Acupuncture and London Here We Come Again!

I should be packing right now, but I am procrastinating. Although, at least I have piled my clothes that I am taking with me onto our bed. And in a bit I am going to go downstairs and have a bit of lemonade and then I will do my packing. Here is my wardrobe for next week ... fashionable, huh? (laugh)



Yeah right. (laugh) Well, maybe not "fashionista-esque", since we will be hoofing it a lot around London, but I am leaning more towards "casual and slightly fashionable". I am packing my sunglasses optimistically in hopes that I will need them to shield my eyes from all the bright sun at Wimbledon. Brit Boy and I are so hoping that the rain holds off for the tournament. We had lots of rain last night and today it is sunny and clear and windy. So if we can just have sunny, lovely weather like this for the tennis it will be splendid. One other fashion note, I am NOT going to be taking my “blister-blooming boots” this time. If you are not familiar, please read my post from our trip to London in April…I limped for days. (laugh)

Brit Boy and I ate a big breakfast this morning, so we both may not be hungry until 9pm. (smile) Since we are going to be gone all week, I am trying to use the last of our perishable food so it won’t go to waste while we are gone. The last few eggs, last few pieces of bacon, a few pieces of bread, and the last of the orange juice have now been consumed so we are almost all set. Whenever we get a space in our guts for some dinner, we will have a baked potato each and some brussel sprouts…and then tada…no perishable food left except for a few slices of bread and a bit of cheese to make sandwiches to take along with us tomorrow and then our consciences will be cleared. Since food shortages and high prices seem to be the rule of the day, we don’t want to throw away anymore than we have to.

Yesterday, I went to my next to last acupuncture visit. Karen and Ta were kind as always and I had my treatment. Karen and I talked as Ta made me into a human pin cushion. (smile) After all the pins were in…about thirty…she placed three big sponges along my body to cushion so that she could place the towel over me and thus the pins would not get snarled up or go in even deeper with the pressure of the towel. So they leave me in the room, all Zen and stuff, with the lights out and lovely Chinese spiritual music playing in the background. Then within five minutes the fire alarm goes off in the shopping plaza. I’m not losing my mind, but instead of being scared, I laughed first that this was my current condition with all the pins and I may have to run for my life in my underwear. (laugh) But good ‘ol Karen comes into the room just as the alarm pipes down and she says that it was a false alarm. She said, “Don’t worry, we will take care of you if there is a fire or anything. You are our friend.” Then she patted me on the arm. I told her that I had no fear and knew that they would look out for me. I was the only customer in the shop at that time. Karen is a sweetheart and I told her so. I always feel very relaxed in that tiny shop. (smile) Even though I have my last treatment coming up in the next couple of weeks, I am still going to stop by and say hello every time I get into town, just to see my friends.

Well, I better get to my packing. Just one last quick note. I won’t be able to post anything from tomorrow (the 23rd) through Friday (the 27th) since I will be in London and away from my laptop. I will probably go into shock and miss my little green machine, but we are trying to pack lightly. (smile) But rest assured, I will be taking notes on what we see and do on our next London adventure and I will also be taking lots of photos to share with you all. Brit Boy and I will be doing the rounds of London this time for sure…Wimbledon, King Tut’s exhibit, the Victoria & Albert Museum to see some Supremes memorabilia, and then on Friday we have the Nelson Mandela concert. And I will also share wherever else that we come across on our latest trip to the Greater London area. It’s always a fun time when we take a trip there, so I look forward to sharing it all here with whomever takes the time out of their busy days to read my blog. Once we arrive back home on the 28th, I will start spilling my guts on all that happened. (smile) Thanks for visiting with me here. Until then…take care :-)

