London Journal

ok. last entry. i realize that i am no longer in london but since i didnt fill you in on the last few days of activity. here goes...

Thursday
got up sorta late (for me at least) and got ready to wander around. i had breakfast at the cafe nero around the corner (which i have developed an incredible fondness for cafe nero in the one week that i was in london. it is so much better than starbucks (that actually sells fair trade coffee at their shops in london) and a lot cheaper too. not to mention that they have the best muffins ever.) and had a grande cappuccino and an amazing blueberry muffin. im not sure if the muffin qualifies as an english muffin or not. it is an english muffin in the sense that it is a muffin that was made, purchased and consumed in england but you know how we have english muffins here that are different from regular muffins. i dont know if they have english muffins in the sense that we have them. im guessing that it is something along the lines of the biscuit, cookie, scone thing that i discussed the other day. so anyways i had breakfast. we have established that. i walked down through leicester square and past covent garden to the grand lodge. i just went to check it out for dad to see if they had anything of interest. they had some things that i found interesting but i think dad would find them more interesting.

after leaving the masonic place, i walked back to covent garden to check it out. i loved it there! it was so cool and funky. such a great place. there were shops all around the plaza where the market was and there were two different markets plus the buildings that had the cafes and shops in them. there were a lot of crafty things and jewelry there. lots of clothing shops as well. plus there was a section that was almost like a flea market that i wasnt so keen on. i bought the most adorable hand made toy from the apple market. this indian woman had made these clown figures that you could make stand and sit in different positions. they were so cute and only sold at the apple market in covent garden so i had to buy one. im so proud of that acquisition. i wandered around a bit more and went into the doc martens store. i tried on really cool pair of pink buckle shoes that i really liked but they only had one pair left and it was half a size too big. i didnt them b/c they didnt fit but they pesky salesman tried to get me to buy them and when i said no he went and got every other pair of pink shoes they had in the store. he didnt understand that i wasnt really interested in buying a pair of pink combat boots. so i just ran away when he wasnt looking. so much for buying some doc martens at the original store. as much as i like them i dont think doc martens air waves are really for me anyways. im just not mod or punk and i would probably just look like a fool wearing them.

i wandered back to piccadilly and down the the orsini sandwich shop to try out kate's chicken, brie and cranberry sandwich. two thumbs up. really tasty. then after eating i went back to the hostel and slept until 530. nice way to spend a vacation day isnt it?

for dinner i met kate and chris (who were getting kinda snippy with one another) and we went to the spaghetti house. it was pretty good but i would have like to have something that was a little more native to london... like indian food or something.

kate had to go to a play after dinner so chris and i decided to take in the reduced shakespeare company's performance of the complete works of god (abridged). it was just as funny as the history of america. some highlights as follows:

~ how do you know they had computers in the garden of eden? because eve had an apple.

~ adam: ow! who took my rib?

~ old man noah had an ark e i e i o...

~ the discussion for 5 minutes about whether or not noah had mackerel on the ark.

~ mary became pregnant when the angel gabriel came upon her... (ill leave you to think of that one)

~ the sinners who were not on the ark (cue audience participation) "ah! im drowning! help me! bbbbblllllllbbbb!

~ Jesus being baptized by John the baptist with a garden squirter (that looked like a miracle grow containter) "in the name of the father, and... yourself, and the holy spirit" and jesus threatening to kick johns ass if he didnt stop squirting him.

~ Jesus feeding "the crowd" with "loaves" (throwing a loaf of sliced bread at the crowd) and "fish" (throwing a goldfish bowl of water and rubber goldfish at the crowd)

~ reciting the humorous parts of the book of Job (nothing... just turning the pages)

~ Jesus runaway note: "dear mom and joseph... i have run away to wander in the desert for 40 days.

~ God has a sense of humor because for 40 years he led the israelites around the desert and the final place he let them stop is the one place with no oil.

~ the prophet song that ended ever verse with "and jeremiah was a bullfrog"

~ the armaggedon song from the book of revelation

~ 668... the neighbor of the beast.


