Countdown

😪 That was some hiatus.  I really should have posted more often, but it's been so busy with work lately!  Yesterday and today were honestly the first time I've had time to breathe during the work day.  Phew!

In the month and a half that's elapsed, we've gone to Barcelona, had my best friend stay with us for a week, had a nice ex-pat Thanksgiving, and been to Canterbury.  Tomorrow, we're going to Nice, France for the weekend and then in a couple short weeks, we're off to Prague, Munich, Vienna, and then...New York City babes!

Sad to think that our time in London is winding down.  I'm already thinking about packing all our things back and the remainder of my "bucket list" before we go.  Bittersweet!

I'm Back Baby!

Arm Update

It's been about two weeks since my running-slow-but-still-manage-to-get-injured injury and I'm almost 100% better.  Not gonna lie, those first few days were pretty brutal - I couldn't really lift my arm, needed help putting on a bookbag or a jacket, needed to prop it up while doing mundane things like shampooing my hair.  I also found out that laughing really hard and sneezing were both very painful, not only in my shoulder but even in my shoulder blades and the whole left part of my upper back.  Yeesh!

Lots has happened since I last posted, which is why it's been so long since I last posted :)

Dover

The day after my boo-boo, Alex and I hopped on a train east to the town of Dover, famous for its white chalk cliffs.  I was not a fan of the weather (it was rainy and my shoes where soaked through in just a few minutes of leaving the train station), and we took the most indirect, arduous hike up to the cliffs (involving hiking up an inhuman incline to Dover Castle, only to find it was really expensive, and then walking basically around the entire hill to get back to the other side).  I was also dubious because...like...how do you see the cliffs if you're standing on the cliffs?

However, once we got to the main area, you indeed can see the cliffs rising up above you and a little bit around the bend, and it was so majestic and made the whole trek (almost) worth it.  A few things we discovered: the cliffs of Dover are populated with lots and lots of snails, beware of crumbling bits of chalk, and standing at the edge of England and the closest point to France was really breathtaking.

Chilling with Wills & Kate & George & Charlotte & Uncle Harry

The next day, we continued our exploring at the Tower of London, where we'd both been, but we figured we live literally 10 minutes away, so why not.  We saw the usual bits: the Crown Jewels, the ravens, the Beefeaters.  Then, we hopped across town to Kensington Palace.  One thing I had kind of known in the back of my brain somewhere but didn't immediately register was that THE DUKE AND DUCHESS OF CAMBRIDGE ACTUALLY LIVE HERE.  Okay, so when we were there, I think they were in Canada, but how cool is that?!

One of the best things we stumbled upon in the palace was a tour guide (who looked a bit like Leslie Odom, Jr.!!!) telling a brilliant story of British history to an enraptured audience.  He went through like 600 years of history in minutes, not only reciting speeches and formal recorded prose but also throwing in jokes and impressions.  I would invite this guy over for a dinner party and just let him talk for ages.

Oh, Also Paris

Last Friday, we went to Paris - nbd, right?  ;)

We booked everything fairly late so Eurostar was expensive and the only other choice we had was to take the earliest flight.  That involved waking up at 3:45am, walking over to Blackfriars Station, taking the train to Gatwick, waiting 2 hours in the airport...just to take a 40 minute flight to Paris.  The flight time was literally shorter than my commute from Brooklyn to Manhattan.

Also along the lines of booking late, we hadn't really planned anything except to a) meet up with Alex's aunt and great-aunt, both of whom were going to be there that weekend and b) meet up with Alex's old coworkers when he was an intern in the Paris office way back when.  We got off the plane with kind of no idea what to do or where to go (#firstworldproblems #beentoparisbeforeanddidallthetouristthingsproblems) so we wound up wandering, which honestly is most of the fun of travel anyway.  We found our way to Le Marais and had some of the most delicious falafel at that famous place that's always got a line down the street (I was afraid it would be overrated, but no it is bomb).  The unfortunate part was that it started pouring later in the day, and again my shoes had soaked through so badly that I thought I had two sponges strapped to my feet.  Sadly, I've since had to say goodbye to my beloved Keds (well, they're sitting in a garbage bag in the apartment - I haven't had the heart to throw them out out, but they've got to go).  I traipsed through all of Paris on these wonky wet shoes.  In the evening, we met Alex's former colleagues for drinks, who were so sweet and welcoming, and I had a great time.  We left the bar pretty late, realizing we hadn't had dinner, so we hopped on the metro back to our hotel to try this place that my best friend Jackie had recommended when we were all here together last year (em, the Engagement trip hehe) but never got a chance to try: L'Office.  Turns out it was the best meal of the trip, the best meal I'd had in a long time.

