four pounds. I didn't. After hearing about the agony, and after having her look up which train to London I should get, I decided that a taxi would be choice. Let's also keep in mind that I'm little-miss-delicate shoulders (the bits on me hurting the most right now) I'd have probably pulled something and been in agony right from the start. Yeah, take a cab.

So the loverly cabby got me to the train station at the perfect time, he even used a short cut. I gave him a respectable tip, so he carried my luggage up a bit and didn't make me haul it on up on my own. To the train station! The people there immediately directed me to the elevators which were very very well hidden. I didn't have long to wait for my train, until it was delayed. I thanked the heavens above that my plan got me to Heathrow aproximately two and a half to three hours before my flight. The train wasn't delayed too long though and I was soon at St Pancrus station. This was a little more confusing, as it's bigger, but I figured it out without issue. As Beth mentioned the tube station that connects to it is very well laid out with lots and lots of elevators, and in one case an escelator, but I let that go. They did such a good job overall.
Now, as someone who was once prone to trying to get to Surrey when they really didn't want to go to Surrey on the Vancouver skytrain she'd ridden on a million and nine times, I was a little nervous about this whole tube thing on my own. I mean I've gotten way better at looking at signs since then (it's Beth's and my defence technique in new places, always look up, you'll find a sign--sounds spiritual) and since Beth had told me to look out for the Heathrow terminals 4 and 1,2,3 NOT Heathrow terminals 5, 1,2,3 I knew where to go. But I swear not all the signs and train departures on the Picadilly line matched with the map, though that's probably just my inexperience. I didn't make a lot of questions on the matter, but remained confused about the whole situation regarding it. "Just get on the one that you KNOW you're supposed to get on. I told myself, and so I did.

I knew I wouldn't have to stand up long, but I was annoyed by this one fellow who pushed his way in to the front of the line past people who were clearly going to be on longer than him and nearly pushed people getting off out of the way so he could grab a seat. All was cleared up about his rude behaviour (sitting in seats clearly designated for people who have lots of luggage) when I realised he was crazy. I don't mean 'a little slow' I mean crazy. He had that haze about him. That and he whacked some girl on the head with a news paper while smiling and I think trying to make a joke, but he just turned out creepy. She looked quite offended, but I still thought she knew him. She clearly didn't when she got off the train shooting him wierded out glances but obviously trying to not make eye contact.

The rest of the tube trip was nice. Got to observe a lovely Norwiegian family--the girls kinda looked like me in the face--and got to Heathrow just fine.

I must say this about Heathrow, everything is quite well organized, with the exception of the tube entrances. They really don't want you to have luggage, seriously. The tube entrance for your ticket was closed down, myself and an American lady and a pack of lovely East Indian women were disugsted, we had to wait sevevral minutes for someone to saunter out of his office to open it as useless workers of some other airport denomination stood by and stared at us. We then encountered these zig zag things that required careful manouvering and dragging to get through these things. It was rather comical "They really don't want people to have luggage" I stammer, catching my breath from this silly process.

"It is absolutely rediculous" my American friend agrees. She rushes on ahead of me and catches the next elevator full of people, I wait aproximately twenty seconds longer and get one all to myself.

Bag check was easy 19.9kg, I do believe that that's less then I came here with, but will have to consult a converter (not my head). Thus, whatever concerns I had were needless. Away with my luggage it was and onward to Heathrow shopping. I had a whole twenty one pounds left to spend and a rediculous amount of change in the form on one and two pence coins. Bought some presents, and then got a drink at the airport bar. Pomagranite juice is yum, the bar tender totally understood my paying him with the remaining rediculous coinage too. I still have a pound though, I feel like I haven't done my best. Ho hum.

As I went through customs I asked if I'd have to take my laptop out here to one of the other passengers in line. He stated that I would, and that Heathrow was pretty tight. I laughed and told him to wait for the states, they make you take your shoes off there. He was rather astounded. I still think that that's a rediculous process by the way. My shoes... pfft. Oh and I questioned the laptop thing because in other parts of the airport I was told to do stuff, but keep my laptop in the bag. It was all rather confusing.

On to the flight. Delta does nice enough international flights. Really no complaints... except one. On their forms they really should ask people about dietary restrictions. On my way to England I couldn't accept their last meal because it was a grilled cheese sandwitch *waves lactose intollerant flag* they gave me an extra fruit cup and something else as compensation, but it still kinda sucked. On my way to the States though I thought "hey I've been goodish with dairy, why make the hypo-glycemic part suffer on account of the lactose intollerant one?" So I ate the tiny piece of cheddar and it began. Nothing much actually, but I really should not have accepted the ice cream cup... which just did it. Flat out. That POOR person sitting beside me, though, she may not have noticed what with her head phones in. They could have used me as propulsion... so of course, once I settled my stomach a bit with a trip to the bathroom or three (from the window seat, I was totally the best stranger to be sitting beside) so of course, I ate the pizza with cheese on top that they gave me for a last meal on the plane... of course. And no, I didn't attempt to scrape off the cheese. Yes I'm brilliant. Needless to say it was not a plesent flight for obvious reasons.

