Monday, May 10, 2010

Wicked...again!

I spent the entire morning trying to catch up on my journal/blog. It was taxing to my brain but I felt very accomplished when it was finally finished. By about 1pm, I was ready to hit the city. I took the tube over to Embankment and walked along the river towards Westminster Abbey. It was a semi-sunny day with a cool breeze. There were tons of people out so people watching was at a high. Something was happening around Parliament because people with very large cameras were starting to gather but I chose not to stick around.
Somehow I found myself back at House of Fraser on Victoria street so I decided to stop in and have an afternoon tea. They do make a fabulous sultana scone! I enjoyed my tea and scones while I chatted with my mom on my phone with free wifi. That palm pre has come in pretty handy during this trip - even more than I imagined it would. I caved and bought a tiny telescope (or a one eyed binocular, as I like to call it) to take to the theatre - and to just carry in my purse. It's made my Muji and it was 10 pounds (a.k.a. $15.30). I was on my way to meet Shaunda at the Chicago Rib House when she called and had just gotten out of a meeting. We decided to eat somewhere closer to the theatre so I stopped in at the Duke of York across from the Victoria Station to have a cider while I waited for her to arrive. I saw two men sitting at a table, obviously not together, so I asked one of them if I could share their table. He had headphones on so I figured it was a safe bet but he immediately took them off and started to converse with me. We had an enjoyable conversation for the next 30 minutes about everything under the sun - politics, the world, language, etc. It was fabulous! He is a computer programmer who travels the world and he had just found out that his father had passed away so he stopped in for a beer. As we said our farewells, he said I was meant to come and talk to him. That made me feel really good. I met Shaunda outside and we had a quick dinner at the Pizza Express. It was better than I expected considering it was thin pizza. I had pizza with goat cheese and carmelized onions and spinach. Oh my!

Our seats in the theatre were the very top row in the left corner. It made me laugh but I was very glad to have my telescope! The show was absolutely amazing! It was my 5th time to see Wicked and I loved it just as much - if not more - than the first time. The first time was in that very theatre in 2006 with my mom, dad, Jo & Scott. After the show, Shaunda and I walked over to The Albert for a drink. It's a cool looking pub with four floors. The first floor is the bar, the second floor is the dining room and the top two floors are rooms for employees. It's amazing to me that everything shuts down at 11pm. London is definitely not the city that never sleeps - but it is definitely my favorite city in the entire world!

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