~Veritasty Crossover~

Luckily for us, L'Office was literally two doors down from our hotel.  We ordered with some difficulty (entirely French menu + minimal understanding of romance languages + slow-Internet stop-and-go Google Translate) and finally wound up sharing two entrees of fish and veal risotto.

The fish turned out to be line-caught whiting with a lemony spinach puree, thinly shaved almonds, and a fine crumble of crunchy potatoes.  I could have done with a little less lemon in the sauce, but let's talk about this FISH!  It was so succulent and plump, flaky and white - my tongue felt like it was, in the words of Liz Lemon, high-fiving a million angels.  It was glorious.

Alex had a similar foodgasm with his dish: he proclaimed, "How do they make meat taste like this?!?!?!", but it was unexpected for me, for...it was not veal risotto but veal sweetbread risotto.  As in, baby cow thymus glands.  Regardless, still delish.  I had never had sweetbreads until now, and the best way I can describe them is as fluffy pillows of meat, lightly seared on the outside and really tender on the inside.

We cleaned our plates so well that night that I joked to the waiter that they didn't need a dishwasher.

The next morning, we tried to find some wonderful farmer's markets around town, but all my attempts turned out fruitless (pun intended).  We had to ditch the attempts in order to meet the aunts-in-law for brunch at a cute place near Bastille.  We had a whole load of delicious, non-pretentious brunch food for a really good deal - puts New York City brunch to shame.  I had a glass of fresh-squeezed lots-of-pulp orange juice, espresso, fresh baked brioche with French butter and raspberry jam, salmon with scrambled eggs, potato, salad, and finally an amazing banana-chantilly cream parfait.  IT.  WAS.  HEAVEN.

And then all of a sudden, I was left in a state of alone-ness.  See, Alex had to leave for two weeks of training in Florida, so he was only able to spend about 24 hours in Paris before flying back to London, packing, and then flying out to Florida.  If Alex had his own blog, you could read all about his 8-hour flight delay and overall horrendous trip from London Gatwick to Florida!  Thanks British Airways!

Anyway, I used my newfound independence to run amok across Paris.  And by 'amok', I really just mean hitting up the fancy shopping areas where Alex would get bored in about 3 seconds.  Now I realize why he resisted the department stores and high fashion boutiques: he has no phone data plan out here, so what's a guy to do while the girl shops?!?!  Actually, my first stop was the Musee Marmottan Monet (say that three times fast) out west past the Arc de Triomphe.  I considered this the last stop in the trinity of Monet sights in Paris, after Musee d'Orsay and L'Orangerie (where I had dragged Alex, Jackie, and Harry last year).  I was so excited to finally get to see THE Monet museum.  Like, Monet is in the name of the museum.  There were some great bits, like the art obvi, but...

I was really disappointed that they didn't allow photography, and the guards were really mean about it.  There was one exhibit that explicitly said no photography, but once I left that exhibit, no where else indicated the camera with the slashy line through it so I thought, fair game.  All the guards there seemed to be pretty miserable creatures, with a vendetta against mainly me.  Loads of other people were taking photos, but for some reason they only noticed me.

I sat in the main room of Monet works (there are decorative arts and other things in the museum too, but for some reason decorative arts is a snoozefest for me) and took it all in with my eyes, since I couldn't take it all in with my lens.  I saw a beautiful Monet painting of roses that I had never seen before, among some of his famous and iconic water lilies.  I just sat and sat and journaled and stared around for a good while.

When I left, I decided to walk halfway across Paris to the Galeries Lafayette.  It took more than an hour of pounding the pavement in my "cute chic Parisienne" outfit (dress and tights and pointy black suede flats).  I passed through some upscale residential areas, by the Trocadero and the Eiffel Tower, and then across the Champs Elysees.  Even though it was a pleasure to be in Paris, I could have killed someone on the Champs Elysees.  It's like the worst of Times Square, Rockefeller Center at Christmastime, and the Dominique Ansel Cronut line rolled into one.  So.  Many.  People.  Not walking, just stopping and milling around outside stores.  The sidewalk is so wide you'd think it wouldn't be a problem but I was getting so much sidewalk-rage.  Afternoon Champs Elysees is definitely not for me.