Well we made it to Georgia. I have now seen Atlanta from above. I will start by saying that I really didn't think it was going to be this particular air port that trapped me, but uh, it's freaking huge! It's old and has art from the nineties all over the place, really nothing modern even their food areas look ancient very eighties, but it is positively huge. How huge? Well, much like Heathrow it has a train that will take you to the various concorses. Before I had to figure all this out though, it was through customs with me. Pick up my luggage, and shuffle it to a new belt, then shuffle myself to the carry on check. At least Georgia thinks I'm awesome. Seriously. To start, the first customs fellow I had laughing, yes customs agents can laugh! He thought I was a very funny Canadian. Then the people with the metal detectors, the two I delt with thought my collar was a hoot. I didn't take it off, just forgetting it was on my neck, it's very comfy. But I remembered just as I was about to go through with it on. It hadn't turned the sensors at Heathrow so I thought I was safe. Beep beep beep. "Ah, guess it's turn'n them on today" the lovely girl says grinning at me, so I take it off and put it in a bowl to go through again. I don't turn them on this time.

As I put on my shoes and snatch my collar from its bin a funny young man looks at me and says "Is that your dog collar miss?"

I smile wide and proud and go "Why yes, it is" which makes him laugh. Well I guess I'm little miss harmless in the south. I practically skipped through that process. Aw well, away I go.
I got lost, got lost until I found a guy to tell me about the train station. Took the train to concorse A where my flight was supposed to go from. I figured then would be a good time to get some food in me... in fact, thinking about it, it would be the last chance until such time as I got on my train from Seattle to Vancouver. Hm, that would be more than fifteen hours without food, I can do it when sleeping but uh, when moving around. Likely not. So I looked around: hot dog world, something or other the southern tradition, some chinese place that looked sketchy, and dunkin' doughnuts. None appealed, but hey, there was a chilie's I could go to. Never been there before, but as it was a sit down resturant I figured it had to be better than hot dog world. How right I was. One of the best chicken sandwitches I've ever had. They even had hot sauce on it, which I adore... unfortunately it also had ranch. Kind of a double edged sword that, on the one hand it tasted amazing, on the other... DAIRY! Not much, but in my current state it didn't help. What ever. I pissed the poor waitress off by not tipping her (the only southerner that didn't think I was the cutest damned thing--seriously, going to spend time in the south one day, if you take away my tendancies towards bohemianism for a month or two I'd fit in well I think--but I didn't want to 'cause I wanted to make a call, unfortunately the person I was calling didn't answer and I couldn't leave a message cause the connection wasn't good enough. The waitress and I remain pissed off about that.

As I mentioned about the clocks, mine was off. I was pretty sure that it was supposed to be seven something, but mine kept telling me that Atlanta time was eight somehting. So I asked some people about that and generally amused them as well. "My iPod liiiieees" perhaps they thought I was immitating southern inflection? Dunno. Wasn't. Off to my gate. Or what I thought was my gate...

It was the gate on my ticket at least, and apparently I wasn't the only person fooled by the sudden change. It started to dawn on me when, very close to my own boarding time people were just finishing boarding at the gate for Florida. Suspicious, yes.I asked the nice people at the gate about that and they informed me that yes, my flight was relocated to gate B23. I was at A25. Remember the comment about BIG airport? At that moment a very flushed man ran up beside me and yelled "what's that B23? Where's this damned flight going to now? Seattle where do I go to get to Seattle B23?" He asks the person at the desk, who nods yes "B23?" He asks in a flush, I nod and hurry that way with him.

