Top Of The World

12 September - After the very nice reunion with the Chopes et al last night it took me a little while to get started the next day but I had a mission so I headed out to Camberwell in the morning to find the local Internet café where I did some quick research to find a flight to Amsterdam. I found some good deal online but then found that the online booking system wasn;t working so I called the number the suggested. The guy on the other end then quoted me a price far in excess of the one i'd just been given on the Internet - I told him that they'd just quoted me a lot less but he said that the phone booking fee was higher, it turned out that he couldn't accept my Australian credit card anyway so I went straight to the airline and got a deal that was close enough.
Headed back to the house and then after a few errands me and Kimberley headed into town to go on the London Eye. There was a two for one deal if you used a travel card to get there (apparently my oyster card didn't have that morning's trip registered on it but we still managed to get the deal). Apart from the ride being referred to as a flight (please enjoy your flight, sir) it was quite exciting to see the London view. The wheel is incredibly designed - it moves slowly and constantly onlystopping for disabled people to get on or off, and when at the top the view stretched for miles, only marred in the distance by the ubiquitous London smog. I couldn't see our house but many other things.
After this we headed into the west end for a sammich and then I finally made my return to the National Portrait Gallery - i'd dropped in briefly a few weeks previously but hadn't had a proper chance to see everything and I was worried that i'd keep on delaying my visit and eventually miss it altogether so it was very good to see it all properly. Noted the portraits of Degas and Sickert and a few others from the Tate Britain exhbiition i'd seen a few days prior, people who I had no idea of before my visit to the London - obviously i'm becoming more knowledgeable about the art world since my arrival in the city.
I then headed off to meet Walber (from Thailand) where he took me along to his Bikram yoga class - it was a very overpriced studio with tiny facilities but it was well organised. I'd only ever done yoga at the old Broadway Gym and that had been pretty basic so doing it in a room at 40 degrees was very different. I hadn't done much exercise since my the run so it was very good to sweat out the toxins that have been building up in my body this past week - hardest part was dealing with the salt swamping my contact lenses but it was very purifying. After this and something to eat me and walber headed to one of my old places of work, the Black Cap in Camden Town. Hadn't changed too much in eight years although the décor had been updated at some point and the chair were very uncomfortable. According to the barman the landlord was the same guy but he wasn't around (which was not such a bad thing since I didn't have a hell of a lot to say to him). DIdn't recognise any of the customers either but did spot Julian Clary sans makeup - I had been on name terms with him last time i'd been workingthere but there wasn't the flicker or recognition in his eyes when he saw me, eight years is a long time.