here again

Long weekend sans MLK and on the wrong end.

Thursday: homemade chili con carne; proper Irish pints; nearly ceilidh; juggling act.
Friday: O'Neil's in Covent Garden; Becks in Fuel; British boys in boots; "me and the Spider".
Saturday: Green Park meander; Mrs. Windsor at home; Oxonians o'er London Bridge; curry in Brick Lane.

soundtrack: Bitches in Tokyo - Stars

rockstarspotting

At approximately 11.33 this morning my flatmate passed GC on the sidewalk outside Camden Road Station. Rather than cry, have a fit, and/or say "wtf? where's my GC spotting?" I am taking this as a sign.

GC as beacon: don't give up.

soundtrack: Calendar Girl - Stars

all things go

Year In Significance: 2007

• 17 February: Birthday excursion to Tiswas with Anna, Sarah, and Carla.
• 22 February: First graduate school acceptance letter.
• 21 March: Got into Oxford.
• 2 May: Off to Ireland.
• 16 June: Sang on stage with Brakes.
• 17 August: Said adios to W.W. Norton.
• 18 September: Officially (and literally) traded NYC for LDN.
• 27 November: Babyshambles at Wembley Arena.
• 16 December: Walked along the Thames, touched a stingray at the London Aquarium, kissed my boy in Trafalgar Square.

soundtrack: Chicago - Sufjan Stevens

things i will miss while away

1. £2 pints of Strongbow at ULU on lazy afternoons.
2. Getting an upper-deck, front-row seat on the 24.
3. The Crowley cup of tea.
4. Camden Lock late on weeknights.
5. Touching out of the Tube with feigned disaffection.

soundtrack: Blue Monday - New Order

de nada

Worlds collided and we gave thanks.

soundtrack: Norwegian Wood - The Beatles

this is england

soundtrack: Fields of Athenry - Dropkick Murphys

bonfires

It's strange to think this is my second UK-residential Guy Fawkes Night; the England of 2003 and Oxford seems so alien and far away now, another country entirely. Which is all the more ironic given my current beau, and the unexpected recognition of at least three Oxonians at the Battersea pub on Friday night. The weather has not improved, the class consciousness remains palpable, and the sunsets are still guttingly early, but something about this City of London - a little bigger, a little brighter - is making all the difference.

The days pass on the tops of double-decker buses or in the sharp-angled descents of Tube escalators; frowning at tightly printed pages of Conrad in my room or hastily recording a particularly salient point at the wide wooden seminar table; drinking at the Hawley Arms, drinking at the ULU, drinking at the Lord Stanley; markets under railway trestles, misleading slips of paper, wine-fuzzy kitchen gatherings and standing, skunk-stoked and spinning, on a balcony on Camden Road watching fireworks glitter and explode in the heavy evening sky.

And I wonder, what was I so afraid of?

Happy Guy Fawkes y'all.

soundtrack: Unstookie Titled - Babyshambles