"Our flight leaves at 9:35, it's not 9 something" he informs me, and runs off. I don't run. Not only have I not had time to take my asthma meds since I first left Leicester, but I also happen to have a huge back pack and carry on. I'm not running, especially when I realise how many motorized side walks there are and how close B actually is to A--far closer than D was. So I get there just as they starte boarding real people. I get on just fine and get my spot. I don't mind being one of the last people borded, I know I have a seat, so what's the big hooplah, right? I get on board and sit and meet my seat mates who are far more tolerable than the ones from Seattle to JFK were. The flight was delayed just over an hour. My ass was already starting to numb and we hadn't left the ground yet. It was something about their weights being off. Whatever the case, as soon as I got my refreshing beverages I was off to the land of nod (I had to wake up for the drinks, practically, actually). That's five hours of sleep. Good for me! So far I'm going at 13 hours over three days. Hey, there wasn't a movie on this flight to keep me up. The one to Georgia was showing this one show called "Ghost Town" which was fun, "Journey to the Centre of the Earth" which was the part of the flight I decided to sleep through, and to my upmost joy "Wall-E" that just thrilled me to bits, and was an adorable movie. Absolutely adorable! If I was a kid though, I might not have liked it. Damned those target audiences eh?

So now I am in Seattle, my waiting time here is slightly less than it would have been, especially if we take into consideration how long it took for my bag to arrive on the carosal. I've met some lovely Chinese girls who are going to Victoria, I've exchanged about half of my Mandarin with one of them in saying "thank you" because she looked after my bags as I made yet another trip to the bathroom. My organs still haven't forgiven me the dairy, or maybe now it's the lack of sleep, they're always quite bad at that. It is 3am now, and writing this has taken up a goodly chunk of time. I am listening to the tiny bifs that live in the airport at this moment as they chirp around the fake trees hung with iceicles that bear a great deal of fake snow that occassionally falls from the sky to the sound of wind chimes and lovely music. It is wintery but warm. I like Seatac.

I guess that's a good thing. I now wait for the coach that will take me to the shuttle which will bring me to the train station which will provide me with a seat on a trian that will take me home. You won't have read this in time but, wish me luch anyhow.

Higher education

Pausing now between clearly critical games of computer mahjong (nah, I don't have homework to be doing) I thought I'd take a moment on anachronistically update this blog. You see, before the lovely trip to London that Susan so elegantly wrote about a few days ago, we went to the great educational city of Cambridge.

We had heard it was a nice place to go, and we thought it seemed reasonably low key. Susan was only just getting over sickness and we wanted to avoid any Everest-like tors, if you know what I mean. So we picked Cambridge. And what a lovely city it turned out to be!

So we get into Cambridge reasonably early. We wander into town from the trainstation, taking in the fairly banal parts of town. Even this we enjoy though because as we've noticed England is extraordinarly regionalistic, and even cities not that far apart from eachother have such different regional flairs to them. They're all quite unique and in sometimes unexpected ways -- be it architecture (Bath has so much sandstone) or cuisine (Leicester with its Indian) or what have you, even the most "boring" parts of the city provide us something neat to look at and think about.

As we're wandering, we've got only a fairly general idea where to go. We're following what we call the handy tourist signs towards "city centre". We think we're getting close, but we're not too sure. Then we turn a corner and our jaws drop:

We shuffle aside so as not to be in the way of pedestrian traffic and stand staring in near silence at King's College Cambridge. Now you have to understand that by this point we've both had almost a full semester of art history classes, more than half of which at this point have been about architecture. And this... well let's just say you don't turn corners in Vancouver and see this kind of building. Interestingly, the next art history class we were lectured about the chapel at King's College. The professor asked if anyone had been to it and we both shot up our hands rather excitedly and the prof kind of chuckled and was like "ok then... that's good."

So we tear ourselves away from King's College and wander down to the river Cam. On the way we stop at the most adorable of little bakeries with the most delicious looking baked goods and get ourselves some goodies to go with lunch. We get to the river. We had heard of this thing they do in Cambridge called punting. A punt is a small flat bottomed boat, kind of like a gondola in Venice. A dude stands at one end with a long pole and pushes you through the water. So we took a punting tour down the river Cam, along the banks of which sit the colleges of Cambridge University. We got to see all these amazing buildings and were told a bunch about their history. We went under the most quaint of bridges, saw ducks paddle by... while we were on board we brought out our baked goods (having eaten our lunch while waiting for our punting appointment) and the punter asked if we had gone to FitzBillies. "Uh... maybe?" we reply, and check the box. Indeed, that was the name of bakery. Turns out it is apparently a famous bakery. Go us. The goodies were amazing: A chocolate eclair, a Napoloeon slice, and a chocolate mouse truffle.

After punting we went back to King's College and took a look at the chapel. We were planning on going back later, but wanted to have a chance to look abotu inside. We were excited to check out the perpendicular style of gothic architecture (yay nerding out). Then we went on a bit of a wander through town, ending up at the FitzWilliam museum. They had a bunch of neat artefacts from all over and we spent a grand time just looking about. It was named the best small museum in Europe by some group or other -- small isn't quite what I'd call it!