Sunday in London

Now back to my story of our time in London over the weekend of April 26-29th. As I said yesterday, we got around quite a bit and it was a fun time. However, on the Saturday night when we got back from the theatre, I limped into the hotel. Once we were upstairs, I sat in a chair and had to get Brit Boy to help me take off my boots. If I had been a cartoon character, when my feet came out of those boots, they would have been steaming. (laugh) When I was a kid, my dad used to call the feet , “dogs”, so let’s just say, my dogs were yelping. For our night out, I had worn a blazer and a nice top, with a flippy skirt and my boots. It was cool out, but not cold, so it was the right thing to wear. And my boots were flats, but I hadn’t worn them in a while. So with the bit of walking that we had to do, the boots rubbed my feet the wrong way and made blisters on my little toes on both feet. Ouch! (smile) The funny thing is that my toes didn’t hurt until we got back to the hotel. So it was all good…I looked good while we were out. (laugh)

Anyway, Sunday morning when I got up, needless to say, my feet were sore. I limped around and got dressed for our day ahead. Brit Boy and I were planning to meet up with a new acquaintance of mine that lives in London. Now, walking was something that sounded incredibly painful at the time, but I always love being in London, so I figured I would grin and bear the discomfort. I wrapped my toes in tissue and put on socks and then my shoes. I was ready.

We met up with my new acquaintance at a place called Maggie Jones. I looked it up ahead of time and apparently it is named this after Princess Margaret. She used to frequent the place when she was being courted by Antony Armstrong-Jones, so this name is a nod to her according to what I read. It is a tiny little pub-like restaurant with traditional British food. It was quite intimate and lit mostly by candlelight. They have lots of traditional British paraphernalia hanging from the walls and overhead. It gives the place a very nice feel of stepping back in time. We had a nice lunch with my acquaintance and her guy friend.

After Brit Boy and I had lunch, we decided to have a good walk around. My toes had hurt when we walked into the restaurant, but after our lunch, and a couple of glasses of wine, I was feeling less pain. (laugh) We took a walk over to Kensington Palace and Kensington Gardens. It is lovely over there. It was quite moving to see the gates at Kensington Palace for the first time, as this was where all of the flowers were placed in honor of Princess Diana at the time of her death. It is a lovely area, very green and beautiful. Here is a photo of the palace.




Then we walked along and saw the statue of Queen Victoria which also sits in Kensington Gardens. Here is a photo of that.



Next we walked along to the Albert Memorial which sits along the edge of Kensington Gardens. Across the street from the memorial is the Royal Albert Hall. Brit Boy and I will have to find a chance to attend something there some time. (smile) Here are photos of both.





Then we walked along to Hyde Park which is right next to Kensington Gardens. Here’s a lovely photo of the flowering trees in one corner of the park.



Lastly, we walked over to see the Princess Diana memorial. I must say, I had heard before about all of the controversy in the past on how it should be done, and in my humble opinion, it isn’t nearly good enough for her. I guess that a worse thing would be having no memorial at all, but Brit Boy and I both thought that it looked like a half-hearted attempt. She seemed to be a good person and after all she is the future king’s mother, so it just seemed half done. However, as I said, it is better than no memorial at all. The lake across from her memorial is called the Serpentine. It is apparently a man-made lake, but it’s a beautiful place, just right for a princess. (smile) It was very peaceful there. Here are photos of the memorial and the lake.






After all of this walking, we sat down and enjoyed the end of the day. By this time, my feet were a bit sore again, but I was happy. Brit Boy and I were spending time together, so all was right with the world. (smile) So we stopped by a store and got some proper bandages for my toes. I was ready for the next day.

Tomorrow, I will tell about our next day at the immigration office and the cool guy that did my interview. He rocked! (smile) Also, I will tell about our hanging out in Piccadilly Circus. It was a fun day.

Saturday in London

Today is Bank Holiday here. It is a day off, sort of like Labor Day is back home. I like days like this. Mondays are usually days that we associate with getting back to the daily grind, so these holidays are a great gift. They give you a longer weekend and then they help you ease into the new week.

Brit Boy and I have been chilling out for the past week and today is our last day of chilling out together for a while. After our trip into London the prior weekend and with my visa stuff and everything, we were quite wiped out. So we have been taking it easy. My quest to get my indefinite visa has taken me three years of hard work, so we figured that we were long overdue for a breather. (smile) So it has been fun to just kick back for once. So thank heaven for bank holidays…an extra day to relax.

