Friday, October 31, 2008

More Fun

Again it was a busy week, but I thought I'd catch up on this before the weekend hits. Sunday ended up being a mellow day. Meredith and I went to see a Banksy piece that's going to be painted over then we just hung around MTH for the day until a group of us aka the circle of friends went to La Tasca for dinner. It's a tapa's restaurant and it was so good, I definitely would go back. Then we just hung out and took it easy the rest of the night. Then Monday was pretty relaxed too. I went to H&M after work and got some gloves, a huge warm scarf, socks (to delay laundry) and a shirt all for under 20 quid. Then I headed home, got some food then we just got a drink in the ISH bar and hung out then I headed home and took it easy.

Tuesday after work I went to dinner at Jon Marx's house. He, David, Neil, and I had a lovely little dinner together then we watched some TV show about zombies. Perfect after dinner viewing. Then as Neil and I were leaving we saw that it was snowing. It was the first October snow in 70 years! Luckily Neil gave me a ride so I only had to walk a tiny bit in the wet snow, but still not tons of fun. I got home around 11 so I was tired from the day so I just went to bed.

Wednesday we had planned to go to the Lion King and just get tickets day of. It turns out that there were only 3 standing tickets available or tickets for 50 quid, which is more than I'm willing to pay. So a few people went to the Lion King but Meredith and Kallie decided to walk home but stopped at a few pubs on the way home. It turned into quite the night. We had lots of fun, especially at O'Neils on Wardour St. Then on our way home we happened to be walking down Carnaby St. so we went to The Diner. It was tasty as always. Then we made our way home.

Yesterday was fun. After work I went home, changed, ate and then went to the Astoria to the Black Kids concert. I was in the very front, right up against the bar and pretty center. It was a fun show, and it is the kick start to the concert week. Within 8 days - Thursday to the following Friday - I'm going to 4 concerts. FUN! After the show I headed back to ISH for karaoke night. It was a girl's birthday in our group so we sang Happy Birthday to her and just had an all around good time. Somehow there were glowsticks everywhere. I'm not quite sure where they came from but it was a good time. Then once the bar closed Meredith and I walked home after a funny stop at Great Portland Food and Wine and had a funtime sleepover then today I've been laying around and we were just laughing about last night. Oh man, fun times.

Monday, October 27, 2008

More Pictures

Pictures from country houses I went to, karaoke, the O Bar, Regent's Park, Camden, Banksy and maybe a few others

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2098613&l=7d12e&id=219703240

Sunday, October 26, 2008

I Like

So a bit has gone on in the past few weeks since I last blogged. I really should do this more often. Anyways, here's just a recap of what I've done since Bath and Stonehenge, and sorry if I repeat anything, I just don't know. I saw a talk by Moazzam Begg (?), he was imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay. It was pretty interesting to hear his story. That Friday I went to the Saatchi Gallery. There's an exhibit of contemporary Chinese art. It was a great exhibit, my favourite so far I'd say. The link to the pictures of the exhibit is below. Check it out. Then that night I saw Jenny Lewis. It was amazing, right up front.

The next day I woke up and headed to the British Museum to see the Hadrian exhibit but sadly I didn't see it because of timing so I walked around the museum a bit. They have this exhibit going on called Statuephilia and they had 3 different sculptures throughout the museum by various artists. One was a solid gold sculpture of Kate Moss, another was by Damien Hirst. It was quite neat. Then after that a group of us walked around trying to find a place to get a tattoo but we weren't very successful. After the unsuccessful search we went to The Diner and I got a hard shake which was tasty. The next day, Sunday, Kallie, Meredith and I went to see the comedian Sarah Silverman. I wasn't sure if I'd like her since I've seen some of her stuff and was kind of bleh about it but she turned out to be hilarious. I laughed the whole time, it was a good way to top off a great weekend.

This past week started off pretty mellow, Tuesday I just went to Yo! Sushi which is a pretty cool place. They have the food on different coloured plates and they just go around on a conveyor belt. After that I just came back and watched Love Actually and got really excited about being here around Christmas and seeing the decorations. Then on Wednesday I went to a private viewing at the National Gallery for the new exhibit about Renaissance and how the art changed during it. Then I went to the Syon House instead of going to work. My boss took me there. It's a huge house right outside of the city. It used to be a country house but the city closed in on it. It was cool to see though. Then that night I went to see Avenue Q again.