Friday

up and out of the hostel around 930. breakfast (cappuccino and a muffin) from cafe nero around the corner again. i walked down piccadilly street to bond street. bond street was fabulous. that is where all the desiger boutiques are located. i walked up bond street just admiring all the gorgeous things in the windows that will never be able to affort. i have decided that dolce&gabbana are just a bit to "creative" for me but i loved the things i saw in burberry, prada, cartier, armani... everthing. tiffany's had the diamond ring i fell in love with years ago in their front display and there was a beautiful dress in the display of the emmanuel ungaro boutique that i loved so much. it was like a cream colored silk and chiffon with pink and orange flowers and some light green leaves on it. gorgeous. but no price tag and you know the rule... if you have to ask you cant afford it.

i caught the tube from the oxford/bond street station and went over to notting hill. it is such a cute little area. its so quaint and it would be a great place to live. there are some cute little flats and then i went through an area of huge mansions as well. all on a mission to get to portobello market.

portobello market was great. fruit and veggies everywhere as well as some clothes, scarves, antiques and various other items. i spent a long time walking up and down looing at the jewelry and things. i stopped at the bakers stand to get a muffin (lemon flavored) and a croissant for lunch (yay... lunch for 1 pound 60 pence!). some parts of the market were great and some not so great. once you pass under the motorway over pass it looks like you are i section 8 housing and i was wondering whether a lot of what was being sold was stolen property or not...

after portobello i took a bus down to harrods and got lost in the store. it is so big and there were so many people. things were so overpriced too. but they had a lot of fabulous things to see. the jewelry was amazing. it looked like the things that actresses would wear to the oscars. the food halls were amazing as well but like i said everything was so overpriced. even all the chocolates and things. i bought nothing. at all.

took a bus up to kates flat. we went up to madam tussauds wax museum that was waaaaaaaaaay over priced (20 pounds! just for admission. and no student discount. BOO) it was kinda campy but still fun. lots of stupid pictures... me with "uncle gerry" (gerhardt schroeder, chancellor of germany), kate sitting on abe lincolns lap... you get the picture i think. there was also this "haunted london" display where kate got scared so badly by a jack the ripper sort that she screamed and ran at me nearly knocking me over. then kate and chris got in a massive fight and he left us at the museum.

so she and i went to the grocery to get some food for dinner. i never know that two girls could eat so much. we ate an entire baguette, an entire head of broccoli, a jar of spaghetti sauce and a can of apples. yikes.

we were planning on going to soho to get some coffee at this great coffee shop and then to patisserie valerie for snacks (which was great, we went there thursday. i had raspberry mousse, with whip cream, fruit and white chocolate) but kate and i didnt want to walk around soho by ourselves since two people had just been murdered there on tuesday night. we ended up going to this halal coffee shop near the flat. when we came back chris decided that he wanted to talk and they left me in the living room watching friends, will and grace, and sex in the city (all things shown in america about 4 months ago). cue screaming and crying for the next hour while i hang out on the couch. finally kate came out and we talked for a bit. i told her she wasnt allowed to come home no matter what because quitting is bad. so she said she wouldnt and we said good bye. i took a bus back to piccadilly and it was nearly 1130 when i came back in. tweedledee and tweedledum were gone and there were two new girls who i think i made mad by flipping on the lights and proceeding to pack my stuff. they can deal with it. who goes to bed at 1130 on a friday night anyways?

Saturday

got up really really early. finished packing. checked out. went to catch a bus to victoria train station. saw the famous london fog. caught the bus. found the right train. got to the airport amazingly without any hangups. checked in. spend a load of money on perfume in the duty free shop (a new christian dior, and a cacherel). i wanted to get burberry (because it was english) but it was still way too expensive (nearly $80) and i couldnt find the one i liked. after that got breakfast (cappuccino, no muffin, a pain au chocolate, an apple danish and a scone for mom) then spent the last few pounds on cadbury chocolate for dad and cadbury eggs for tony. waited for the plane. spend 8.5 hours on the plane. got to minneapolis/st paul. got ripped off ($5.53 for a smoothie?!?) and sat in the airport for 4 hours. finally got a plane to cinci. slept all the way. stopped at wendys for a burger on the way home. rejoiced at having a nice shower and my own bed.

and that folks wraps up my trip to london. hope you enjoyed hearing about it as much as i had doing it!

ok here is a quick highlight of "the complete history of america (abridged)" from last night. it was incredibly funny. kate and i laughed so hard at some parts and i am pretty sure that we are some of the very few people that got most of the jokes.

*"I heard a shot" + "I heard a shot, Monsieur" + "I heard a shot, Senor" + "I heard a shot, Comrade" = The Shot Heard 'Round the World (which was fired from the scroll repository)

*Giant Abraham Lincoln had a velcro "alive" face which ripped off when he was shot (by a John Wilkes Booth that looked strangely like Charlie Chapman). This event (apparently) triggered the joke "But aside from that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you like the show?"

