interstellarglue

Greetings from London!

I’m writing this on day two of our trip. Oddly enough it seems like it’s day three. Yesterday (our first day) seemed like two day. We landed in Heathrow at about 9:30 a.m. We awkwardly made it through customs and found our way to the tube station quite seamlessly. Two words sum up the way the rest of the day felt: jet lagathore. Okay, I guess that is only one real word, and one word that  made up, but saying “jet lag” really doesn’t express how awful we felt. We didn’t get a wink of sleep the entire time on the plane, which basically meant that we missed an entire night of sleep. I did, however, watch “What Happens in Vegas” on the plane, and I’d like to take a moment right now to thank Jenn for giving me adequate warning of how horrible that movie was. Oh god, it was just so bad. Not only was it not funny at all, but it also had a horrible message. But now is not the time do give reviews on crappy movies. The flight actually wasn’t that bad. Perhaps it was because I was so excited about getting to London, but I really didn’t feel like the flight was that long. My main complaint about the flight was that I was just so uncomfortable the whole time. 

So like I said, we made our way into the city via the Tube. I felt like death. We found our hotel quite easily, only to find that it was the wrong hotel. I was using my travel book as a reference to find the hotel, but I forgot that there is more than one easy hotel in London. Oops… Since we were so exhausted we took a cab to our actual hotel. It turned out pretty well actually, because this easy hotel is in a better location than the other. It’s not even a mile to Westminster Abbey and Buckingham Palace. 

Check-in wasn’t until 3, so we dropped our luggage off (for 5 quid, of course), and went exploring. My excitement was able to ease the jet lag for awhile, but it eventually came back. Kyle was hungry, so we found a little cafe that served very British-y breakfasts. He has a fried egg, beans, hash browns, grilled tomatoes and toast. Sounds pretty weird but it was actually quite tasty. I ordered the same thing as him, but the guy didn’t understand me, so he just brought me coffee. Haha! I’ve found that it’s kind of hard to understand the Brits, and likewise, they often don’t understand us. I’m constantly having to repeat myself when speaking to them. Oh god, what am I going to do in France?

After breakfast we decided we wanted to walk around and explore the area around our hotel. I could see the Houses of Parliament jutting out behind the trees, and the London eye as well. I knew that the Thames must be close if I could see those landmarks, so I told Kyle that it would be nice to find a bench and relax next to it. One might think that would be easy, as we would just have to go in the direction of the London Eye… well, it wasn’t. The streets of London do not form a grid, so you can easily go in the wrong direction. Our feet started to hurt (I was still wearing the sandals I was wearing on the plane) and the jet lag was coming back with a vengeance. I was becoming quite cranky. Kyle wanted to go check into the hotel, but I wanted to find the damn river. My frustration caused me to give up, so we walked back to the hotel. 

I knew going in that our hotel was going to be teeny tiny, but that didn’t take away from the shock of seeing it how teeny it was in person. It’s literally the size of a double size bed. There is a tiny area where the door opens as well. That’s where we keep all of our luggage. The bathroom is also a shower. But whatever, all we wanted to do was take a quick nap so we could go back out and explore. We set the alarm on Kyle’s 770 to go off in an hour (there is no alarm clock in this room). We both passed out as soon as our heads hit the pillow. It was heaven. When I got up I took a hot shower, which felt so nice… that is, until I was done. When I turned off the water, I was like… okay, now what do I do? I dried off the best I could and awkwardly got dressed. Waking Kyle posed a problem. He was reluctant (as usual). I told him that he had to get up, and try to adjust to London time. I wanted to  dry my hair, so I got our handy UK power adapter, plugged it in, and asked Kyle if he was sure this would work. He sleepily said, “yeah… I’m pretty sure.” I should have known better… I plugged it and it a huge bright blue spark lit up the electrical socket. I thought that either I was going to die, or the hotel was going to light on fire and we were all going to die. I let out a yelp and moved my hand as fast as possible, and just waited for the pain to sink in. Luckily, I felt nothing. My hand was black because the capacitor exploder in my hair dryer and left a back power residue. Thanks Kyle! I guess my hair dryer wasn’t built to take on that kind of electricity. It’s okay though, all of our other stuff works just fine. 

We decided to go out again (wet hair and all) and make our wait to the Somerset House to watch Brokeback Mountain on the outdoor screen. The Tube line we needed to take wasn’t working, so we (reluctantly) walked. It ended up being a pleasure to walk all of the way there (probably about 3 or so miles). We finally found the Thames (squee!) and walked along side it most of the time. We found a nice bench and decided to rest our feet. That was probably the most enjoyable thing we did all day. It was so beautiful. We walked by the Houses of Parliament and through Trafagar Square. London is truly an amazing city. It’s like none other I’ve ever seen. It’s a huge city, but it feels so tiny and personal.

 When we found the Somerset House our feet thanked us. Unfortunately, or backs did not. The Somerset House is a beautiful museum, but outside, the ground is made of bricks (I was picturing grass for some reason). Kyle got some chili, a jaffar pudding, a beer and a strawberry-pear hard cider. Delish! This was our first time watching Brokeback Mountain. Man, what a a beautiful movie. Had I not been in public, I would have been bawling. The presence of others certainly did not stop the girl behind us from giggling for the first part of the movie, and bawling throughout the second half. She also verbally expressed every emotion she felt throughout the whole damn movie… like we care.

After the movie, we walked to the center of Waterloo bridge. Everything was lit up. It was like a fairy tale. It was pushing midnight by then, so instead of walking or trying to navigate the public transportation system, we took a cab back to our hotel. We hit the mattress and passed out for 10 hours. I’m feeling relaxed and refreshed. 

Today we are seeing King Lear at the Globe. That’s all I have planned. I’m just going to let the city take us where it wants us to go.

P.S.- It only took us 10 minutes to get from Terminal C to Terminal E at George Bush International… plus, our plane was 15 minute early landing in Houston… all of that worrying for nothing!