Well, three days in London and Id like to think that so far they have been productive, though, really, by what standard can I possibly measure productivity during this time of complete and utter uselessness to society...anywho...this sign made me laugh, so we´ll go ahead and start with it .














Im not sure how they define "messing about" but I feel that Im going to have to work hard to avoid being defined in that manner at some point.

I do need to stop for a moment and say thank you to two stupendous people, without whom I certainly would have felt a bit out of sorts my first few nights here . This is Isabels (friend with whom I am staying) flatmate and her boyfriend, and despite my most fervent assertions, they insisted that I come out to the bar with them.








Eileen and Matt




To be fair, I managed to stay somewhat more sober than matt did, but I think that the sleeping-for-13-hours thing the next day lost me some points. Regardless good times were had by all.

I have largely spent my time here simply walking from place to place. Ive always found this to be the best way to get to know a city, and I feel like Im making some progress in that regard. For instance, if you tell me a street, I am extremely proficient in asking 10 people for directions to it, then promptly ending up on the wrong side of town. I am so good at this now that whenever I get directions, the first turn that I think to take I do the exact opposite of what my memory recommends. Of course, since I havent really had any destinations firmly in mind at the outset anyway, I still end up on a different side of town. Part of the fun!

As for my second night out, I met up with a friend who I used to work with in the states. He is a funny man, his name is Ian, and he wants to play rugby with you. I asked him, he told me.

Rugby players cower in fear from Ian Powells patented "tongue o'death" Interpret how you will.

I would love to have some wild drinking story to recount here, but it was a fairly standard night out, albeit with louder people than usual (hard to do, I know) and more football than I could shake a stick at (cricket bat?).

When my night got interesting was on the "night bus" home. As I have now learned, the tube closes at midnight. I, as well as pretty much every Londoner who I commiserated with about this, could go on at great length about how ridiculous this is. However I will spare you the gory details and just let you imagine how annoying it would be to choose from the following options; 1. go out at 5PM, get sloshed in time for you to catch the 11:45 tube home 2. go out at whatever time you damn well please, then pay upwards of 40 DOLLARS to cab home (Im staying an area right outside of most of the pubs/clubs etc and it STILL would have cost that) or 3. the option that I chose, take the night bus. So I took the night bus. So did this guy .



Completely Sober. Not at all in need of medical attention. Really.



If you open the picture, and look veeeeeeeery closely, you may notice that he is bleeding from the nose. He was also getting sick all over himself. He was also singing inbetween his infrequent, and failing bouts with conciousness.

The night bus is this bizarre entity, part mass transit, part lunatic asylum. To actually figure out which bus to takes requires the wisdom of socrates, the innate sense of direction of magellan, and, apparently, an indecipherable cockney accent.

"U´se gon´take-a dat ni´bus to x´´furd cirk´s see? (english translation: you need to take the night bus to oxford circus....see?).

At the time, I didnt see, so I spent roughly 45 minutes walking along the biggest, longest, most curving street Ive ever been on, essentially begging for help. Eventually, a guy named Joe helped me out, mostly, because as he fell over on me, I held him up. He decided that that warranted some directional advice. Wherever you are...thanks joe.

I have some other thoughts that I am putting together, but I can sense that some of you have skipped most of this and are looking for more pictures. Well you illiterate bastards, I suppose if it will keep you happy...First, and most importantly, this is a picture of Isabel .





"I'm just happy to be here"





Some of you may be familiar with the near-universal "stop-dont-take-a-picture-of-me-because-i-look-terrible"-face that I believe all women are born with the innate ability to make. If you dont, its the one in this picture , in which she, of course, looks fantastic. Next, we have a picture of what appears to be a whole bunch of white boxes. Well, jokes on you...

This gallery is so modern that just by walking in, you yourself turn into a sideways piece of abstract art. I swear I'm standing normally here and the buidling is sideways, you figure it out .

...its actually a WHOLE RIDICULOUS UNBELIEVABLE AMOUNT of white boxes (sorry about the sideways picture, technology is a fickle friend). This was the main exhibit at the tate modern gallery right now. The tate modern has an entrance foyer that would comfortably house three NASA space shuttles, and have enough room left over to store a lifetime supply of twinkies. The thing is massive. Into that space, an artist named Rebecca Whiteread has placed a kind of maze of the plaster molds of thousands of cardboard boxes, an idea she apparently got while cleaning out her closet at her mothers house.

NOTE TO THE TATE: I recently cleaned out the closet at my parents house and found a half eaten milky way bar, a belt that fit me when I was 7 and a comic book about telling the truth. I am willing to sell these items for your next collection for 8 million pounds...of cookie dough. Non-neogtiable.

Anyway, this shot is of the biggest tower that there was (which I dubbed "the big tower"). Cool huh? Huh?

And finally, this picture actually got me in trouble. Apparently, you are not supposed to take pictures of anything in the museum. I pointed out that I wasnt using a flash and that my intentions were pure and noble, there was no way that I would put the images up on a website. Nope. Never gonna happen. So I braved the stockade for my art, Im a true rebel. Anyway, I was in the surrealism section and as soon as I saw this, realized that both my sister Tovah, and my Brother Noah needed to be made aware of the existence of such an object post-haste. Thus, brother and sister, I present to you...The Lobster Phone.

Boy do I love art.






Lobster Phone!!!