Dare to be different and learn to be lonely

Last week(end) I traveled on the Eurostar to England for another businesstrip. I had a day of rest before work, and I decided to visit a part of London that had been on my to-see list for a while: Greenwich Park, the site of the Royal Observatory – the home of Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) and the Prime Meridian of the world. The trip there and back was even more fun that I had expected; it was such a relaxing, lovely area and I got to go on a fast boat over the river Thames!

Here's a picspam of my adventure :-)

( London in August is very green! )
I took so many pictures (There are 10 more photos on my Instagram!) but I also spent a lot of time walking around without making photos. The Royal Observatory is an interactive museum with loads of information on all things related to time and finding our place in the world. I highly recommend a visit!

J.

X-posted to https://beelikej.livejournal.com/584218.html
Lurk or comment wherever you like:)

Been busy with work and I spent the last two weekends doing absolutely nothing, which was bliss. It was great to return to the office after working from home since November; I really missed the cycling to and from work, but it took some getting used to again, rushing in the morning to get out of the house on time!

Now that I found my weekly rhythm again, I continued sorting my photo-album from October 2018. So here's Day 2 of my trip to London back then, where I continue my version of the Secret Walk of London and go to a musical:) In case you missed it, here is part 1. I noticed an issue with the photos there; apparently I downsized them with the wrong quality setting in Affinity Photo. I'm still learning the specifics of that program, I think I got it right for this new picspam. If you see anything wonky, let me know! Without further ado, let's start day 2:

( Tuesday October 23, 2018 )

To be continued with Day 3 soon!

J.

X-posted to https://beelikej.livejournal.com/572911.html

So I was supposed to go on this theatre trip to London in July 2020, but then the world got to go into lockdown and the play was cancelled. I was thrilled when I got a mail from the Young Vic theatre earlier this year announcing that they would put on Hamlet with Cush Jumbo after all and that my ticket would be valid for the new dates. I was very excited when I got the confirmation for Saturday October 17, a perfect day for me to organize traveling to London. Since the world still hadn't recovered fully, I planned for minimum travel: take the nightferry on Friday, spend Saturday in London and then one night in a hotel before catching the Eurostar train back to the Netherlands. Exactly the amount of traveling needed to see the play as comfortable as possible within the limitations.

I wouldn't have traveled at all if it wasn't for this rescheduled play, as the world was still not perfectly safe from Covid, but traveling was allowed with strict rules and I stuck to them all; wearing a face mask on the ferry and trains, getting tested within 2 days of arrival to the UK (even though I would leave again the next day, this test was still mandatory) and getting tested again to go back home. (Even though I am vaccinated, for traveling back into my country an additional negative test was needed). I was willing to do it all, just to see Cush Jumbo on stage.

I have taken the night ferry loads of times and love it lots, but for some reason this time it was too crowded and several things went wrong. The connecting train from Harwich was replaced with a temporary bus service, but that had also happened before, so I could deal. London Underground was hellish, with about half of the people not wearing a face mask (and in my opinion abusing the option for exemption) and for my afternoon tea I had to deal with a stuck up server, but I kept my eye on the price: a nice evening in the theatre... (I did have some fun in between all the hassle; I found a souvenir my mom had requested, I got to go shopping at Boots and Marks & Spencers plus I got fancy at Fortnum & Mason, so not everything was bad, but I did feel slightly off kilter all day)

And then, it was finally time to go to the theatre, yay! I was all giddy walking from Waterloo Station to the Young Vic, discovering Cush Jumbo's photo high up there. I took a picture with her in the background before going to enter the theatre, where I walked into a pamflet on the door stating that 'due to unforeseen circumstances, the evening performance was cancelled'! I was in shock but to be honest not that surprised, because of all the little things that went wrong, so of course this was the final thing that had to happen. I still went inside and found out the theatre had sent out an email in the afternoon, but I was glad I had missed that or I would have been moping all day and now I had at least had a somewhat pleasant day in London.
The staff was very nice and they were sad a rebooking was not an option for me. They did arrange an e-ticket for the online live performance at the end of the month and I got a program, which I loved.

I got on the Tube back to Leicester Square and walked through the theatre district to see if I could maybe get a ticket to another play, but I wasn't really in the mood for what was potentially available, so in the end I bought myself some comfort doughnuts and returned to my hotel where I relaxed in a bubbly bath with a book.

Of course I still did come home with a whole bunch of photos from that one day in London. See if you can discover all the signs that this just wasn't my lucky weekend;)

( A sunset, a sunrise and squirrels! )

So two weeks later I got to watch the play from home, on my computer. It was still great to see Cush Jumbo, but even though it was live and I got close ups, on screen is not really as intense as in the theatre, is it? I hope I get another chance to see her on stage in the future. (Now that she's living in the UK again, that could happen, right?) - good review of Hamlet by Nick here

J.

Right before travel was shut down to slow down the spread of the Corona virus, I went on a weekendtrip to London I had planned months before. I had a ticket to a play on Saturday and on Sunday I was going to meet up with friends at the British Museum, that I'd never been to. Unfortunately my friends had to cancel last minute, so I visited the museum by myself, specifically to find the Lewis Chessmen, a medieval chess set that was the inspiration for the Wizard chess in the Harry Potter films:)
But before that I spent a day strolling around and doing some (grocery!) shopping and of course I'm once again sharing photos of the traveling process *grins*

( Here's a picspam of my two days in London! )

J.

