Tourist bonanza

Had a great day yesterday and today. Did the lunch BBQ with S & K's friends and then went to Julian's (Lex's boyfriend) place (1.5 hrs later on public transport) for the afternoon BBQ. A very nice guy from the party, Shane, and I arranged to do some London touristy stuff together. We went to the National Portrait Gallery this morning and I saw some famous artworks. Shane also knew his way around, so I happily handed over the navigation duties for the place...I would have ended up at Sylvania f'n McDonalds in the first 10 mins...you should have seen the maze we had to get through to get to the toilets..there could have been an incident if he wasn't there!! Then we went to the British Museum and saw an ancient Egyptian, Assyrian, and Greek exhibitions and conveniently, Shane was quite knowledgeable about some of that stuff too.

Walked around Covent Garden and some markets there. Had lunch at an "English restaurant" so I ordered the Shepherd's pie (but declined the side of chips). Unfortunately, this didn't cure my hangover, but it was a welcome respite. The weather turned too miserable to continue walking (in inappropriate clothing) so we got on one of those double decker bus tours (super touristy, but it has to be done). It was great! It was a hop-on hop-off affair and we got to see quite a ot of London's sights with amusing commentary. It did come with the obligatory set of annoying Americans, but such is life. Got a free Thames river cruise included, so did that too. Of course the bus just drives past these things, so I'll go back and do the tours another time. The crowds are impressive for these places, even though the weather was cold and raining today.

Tomorrow I'm starting work so I should totter off to bed for some recuperative sleep.