Wrapping up at the museum, we made our way back to King's College Chapel (it sounds like we spent more time there than we did...) this time to take in Evensong. You see, King's College Chapel has a world famous choir -- you might have seen them singing their carol service on CBC sometime at Christmas. Every day there is a free choral service given and Susan and I were so on top of being a part of that. Yes, it was an actual church service, so it was something of a change of pace for the both of us, but we both really enjoyed it -- definately a highlight of the day. The singing was so beautiful and set up such an amazing atmosphere. I'm glad we were able to be a part of it.

After that we went towards the general direction of the trainstation, looking for somewhere to eat dinner. We ended up deciding we wanted Chinese food because there was a much better selection of that in Cambridge than there is in Leicester. We ended up at a place called Charlie Chan's (oh I know, the political correctness is enough to blow one's socks away) where we enjoyed a great meal, the hightlights of which were the chashew chicken in yellow bean sauce, and the toffee bananas we had for desert. Mmm.

Then it was time to head home. That... didn't quite go as planned. You see, we took a wrong turn and got temporarily lost. We had to double back a bit to get to the train station, and in so doing missed the last direct train to Leicester. This shouldn't have been a problem because it was only like 9:00 and the website had said there was another way to get home that just involved changing trains somewhere... Well we got all the way to Ely and then was told we couldn't get back to Leicester until 5:26 the next morning. We had to get back on a train. We needed to spend the night. NOT in Leicester. If you wanna hear more about how that went down, ask us in person. It's a much better story told with voices. Trust us.

All in all it was a fantastic day out. That list bit about the trains only served to teach us that we had to be just that much better with our planning. And we were! Note the London trip where nothing went wrong. And while Cambridge may not be on the very top of a tourist list, it turned out to be a city that we enjoyed even more than we thought we would. Yay!

London Bridge is Falling Down!

I feel like I've spent an obscene amount of my time in Britain trying to escape London. "What's this!" You may say, "But Susan, London is historically one of the most brilliant cities in the world!" To them I say, yeah yeah yeah! Tell me about it...

It's nice, and after our most recent day out I'm no longer liable to say the London is evvviiil! You see, my first experience in London was my first day in Britain where I got to wait over two and a half hours for the coach that would take me to Leicester... for three in the morning. I wasn't impressed, but didn't blame London for that. My second experience in London was the one where my toes turned blue... fantastic. My third experience involved a tragidy involving the Ely train station and Beth and I being forced to stay in London TILL THE 5AM/8AM LEICESTER TRAIN CAME IN. Long story, one on its own, I won't go into it... gr. Needless to say, I was unimpressed with London. So, it's no wonder when I told Beth that it was up to her to pick our second to last outing and she chose LONDON that I cringed and muttered under my breath. That city's not been good to me.

But I went, because Beth really wanted to go to theatre in London--she later told me that the only travel related regret she would have had if we hadn't done this, would have been... that we hadn't done it--so we went and I didn't complain, though clearly I was very cautious. Beth made sure she had a variety of clearly written out ways home by the train, exact times and everything. We had a lovely illustrated map of London, also produced by Beth, and we had our lunches packed. We were so ready.

And it wasn't a disaster!

First things first was a mad dash to Leicester Sqare so as to get in line for theatre tickets at discount. We did this and made friends with some lovely queer men from Cork Ireland. They were very excited over Bethany's Irish heritage and even more excited over the fact that we were from Vancouver, because "Vancouver is just lovely!"

We were happy with getting tickets for Avenue Q, Wicked, Chicago, or The Lion King. Any of those four would be good. Well, our little friends wanted to see Avenue Q, and then they later realised that they would be happy with a show that--when translated--is called "The Birdcage" it's based on a Robyn William's movie that is very good. We went up to the ticket people and paid exactly what we were hoping to for our tickets, not the best seats we're told, but whatever, we'll cope!

The little men were directly after us, I guess we got the last two tickets because they had to go to Birdcage, but then, they wanted the evening show so, *shrugs*, we did nothing!

After our tickets we wandered the square a bit, noticing a priceless sign warning us that "criminals operate in this area" which I got pictures of. We did a section of London that I hadn't seen, going to such places as the TATE Modern Art museum which I'm now in love with. The Globe theatre is right beside that, and after seeing these two biggies we walked across the Millenium bridge to go see Saint Paul's. We got day passes for the tube, which was handy, so travelling about a bit wasn't a hassle really.

We did end up back at Leicester Square again, as that's around where our theatre was located. Once we found it (using a rediculous route, though neither of us knew that) we noticed that it was right next to a British Pub, so stopped in there for dinner. This was a rather large accomplishment for us as thus far we've only eaten at British Irish pubs! Yes Irish pubs in Britain, we're so bad. This pub was quite nice I had steak and ale pie, to be all British and stuff, and Beth had chicken kiev (she says that she was going to get fish and chips but this dish just sounded too yummy, I maintain my eye roll).