Last weekend I did a quick trip to London, mainly because I don't know what's gonna happen after Brexit and I so love to go there. I worked on Friday morning, then went home and packed my bags for the night boat across the Channel.
I didn't do any sightseeing, this was basically just a weekend to visit all my favorite foodspots and do some foodshopping. Also: Pottershops. Also also: bubblebaths.

Friday, March 22

Getting giddy over roadsign: not 'harbour', but ENGLAND, haha!
My cabin is mirrored from my previous trips, it's a bit confusing:)

( Food and graphic design in London (but mostly food) )

I had a great time. Glad I had taken Monday off, so I could take my time unpacking and enjoying my loot. I do hope they sort out this Brexit thing soon, because I want to go back to London this Summer and bring my mom:)

J.

I have not left LiveJournal, I'm merely trying the cross-posting from Dreamwidth to get the hang of it. When I found out they now offer image space, I wanted to give DW another chance:) The last time I made a back-up of LJ was halfway 2014, in the past week I updated my DW by transferring all the posts I made since then. I noticed that videos are not showing, I'll check up on that later. For now I just want to start posting again after a couple of busy weeks. I've been ignoring most of my social media because of a fangirl sleepover and a long weekend in London two weeks ago. Here's a picspam of the latter (I saw David Tennant and Daniel Radcliffe on stage and spotted another celeb in the audience!)

( Theatre and Fangirling in London-March2017 )



I have kept up with the Age of Pandora work-outs; did Chapter 55 of 60 today! Will catch up on posting about that tomorrow:)
How have you been?

J.

P.S. Dreamwidth's image galery interface doesn't seem to have an easy posting option, and apparently only allows to copy one file-code at the time, so I uploaded the images to LiveJournal as well to get all the codes at once and speed up my html-coding;)

Oops. Had honestly planned to continue with part three of my travelreport right away, but then I got hit with the blues and I spent some time feeling sorry for myself instead of doing things. A combination of a brutal period and frustration about the slow progress with my calf rehabilitation drove me to the edge of the pit of despair. (I also blame the heat, pffff).
I felt guilty about skipping a day of my Hero's Journey work-out and not doing my calf exercises, but after being pampered by my mom on our weekly tv-night, I realised resting is taking care of myself too, and I started focusing on getting back on track. I even tried a bit of cycling yesterday afternoon! It was scary, especially the dismount is tricky, but my calf didn't object to the movement, so here's hoping I can brave the traffic to work again soon.

Who's up for the final part of my trip to and with amberdreams? If you missed the beginning and middle of our adventures on the Pigs Gone Wild art trail, click for part 1 and part 2 to see what you missed before moving on;)

( PART 3: last pigs and train to LONDON, BABY )

( Traveling home )
I had a blast and hope to visit Ipswich again so I can explore the town a little more without being distracted by pigs or slowed down by crutches;) Thanks for a great time, amberdreams (and husband P and the fanpeeps in LND)!

J.

How did I end up with hundreds of photos after not even two full days in London? I never realize I take so many in between ogling the buildings and walking (so.much.walking). Obviously I didn't post them all, but it's definitely a picspam;) If you missed the first post, it's here. I'm continuing with Easter Sunday when I went to Camden, Choccywoccydoodah and the newly discovered SkyGarden before my afternoon date with Kevin Spacey. (What? I was close enough to the stage to touch, it totally counts as a date).
Ready? Let's go! (Click on the photos to zoom:)

( Sunday 5 April )

( bonus photos Amsterdam )
The end.

I am so sorry. I only spent two full days in London, but somehow I made loads of photos and as hard as I tried to make a small selection, I only managed to cut down the original amount to a picspam of 70 (?). Oops. Hope you're in the mood for a long tour *grins* May I entice you with a visit to Choccywoccydoodah? A view of the river Thames? A stroll through Soho Square Park? Come along then! ( Let's go into town )
( Day 2: Saturday May 31 )
( Travelday 3: more sights! )

Thanks for coming along. I apologize for the random foodpics and selfportraits *grins*. Hope you enjoyed the trip anyway.

Back to working on my BigBang art!

J.

P.S. Please let me know if you can see the photos as LJ keeps messing up my preview:(

Oh, booh. I had selected and edited all the pictures for my third and final picspam of the trip to London, when the stupid computer at school killed my USB stick and destroyed all the photos I'd saved on it. Luckily I have a back up, but it's gonna take me some time to go through them again*. In the mean time, here are links to part 1 and 2. For people who don't want to see my face, I recommend link number 3 for a couple of delightful photos of my 2,5 year old nephew. He was having a sleep-over at my mum's last week and since she only lives a bicycle ride away from me, I went over there for dinner and cuddles;)

LND trip, part 1: The WB Harry Potter Film Studios
LND trip, part 2: An afternoon trip to Oxford
Linkie #3: My adorable nephew

( *Some additional babbling about my shoulder and sketching(!)... )