Pigeons and PDA...

Liz, Katherine & Me w/ the London Tower Bridge

Okay call me Negative Nancy, but I found two things I don’t like. Pigeons and PDA: Go away, please? I realize neither of these things is unique to London, but they are everywhere here.

I’ll start with the pigeons. I hate hate hate them. Nothing disturbs the peacefulness of strolling through a quiet borough or the awe of standing in the shadow of the London Bridge like a hoard of dive-bombing pigeons. They are quite possibly the most worthless, ugly, annoying creatures on the planet. Admittedly, my aversion to pigeons goes back to a bad experience in Boston, which involved me standing in the middle of a large crowd of people with a certain something dripping down my forehead. (Even the 100 year-old couple sitting on the bench that could have passed as unconscious managed to see my living-nightmare and laugh at me. And point…ouch.) I’ve been slowly working on confronting my fear and I can proudly say that I no longer shriek out loud when they get too close. However, I still go into Quasimodo mode and duck and cover…it’s really cute.

Onto PDA…public displays of affection. Why is it a good idea to hug each other while walking up the stairs of the tube station when 3.5 million (actual fact…3.5 million use the London tube every day) other people just trying to make it from point A to point B? That seriously happened the other day. It was so awkward. My brother Adam would probably just call me cold-hearted, but it’s just unnecessary. This really doesn’t bother me even half as much as the pigeons, but just wanted to give you all an update.

Okay now for the events of the last few days! Yesterday and today marked our tenth and eleventh days across the pond. I went to my interview for CNBC and it went well. I always feel dumb in orientation-type settings when all I have to say is  okay, great, uh huh, okay, awesome. Yuck. But oh well…I’m excited to actually start working next week. It looks like I’ll go in at 7am on Tuesdays and Thursdays (which means I need to leave 40 Hogarth by 6:10am) and then either Monday or Wednesday morning too. I’m crossing my fingers for Wednesday mornings because that will give me a little more flexibility for weekend trips, but I’m up for anything.

After the interview I relaxed for a little bit and then headed to class from 4-6. We had to ‘reflect’ via prompts from our Missouri professor about our goals and how we will achieve them. It was actually nice because I know I’m going to wake up one day and realize I am only have a few days left. I’m still a little frustrated about having so much class though. They switched the program long after we committed to it, so now we are only working 20 hours a week and in class for 8 hours instead of full time working with one class, like last year. Great Britain changed the work visas so it’s no one’s fault, but I just hate that we are going to be doing all this class work instead of exploring London.

Enough complaining! Since I didn’t have to work today, I let Katherine convince me to go out with her and her flat mates. We just took the tube to Piccadilly Circus with absolutely no destination in mind, other than fun. Luckily, we found it. I think the place was called O’Neils. It was 3 stories and turned out to be a fun night. The first floor was the typical pub scene. I got a Bulmer’s cider, which I love…even if the bartender had to help me with the money because figuring out all the coins is quite a challenge. Up one flight was the Harpo’s-esque bar…then on the third floor we took advantage of live music and a flashy dance floor. It was great. The bad thing about going out here is that I can’t figure out how to do it without staying out until at least 3 or 4 in the morning. That doesn’t translate to a productive next day. Last night it only took us about an hour to navigate the Night Bus and then I skyped with my mom, dad and sister until the sun started rising so my early morning museum plans got …shifted.

All my flatmates except Liz had to work today, so we cleaned and then headed out with Katherine around 3. We got off the tube and crossed the Thames to find the HMS Belfast. A few miles later we found it. It is soo neat! It’s a big warship from the WWII era. This year is the 65th anniversary of D-Day so it was humbling to see a ship that was at the beaches of Normandy and one of the first to fire on the German forces. There just happened to be a huuuge yacht tied up to the ship that provided a very modern contrast to the Belfast. We made friends with a one of the crewmembers and he said it belonged to a Mexican millionaire who owns his own diamond mines. Wow. I kept thinking, ‘I wonder which boat Dad would be more interested in…’ Obvious. It was so big that the Tower Bridge opened up for it to get through on its way to Bermuda then Cayman and Miami, according to our crewman friend. What a life.

Time to go pack for Paris tomorrow. In 24 hours I will be there. I’m so excited to see Paris in the summer. Last time I went it was the beginning of January and beautiful, of course but I think summer Paris will be incredible. If you have suggestions please let me know!

HMS Belfast.

So neat! They have restored pretty much all of it to look like it would have in the 40s and 50s when it was still operating.

I'll try to get a better picture ASAP. :)

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Here's the Mexican diamond mine owner's boat. This is the only pic I got before my camera died and it really doesn't do it justice. But I had to try to get a shot for my dad. Think it would work at Table Rock?

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