We were going to have apple pie, but felt that we'd rather get settled into our seats in the theatre as, this pub was super slow, so we paid and left--not letting the London time crisis get the better of us.

Avenue Q was amazing... no joke. Sure the Noel Coward theatre isn't the best known, DON'T CARE. I feel like Avenue Q was designed with my joy in mind. Muppets, silly dancing, songs like "What do you do with an English degree," "If you were Gay," and "The internet was made for porn!" as well as a very stimulating stage design and charming actors... I'm good to go. Beth and I were helplessly giggling throughout this entire play, more so when the "Bad Idea Bears" were on stage--famous for the line "More drinks more fun YAAAAY!"

To quote Bethany, "The bad idea bears are not fictional... nope."

We went home straight after this, but not before running into a mob of feminists protesting for violence against women to end. This insighted some truly... enlightened... mysoginist comments from the gentlemen leaving the tube station. Yes, most of them. Oh and when I say mob I mean it, couldn't see their beginning or end, they took up and entire street!

Sure, it was windy and full of angry feminists (I like my feminists happy and reasonable) but London didn't do me wrong this time. The train home was relaxed if not a little tiresome. Both Beth and I got home and happily drifted off at a reasonable time: home safe, sound, and un-traumatised.

Her hair is black and her eyes are blue

Hello all!

Last weekend Alex and went to Dublin. We had a grand time, dampened by the fact that Susan wasn't there. She got sick and simply wouldn't have been able to handle a plane ride and sightseeing and drinking. But considering I've already blogged about Dublin, I'm going to let Alex have the honour of recording our trip ;)

You might be wondering how life is going for us Leicester gals when we're not all globe-trotty. We're having a pretty good time. As I mentioned, Susan was pretty ill lately but she's getting better. There were a few down right pathetic days, but we successfully did both grocery shopping AND going out for dinner yesterday, so she's clearly improving.

School's going reasonably well. The marking system is quite different from home. We're not going to be assessed on anything until the last week we're here. There has been one practice essay, but it won't count for marks. So that's different.

In general we're unimpressed with the English classes, especially the lectures. They lack the spark they can have at home. We've come up with a number of hypotheses to explain this. Our top at the moment is that they teach English almost scientifically. It's like they're saying "this is what this is about -- now let's discuss it," rather than what we're used to which is more like "here's some basis for ideas, but let's discuss what you think it's about." It feels a lot like there a right and wrong answer -- moreso than at home. In addition, every English student here takes the same core modules. At home this isn't the case. Even in classes that pretty well every English student will take (i.e. Intro to Fiction and Intro to Poetry) the course outlines and texts are always different and taught by different profs. Here they all take the exact same course. So there's not a lot of new perspectives being brought in. I talked about Plato in one seminar and was looked at like a crazy person because no one else had read Plato and no one could quite understand why I had.

History of Art, on the other hand, we're thoroughly enjoying. It feels like we learn from that class, especially when the lecturer is Phil. There are two lecturers for that class and while they're both really knowledgeable and all that, Phil is especially passionate and communicates in a way that works really well for both Susan and myself.

Other than school, things are going well too. We're getting really good at grocery shopping. We're getting to know our flatmates and a couple of people from classes. It seems weird that we go home in about a month.

We've both still got a bunch of days on our rail passes so we're going to do a bit of a whirlwind tour of England over the next couple of weeks. We're thinking day trips to places like Cambridge. Next week we plan on training up to Liverpool for Alex's goodbye party. He's made a bunch of Liverpudlian friends and they've invited us up for his last hurrah before he (really this time) goes home.

Hopefully sometime soon Alex will get on writing about our Dublin trip. I figure if I have to put up with homework, I can give him some too :P

We took the low road.

Beth and I were super excited. We were going on a trip, a whole day out to the National Art Gallery in London for only ten pounds. The trip was subsidised by the school and would last all day. Yes it would...

So. Yay us. We get dressed super quick in the morning, pack our lunches for the day, and hop on the bus with ease. Actually, quite a lot of ease considering that I was sick and thus a right pig to try and get out of the house on time... actually... it's almost impossible to ever get me out of the house on time. But, Beth and I are pretty good at coaches. We're not those people who disrespect the fact that we have a schedule to keep, and thus always try to get there on time. Which is what made us give somewhat amused looks to the clearly still sleepy Halloween casualities as they rushed their way on to the bus about ten minutes late, by the grace of their friends saying "Oh please wait just a bit longer!" Whatever.

