OH it's Christmas!!!

- lunch in the courtyard
- BAKER STREET AND MUSEUM/SHOP
- Byron's
     Guys. Today was the GREATEST DAY OF MY LIFE. Honestly. Basically all day I was going:

"OH, It's Christmas!" 

But we'll get to the greatest stuff in a little bit. First - some art.

     Today was our scheduled day to go to the Victoria and Albert museum as a group. I thouight there was some really great stuff there. We walked in and it was just an entire hallway filled to the brim with giant sculptures, to which I mentally went "YESSSSSSSS." I am quite partial to sculptures. :) There was a part where there were a lot of busts lined up, and the way in which I was weaving around the artwork made me feel as if I were at Pemberley.

What surprised me though was how everyone was saying "Oh, hello naked statues. Awkward." or making fun of all the sculpture in the exhibit. My response was a) I like it. (Not because their nude. Let me clarify. Just because I love sculpture and find the craft and artistry of it fascinating. And it is just plain beautiful.) And b) Never go to Italy. 

And guys - YOU'RE WALKING UNDER A FREAKING BERNINI SET UP FROM ROMAN TIMES. A FREAKING BERNINI. WHAT ARE YOU DOING WITH YOUR LIFE. GET CULTURED.

This also just so happened to be my favorite piece in the museum.

But I digress. Here are some pics:

This was a really interesting piece to me. From far away it just looked like a battle scene, but upon closer observance, the characters in the sculpture looked as if they had real fear in their eyes. Whether this is just a result of the way eyes are carved in sculpture or was intentional; their fear stuck out to me. 

I loved the dynamic of this one - all of the motion

Can I PLEASE have this dress? For my 50's formal evenings which I so often have? 

How about this one - just for normal life. Please?

Some Raphael cartoons in the Raphael room. Nbd. 

Time for the ball!

We're ready. 

Some Rococo art. Love me some Rococo. Maybe it just entertains me.

If ever I were to have a bust made of myself, I want it fashioned after this man's. They already have a template for my hair.

My coat of arms! 

Bust of Shakespeare

 LIBRARY!

I wanted to get up on the ladder; I was feeling a bit like Beauty and the Beast/Bedknobs and Broomsticks

     After going around the museum for quite a while (about 4 hours) - we had lunch in the beautiful courtyard. I had my peanut butter and lemon curd sandwich. Btw, I am now completely addicted to lemon curd. Lemon curd sandwiches, lemon curd yogurt, lemony lemon lemon curd. :) America better be stocked. 

 Pretty Courtyard :)

    But then - THEN - it was time for glory. The game, Mrs. Hudson, is ON!

      As I was riding the tube, I was listening to my Sherlock soundtrack. (Specifically the song above.) As I walked down the tube to the car, it was playing "the game is on" main theme, and as the doors shut and simultaneously with movement, the song went to the "thinking" music that plays whenever Sherlock is riding in the cabs. It was pure perfection. The universe aligned. Angels were singing (though quietly, otherwise it would have interrupted my musical perfection.)

Oh look! Sherlocks!

That's how much joy I have. I dare you count the Sherlocks.

Go on. 

THE JOY!

And this was just the most adorable thing I have ever seen. 

:D

 Even the bathroom was adorably Victorian and perfect. 

Even this brought my joy. 

    So, naturally I waited in line for the museum. Because that was super necessary. There was no question, actually. I thought the museum was really cool. Of course, it wasn't "real" because Sherlock Holmes never lived in "real" life, but it was very neat to see all of the detail in the recreation of the novels. They went through each detail of each story/novel and implemented it into the recreation. Even to the number of steps and the pinned letters on the fireplace. The more you knew about the novels the more you got out of it. I still have yet to read all of the novels, but I've read enough to really appreciate a lot of it. Here continues my joy:

That's the real 221B there. And that was the guy who played Kent in the production of Lear we saw. He was my favorite actor in the production. Also - he was very attractive. Had a nice, quick little convo with him. His name was Denny. 

Different gaurd. But I'm rocking that death frisbee and pipe. 

Sherlock's violin.

Watson's chair and the antlers :)

The letters ;)

A bust of the man himself

Signed my name on the visitor's log. Freaking love it. 

Keeping most of my pics to myself, other than super iconic stuff, but this one just looked cool. 

The Hound of the Baskervilles!

Recreating adventures

Jim Moriarty. Hi-i!

The consulting detective.

    After my lengthy stay in the museum, I spent just as long (if not longer) in the store. I literally looked at everything they had to offer. And bought myself a few things. And a cool postcard. :) It was a very fine day at Baker Street. 

  Afterwards, we all went to the pub by Trafalgar Square - but the queue was quite lengthy so we called it a rain check.

