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beelikejI had planned to post the rest of my London rapport sooner, but I have been falling asleep on the couch all evenings in the past week. Work was busy, but I think it was mostly all the stuff that was going around in my head concerning the cut of my hours in the near future. A short update on the situation; since I officially objected to my boss' decision, he now has to apply for a permit to continue downsizing. I will get a letter from the unemployment agency to which I can protest. Then there will possibly be another round of arguments before the agency either hands out of refuses a permit. Even though my boss gave me notice over two weeks ago, I'm still waiting for the letter. Until then I can't do anything but go to work with a smile on my face. (Haha).
Anyway, I was going to tell you about my trip to London! I'm putting this behind a "spoiler-cut" with square brackets instead of an old fashioned "LJ-cut" because LiveJournal in its infinite wisdom has decided to replace the familiar and sensible parenthesis with a childish image of scissors (a "cut", get it?). I understand the symbol is not visible on some users' browsers and personally I just hate the change (if it ain't broke don't fix it), so spoilercut it is...
Saturday, April 7
(continued from here).
London, day 2: after breakfast
While searching for a shop I had discovered online, we explored the Covent Garden area and ended up in The Seven Dials; a set of streets with quaint little shops; on the right you see Hans walking though a small alley to Neil's Yard.
Neil's Yard; isn't it awesome? So pretty with all the colours! Plus we found the shop I was looking for! (Bought delicious Comfrey & Mallow Footbalm)
Cool graffiti in the alley
When we walked back towards the centre of town, we came by this building-site art by Nathan Bowen
When we passed the Palace Theatre with the Singing In The Rain façade, Hans couldn't resist; he had to swirl around a lamppost:)
We decided to check out tonight's theatre The Duke Of York, to find out how to get there later and to see if we could maybe already pick up our reservations for All New People. (We could, yay!)
View from The Duke Of York. (Sorry, I'm too lazy to check the streetname or sights;) Enjoy the impressive buildings.
While I was leading brotherdearest to Piccadilly Circus (for a visit to bookstore Waterstone's and drugstore Boots) I had meant to quickly bypass M&M's world on Leicester Square. Unfortunately Hans sensed my discomfort and decided we had to go in. Well, he is my little brother and he had been so sweet up until now, accompanying me to all the shops on my list without complaining. Still. I think that doesn't compare to the horror of what I was about to experience...
Four floors of M&M madness, oh pardon, 'merchandise'. It smelled like chocolate but there were humansize dancing M&M's and what little comfort I got from the scent was blown away by the weirdness of it all. I repeat: FOUR FLOORS.
Okay, this was kind of cool, especially the wall with M&M's in an overwhelming amount of colours. But again: on FOUR FLOORS.
Ahw, look at hiscrazy happy wittle face. *pinches cheeks and then slowly steps away*
And then look at my not so happy face when I discover the Periodic Table of M&M's. I think my exact words were "Oh. My. God." (I didn't know Hans was taking a picture of me until I heard him giggling. Bastard)
After climbing ALL the stairs and checking ALL four floors, Hans finally showed mercy and we went back outside to continue our walk to one of MY favorite stores. Pfew. I was also relieved to see the apostroph was still on the front of Waterstone's. That restored my faith in humankind a little;)
With bags full of books and toiletries (from Boots), we took the Tube to the hotel. On the way we grabbed food at Pret a Manger and had lunch in the park before finally checking into a room where we collapsed on the beds.
We napped until 4 p.m. *grins*
Well, I had to take a photo of my loot first, but then it was really nice to be able to sleep in a bed for a bit, after the long night on the bus and boat.
Completely refreshed we went back into town around 5 for our visit to the Hamleys Toystore, where it was busier than I had ever seen it!
There was an awesome LEGO display of the royal family.
The Queen was sitting in the corner with her little dog. Ahw.
For dinner we went to my favorite restaurant Mother Mash for mashed potatoes with steakpies and for dessert pudding and warm custard. Omnomnom.
Then we walked through Regent Street to get to the theatre. I tried to make a photo of the Abercrombie & Fitch ad across the street. Grumble, stooopid tourists...
My darling brother saw my struggle and having the advantage of height and a better camera, shot a photo especially for me. Obviously, he is totally forgiven for the M&M thing;)
Then it was time for the play All New People, written by and featuring Zach Braff, which is why we wanted to see it. Extra bonus was Eve Myles (Torchwood) who played another one of the four people in the play, who all end up together in a beach house in the wintertime. - If you want to know more, you can find a review from![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
nick730 which I mostly agree with here.