Doctor (Mr?) Clarke took that moment to tell us that on the way home there would be no waiting, 4:45 you were on the bus and we were leaving. Ok. Off to the gallery!

This gallery, can I just say, was huge! I have never been to a more intimidating place for the arts. It's a good thing it's free, 'cause it's not something you can do in just a day. Beth and I were overwhelmed, we were swamped, we were sick and frigging tired of looking at St Sebastion pierced with a thousand arrows, and the creepy depictions of the Christ child--I'm not saying Christ is creepy, but some of the images of him as a baby are. Occassionally it looks like the kid was popped out lifting weights, which completely negates the naturalistic beauty of the Nativity. Also, there was no way that the Virgin was wearing silks when she gave birth, give me a frigging break.--we were pretty sick of the common themes dealt with in the same mannor over and over. I was beginning to feel like, because it was the free part of the gallery, it was the part where they put up the works of the Great's minions "Yeah these guys were pretty good, you have to pay to see the amazing stuff though." Granted it was better than anything I could do. Granted.

Well, we took leave of the gallery after eating lunch in the Gallery's no-man's land, where people who wanted to eat lunch and talk on their cell phones went. Good thing no one looked there.

The gallery is just across the street from the Canadian embassy, and on the other side, Trefalger (oh the spelling) square. Unfortunately, the square of containing a free concert that day... a bunch of unknown rappers and Kelly Roland. Huh. Well, we got a free can of Coke Zero out of it. I start noticing at this point that the wind is picking up, and so is the rain. My shoes, haveing taken a beating on this trip, could definitely be more water proof. Getting a bit soggy at this point. Have I also mentioned that I'm sick right now. Yeah.

Anyway, we make it to the Parliment buildings, which really are beautiful, and then Westminister Abbey right near. Took a bunch of pictures and nerded out over some architecture. Took in the tourist shop. Then back out to check out the river, even though by this time my feet are pretty god damned soaked, and disturbingly... starting to ache. Whatever. By this time it's about ten to three, or about three on the dot. I suggest we find a pub and hang there until four fourty five. First things first, we have to figure out where our bus was supposed to meet. We ask a tour guide, who gives us a neat story about how the term "break a leg" came about, and why Her Majesty's Theatre is thus named. We find our stop and look around for a nice place to wait out the hour and a quarter we have as it is now about three thirty.

We're given a lot of options, we choose Pizza Hut. Hey... it's cheap.

We get pizza, we get drinks. My feet experience a frightening cramping, Beth's fingers figure out that they can move again. Well, we figure it's about time to get the check. We get the check. We go outside where my feet feel deformed and spastic. Pained. Very pained. My hoody too... quite soggy (I don't have a coat in England. It's turning out to be an issue, but they're so expensive). This is when, while we're about four minutes ahead of schedule, is when we see the bus pull away from our stop. Our big, white, heated, coach... pulling away. Oh. God.

"Maybe it's another group's coach. Surely we're not the only group in London today." One of us says optamistically to the other. We go and wait. Quarter to five strikes on Beth's watch. Our bus still hasn't arrived, and no one from our trip is at the stop. I have a sudden horrifying idea, turn to a lovely woman waiting under the same awning as us and ask "Do you have the time?" She does. It's four fifty by her cellphone. Both Beth and I look at her watch which says four fourty six. I think we both smacked our heads.

So. We are stuck in London, in the pouring rain, in soaked clothes, me with a cold which is very unhappy with me, and SOAKED feet which are giving me new sensations every minute.

Well we ask two lovely men how to get to St Pancrus from where we were. To Piccadilly Circus it was, and the tube. Beth turned to me on our way up to the Circus, "You want to buy a tacky sovenier?" We were both still in disbelief.

I looked at her with my most pathetic of pathetic faces "I want warm feet!" I say all cutely pathetic. She laughs and we keep laughing. Through out the rest of the story you can just pretend that the feet mantra is what's threaded throughout. 'Cause I said it a lot.

So, we got onto the tube. That's eight pound for both of us.

Our bright side number 1: "You got to see Piccadilly Circus, and you got to ride the London Tube Susie!"

We get to St Pancrus and buy tickets. That's 86 pound for both of us. I'm complaining that my feet are starting to loose feeling, but not that very distressing ache...

Our bright side number 2: We'll probably still get there in the same time, maybe earlier, than the people on the coach.

We use the loos at St Pancrus, which were less than fresh smelling and hygenic.

Our bright side number 3 and 4: Hey now we know that St Pancrus has an all you can eat sushi joint in it. The toilets weren't pay toilets.