Galeries Lafayette was not as bad, but still fairly crowded.  And, a funny revelation, it was crowded full of people who looked like me.  Asians!  The upswing of wealth in China probably leads to a whole lot of brand name shopping in major cities, and Paris was no exception.  Everyone from middle-age men with dad bods (or...maybe the Beijing bikini) to fashionista young women were snapping up the latest handbags, makeup, accessories, whatever.  All the different designers had Mandarin-speaking salespeople.  This was my favorite: L'Occitane not only had a Chinese saleswoman, but they also staffed a Caucasian young woman who spoke almost fluent Mandarin.  I was so flabbergasted when I heard the two staff chatting amongst themselves that I actually asked her, "wait, you speak Chinese?!"  (Hello, I must have been the only Chinese person there who didn't actually speak Mandarin)  She said she studied Chinese in school.  That is probably a brilliant move for anyone who wants to get into the retail/service industry nowadays.

After my session of window shopping, I headed to the neighborhood near the hotel that Alex, Jackie, Harry, and I previously stayed, a little north of the Galeries Lafayette.  I wanted so badly to have dinner at Le Petit Canard, a tiny restaurant that served delicious dishes featuring duck, but they were fully booked for the night, as were several other restaurants on that street.  Eventually, I had to settle for a...burger joint.  And not only that, I had a chicken sandwich at a burger restaurant.  It was a pretty lame end to my evening.

The night was still young, though.  I spent the rest of the night walking around the vicinity of my current hotel, which turned out to be in the theater district and right down the block from the Folie Bergere (which I only know about from the movie Anastasia, when she's frolicking in Paris for the first time).  I wandered aimlessly and was content to get lost in the little backstreets.  There were lots of people around since it was a Saturday night so I wasn't too worried.  It was really cool to hover around the nightlife (albeit tame nightlife because we all know I can't do untz untz clubbing) and see the locals in their natural habitat.

The next morning, I woke up early and raced to Champs Elysees for a bit of window shopping before it got cray cray crowded.  It was a good move, because there were hardly any people out on the streets and I got to go inside the flagship Sephora store relatively unhindered and not needing to elbow people out of my way.  I again wandered my way back to Le Marais, where it was getting super packed with the Sunday afternoon revelers, but the big problem now was that my feet were absolutely killing me.  At this point, I had walked two days of over ten miles in d'orsay cut suede flats that sometimes hurt me when I wear them just around the office, not to mention hobbling over the cobblestones of Paris.  I even bought a cheap pair of flats at H&M which did the trick in calming my aching puppies for a couple of hours, but I was suffering bad.  I wound up sitting in a Starbucks for a while to recaffeinate and soothe my feet, which kind of helped because I was able to make it all the way back to the hotel on foot, where I picked up my stuff and headed off to the airport.  And that was it, my whirlwind weekend in Paris!

Hell Week

This work week and the previous one were pretty rough.  I've been trying to sign on a little earlier than usual to get work done (my 12:30pm, which is 7:30am EST) and still wind up working until my 11:30pm or 12:00am.  I know the upcoming weeks won't be any easier with the holidays coming up.

Hella Weekend

Today, I treated myself (one might say) to a beautiful day out walking.  I logged more than 16 miles (and 39,700 or so steps...you have no idea how upset I am that I didn't hit 40k) from walking to Greenwich, and then around the West End area afterwards.

Greenwich was much more beautiful than I remember.  My first time here was in a nasty downpour for my architecture class.  The second time here was possibly during a hangover before I knew what a hangover was (Ivy, I'm looking at you girl <3 a="" amp="" and="" arms="" around="" at="" beautiful="" blue="" by="" chips="" clouds.="" college.="" constructed.="" couldn="" day.="" dotted="" down="" eautiful="" elements="" enough="" everything="" fish="" for="" full="" geographic="" get="" good="" guess="" had="" having="" house.="" house="" i="" ideals="" in="" inspired="" is="" kings="" late="" life="" lunch="" middle="" mostly="" my="" naval="" nbsp="" observatory="" october="" oday="" of="" p="" palladian="" photos="" puffy="" queen="" really="" reenwich="" royal="" s="" sky="" staircase="" streets="" symmetric="" t="" taking="" the="" time="" to="" tulip="" up="" walked="" wandered="" warm="" was="" white="" with="">