Thursday was fun. I worked then I bought some shoes for 4 quid then I went to karaoke at ISH and hung out with Jon Marx and a few of his friends who were pretty cool. It definitely was a fun night. Then Friday a group of us went to Brick Land and went to a ton of vintage stores and just wandered around. There also was a ton of cool street art in the East end as well. Then Meredith, Becky and I went to a snowboard fest/expo. It was a bit less that we thought it was going to be since it was really hyped up but it was cool. There was in indoor jump and there was a competition so that was neat. After we came back to MTH and played beer pong. I lost horribly. Then a group of us went out in Soho, we ended up going to The O Bar. We drank and danced and had fun for a while. Then we tried to go to The Diner but it was closed so we just came home. It was a fun night full of ridiculousness.

Then yesterday Meredith and I got tattoos in Camden. I got a Tudor Rose on the back of my arm. It was exciting. Then we went to a store across the road and I found some awesome shoes and they actually had my size so I snatched those up. Then we just wandered around Camden all day. Then we came back and hung out for a bit then I went to Soho and met up with Jon Marx and friends. It was an interesting night but quite fun. We started out at some bar then we went to Ghetto which I liked quite a bit. It's been a great weekend and today should be good as well. That's all for now, hopefully I'll post again soon.


Saatchi pics http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2098338&l=2fb6a&id=219703240

Jenny Lewis video of the show I was at http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=J1u-hrZn73Y

Sunday, October 19, 2008

Friday, October 17, 2008

Oh Wow.

Quite a bit has happened in the last 12 days, so I'll just recap what I can remember and try to do a best of kind of thing. It's been fun and I've been busy, hence why no update in ages. Also, I'm quite tired right now so bit of this might not make sense or may be ridiculous, fair warning.

I'll start with Wed the 8th Meredith, Shawn and I originally headed out get into the Ting Tings concert but the tube was taking too long so we headed to meet a bunch of people but we ended up going to a restaurant called The Diner. It was a really cool place and we had some food and I got a banana bread beer. It was pretty tasty, like banana bread in a glass. Then we decided to check out a club but it turns out it was kind of lame so we headed home but it was still a good night.

Then Thursday work was fine then after work I headed to ISH to eat then a group of us went into Emma and Becky's room and hung out and played ridiculous games and built a human pyramid. It was fun. Then karaoke happened. Overall it was a very fun night. Then Friday we woke up (I had a funtime sleepover) and we went and got delicious breakfast sandwiches then we got ready and went wandering and shopping. I had wanted to get some shoes but I just didn't find anything just amazing so I waited, but I did get a pretty sweet shirt. We again went to the Diner for lunch and I got a delicious burger but more importantly a strawberry cheesecake hard milkshake. Very tasty. After that we headed to Primark (a ridiculously busy big store but also ridiculously cheap) and I did get a nice hooded cardigan and a blanket. I was happy with my purchases. Then we got some food and Meredith and I tried again to go to the Ting Tings. No one thought we would get in since it was sold out but there were some touts/scalpers right outside the tube stop so we got tickets right away then got into the venue, got some drinks and found our spot. We were right up front, maybe 2 or 3 people in front of me. Also not only were we right up front but Meredith also got a guitar pick that the singer threw out. It was a fun show, I only knew a few of their songs but I enjoyed it, it's just fun music. After the show we just headed home and went to bed.

Saturday I woke up early and Kallie, Billy, Meredith and I headed to Stonehenge and Bath for the weekend. We took the train which was kind of fun. Meredith and I drew pictures and played games. Then we got so Salisbury then took a bus to Stonehenge. I had been there before but it was a good time. Then we headed back to Salisbury and wandered around and ate and just hung out for longer than expected. Then we took a train to Bath and arrived at about 9:30 and wandered around looking for a place to stay. We ended up staying at the YMCA. It was actually pretty nice. We dropped off our stuff then went out. We ended up only going to 1 bar, Belushi's, but it was a lot of fun. There was dancing, drinks, foam, and fun. Then we went and got some food then headed back kind of early.

The next day we woke up and headed to the Roman Baths. It was really cool. I love Roman history so it was cool to see a new part of their history. We also tried the super mineraly water from the hot springs. It was pretty bad, kind of like eggs. Then we went outside and there were some street performers. They did acrobatic things which were pretty impressive but what first gets your attention was that they were in sparkly man-thongs. They were pretty funny too, so we watched for a while. Then Meredith, Kallie and I went to the Fashion Museum. There was some interesting stuff in there, and some things to try on so that was fun enough. Then we just walked around a bit and went to a park and relaxed since we were all a bit tired. On our way to pick up our things and head to the train station we happened to find a mini-golf course so of course we couldn't pass it up and we played, I came in second, so not bad. Then after that we headed to the train station to head back but we had to take a bus part of the way to Swindon, which I recognized from the UK version of The Office. Then we caught the train back into Paddington station then went home. We were all a bit tired from a fun filled weekend.