We managed to get a pretty direct train from London to Leicester. As we moved through the station we noted some fun people, and one very distressed (see wailing) little girl in a soggy jumper, I think I made comments about her having no right to complain. Petty? Yes.

On the platforms area we were directed to our platform specifically, as the sign had not previously indicated where to go. Outside I was afraid that my feet weren't stinging at all anymore... But I found a one pound coin!

Our bright side 5: We recooped some of the cost.

We got onto the train on the side that said coach, instead we walked through possibly the longest first class section ever. So when we finally got to coach it was a bit of a press to get seats. But I didn't have to fight grumpy guy again, thus...

Our bright side 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9: We found un-reserved seats together. The seats and area they were in were warm. By walking through first class we didn't have to walk outside anymore. We could take off our soggy jackets. Finally, it would be a short trip, shorter than the coach would have been.

Well we settled into our seats for a bit of a haul, watching as people who weren't as prompt as us showed up and settled in to find their own seats, and last on the train, much to our surprise (and yet not, 'cause it's us) was a troop of mimes.

Yes mimes.

A bunch of people in stripy shirts and black spandex pants who only spoke with their hands. We have no idea why these mimes couldn't be off duty mimes, but there you have it. I considered giving one of them my seat, as they too had clearly been in the rain--you could see some of their makeup running--but I would feel obligated to mime it at them, I so wasn't in the mood to mime. Also, my feet were only just remembering what a vague sense of warmth was like and I was hacking up a lung. I needed it more than the mime did. Beth spent a good portion of that trip giggling and pretending it was my fault. I insist that it's ok to giggle at mimes, they're there for our amusemet, but she didn't want to be offensive. I clearly have the better poker face.

Our bright side 10: We have great imaginations.

By the time we got the Leicester the mimes had left, they got off the stop before us, which was quite disappointing. I would have enjoyed some mimes in Leicester.

I think it was the mime's fault. But at this point we got a bit turned around in Leicester station. We can navigate Birmingham, Edinburgh, and London but not freaking Leicester? What's with that. Well, we made it out.

Well, it was one more leg of our journey until home. We didn't talk much during our walk. I was busy trying to breathe and Beth was probably feeling a similare sense of "just get me to a shower!" Also, I had to pee.

There was no bright side for me on our 2.5-3 km walk to home from the station. I was so cold. There was only blind focus. If I kept walking at a good pace I wouldn't think about the fact that I was so cold (and had to pee). Beth was a doll and offered me her coat, but that seemed kinda silly. She was warm, and then wouldn't be. No. Not cool. Also, I was already soaked through, why get her coat wet? So we powered through.

Blissfully, no one was in my shower or the downstairs washroom, when I got home.

When I took off my shoes and socks I was horrified to figure out that my worry hadn't been for naught, my toes had turned blue. Eek. Thus, I spent about a half hour under the hottest setting my shower had. My feet still weren't warm after that, but the rest of me was. Hey, my toes weren't blue any more. Bonus.

The rest of the night was spent not thinking about money and rain... though the rain was hard as it was pounding our windows but hey...

Our Bright Side 11: We were at home and not out in it any more!

I'll Take the High Road

Scotland! Okay, I know, that was ages ago. Where's the post?? Well folks, *hint hint* you'll get more posts out of us if you demonstrate you read the blog. That means, *hint hint* we want you to leave comments.

So Scotland was quite amazing. We started our journey by meeting Alex at the trainstation in Birmingham. From there was a direct train ride, four and a half hours, up to Edinburgh. We got great seats and just enjoyed being together after what I maintain felt like AGES apart.

We got into Edinburgh at night time. It was about 6:30 or so. Dark. WINDY. We went to Scotland and met weather. We laughed basically the entire way to our hostel because the wind was blowing so hard we could barely walk into it. We found the hostel with little issue. It was a cool place. A converted 19th century church, which meant it had all kinds of character. It also meant that the individual rooms did not have their own roofs. The three of us were in a room with six beds and there was no one else for the first two of our three nights. Sounds perfect, yes? Well unfortunatelly the no-roof situation meant that we heard every little sound that everyone in the hostel made. Now this might not have been a problem if it hadn't been for some very noisy people. Most notable of them was the guy who shouted out every few seconds "Has anybody got a joke?" along with a few other sundry comments.

Well the first night there Alex and I stayed up chatting until a silly late hour (made more silly because we knew we had to wake up early) and we kept up later because of the yelling guy. And the laughing obnoxious Italians. And the chipmunks. Well those were Italians too, but they were doing this *tch* *tch* *tch* sounds that as bizarre as it was annoying. Well we all got up early anyway, and headed out to our first tour.