<3 a="" amp="" and="" arms="" around="" at="" beautiful="" blue="" by="" chips="" clouds.="" college.="" constructed.="" couldn="" day.="" dotted="" down="" eautiful="" elements="" enough="" everything="" fish="" for="" full="" geographic="" get="" good="" guess="" had="" having="" house.="" house="" i="" ideals="" in="" inspired="" is="" kings="" late="" life="" lunch="" middle="" mostly="" my="" naval="" nbsp="" observatory="" october="" oday="" of="" p="" palladian="" photos="" puffy="" queen="" really="" reenwich="" royal="" s="" sky="" staircase="" streets="" symmetric="" t="" taking="" the="" time="" to="" tulip="" up="" walked="" wandered="" warm="" was="" white="" with="">*Yo, I just re-read my post and I have no idea what happened here.  Sorry, I really want to fix it but it's almost 1am and I'm supes tired.*
<3 a="" amp="" and="" arms="" around="" at="" beautiful="" blue="" by="" chips="" clouds.="" college.="" constructed.="" couldn="" day.="" dotted="" down="" eautiful="" elements="" enough="" everything="" fish="" for="" full="" geographic="" get="" good="" guess="" had="" having="" house.="" house="" i="" ideals="" in="" inspired="" is="" kings="" late="" life="" lunch="" middle="" mostly="" my="" naval="" nbsp="" observatory="" october="" oday="" of="" p="" palladian="" photos="" puffy="" queen="" really="" reenwich="" royal="" s="" sky="" staircase="" streets="" symmetric="" t="" taking="" the="" time="" to="" tulip="" up="" walked="" wandered="" warm="" was="" white="" with="">
<3 a="" amp="" and="" arms="" around="" at="" beautiful="" blue="" by="" chips="" clouds.="" college.="" constructed.="" couldn="" day.="" dotted="" down="" eautiful="" elements="" enough="" everything="" fish="" for="" full="" geographic="" get="" good="" guess="" had="" having="" house.="" house="" i="" ideals="" in="" inspired="" is="" kings="" late="" life="" lunch="" middle="" mostly="" my="" naval="" nbsp="" observatory="" october="" oday="" of="" p="" palladian="" photos="" puffy="" queen="" really="" reenwich="" royal="" s="" sky="" staircase="" streets="" symmetric="" t="" taking="" the="" time="" to="" tulip="" up="" walked="" wandered="" warm="" was="" white="" with="">I took the 188 bus all the way back to Russell Square, just so I could see the return trip in a different way.  When I got off, I wandered around the old British Museum area, a bit around Chinatown and Soho, before having a quick dinner at Herman ze German for currywurst and pommes frites.  Healthy day, no?  After, I hit up Piccadilly Circus (also a mistake, I wanted to trample people) and Regent's Street for a bit of upscale window shopping.  Sorry, Alex, I may or may not have spent all your money buying a perfume at Jo Malone that makes me smell like a strong cup of chai tea.  Sorry, not sorry.  And then I walked all the way home!

Tomorrow, planning on just relaxing (probably more walking involved) and visiting my coworker's place in Hampstead to play some board games and hang out with his bunny rabbits.  And then we do this shiz all over again next week.

Cheerio loves!

Wham

I did such a stupid thing.

Just after I posted about my morning runs, I go and mess it all up today.

I was jogging along the north bank, slow as ever, y'know, trying to conserve my energy to go all the way to Trafalgar Square.  I was listening to Serial season 2, which is super interesting, but I realized I prefer upbeat music when I run so I changed to Hamilton, track 2, "Aaron Burr, Sir".  The first few bars play and WHAM-O, I trip on a bit of pavement and instead of falling to the ground, I am obstructed by a piece of wood put up around a construction site and slam my left shoulder right into it.

It's like those scenes on cop shows when they need to open a locked door so someone with massive deltoids backs up and then smashes into the door and it always works.

I am alright.  No scratches, it didn't even really hurt at the moment, but what's scaring me now is that my upper arm hurts depending on how I move it.  I feel like John McCain; can't really lift my arm high or move it behind me.  Before I sneezed while my arm was on the table and the sharp movement from my sneeze resulted in intense pain.

So I guess here's my excuse to go easy on exercise (i.e. be a bum) for the next few days.

