Thursday, June 11th 8:19 (London)
Bloody Allergies
The allergies followed me, and as I write this I am sniffling. I am hoping they go away before I meet up with Ivan for breakfast/lunch. The water was finicky this morning and I had difficulty keeping it comfortable. A very hot trickle still burns. I think I have identified the rumbling I hear almost constantly. My theory is that it is the water pipes. The more I look around the more I wonder about the quality of this place, and it makes me worry about other, cheaper establishments further down the line. Que sera, sera. What happens, will happen. I worry that even though I got a full night’s sleep (on top of the nap) I still suffer from jet lag. I still feel slightly tired. Maybe that will pass with breakfast and simply getting up and about. I’ll report later. I was exhausted at this point and surprised, even now, at how vivid my memory of those first few days in London were.
11:26 (London)
I met with Ivan and he confirmed that I am still suffering jet lag. I might even suffer it tomorrow. Breakfast was nice and he recommended a route through London to see things. I might follow it, I might not. While I write, my new phone is charging. I intend to head out in an hour, if I don’t succumb to the temptation of a nap. I will hit the museum and the V&A (I didn’t make it to the Victoria and Albert Museum my first time through London) then the bookstore, followed by a walk in the park. The Park in question would be Hyde Park along High Street Kensington.
21:02 (London)
Trip Planning
The Natural History Museum was a blast. A lot of neat things to be seen there, and I took a ton of pictures and looked at a lot of awesome sights including one particular brunette haired girl. She was petite, had angular features, a small bust, long legs and was shorter than I. Maybe next time I run across a girl I repeatedly bump into and find attractive, I’ll actually have the stones to say something. Turns out, the woman mentioned here had someone else anyways. I saw her meet up with him after wandering the Natural History Museum. We’ll see. It would have been nice to have dinner with someone as opposed to alone. I hope to meet dining partners from now on. Wish me luck. Good Luck Mike. Though eating alone wasn’t all that bad. It was a milestone. I am going to repack my bag tonight. I need to figure out a good way to keep dirty clothes from the clean. Inspiration will strike, I have no doubt. My plan for tomorrow: meet with Ivan for breakfast or coffee (I hope food is involved) at 8:30 and head out to Marybole Station to catch a train to Birmingham. I kind of wish I had more time here in London to do more exploring, but it will have to wait. (On my way back through I won’t even be jet lagged!) In other notes, I am slightly surprises at the amount of dogs I have seen being walked on the street; and the amount of motorcycles/scooters around as well. I am not surprised at the lack of trucks I have seen. I expect trucks are more of an American thing. Probably better for it too. Oh! And the weather was perfect! Maybe not entirely perfect, too much sunshine, but it was really cool and most of the time there was a nice breeze. Sunny and cool. Though the wind did try to take my hat away a couple times. Time to go read. In my room, not the part, though I could spend hours upon hours out there.
The following pictures are of the Natural History Museum and some of its exhibits.
Friday, June 12th 6:11 (London)
I’ve been up for about half an hour now. I am still amazed at how early the sun seems to rise. Half an hour ago it seemed to have been up for several hours already. I didn’t sleep well last night. Tossed and turned and my usual relaxation technique for getting to sleep didn’t work. It didn’t help that Elaine called almost at midnight. As a result I feel tired out right now. I am running on approximately 2-3 good hours of sleep. I hope that this problem doesn’t persist throughout my entire trip. In other news: the shower was consistent and had 3 temperatures, hot, cooling, and cold. Stupid inconsistent shower! It made cleaning myself annoyingly painful and overly difficult. I hope that it is the only time I have this problem. I’m going to grab Advil or Ibuprofen while I’m out today. I also have little intention to take a nap today, as I suspect that is part of why I had trouble getting to sleep last night. Time to read (almost done with Ender’s Game) and rest before going to meet with Ivan.
7:16 (London)
I have just finished Ender’s Game and now have spent ‘free’ time thinking rather than reading. I find myself wishing I had a companion to travel with, but alas it isn’t so. I am sure that in time my thoughts will turn to the Halflings game and my future novels. At least Jenn hasn’t directly invaded my thoughts of late. I actually ended up rereading Ender’s Game while in England, along with writing out a ton of material.
