Rainy days and Thursdays....

Greetings from BlogLand on Thursday,

Hello all! I hope you are all well....it's quite late here (12.25am) and I am getting ready for bed. Today has been a long day! We managed to sleep all the way through the night yesterday, awakening to the alarm at 8am. A quick shower and brushing of the teeth and we were on our way to breakfast. I had spotted a place yesterday that I fancied trying. It was called the Victory Cafe, and it reminded me of the kind of place I would sometimes be taken by father when I was a little boy. Well, all I can say is that I probably didn't have particularly refined taste buds when I was a boy! It wasn't too bad, but I can say that I have now done it and that memory is dealt with!

After that, I headed out with camera bag while James did the conference thing. I felt a little sorry for him as I gamboled around town....well, I only gamboled for about 30 minutes as then the heavens opened forcing me to duck in and out of shops. I was working my way down Oxford Street at the time, so it wasn't really too much of a chore as there are plenty of nice shops to spend time in! I was thrilled to find the latest re-issues of 5 Thompson Twins albums on CD that I had been wanting to buy in HMV, so that made up for the fact that it was raining and that all the pictures I had taken so far were crap.

After a sandwich from Marks and Spencer (where else!) I arrived at Marble Arch, one of the places on my list for photographing. And I was faced with the same problem here that has stumped me at so many other sites. How to take pictures of something so big? I didn't want to do just small detail shots, from which you would never really know the bigger scene, and all the other kinds of angles I shot just looked silly. So instead I shot it in 5 pieces and I will try and do some kind of montage thing after the fact. Who knows if it will work; I have never tried anything like that before!

Next I headed off to Hyde Park, which was really quite lovely post rain. I wandered around, took some dud pictures of daffodils and then settled for some hopefully nice scenic views of walk ways and couples who had stopped for a quick snog on the paths. I have high hopes for these; snogging always adds a little something, don't you think?

By this time, the gorgeous James had finally broken his bonds and was heading to meet me. Through the wonders of cellular communications, he emerged from Hyde Park Corner tube station to meet me at the Wellington Arch. Then the heavens opened again. With that we headed off down toward Buckingham Palace to see if Liz Windsor was there. I am guessing yes, as her flag was flying from the roof. After realising that we had not been invited to tea though, we headed off in the other direction with as much flounce as we could muster - pretty difficult when you look like a drowned rat. After heading up the mall to Trafalgar Square we decided that enough was enough, and that shopping would be the antidote. A quick train ride and we arrived at Marks and Spencer's clothing store in Marble Arch (seems like a circular tale, eh!) James busied himself in the underwear department (bet you really wanted to know that) while I picked out two nice pairs of flannel pyjamas. How middle aged are we! Those of you who thought that this blog might get a little racy can switch off now!

Next on the agenda was dinner. James had wanted to try an Indian restaurant so we went to Veeraswamy off Regent Street, England's oldest Indian eatery. It's been there since 1926, and I thought that would mean it was either going to be terrible or fabulous, with little middle ground. It turned out to be quite fabulous, although with scary prices. I had a chicken, James had lamb and we washed the whole thing down with a Martini each and a bottle of wine (between us, not each!) Back on the train (pic attached!) and now it's time for bed!

Tomorrow I have to do more photography (getting a bit nervous now...have to shoot some good stuff or I am in trouble!) and I have to do an unplanned English paper, thanks to my professor changing the syllabus. It meant that I had to buy a book tonight to read tomorrow, and then write. So I am not a happy bunny about that. But such is life. I can't really grumble can I!

So that, dear readers, is today. Tomorrow night we are heading out for dinner with two dear friends, David & David who are coming up to town to meet us. I can't wait!

I'll post again as soon as I can. Hope all are well!

Big Love,

D&J