We had great seats, but I had a bit of bad luck with tall men in front of me, the last one coming in after the lights went out, so Hans and I didn't have an opportunity to swap. In addition I was distracted by dumb people beside me who kept checking their phone throughout the performance. Grrrrr. Luckily I still enjoyed the play, because I was just so happy to be there.
Afterwards we noticed a bunch of people hanging around the side-exit of the theatre and since we suspected they were waiting for the actors, we stuck around for a while.
Zach did indeed come outside and was ever so nice: signing programs and posing for photos (he even made some arm length pics for people who were on their own!). We only took pictures from behind the crowd, but it was really nice to see him in person. A great end to a wonderful day!
We went back to the hotel, where Hans crashed while I got comfy in the tub. So comfy in fact that I fell asleep and didn't wake up until Hans started banging on the door. Oops. Luckily I had put my book away and had added warm water right before I dozed off;)
I didn't waste any more time getting ready for bed, since we had to get up early for the busride home...
To be continued:)
Anyway, I was going to tell you about my trip to London! I'm putting this behind a "spoiler-cut" with square brackets instead of an old fashioned "LJ-cut" because LiveJournal in its infinite wisdom has decided to replace the familiar and sensible parenthesis with a childish image of scissors (a "cut", get it?). I understand the symbol is not visible on some users' browsers and personally I just hate the change (if it ain't broke don't fix it), so spoilercut it is...
Saturday, April 7
(continued from here).
London, day 2: after breakfast
While searching for a shop I had discovered online, we explored the Covent Garden area and ended up in The Seven Dials; a set of streets with quaint little shops; on the right you see Hans walking though a small alley to Neil's Yard.
Neil's Yard; isn't it awesome? So pretty with all the colours! Plus we found the shop I was looking for! (Bought delicious Comfrey & Mallow Footbalm)
Cool graffiti in the alley
When we walked back towards the centre of town, we came by this building-site art by Nathan Bowen
When we passed the Palace Theatre with the Singing In The Rain façade, Hans couldn't resist; he had to swirl around a lamppost:)
We decided to check out tonight's theatre The Duke Of York, to find out how to get there later and to see if we could maybe already pick up our reservations for All New People. (We could, yay!)
View from The Duke Of York. (Sorry, I'm too lazy to check the streetname or sights;) Enjoy the impressive buildings.
While I was leading brotherdearest to Piccadilly Circus (for a visit to bookstore Waterstone's and drugstore Boots) I had meant to quickly bypass M&M's world on Leicester Square. Unfortunately Hans sensed my discomfort and decided we had to go in. Well, he is my little brother and he had been so sweet up until now, accompanying me to all the shops on my list without complaining. Still. I think that doesn't compare to the horror of what I was about to experience...
Four floors of M&M madness, oh pardon, 'merchandise'. It smelled like chocolate but there were humansize dancing M&M's and what little comfort I got from the scent was blown away by the weirdness of it all. I repeat: FOUR FLOORS.
Okay, this was kind of cool, especially the wall with M&M's in an overwhelming amount of colours. But again: on FOUR FLOORS.
Ahw, look at his
And then look at my not so happy face when I discover the Periodic Table of M&M's. I think my exact words were "Oh. My. God." (I didn't know Hans was taking a picture of me until I heard him giggling. Bastard)
After climbing ALL the stairs and checking ALL four floors, Hans finally showed mercy and we went back outside to continue our walk to one of MY favorite stores. Pfew. I was also relieved to see the apostroph was still on the front of Waterstone's. That restored my faith in humankind a little;)
With bags full of books and toiletries (from Boots), we took the Tube to the hotel. On the way we grabbed food at Pret a Manger and had lunch in the park before finally checking into a room where we collapsed on the beds.
We napped until 4 p.m. *grins*
Well, I had to take a photo of my loot first, but then it was really nice to be able to sleep in a bed for a bit, after the long night on the bus and boat.
Completely refreshed we went back into town around 5 for our visit to the Hamleys Toystore, where it was busier than I had ever seen it!
There was an awesome LEGO display of the royal family.
The Queen was sitting in the corner with her little dog. Ahw.
For dinner we went to my favorite restaurant Mother Mash for mashed potatoes with steakpies and for dessert pudding and warm custard. Omnomnom.