Running, or fast walking

In the mornings, I run.  My running speed and endurance level leave much to be desired - what would I call it?  Jogging?  Walking fast with my arms pumping and my legs slightly kicking?  I'm trying to get as much running in before it gets cold, and as a way for me to get exercise because otherwise I spend about 10 hours a day parked in front of my desk.  This activity level is an improvement over my activity level in New York; though I was a member at a gym, often my 2+ hour commute and/or busy projects at work limited the amount of time I could go to the gym.  Now with a 30 second commute from bed to desk, I have quite a lot more leisure time, from about 9:30am to 1:30pm GMT.

My preferred "running" path so far is along the Thames, on the south bank, from Millennium Bridge west to almost Westminster Bridge.  It get a little crowded around the London Eye so I usually turn around then.  I've also gone that direction north of the river, but the buildings and construction sometimes obstruct the path.

One of my favorite things, one thing that will never get old, is looking up and seeing Christopher Wren's great dome atop St. Paul's Cathedral.  It's especially eerie at night because the dome is not lit by floodlights or anything, just a faint dark ghostly shadow towering above.  In the morning, though, I love coming to the street at the south wing, then turning left and walking across the Millennium Bridge, sometimes peeking behind me to see the beautiful symmetry and geometry of the dome.  When you're on the Millennium Bridge in the morning, you can see just how low the tide is in the Thames below.  Sometimes you see people combing the gravely river bed for broken bits of pottery or sunken re-surfaced treasures.  Along the south bank, there's actually a beach that winds up being revealed at low tide, and yesterday I saw some very talented artists making sand sculptures.

Friday, 30 September

I ran along the north bank all the way to Westminster/Big Ben, and then wandered into Belgravia for the grand opening of Dominique Ansel London.  I skipped the crazy long Cronut line to get some pastries to bring back home.  I got a DKA (chef's version of the kouign amann, basically a pop-over croissant hybrid), a chorizo croissant, a chocolate cream puff in the shape of a very cute owl, a jasmine mousse, and an Earl Grey/blackberry/lemon doughnut.  It rained on my hour-long walk back home, so you bet I was guarding that bag with my life and shielding it with whatever I could.

Saturday, 1 October

I can't believe it's October!  This morning, Alex and I popped over to the south bank again for a bit of wandering.  We found the Hays Galleria, a cute covered market/mall and had a really good breakfast at Cafe Rouge.  Then, in the drizzly weather, we walked in the area just south of Tower Bridge called Shad Thames, looking at rustic-industrial-chic neighborhoods.  When we crossed Tower Bridge back to the north side of the Thames, the weather miraculously cleared up, though it did rain again on and off all day.  We headed to Spitalfields Market and wandered amongs the independent craftsmen and shopkeepers.  Finally, we had reservations at a pub in the West End for afternoon tea.  I won't name the pub, because tea was pretty awful.  After that, we walked around the crazy shopping areas of Tottenham Court Road, the art shops in Soho, and finally had Indian for dinner.

Sunday, 2 October

I overslept.  Feeling super guilty, because I didn't come here to sleep in on the weekends, I urged Alex to rush to the Columbia Road Flower Market in Shoreditch, about 40 minutes away and which was slated to close in an hour from when we left.  We walked so fast that we made it in like 25 minutes, but it was insanity when we arrived.  The flower market is just a narrow street lined with flower vendors, and the crowd to just walk through was almost a standstill.  Mind, this was a pretty polite crowd; I heard quiet mumblings around me of "oh, this is quite stressful, isn't it?" but I imagined if this happened in New York, there'd be so much more heated feelings.  My inner New Yorker started walking more aggressively just to be able to get through.  After, we found a mini-Smorgasburg-like food market in Shoreditch and had one of the most fantastic meals in London yet!  I spotted a stall called Makimayo and they displayed paper cones filled with bits of fried chicken covered in various sauces.  Yep, count me in!  We got a sweet/sour/spicy sauce and a spicy mayo sauce with popcorn chicken over rice and salad.  Wowwwwwwww, so good!

After Shoreditch, we took a super long walk west towards our old stomping grounds of Nido (now called something else), St. Pancras/King's Cross, and the British Library.  It was quite emotional for me to return to where it all started - where I met Alex.

Let's jump in the Way Back Machine to January 15, 2010, a few days after we arrived in London for the semester.  It was a really rainy day and we had planned to hit up the British Library and the British Museum.  My group of friends ran into some other friends who had trailed behind in the lobby of the British Museum.  In that second group was the man I'm going to marry.