Instead we went to Byron's. A burger joint recommended to us by one of our teachers, it was said to have good burgers, good prices, and great shakes. Turns out he was right. OMGOODNESS. It was so good. I got myself a chocolate malt shake and burger with skin-on chips. Best chips I ever had. 

Greatest day of my life. Cheers from a very full, very content Londoner! 

An Audience with Helen Mirren

     Goodness! Today was quite the eventful day! It started out with a debate in Shakespeare class today. Here's the deal. I don't like debate. Never have, never will. This class today gave me so much anxiety, and actually infuriated me I think. Whatever the emotion was, there was a lot of it boiling up in my chest. Debates never do anyone good, regardless of the intentions. Especially not with stubborn theatre people, as we are most often stubborn. So that was a very rotten way to start my day.
   But the day got better when we decided to take an impromptu stroll through Kensington. The original plan was to go to this Crepe shop but we got a bit sidetracked and ended up going in a lovely little bookshop. (I'll have to go there again, I found a few books I'd like to buy.)

      We then headed over to the creperie. To my mistake, I ordered the Crepe Suzette, which I saw was drizzled with some alcohol. WHOOPS. My roommates got some good jokes out of it, but hey - it's best to try new things while travelling. You live and you learn. (Next time I may stick with Strawberries and Cream though)

     Afterwards we went to Waitrose to get groceries 

sitting outside the store in the Gloucester Rd Station

(I actually bought some this time), dropped them off at the flat, and decided to kill some time by finally going through Hyde Park. We had yet to go in and we live literally across the street from it! So we thought it was about time. The thing is GIANT - we literally only saw a very small pocket of the park, but it was a delightful pocket. :) It was pretty funny, we tried taking these jumping pictures off of a tree with really cool bark. Well, apparently I am the only photographer in the group able to take jumping pictures, because I literally jumped over ten times to get this shot. We tried Melissa's camera, Christie's camera, both cameras at the same time (my camera had died by this point)... it was a hot mess. But we finally got a decent one. They'll be posted as soon as I get them from them.

Anyway, picture time!

Part of the Gate by our flat

Classic tourist picture time

NAILED IT

In-progress monument to Queen Victoria

Royal Albert Hall

"Asia"

"America"

"Africa"

Beautiful land went on for miles

Making wishes in the Gardens

     After our escapades at what I have now dubbed the jumping tree, we left for Picadilly Circus to see our show for the evening. GOODNESS we got there early! 45 minutes in fact! Which is such a record for us - and SO much nicer than running with less than 5 minutes down the streets of the West End. So we took the time to look at the fountain 

and grab a super quick bite to eat at Mickey D's. It was really throwing me off that they were playing American music; from Lady Antebellum to old Stefani to classic Buble. It was weird. But soon enough, it was time for The Audience with Helen Mirren. May I just say that it was absolutely superb. Stupendous. One of the greatest theatre pieces I have ever seen. The direction and composition, as well as the script itself was just beautiful  I loved the simplicity and cleanliness of it all. And I must say - I'm a sucker for some great symmetry. I really adored the entire production. Granted I didn't understand all of the jokes/references because I m unfamiliar with a lot of British history and it's subtleties, but it was still completely entertaining and brilliantly acted.

The set from my seat, pre-show

   Speaking of the actors; Dame Helen Mirren was stunning. Absolutely stunning. Everything about her, her costumes, her performance, just all of it. I was surprised at how moved I was by the performance; I found myself getting emotionally agitated at the Prime Ministers when they disagreed or bashed the Queen. I never would have thought I could feel such pride for a monarchy, or monarch rather, that I am not under or have any connection to. But I was truly touched by the piece. It was a delightful piece of entertainment; poignant, simple, elegant, and astonishingly humorous and touching. 

    And as if the performance wasn't enough, I GOT TO MEET HER! She was just the sweetest thing! She waited for everyone to take pictures of her as she exited the theatre. She pointed at a women and said "you were in the first row, weren't you? I thought so!" The woman was a tourist visiting from Asia. She then proceeded to ask the guest "How is your English  and struck up a nice little conversation with her. She did this with several people as she signed more programs and tickets, even though she had technically done all of the signing for the evening. She was very gracious and quite the lady. I was so excited I was almost shaking when she took my ticket to sign. That's right. CHECK IT.

     It was such a delightful and very exciting evening. Just a lovely night. I was in such a good mood at this point, such a fabulous mood! Especially in comparison to how I was feeling this morning. I was just loving life at this point, bouncing along the streets of London. My roomie and I started getting pretty goofy - or carrying our goofiness out of the theatre rather. We ended up singing Pussycat Dolls - specifically the first 5 seconds to "When I Grow Up" among other songs of a similar nature. We also went strutting around the underground (or at least I was strutting). We've decided that we need to call ourselves one sixth of the Pussycat Dolls. I'm not ashamed. To be quite frank, I'm loving it.

I'm still loving this London life more than ever. 

Cheers from a very happy Londoner!