*"You can't talk about Jimmy Hoffa in the abstract. You have to talk about Jimmy Hoffa in the concrete."

*Midget Revolutionary War soldiers (MinUTE Men)

*When writing the Declaration of Independence, our forefathers had to dumb it down a little, since "someday there might be a president who can't pronounce all these big words!"

*George Washington, talking to the troops at Valley Forge, told of his plan to penetrate past the last membrane of the British (etc.) into Virgin-ia, thus becoming the father of our country.

*Dr. Seuss' "Sam I Am" becomes Uncle Sam, with his own new poem in Vietnam "i do not like your vietnam. i do not like it sam i am."

*"I wanted to make love to her in the worst way; standing up, in a hammock..."

*Famous siblings Betsy and Diana Ross, JEdgar (one word) and Herbert Hoover

*A potential national flag: red with the word America across it, where the M is the McDonald's arch and the other potential flag that was red, white and blue with the writing "i <3 money" across it.

*and the happy ending that americans always expect at the end of their story which included michael jackson becoming black again

so we had a great time at the show last night. and then i came back to three new roommates. all american girls this time and nice as far as i can tell.

today was pretty cool as well. i tried to sleep in as best i could with the two incredibly loud roommates that i now have. i didnt think it was possible to make that much noise by banging a suitcase around and closed. so after they had woken me up i went ahead and got out of bed anyways. i was supposed to meet kate at 11am so i walked up regent street to the store accessorize where i had previously seen a hat i really liked. i didnt end up getting the hat but i did get a new pair of earrings and a ring. after that it was down to hamleys toy store. that place is huge. sadly i didnt make it past the second floor before i had to leave to walk to the class building to meet kate. i did however purchase 3 of their world famous teddy bears. i got one dressed as a guard, one dressed as a bobby, and a really soft white one with a pink bow around its neck. the first two are for katie and abby and the white one is for me.

so i met kate at the building and she was flipping out because there was some trouble with her application for a research grant and her and chris were trying to get it fixed but it was not being cooperative. i just sat and read a the sun newspaper until they were ready. chris had to go to a class in the afternoon so it was just kate and me. we got some really good sandwiches from this shop around the corner (i had a tuna melt, she had chicken, brie and cranberries) and we ate while we walked down through whitehall toward the houses of parliament and westminster abbey. parliament was in session when we went down and there were several protests going on in various areas near it. there was one display of anti-war signs and such and then there was a rather large group of people from the public transport i believe who were protesting something that had to do with taxis. im not really sure but i think some time next week, the underground workers are going on strike. i dont know much about it though. because of all the protestors, there was also a large number of metropolitan police around and they even had their hats on. so kate went up to one of them and asked him if he would mind being in a picture with me and my newly purchased "bobby" bear. he we like "oh yeah right... i see" but he let kate take the picture. ha ha.

we went on around the abbey and we must have been blending well because some random guy asked us for directions to the school. which fortunately we knew how to direct him to. after that we went to the special entrance of the abbey.

we informed them we were there for the service and the guards let us in. there were probably only 15 people or so who were there for the service which was in the main service area but blocked off from the tourists. basically the mass was catholic service done light. there were only a few minor changes and subtractions. i wasnt really sure about some of the sitting and standing and kate and i werent really sure about communion but we went anyways. it was one of those deals where you had to go kneel at the rail as the priest walked along. most people were dipping their hosts in the wine cup which for some reason i thought was a big no no for catholics so i didnt do that. but they guy with the chalice stuck it in my face and tipped the cup up so kate and i got wine whether we wanted it or not. and i was nervous that i was going to end up wearing it or with it all down my face. but all was well.

after the service we waited for a bit to see if the priest forgot about us. he didnt. he came out and talked to us for a bit about the history of the abbey and then he took us on our own private guided tour of westminster abbey. how cool is that? kate and i got our own tour (from a priest) or westminster abbey for FREE!!! thats the best kind. i should add here that the priest happens to be the director of the notre dame program in london (and also chris's theology professor) so our guide was a big wig at ND. yay for us. it was great too because he told us whatever he could think of about the abbey as he showed us around and he even took us into all the parts that are closed off to normal tourists (like the old high alter that is no longer used and hidden behind the new alter). he explained all about who sits where and what certain things were used for. it was amazing. we got to go all over and hear all the info we wanted to know. and then he took us next door and showed us around st. margarets chapel. what a great time.