That's all for now since I need to sleep really badly, I'll probably write about this again and in more detail but today Meredith and I went to to the Saatchi Gallery which has an exhibit of contemporary Chinese artists. It was really cool, I think my favourite so far. Then we walked to Soho, which was a rather long walk, to FedEx her absentee ballot. Then from there we quick ate some dinner, I called my Dad to say happy birthday, then we went to see Jenny Lewis at Koko. It was a great show but I am exhausted.

Friday, October 10, 2008

pictures

ooops. here's the link... http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2097001&l=342c6&id=219703240

More Picture Fun

here's more pictures. fair warning...some are a bit ridiculous.

Sunday, October 5, 2008

Woah

So I think quite a bit has happened this past week. I'm a bit tired so this post might not be the most coherent, but it works. The internship is getting more interesting. I met my other boss and she's so nice and pretty funny so that'll be nice working with her. She mentioned taking me out to some of the big country houses so hopefully that'll work out. I got a bit of a cold on Monday too, so that wasn't too fun but I did get sent home early two days this week so that was nice. Monday night I just hung out in the ISH bar. There was a singer guy there and he was pretty good, and he'll be there every Monday so that'll be nice.

On Tuesday I got sent home early but I headed to the Courtauld Gallery and checked out the Cezanne exhibit they had going on. I had no idea that the gallery had so many great works. I walk in the first room and I was just amazed. The Cezanne's were cool as well, I'm glad I went. Then that night Kris and I went to see Avenue Q. I've seen it before but I'd even see it again it's so funny. We went and got last minute tickets and we got 4th row right in the middle for only 20 pounds. It was such a good time. Then after we went to the ISHbar and hung out for a bit.

Wednesday I just kept it mellow and went to bed early to try to feel better since I knew little sleep would be had over the weekend. Thursday was a good day, I had lunch sitting by the Thames and I realized that my life is pretty great. Also I called my mom to tell her that we have Kimberly Clark paper towels in the bathrooms so I think of her in the bathroom, lovely I know.
That night it was karaoke at the ISHbar and that was a good time.

Friday a group of us went to the Tate Modern. There was some pretty interesting stuff there and a little ridiculous as well. I didn't seen any new installation in the Turbine Hall but I think they're in the middle of setting it up since I did see a giant spider and a big apple and a few other things there, so I'll just have to go back and see. One perk of my job is that I get into special exhibits for free. I haven't taken advantage of it yet but I want to go to the Rothko exhibit at the Tate Modern and there's a Francis Bacon exhibit at the Tate Britain, and at the Courtauld there's going to be a big Turner exhibit. I figure they're free so I might as well check them out. That night a group of us headed to the ISHbar were there for a while then we went to a pub across the street, The Albany. Then we went back to ISH for a little bit. It was a good but more mellow time. Then I hung out in Meredith's room and just talked about music and watched youtube videos.

Saturday I woke up and a few of us went to The Xpo. Apparently it's Fetish Week in London so we decided to go to the expo. It wasn't nearly as crazy as I thought it would be. There was a lot of rubber everywhere. There was a fashion show so that was good. Some of the things were actually just things you could wear out in life, but there were some outfits that were a bit crazier. So it was interesting and I'm glad I went, how often are there fetish expos in town right? After a long day of fetish I was a bit tired so I headed home and just relaxed for a while and I filled in my absentee ballot. Then last night a few of us planned on going to see some bands at some bar. We didn't have very good directions and weren't familiar with the area so we just went to a pub that was right by the tube stop which ended up being a really fun place. Then we left to catch the tube back and once again we ended up going to ISHbar. It was fun.

Today I woke up and a group of us headed to Speakers Corner. It was and is raining so there wasn't really anyone there. So we left right away and Kallie, Meredith and I went to Primark. I wasn't in the mood to go but I'd been putting it off so I had to go today to get a few things since I did kind of a bad job packing. It's always so busy since it's crazy cheap. I got a zip hoody, a sweater, a scarf, and a 3 pack of t-shirts for only 16 pounds, so not bad at all. Then we stopped in a few more shops on Oxford St. then went to ISH to eat but it was closed so we headed to a cafe across the street. Then I headed home and am just taking it easy in my pajama pants.