Present day, almost: I was cooing like a crazy person.  "Oooh, this is where we first met!  Can you believe it honey?!  Did you ever expect we'd be back here again, engaged?!"  We had a late afternoon beer at a pub behind the library, and then wandered around the back of St. Pancras/King's Cross stations, which is a revitalized neighborhood now, very hipster, kind of High Line-ish.

Finally, we hit up another old haunt: Angel, specifically the restaurant Le Mercury on Upper Street.  This place holds such dear memories for me, as it was the place where our group of friends had our last dinner in London.  One big table, about 10 or 12 of us sitting around, enjoying delicious food, pretending it was Melissa's birthday to get a free dessert....  This time was more subdued, just me and Alex sharing calamari and a huge melted Camembert wheel, duck, and their epic dark chocolate tart.  Alex asked me if it was as good as I remember.  At first, I was like, nah nothing is as good as a memory, but then I realized it was actually even better.

Monday, 3 October

Discovered my favorite, favorite, favorite graffiti ever:



Tuesday, 4 October

Wasn't feeling all too great this morning, so I just took a long stroll up Holborn to Covent Garden and back.

Wednesday, 5 October

To make up for my lazy day yesterday, I took a nice long "run" along the south side of the Thames.

Thursday, 6 October

Another cheat day for me.  I walked about an hour towards Selfridge's department store.  All the salesfolks were asking me repeatedly if I needed help.  I'm like, I have earbuds in!  First, I can't hear you.  Second, I am trying to not have to hear you.  Please let me browse in peace!  Does that irritate you ever?

Alrighty time for the final push of this week.  Monday is actually a holiday (Columbus Day), but because I'm taking off next Friday, I may do some work to keep up.  What's happening next Friday, you ask?

Paris!

Recap, Again

Work the last few days has been more of me sitting around, waiting for things to upload or download (I'm looking at you, Google and Bing Ads Editors and Kenshoo...😒) so I have time for a little post.

Wednesday, 28 September

Today, I took a nice long walk to Canary Wharf, where Alex's office is located.  I walked around the Tower of London, which was looking very majestic and brilliant against the sunny cloudless blue sky.  Then, I wove through the north part of St. Katharine's Docks and along the Thames until I hit the distant Financial District about an hour's walk outside of London.  Canary Wharf has got major companies like Citi and Credit Suisse, but what interested me more was the shopping mall, of course.  I had a quick lunch at Nando's, a coffee to go from Caffe Nero, and then hopped on the Tube back home to get to work.

Thursday, 29 September

This was the first rainy day since we arrived, almost exactly a week ago!  We were very lucky to arrive at the end of an Indian summer-like period, though now it's just about the same autumnal temperature as New York.  It was just barely misting when I left the apartment, but when I got to Embankment, it was full-on pouring big rain drops, so I ducked for cover under a bridge and then under some building overhangs.  Turns out that 20% chance of rain wound up happening!

I headed to The British Museum, armed with a Rick Steves audio guide podcast.  I had it on at 1.5x speed, and walked quickly through the Egyptian, Assyrian, and Greek wings.  It was kind of cute to have Rick Steves babbling in the background while I meandered through the oft-visited British Museum again, sort of just drying off and waiting for the rain outside to stop.  Finally, I popped over to the Brunswick Center, taking the same route I used to use when we walked to and from NIDO, and did some grocery shopping at Waitrose.

-----

Saturday's weather is supposed to be dreadful, so we're looking for a cute day trip for Sunday...thinking about Brighton?  I'll let you guys know how it goes!  Have a great end of the week, everyone!

Recap!

I have been wanting to blog for a few days now, but haven't found the time.  I'm working right now, but an Excel file is taking quite a long time to open, so I finally found a few minutes free!

It has been a blissful few days here in London.  The weather has been blessedly sunny and relatively warm.  I caught a little cold, likely from the stress of moving and air travel, but I'm on the mend now, and luckily even though sniffly and congested I had a great weekend.