after that kate and i hopped on one of the fun double decker busses. i got off at hyde park corner because i was going over to kensington and she was headed back to her flat to do some homework. so i spent a good long time (maybe 1/2 hour) walking from one end of hyde park to the other and then through kensington gardens. the gardens are really pretty but i bet they would be amazing in the spring and summer when all the flowers are blooming. i have to add that the squirrels are really tame there. i stopped to take a photo and the next thing i know i have a squirrel chewing on my shoe. crazy little thing. i decided to take a tour of the state apartments which were also fantastic. it talked a lot about debutantes and being presented at court as well as a trip through queen victoria's bedroom and dressing room. my favorite part though was the dress collection. they had a collection of some of the queen's original dresses (all absolutely gorgeous) and about 100 of her hats as well as about 10 to 15 of princess diana's dresses (all beautiful as well).

after i left the palace i took the bus up to marble arch, picked up some food and a newpaper and went to kate's flat. the guy at the front desk was a total idiot. i tried to ring kate and she and chris couldnt figure out how to work the door lock but i ended up getting in. i asked if i needed to sign in as a guest and they front dest moron asked who i was here to see. i explained to him and told him that i wasnt sure if they were flat 26 or not and he told me that if she wasnt coming down and i didnt know if she was really in flat 26 i had to go back outside and call up and stand there until either she came and let me in or i was 100% sure. he was a total jerk about it. one of the other people who apparently worked there asked me if i wanted to come in and use the phone inside and i told him that the man at the front dest siad i couldnt come in until my friend would come to get me. hopefully he was his boss and yelled at him. i would feel a little better at least.

we had skyline 3 ways for dinner. i also had some fruit and a parfait that i bought at safeway and a fruit twist fanta. i helped kate clean up the mess and then caught a bus back to trafalgar square to go to the national gallery because it is open until 9pm on wednesday nights. i got to see some fantastic paintings including jan van eyck's "arnolfini portriat" and lost of beautiful monet's, cezanne's and seuraut's. it was fabulous. i loved it.

i think now im going to head back to the room and plan out tomorrow because i have no idea what i will be doing. i am meeting kate and chris for dinner and then chris and i might go see a play while kate is suffering through her "play without words" that neither chris nor i are interested in.

later!

ok. you get a relatively short one tonight for various reasons. one of them being that i am sooooooooooooo tired because i stayed up late last night to blog and then had to get up at 630 to make it to my tour on time. the other is because i only have about a half an hour left on my time here and i have to meet kate at 715 so we can see the complete history of america abridged. it should be a funny one.

so i got up early this morning and i was dragging pretty bad. the room was freezing cold last night and that made it really difficult to sleep. plus for some reason my roommates kept coming and going through out the night. hmm. no idea what they were up to. so anyways i got up early and got ready. the breakfast room opened 15 mins before i had to be at my pickup so i scarfed some toast and jam and orange juice and headed out. i only had to walk 30 seconds down the road for my pickup but i had to be there on time. it was at the regent palace hotel and they had a coffee bar so i got a cappuccino and waited. and waited. and waited. it was about 10 mins after my pick up time and the concierge noticed i was still there and i showed him my ticket. he was nice enough to call for me and they new they had to get me it was just that the coach was stuck in morning traffic. so then the lady comes in to get me and i go onto the coach and no one else is there. according to the lady all the other people who they were supposed to pick up were not at the place they needed to be. we went to one other hotel and that person failed to show up as well. so they took me (on the bus all by myself) to the main tour office and pointed out my meeting place. there were about 13 people total going on the tour. it was a nice size group.

the first place we went was to greenwich where we stopped briefly to see the cutty sark and some other ship that i really didnt find too interesting. some little sail boat that this guy sailed around the world. ok. next. we went back on the coach and drove past the royal observatory. we didnt get to stop so i didnt get my fun tourist picture of standing with one foot on either side of the prime meridian. boo for not getting cheezy tourist pictures.