We took a tour from Rabbie's Trail Burners called Highlands Lochs, Glens, and Whiskey. Click the link to see exactly where we went. We had a chance to go on a little nature walk in the low lands, which was a little unnerving because it almost felt like we were in Lynn Valley or something. The scenery was very familiar to home. We were at a place known for it's salmon jumps for goodness sakes. But it was neat anyway. A highlight of the day was definately the tour of Blair Atholl whiskey distillery. We're now whiskey experts. We know how it's made, we know how to drink it (never put ice in a single malt!!) and it was generally very cool. There was then a scenic drive through the highlands, which were spectacular.

That night we were pretty bushed and we happy to go to bed fairly early. It's a good thing we did, because at our early bed time there weren't that many people in the hostel. It wasn't until later when the people got back that things got noisy. "Anybody got a joke?" *the hostel grumbles as one* "Anybody got a joke?" *We turn over and try to ignore obnoxious guy* "Anybody got a joke?"

Pause.

"I'LL SHOW YOU A FRIGGIN' JOKE!!" In steps angry scottish man.

We hear doors opening. We hear general threats, not all of which are PG-Blog rated. We hear some furnature. We hear joke guy say "Holy **** you're like twice my size!" We hear some running. Yelling. Oh the excitement. By now the three of us are kind of sitting there hoping they just don't come near our room. We kept hearing doors open and didn't know why. Was joke guy trying to hide? Was scottish guy systematically looking for him?

Well after a couple of thoroughly exciting moments we hear the distinct sound of police walkie-talkies. The commotion is broken up. Somehow all this excitement made both Susan and I have to pee so we go out to the washroom and on the way see police talking to various people. Commotion over. The next night was nicely quiet.

So the next morning we had another tour. This time it was through Scottish Tours and went to Loch Ness & The Highlands. Yes, we went up to Loch Ness. How very... legendary! The bus ride was a bit longer and both Susan and Alex grabbed a few moments to nap. Loch Ness was beautiful. The monster, they say, comes twice every day: five minutes before you get there, and five minutes after you leave. We also went into Urquheart Castle, which at one point was held by the Grant clan. Grant, of course, is Susan's born surname. When we found out that the Grants were suck ups who literally blew up their own castel, it became something of a joke for poor Susie who was glad to have abandoned that clan for the Curries who are known in Scotland as the "Warrior Poets" -- at much better fit, I'd say.

We also had a chance to see the capital of the Highlands on this tour. Inverness was very cool, though we spent most of it in a pub eating appetisers. Yay.

That night, when we got back to Edinburgh, we did a ghost tour of the city. It was a fun nighttime walk. Amusingly, the tour was given by a Canadian. We got to go into a really old cemetary, climb a faerie mound, and go through some neat areas of town. The tour ended at a pub where we got a free drink. We took advantage of that drink as well as a few more, occupying ourselves until the establishment closed at 1:00 -- what kind of pub closes at 1am? Really now.

We went back to the hostel, had a slightly better night of sleep, and checked out the next morning. When we got to Wannaburger for breakfast we were surprised to hear that daylight savings had just gone into effect. Cool, another hour in Edinburgh! We did some casual shopping on our way to the train station.

The train home was less fun than the one there. We had a really long ride on a train where we were only able to sit for a small portion. Then we changed train, and there was a grumpy guy. Travel wasn't fun that day, really. But we got back just fine.

Alex spent a couple of days with us, and has now gone off to flitter about the country again. We'll see him next week.

Overall scotland was a blast, and I'd love to go back to Edinburgh some day. The city was beautiful with so much history and so much that we didn't have a chance to see. Who knows, maybe one day we'll go on a 100-mile trek through the highlands.

The End of the Asterisk

Alright so I figured it best to do a small schedule for various people on here before I conclude the last two weeks of my trip.

These dates are subject to change.

Tuesday 28: Leicester
Wednesday 29: Leicester -> London
Thursday 30: London -> Liverpool
Friday 31: Liverpool -> Manchester
Saturday 1: Manchester -> Sheffield
Sunday 2: Sheffield -> Leicester
Monday 3: Leicester
Tuesday 4: Leicester -> Bath
Wednesday 5: Bath -> Cardiff -> Bath
Thursday 6: Bath
Friday 7: Bath -> Bristol -> Dublin
Saturday 8: Dublin
Sunday 9: Dublin -> Bristol -> Bath -> London
Monday 10: London
Tuesday 11: London
Wednesday 12: London -> Vancouver

I STRESS subject to change. I need a whole day just to contact people and look at hotels! URGH!

Love
-Alex