Then we walked through Regent Street to get to the theatre. I tried to make a photo of the Abercrombie & Fitch ad across the street. Grumble, stooopid tourists...
My darling brother saw my struggle and having the advantage of height and a better camera, shot a photo especially for me. Obviously, he is totally forgiven for the M&M thing;)
Then it was time for the play All New People, written by and featuring Zach Braff, which is why we wanted to see it. Extra bonus was Eve Myles (Torchwood) who played another one of the four people in the play, who all end up together in a beach house in the wintertime. - If you want to know more, you can find a review from
nick730 which I mostly agree with here.We had great seats, but I had a bit of bad luck with tall men in front of me, the last one coming in after the lights went out, so Hans and I didn't have an opportunity to swap. In addition I was distracted by dumb people beside me who kept checking their phone throughout the performance. Grrrrr. Luckily I still enjoyed the play, because I was just so happy to be there.
Afterwards we noticed a bunch of people hanging around the side-exit of the theatre and since we suspected they were waiting for the actors, we stuck around for a while.
Zach did indeed come outside and was ever so nice: signing programs and posing for photos (he even made some arm length pics for people who were on their own!). We only took pictures from behind the crowd, but it was really nice to see him in person. A great end to a wonderful day!
We went back to the hotel, where Hans crashed while I got comfy in the tub. So comfy in fact that I fell asleep and didn't wake up until Hans started banging on the door. Oops. Luckily I had put my book away and had added warm water right before I dozed off;)
I didn't waste any more time getting ready for bed, since we had to get up early for the busride home...
To be continued:)
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no subject
Date: 2012-04-14 04:06 pm (UTC)Personally I don't mind the scissor symbol - but I like the brackets better, and it has always annoyed me that the site reload when the cut was clicked - with the spoiler cut it doesn't reload. I really don't see why we would want to use the cut intead of the spoiler cut then? I don't know if we can link directly to a spoiler cut though - that might be why we need the LJ-cut still.... eh... okay, I am just thinking out loud in your LJ. :-)
no subject
Date: 2012-04-14 04:16 pm (UTC)I hope you feel better soon. We had a blast in London, I'd never traveled with this brother before, but he was a great compagnion:)
I don't like the scissor symbol because I'm not a fan of icons in the middle of my text (like how some chat-settings show smiley faces when you type ":-)") and because the parenthesis show exactly what the text is; information you can read or ignore if you want. Even though the LJ-cut is called a cut and I get the joke, the symbol doesn't make sense to outside visitors. If they are gonna keep it (which I don't doubt they will) it will be better recognizable with parenthesis.
I do like the way the spoiler cut works (cudos to LJ for coming up with that) but agree that it can't replace the original LJ-cut because you can't link to it. Which is a function I use when I have multiple cuts in artwork-posts for instance.
Feel free to talk more here, that's why I prefer a journal over other social networks;)
no subject
Date: 2012-04-15 09:05 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-04-14 08:05 pm (UTC)- Aaaahahahaha, you had to go into the M&M's Store. Ahahaha. *laughs and points* (But seriously, that wall IS cool. So many colors!)
- YOU SAW ZACH BRAFF. And he looks so lovely and pinchable <3! How was Eve? I can never really tell whether she's a good or terrible actresz, it's weird.
- Dude, falling asleep in the tub. Tsssk. I bet Hans was worried. Loving his Singin' In The Rain pic, by the way.
Siiiigh I want a vacation now!
no subject
Date: 2012-04-15 08:26 am (UTC)LEGO RULES!
*glares* Shut up. You're only brave enough to point and laugh because you know I'm scarred for life now and could never get you back by dragging you in there. *wobbly lip* It was horrible *shivers*
Zach is the sweetest. Or coolest, as I'm guessing he would like to be described;) I know exactly what you mean about Eve and can't really give you a clear answer. She didn't have her own Welsh accent here, that felt a bit off, but I can't judge that for sure. In addition to the stupid audience my opinion is also coloured because I couldn't relate to any of the characters; petty as it may be, I just have problems liking dope and cokeheads. There was also a lot of smoking on stage which didn't set well with me either. Their personalities all managed to annoy me, so that must mean the actors were convincing *grins*
Aside from the M&M's issue, my brother is pretty good company:) I wouldn't mind making a longer trip with him, but apparently that's what the girlfriend is for.