We were in London for about three days, give or take a few hours. So I have decided to break the days up into three different posts, so the entry won’t go on and on.

We headed out on our journey, on Saturday morning, the 26th of April. I was a tiny bit nervous that morning, because I knew that I had a big hoop to jump through at the immigration office on the following Monday. But quite miraculously the mail arrived earlier than usual and I got a happy anniversary card from a friend from back home. I have known her since I was eight years old. She is my oldest friend. I was so touched that she had sent me this card and she wrote a note inside. She is always so sweet in the things that she says and she always calms me. The funny thing is that she didn’t say anything about my slight worry over my visa, but she said the right thing to me. The thing that touched me, was her simply saying…“I miss you…and we are friends for life.“ That simple connection with my life back home, coupled with the fact that she cared enough to send me and Brit Boy an anniversary card, just instantly made me calm. I guess that her card helped me remember that who I was back home is that same girl that I am now. So no matter what happened with my visa, things would be fine. I remembered that I had been through much tougher times and made it, so an immigration interview was just another thing. (smile) I was ready. The butterflies left my stomach and didn’t return. I placed her card on the table so I could see it first thing when we walked into the house and we headed out.

We took a taxi into town to catch the train. I love taking the train and so does Brit Boy. He likes it because that means he doesn’t have to drive and I am always glad when he gets a break from that. I don’t drive here yet. That is more red tape for later. (smile) When we go back home to visit though, I always drive…so it works out for us. Anyway, I like the train because you can watch the countryside go by the window and you don’t have to worry about traffic. It is probably my favorite way to travel. I think that it is romantic and you have time to think on the train. To me, it doesn’t feel claustrophobic like a plane, but that is just my take on it.

So we took the train into Paddington Station in London. I love that station. It is a great place for people watching. Everyone is going this way and that, on their way to somewhere. From Paddington, we hopped on The Tube and rode out to where we were staying in Kensington. Kensington is quite lively and it’s a nice place to walk around. There’s lots to do. Here’s a picture of the view out of our hotel room. I liked the church across the rooftops.




After we checked into our hotel, we took a walk around the area and just hung out. Then we went into a shop and bought a few things to eat. We went back to our hotel room and ate and watched a bit of tv. Time flew very quickly and so we got ready for our night out at the theatre. We took The Tube again and went to the Old Vic theatre. The Old Vic is a jewel. It sort of stands there on its own in this neighborhood and is not part of a collection of theatres like you get in the West End. I love that it is an individual. (smile)

When we got inside, we bought a program. We have quite a collection of programs now. Then we walked upstairs and hung out in the bar for a few minutes. It was a warm day, so we stood near an open window. Then we went inside close to showtime. The Old Vic is a medium-ish theatre and I loved that. It felt very intimate. It is not a tiny place, but it was just close enough to really feel connected to what was going on onstage. We went to see the final performance of the run of "Speed-The-Plow" with Kevin Spacey and Jeff Goldblum. It was FABULOUS!!! They were fabulous!!!! Kevin Spacey was like energy on legs and you can see why he is an Oscar winner. And Jeff Goldblum is a tall, lean presence with movements like a cat. He glided around the stage like a schoolboy. I want to be "ageless" as I mature, in the way that I carry myself, just like Jeff does. There is definitely something about doing what you love in life. You can tell they both love what they are doing. They both were amazing and they are just fabulous actors. I like each of these actors separately and together they were like fireworks. The way that they both moved around the stage and used every inch of it, was amazing. The dialogue was rapid-fire and you could tell that they were pros at this. At the end, Kevin Spacey thanked the audience for supporting the play and thanked his co-stars. It was the cool thing about seeing the final performance. It was a great night.

After the show, we took this picture of the theatre to remember it all. What a night.



Then we hopped back onto The Tube and headed back to Kensington. We walked around for a bit and then headed back to the hotel. We were beat after a long day.

Tomorrow, I will share what we saw and did on the Sunday. We covered a lot of ground and I did it all on rather sore feet. (smile)