Thursday, 22 September

We've arrived!  After a long time in the customs line, waiting for the Uber, and a trafficky drive from Heathrow, we arrived in our flat in the City of London.  Our flat is comfortable, and though a bit small, perfect for our temporary needs.  It's so close to everything, although the shops immediately in our vicinity close very early (some don't even open on the weekends) since it's a business district and they're banking on people being in the neighborhood just for work.  After we put down our bags, we were starving and took a 10 minute walk to Leadenhall Market (right next to The Leaky Cauldron in movie 1) and had our first back-in-London dinner at none other but Pizza Express.  I had a Middle-Eastern-inspired pizza with lamb meatballs and arugula; Alex had a calzone stuffed to the gills with Italian cold cuts.  We promptly crashed that night.

Friday, 23 September

First work day.  Since I didn't have to start until about 2pm, we took a wee walk around the neighborhood in the morning, hitting up our old favorite Twinings, weaving up through Soho/Covent Garden, and grabbing a quick lunch at Dishoom ("Bombay bistro" - really amazing curries and daal, would so go back in a heartbeat).  Sadly, as we were coming home I started feeling icky, and it did not abate as the day went on.  I actually signed off in the evening, went to Sainsbury for a quick grocery shopping, and we cooked our first meal in the apartment, a very simple spaghetti, chicken with Nando's marinade, and arugula.  We promptly crashed again.

Saturday, 24 September

Weekend!  We crossed over the Thames into Southwark and into one of my favorite places in all of London: Borough Market.  Borough Market is a gastronomical feast for all the senses.  There are plenty of stalls for cheesemongers, bread bakers, sweets makers, and a ton of international street foods.  This is also where Alex and I had...kangaroo burgers six years ago!  I think I'll try to come on weekday mornings to buy some fresh produce, which seems kind of hard to come by in the supermarkets.

Then, we had planned to meet my coworker at his home in Hampstead Heath.  We took a nice ~3 hour stroll from Southwark through Soho and Covent Garden, our old stomping grounds of Bloomsbury, the very "alt" neighborhood of Camden, and finally the prim and proper neighborhoods of Primrose Hill and Hampstead Heath.  It was great fun for us to see all the enclaves along the way, especially the very chic and sophisticated areas up north.

Sunday, 25 September

More weekend!  First, we had a glutinous full English breakfast at a greasy spoon in Southwark.  To walk it off, we wove through Southwark and across the river again at Westminster, then through the gorgeous rows of embassies in Belgravia.  I hadn't walked through this area much, and I loved wandering through the rich marble facades.  Our destination was Harrods, which did not disappoint.  We meandered back towards Soho/Chinatown and had dinner at Belgo; I had a big ol' pot of herb & garlic mussels and fries and a raspberry beer.  Yum!

Monday, 26 September

Real work week.  I started off the morning with a run by the Thames, down to Tower of London and through St. Katharine's Docks.  We had visited this area with my architecture class in 2010, and it was fun to reacquaint myself.  I also walked around the Spitalfields Market area, until coming back to the apartment at about noon to shower, eat, and start work.

Tuesday, 27 September

How is it the 27th of September already?  I started this morning with a run in the opposite direction, also along the Thames but towards Charring Cross.  My ankle was a little sore, so I kind of gave up running and just went for a nice long walk along Regent Street, Oxford Street, and across the British Museum and back for work.

Can't wait for more exploring time in the mornings and this weekend.  In the meantime, signing off so I can sign on to work.  Cheers, friends!  :)

My Future Mother-in-Law Can't Pronounce...

Portugal.  (She says it "Portugo" for some reason)

Hello from Portugal!  The land of Cristiano Ronaldo - I felt like I had to call that out for you, Christie.  Just a quick update while I'm waiting to board my next flight to London.

The flight over here was uneventful, too short for a decent amount of rest so I'll have to find the best coffee shop the City of London has to offer.  I was hoping to get the two seats next to me empty in a row of four, but alas a woman who spoke only Spanish and Portuguese climbed over me and proceeded to spread all the way out in the middle two seats.  She fully lay down across the seats with her head in my armpit and her feet in the girl on the other end's lap.  I was pretty pissed and trying to make my presence known (like, kind of nudging her with my side to remind her that she crossed over into my bubble and could she please back the eff up) but my anger melted away when I woke up from my nap and found her sitting upright, with something CRAZY going on with her hair; she must have smushed it into a terrible shape after sleeping on my arm rest.  That scene from There's Something About Mary comes to mind.  The schadenfreude in me was like, "I'm not even mad anymore."

It looks like a beautiful day in Lisbon, Portugal...from what I can see from the airport terminal.  Boarding in 15 minutes!  I'll be greeting you all from London next!

Ciao!