Well, um... still not very good at this regular updates lark... hohum... (and i never did post reviews of AMSND and CoE, but i will get round to it at some point)
Anywayz - i've done lots since i last updated!
Started work at Group4Securicor - which is thrilling... but the people are really nice, it's not difficult and it pays well, so i have nothing to complain about. It's also genius that it starts at 10am, i no longer have to get up stupidly early every day - yay! That weekend i worked my last day at the pharmacy as well - i won't really miss it, but some of the people were very lovely - admittedly, some of them were less to my taste, but it's all swings and round-a-boutses...
Then, seeing as how it was the bank holiday weekend - which i had totally forgtten about, we (Olli, Scot, Jenni and me) went to Weston-Super-Mud and made (and then accidently collasped, just before we took at picture) the biggest sand castle ever! Although, i'm starting to think that the beach at weston is not mud, and is infact some form of cement - the sand was grey! :o
Next week end i went camping with mum at the Gower Peninsula, which is stunningly beautiful. I wasn't sure about spending a whole weekend camping with her, but actually it was really good - nice to just relax on a beach and in the sea. The next day we went surfing - the fact that there were no waves, and it was blowing half a gale only made it all the more interesting! heheh... i've decided to add 'learning to surf' to my list of things to do in my gap year - but i've decided that it will be easier somewhere warmer that has waves, so i think i'll do that elsewhere... I now really appreciate the genius that is wetsuits though - they're soooo cool (or, infact, warm - that being where the geniusness lies...). So that weekend was lovely, i really could have stayed there for sooo much longer -i really love the sea, can't get enough of it, it's just magical - and so big and expansive and powerful *imagines being on beach with big expansive sea, right now* *sigh*...
So... um then i worked all week (inc. saturday - how very lucrative that is) and spent stupid amounts on clothes... but then, they are kinda necessary.
Sunday we (Allen, Scott, Alex, Jenny, Jenni and I) played poker - hehehe... that was funny - then we failed miserably (well, fairly jovially, actually) at the pub quiz - i'll miss them all so much when they're gone... hohum...
More work ensued...
Friday night, we went out - £8 champange cocktail - mmmm.... then Peppers and then the Bongo Bar - hehe that was funny, before SubTone. I can't believe that we got IDed in all the places we maxed out on Orange juice and coke and didn't when we bought Champange and liquer cocktails... where's the logic in that?!
Some time around then i actually managed to post my Deposit for Trekforce - woohoo!! Jungle here i come. I also succumed to Allen's insistence that i should read the Da Vinci code and bought a copy... more about that later
Then that sunday i finally met up with Anna, my potential travel parnter for SE Asia. Funnily enough, i wasn't really nervous, i just wasn't so sure what we'd talk about all day... But it really wasn't a problem in the end. I was stupidly tired because i stayed up far to late the night before looking at photos and the leavers book... then caught the bus at 7am. oh well...
Got to London with perfect timing and made my way to the Tate Modern - she'd said she was running late, so when a rather confused/lost looking person turned up that vaguely matched my imgined anna, i wondered whterh i was right for a minute- but after looking curiously at each other for a second, we both came to the conclusion that we were who we thought we were... hehe... so into the Tate Modern!
I really don't know how anyone managed to make, what is essentially a rectangular building, so utterly confusing?! i can never find my way in and once you're in - how do you get out again?!? Plus there's always more than you think there is. I do like the Tate - it's totally insane, and some of it is really just rubbish... but there's some amazing exhibits there. The highlight this time - Bill Viola being lacking - was a Chris Offili set of 13 relief paintings/collages, called The Upper Room. This is quite literally a whole (very swedish looking) room inside (the room inside) the gallery.
What i really love about it is basically the colour and the light (but then, i would - it's always the light/colour that i love - think Bill Viola's 5 Angels and you'll know what i mean). It's just sooo theatrical :D It was loosely based, i think, on christ and the disiples, but i've forgotten about the rest, i just know i liked it.
having whizzed round the TModern at break neck speed - i'm really not sure how we ended up doing it so quickly... - we deiced that lunch was in order and wondered outside staright into some kind of weird alternative hippy carnival thing... It was very cool - especially the bicycle band who were, quite lieterally, playing a bicycle - don't ask... - and there were loads of food stalls aswell, so we each had a lovely curry for lunch - best (and cheapest) meal i've had in london for a long time.
With lunch came the opportunity to discuss all things travelling :D We re-established that we were planning what we thought we were planning - so that's all good. Anna really is lovely, and very well-read/interesting. i think i couldn't have come across a better online travel buddy - even if everyone does think i'm mad for doing it - but i spose you don't know til you try - it might be brilliant, it may be a disaster, but i'd rather regret doing something, than regret not doing something!
After lunch we've still got hours before the play, so decided to tackle Tate britain as well - and that is one hell of a lot of art for day (especially when followed by a standing play!). But the Tate was, again fun - plus we dicovered that the easiest way to get there was the river boat, so we took a brief jaunt on the river - which was fun, though i feel would have been marginally better if it hadn't been raining and generally grim...
So, hvaing absorbed just about as much culture as is humanly possible - and attempting to kill our feet - we must have walked literally miles of art galleries! - we headed back to get tickets for the play and a snack.
We got back only to discover that said play was sold out... oops, but that we had a reasonable chance of returns. So, although we had to pay a bit more, we got a couple of separtate returns in the gallery and then asked if we could stand anyway... just for the genuine globe experience :D and actually despite the fact it was about 2/2.5 hrs of standing, you really didn't notice and it was brilliant being soo close to the stage.
The Globe is really really amazing! It's far more ornate than i had ever imagined, but very very cool. Although, what;s possibly more amazing is that what looks like a tonne of marble and gold is, infact, just maticulousy painted wood - damn impressive!
Hohum, once we'd come to the end of the play (3 man version of the Tempest - more than slightly comfusing, but very good nonetheless and some excellent actors - ariel - mmm.... see review for more info.) they performed a dance, which is apparently traditional with all of shakespeare's globe plays - it was tres cool - traditional rennaisance dance with some street moves incorporated - v v funny! :D I like.
The only problem with said dance is that it aided the 25 minutes that the play ran late and left me with less than 30 minutes to get to the bus. Now, if you have everbeen to either Tate or the Golbe, you will realsie what a ridiculous distance the nearest tubes stations are - the nearest being about a 10/15 minute walk across the bridge - and Victoria being about a 10/15 minute ride away - as well as the 5/10 minute walk at the other end to the bus staon. Now, as you can see, these figures don't add up - so we went to find a taxi que - but the nearest was 10 minutes walk, and apparently the traffic was bad and tube would be faster - *eek*!!! So, daily excersize=run as fast as is possible in flip flops, over the bridge, through the people, in the dark to a tube station that we weren't quite sure where is was.... hehe... hohum - we got there, aid an extremely brief good bye :( which was shame, but necessary, then i managed to get on a train just before it left, and relax. A similar amount of running (albeit on more familiar territory) and one broken phone later i got to the bus with about 2 minutes to spare - yay! so that all worked out terribly well.
It really was a fun - if not ridiculously tiring - day and hopefully all things will work out well. We seem to have pretty similar interests in what we want to do, so it'll be great if it works out. YAy for lovelypeople - i wish there were more lovely people - nice is under-rated :)
*yawn* tired now - must go to bed - zzzzzzzzzzzzz..................
peace y'all