10:19 (On the train to Birmingham)
Well I survived the trip via the tube from Kensington High Street to Marleybone Station (Yes, I misspelled it the first time) meaning I will likely be able to do it all over again come three weeks or so from now. I look forward to my trip back to London and hope to meet up with Ivan again, even though he will likely be abroad. I will miss his company (and the free meals). My first goal when I get to Birmingham will be to find lodging. My second will be to find food. Depending on the timeframe then, I may do some exploring. We’ll see. For now, I will put aside the journal and watch the landscape roll by. The tube was interesting, and hot, and sticky, and I stood up the entire way. Not a bad way to travel, but I was glad to ride around on it without my bags my second trip through London. The train out to Birmingham was really quiet. Not as quiet as the one from Gatwick to Victoria Station, but quiet nonetheless. Not all the trains were as such, but… these early ones were.
11:49 (On the train to Birmingham)
I’ve been on the train for an hour and a half but it doesn’t feel like it. I have decided I like traveling by train. It is peaceful and I don’t think I will soon tire of watching the English countryside roll by. It really is a green beauty and truly lovely. It makes me really look forward to my trip to and through Scotland.
The following pictures are of some of the English countryside I saw from the train. I wish I had more shots, but it was difficult to get good ones without a tree popping up at just the wrong moment.
13:41 (Birmingham)
I spent about an hour wandering around before I was able to find a place to stay tonight. At 50₤ a night, I think I won’t be staying very long. I need to wait ‘til 15:00 to go secure a room though, as otherwise it’ll be 60₤ and I have decided that 50₤ is the limit that I am willing to spend. We’ll see if that holds up when I am particularly desperate. I will set and plot out my train trip to Edinburgh tonight. Hopefully I won’t hit any snags.
In other news, I have been inside a very lovely church and even have a brochure of its history. The walk through was quiet and awing. I’m not sure there is a “God,” but whatever higher being that does exist certainly calls that place home, at least part of the time. I also walked down by the canal. It was an interesting 10 or so minutes. I could easily see lots of WOD stuff going on down there. Vampires might have it rough with almost no sundown time during the summer. In hindsight, Vampires probably would just migrate to somewhere more temperate and with less extreme sun patterns. I think I might be slightly dehydrated. My spittle is thick and my lips dry. I’ll consume more water from now on. The weather has been lovely today: cool with a mostly cloudy sky. My kind of weather. Based on that alone, I think I could really enjoy living here. I’d have to find the right place though. I don’t think Birmingham would be the place for me; at least, not in the city proper. I think somewhere out in the country would suit me better. I think it is time to put this down once more and enjoy the park-ish area I’m in near the church.
15:09 (Birmingham)
I’m checked into my room for tonight. I intend to see if I can secure cheaper lodging for tomorrow here in a few minutes. I’ll head downstairs and see if reception can offer directions to an internet café.
17:39 (Birmingham)
Took a walk on the Welsh Side
I went out and used the computer downstairs to tidy up my email and even send a couple out to my Dad and Jesse. I then went out and visited a couple art galleries (the Royal Birmingham S-something of Artists and the St. Paul’s Gallery of Artistic Album Covers) and wandered back to the hotel. I ordered a pizza (pepperoni) and originally intended to take it up to my room, however, I ended up eating it at the bar. This, however, didn’t end up being a bad thing as, toward the end of my pizza, I was pulled into a conversation with a trio of girls. They’re from Wales, and named Sam and Stacy (I know not the third girl’s name). I had a short conversation with them, learned that they are here until Sunday celebrating Sam’s cousin’s 18th birthday. I revealed I was traveling alone and am from America. Wales wasn’t on my travel plans, but I am considering putting it there. Sam asked me to join them on their night out and I am considering going, possibly despite my better judgment. I wasn’t able to get a time out of her, so that will make it a little difficult to meet them. I did give, in passing, that I’m in room 321, so they may end up at my door. If that happens, I will certainly reward their efforts by joining their expedition.
18:14 (Birmingham)
Going to go down to the lobby at 21:00 or so. If the girls haven’t already come to find me first. Have a lengthy walk plotted out for tomorrow and it should be interesting. Another interesting thing to make note of is that the lights require the door card to be inserted into a slot to be turned on. It’s a nice way to save power when the occupant is out of the hotel.
As tempting as it might be to comment on these last two entries and reveal something… I think they make for a nice cliffhanger as to just what happened that night. You’ll have to wait until next week and the next group of journal entries to find out.
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