next we continued our trip down to leeds castle. it is positively gorgeous. the grounds are amazingly beautiful. i cant imagine how fabulous they look during the spring and summer when all the flowers are blooming. so we got to the castle around 1030 and we got to have a morning tea and scone. i have to take a second here to talk about the scones. i had no real idea what exactly a scone was for the most part until i got mine. a scone is what the british call a biscuit because to them biscuits are cookies. got that? scone = biscuit (sometimes with things in them. these had white raisins) and biscuit = cookie. try to keep up. and i need to backtrack a minute. i was the only person who was traveling alone on this tour so i was adopted by a flock of gay men. they were great. i had a really good time chatting and making friends with them. all but one of them were from miami florida. they just cracked me up. they werent really flaming but it was clear that they were uh... not just friends. so anyways i had tea and a scone with 7 incredibly cool gay guys. fun times. when they were almost finished they had me take a picture of them holding up their tea cups. ha ha. it still makes me smile and shake my head. but anyways back to the scones. the proper way to eat a scone is to cut it in half, spread butter on both sides, spread your jam over the butter (if you prefer jam) and then put clotted cream (another term for really heavily whipped cream and sugar) over the jam. you can make a sandwich or eat each side separately. the sandwich is kinda difficult to do with out having the cream mush out the sides. and tea with cream in it... my god its a miracle the english arent the size of whales. but i dont care. im on vacation so i can eat as badly as i want.

after the tea we had time to explore the grounds so i walked through the gardens and out to the maze. they have one of those really cool hedge mazes. my gay friend had already mostly made it through. i wandered around a bit but was lost and couldnt find my way out of the maze (imagine that) so i had to get the guide to direct me. side note: they have a paid guide to stand in the center and keep people from being irretrievably lost (as i would have been no doubt had i not gotten his help). turns out i made a mistake as soon as i entered the maze. turn right not left. once you made it to the center of the maze you could go down into this really cool grotto and then back out.

after that i went and explored the castle. you know, they rent it out for weddings, but i never got a quote. somehow i think it may be a bit out of the price range if i do ever get around to getting married... the castle was beautiful on the inside. i cant imagine what it was like to live there. it on this island out in the middle of a lake so you look out the windows and are surrounded by water. so cool. i dont have any pics from inside the castle b/c they wont let you take them any more on account of the fact that they had a burglary a few years back and they theives had mapped the place out by taking photos of everything before hand. smart crooks.

on to canterbury from there. first we had lunch at this little restraunt. i had some fish and chips that were pretty good. not exceptional. ive had better but they were still good. i didnt get to lunch with my gay friends though. instead i had lunch with a mother and daughter (who is 18) from buenos aires. they were super nice. the mom couldnt speak english and my spanish is horrendous but i still tried and her daughter new english so if i couldnt get it out in spanish then she translated for her mother.

after lunch it was on to the cathedral which was pretty cool. i dont have any photos from inside there either because you had to buy a pass to be allowed to take pics. after i explored there for a while i went to a shop to make my special purchase for the day. i bought a copy of geoffry chaucer's canterbury tales. yay for me being such a tourist.

i slept most of the bus ride back so i feel a bit better now. i also picked up a cafe mocha from cafe nero right around the corner. i have to meet kate in 10 minutes so i need to get moving along. i have no idea what i am doing tomorrow. i take that back. i have a bit of an idea. im going to amuse myself for a bit in teh morning, meet kate for lunch at 11 and then we are taking in a service at westminster abbey. after the service, we will be getting a private tour (for free i might add... YAY) from one of chris's professors who is a minister (preacher?) there and he will be saying the service so that will be great. after that i have no idea what will occupy the afternoon or evening so you will just have to check back later.

miss everyone! have a great day!

wow. lots of interesting things to report from the last 36 hours or so. not much bad thought which is a sign that the gods of international travel are starting to look upon me with some bit of favor.

so last night kate chris (who needs to be renamed "grumpy") and i went on the jack the ripper walk. i cant say that i was so incredibly impressed that i would go on it again. it was decent enough. not really as interesting as i thought it was. and i was kinda nervous that i would get my stuff stolen while we were walking because this area of town is pretty shady. very shady actually. and we got serenaded by drunk people at one point. and then it started snowing the big fluffy white flakes. really hard i might add. so that makes three days that i have been here now and 2 of those three days i have been snowed on at some point during the day. lets pray for now snow tomorrow. so as it is snowing very much blizzard like these drunks start wishing the group "merry christmas" and "happy new year" it was pretty amusing. a bit more entertaining than the tour actually.

so after the tour we caught the tube back and i left kate and chris to catch my exchange. when i got back to the room i had two new room mates. a french girl named laurenica (who had a massive chip on her shoulder about something) and a really nice girl from madrid. so we ended up talking for a long time which really put a kink in my plan to get a decent amount of sleep for the night. but it was woth it b/c they had some very intersting things to say.

i got up this morning to move out of my not as great as it sounded hostel to my new and greatly improved hostel. with no problems at all. not even lost once so far. so my new hostel is great. all you have to do is walk right out exit on of the picadilly underground station and then thirty seconds up the street directly infront of you. absoulutely fabulous location. so i got checked in and stored my luggage away until i could go to my room and decided to wander about until it was time to meet kate for lunch. i had no map so i really didnt know where i was going but i thought i would try to get to buckingham palace to see the changing of the guard. so i just started walking down lower regent street until i passed the pall mall and came to a park. so then i see this parade of horses and a crowed gathered so i thought i must be there. it took me standing around for a few minutes to realize that i was not a buckingham palace but it looked interesting enough so i stayed around to check it out. the ceremony was pretty interesting. after wards i still had time so i decided to find out where exactly i was and what i had just witnessed. turns out that i had accidentally stumbled upon the changing of the horse guards at whitehall. these are the guys that apparently keep a small guard out side number 10 downing street. for those of you who dont know... number 10 downing street happens to be the current residence of our good friend tony blair.

after that i checked out the britain visitors center that i happened to find durning my wandering without a map. yes i didnt know exactly where i was but that doesnt qualify as lost because i had a general idea. so i went in there to pick up so travel info for day trips. i met up with kate at picaddilly circus and she took me to her classroom building to have lunch because they have a really cheap sandwich shop there. the two people working there were great. there was a guy maybe in his 40s who was making small talk and asked us if we had a good weekend. so we were talking about some stuff and some how freemasonry came up and i asked him is he was a mason. he wasnt but he said that many people he knows are masons and i told him that dad was. i think he thought i was a student because he asked when my parents were coming to visit and i said they werent. but he told me that if they ever do come to london to look him up. but the funny thing is that i have no idea what his name is. i may ask because i will probably have lunch there again before the end of the week. and lunch was great too. i had a spicy chicken sandwich with all the toppings. mmmm. and kate was really excited that i gave her one of the boxes of raisins that i brought with me. aaaaah. its the little things in life.

after lunch i was once again on my own but left with plans to meet for dinner and a play. i ended up going to the visitor center and booked a tour for tomorrow. i will be going to canterbury, dover, greenwich and leeds castle with an afternoon cream tea at the castle. its gonna be fun. except for the fact that i have to get up at 630 and it is around 1230 am right now. ill be draggin i think.

after that i went on another guided tour that was not any good at all so i wont bother to talk about it. the only thing i will say is that i think i do better on my own and it is free to be on my own so i wont be taking any more walks probably.

after that i went back and moved into my room. nice and clean. the bathrooms are great adn i like this place 10x more than the other place.

i met kate and chris for dinner. we at at this thai/japanese place. i had singapore noodles that were really good and they heaped it on there. it was great value for the money. after dinner i was going to see the play with chris and kate that they had to see for class. we walked over to the south bank of the thames and i went to get a ticket and they had not student tickets left. i wasnt about to pay 34 pounds for one either so i left them and walked back to the west end to find something to amuse me. i was thinking about phantom of the opera but i settled on a production of when harry met sally starring luke perry (from beverly hills 90210) and alyson hannigan (from buffy and american pie). my ticket was for the 7th row which was great. the play was pretty amusing itself. it had some laughs in it for sure. after that i made my way back to the hostel where the excitement didnt end.

i was just getting ready to get into the shower when the fire alarm when off and everyone had to evacuate the building. we had to stand around outside in the cold. the fire brigade even came. two trucks in fact!!! and all the firemen went running into the building with all their gear on. lost of excitement. i met a fun guy from georgia while we were standing around outside.

the fire brigade visiting the hostel was he end of the nights excitement. they wasted a good bit of my time but it was still amusing. i dont know what happend but my guess is that some idiot decided to be too lazy to take the lift downstairs to smoke and just lit one up in a room. which is really stupid in a smoke free building. way to be genius.

so now i think here is the place i say good night. grandpa i read your email and i havent had any fish and chips yet. i may get some tomorrow night though when i get back because i will be in a hurry. right atfer i get back i have to grab some food and meet kate because we are going to see the reduced shakespeare comedy troupe's performance of "the history of america (abridged)" which should be really funny. and i am really tired and need to go sleep for a while before my busy day tomorrow. and i need to lay off the trial mix that i am munching on as i type. nght everyone!