What to say? I’m now in Dublin, hence the U2 reference for all who got it. I didn’t. I had to look it up, FYI. I’m not a big U2 fan. The cabbie on the way from the airport to the hotel actually pointed out the neighborhood they got their start at on the way over. Nice of him. I think he fancied himself a tour guide. But I’m getting far afield.
Last weekend in London was nice. Lisa came to visit me, which was a real help. Being away from home for three weeks at a time is tough and having a piece of home come see me made it much easier on me. I don’t think it made things easier on her, in fact I’m sure it didn’t. She tends to worry about what’s going on at home a little more than I do. We should invest in an internet camera thing so we can see the house while we’re away. I wonder how much that would cost. We should also invest in kitty-cams. We’ll get the boys some collars and attach cameras to them. Chances are they’re always fighting or looking at each other anyway, so we’ll know they’re ok. Anyway, since the team I was with last week finished up their testing early and went home on Thursday, I was told to work from the hotel on Thursday and Friday. So while I worked on Friday, Lisa took a bus tour around London, and she loved it. She got to go through St. Paul’s Cathedral, which I missed the last time I was in London. And she went through the Tower of London. I don’t think she was as fascinated with it as I was, but I can understand why. I think
I’m a bit more into that kind of place than she is.
We did the Haunted London Walk that night. Tours like that are generally nice as long as there are only about 10 people, but that’s never what happens on these things. There were 25-30 people I think, and it’s really annoying to try jockeying for position in a crowd like that. The guide seemed very knowledgeable, but the scare factor just wasn’t there. It’s convenient that the ghosts are never there when you’re on the tour. Although, now that I think about it, how interested am I really to meet up with a ghost?
Most of Saturday was spent travelling. No, I didn’t get to go to Stonehenge. We decided to skip it since most people are apparently disappointed with it and you can’t get up close to it anymore. It would be interesting to see I think, but I didn’t really feel like going out of my way to see it. Instead we decided to start off with lunch at Harrod’s. This serves a threefold purpose: 1. She got to see Harrod’s. 2. She got to see the memorial to Dodi and Diana downstairs. 3. We got to eat. One kinda/sorta problem with that though was that the Picadilly line was shut down from Hyde Park to Knightsbridge. Hyde Park is only one stop toward Harrod’s from where we were going to get on that line. Knightsbridge is where you get off to go there. So we walked it. The walk there was easy. No problems at all. We got to see some art for sale by streetside artists, and Lisa fell in love with this set of paintings. They were very simple yet very good. I have to admit that I like them a lot too. Then we walked through a fairly nice neighborhood. She tells me that that would be the most likely place to run into Gwyneth. No star sightings though. I never get to see famous people when I’m traveling. Then we walked through some of the shopping around Harrod’s. It was a very nice looking neighborhood with some very nice looking stores. All in all not a bad walk.
We did have lunch at Harrod’s "famous" deli. I think it should be famous for its high prices, but I’m on a per diem, so does it really matter? Most of that will be taken care of by the company. Then we walked around and she did some souvenir shopping. After that it was time to walk back to the station. The walk back was brutal. Not only did it feel much longer, but it was like everyone wanted to walk back at the same time, and they all wanted to walk much slower than we did. It’s just as annoying, if not more, being stuck behind a slow walker as it is being stuck behind a slow driver. When we got back by the artists Lisa decided we had to have some of the pictures she liked. I don’t remember putting up much of a fight about it. I really like them too and I knew it would make her happy.
We decided that we were going to go to the hotel to drop off our assorted purchases and then we’d run down to Leicester Square to see if we could get some discount theatre tickets for that night. No go sadly. I like theatre, and there were a couple of shows that we both decided we’d like to see, but they all cost 50 pounds or more. That’s about $89 at the current exchange rate, and I wouldn’t pay that much for the best seats in the States. I think she was a little disappointed, but I think she also eventually came around to my way of thinking. We ended up going to the Tate Modern art museum. We took a side trip along the way to walk down the Thames Walk nearby and actually ended up going to the London Dungeons. That was definitely over-priced. I prefer my trips through that sort of thing to be sort of free flowing. I don’t want to be herded into giant groups, and that’s exactly what this was. Oh, and I really like to have air circulating. It makes it so much easier to breathe. If you go, don’t bother with the London Dungeons. Sorry, LD, it just wasn’t that great.
After the London Dungeons we went to the Tate Modern for dinner in the café upstairs and to see a little art. We both had fish and chips, which came as a bit of a surprise for Lisa since I’m not normally a fish-eater. It was pretty good, but I wouldn’t say the gourmet fish and chips was any better than what I’ve had at pubs in the UK. Dessert was good, but it’s hard to mess up dessert. All you have to do is add more sugar and it automatically gets better. Next we tore through the museum. We’re pretty quick when it comes to looking at art. I think we’re fortunate that we both look at it the same way. If one of us felt like analyzing each and every piece, the other would get seriously annoyed. That’s not us. We walk around and take a quick look at stuff. If something calls to one of us, we look. If it doesn’t, we move on. There was some really good stuff though. Lots of Picasso and Dali. I don’t know that I got Dali’s Lobster Phone piece, but it was still interesting and good to see.
I spent Saturday in the airport. Lisa’s flight left at 2:45 and mine left at 4:45. Hers was international and mine was considered domestic. So we got there at 12:00 so that we could get checked in and get through security. I left her at her gate at 2:30 when she started boarding and went to hang out in the British Airways Lounge. It was nice, but I’ve been there before.
So, now I’m in Dublin, and I wasn’t here two hours before I had my first adventure. I managed to find a cash machine and the taxi stand and told the driver to take me to the Hilton Dublin. I was a little skeptical because I was sure my reservations were at the Conrad Dublin, but that’s what my itinerary said. So I asked him to drive me by the Conrad on the way there so that I could see where it was. Lucky for me it was close. I tried to check in at the Hilton and they’d never heard of me. They called the Conrad and it turned out that I should have been there. Unfortunately, my driver had already moved on to his next job. Fortunately, it was only a five-minute walk to get to the Conrad. Of course, that’s not the whole adventure. I still had all of my luggage with me: a large suitcase, my computer bag, and a carry-on suitcase with an extra change of clothes. And just to make it more interesting, it was raining. A five-minute walk in the rain while lugging all of my baggage. Sounds fun doesn’t it.
The hotel is nice. This must be a five-star hotel. There’s a soft robe and slippers laid out for me every night, a beautiful king-sized bed with nice fluffy feather pillows, decent television, and a phone in every room. There’s even a phone in the bathroom, which I am militantly opposed to. There are some places that I should not be reachable, and the bathroom is at the top of the list. The offices that we’re working at are nice, but unfinished looking. They tell me they’ve been here for two or three years, but they’ve still got unpacked boxes everywhere and not a whole lot of art hanging on the wall. It looks like a bachelor lives here. I finished up my part of the program very quick. It helps that they’d eliminated half of my testing, but that would still have only another day. The most touring I’ve done is going to dinner. The Chinese place we went on Monday was ok, although they spice their chicken for sweet and sour chicken weird. It’s almost like they were spicing it to have some gravy on the side. Dinner on Tuesday, however, was amazing. I had this incredible roast loin of venison with asparagus and potatoes. I’ve decided that if there’s a vegetable I like it’s asparagus. Weird huh? I think I might also like artichoke too, but I’ve never had one of those that wasn’t mixed in with a whole bunch of other stuff so it’s unclear.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment