Bits and Bobs

Moving
We are all moved into the dungeon. It is a small, simple basement flat - with the most disgusting furniture/curtains/rugs you have ever seen. I will post some before and after photos when we are done fixing up the apartment. We are slowly but surely getting rid of the old, ugly stuff and replacing it with halfway nice stuff. There is also a nice little overgrown yard space in the back off the bedroom that we are going to try and attack in the next 2 weeks. Stay posted.......we'll get there with the flat if we can stay away from the pubs for a while (yeah right).

I will say that I now understand what people mean by "The Damp" and why all those poor souls died of consumption/tuberculosis/whatever horrible disease you died of in London in the past. Our apartment is......well, damp. We'll have to get a dehumidifier to keep the place from molding and the paint from peeling in the winter. Not to mention the fact that houses here don't really have dryers. They have washer/dryer combos that wash your clothes then bake them until the point where you have to take them out and hang them to compete the drying process. I am not kidding. I think this is the main reason why the birth rate is lower here. Can you imagine doing this if you had more than 1 kid, I couldn't.

Iron Maiden
OK people, I went to Iron Maiden with Dave and it was actually better than I ever thought it would be. I even got a scary alien t-shirt (see photo). We sat next to some drunk Colombians and a dad and his 13 year old son. There were actually quite a few families there. My impression was that it was like musical theater for headbanging dudes. There were lots of set changes and props. There plentiful special effects and drama on behalf of the lead singer, Bruce Dickinson. Dave thought there were a lot of 80's dance/guitar moves. Even better - with the very high male to female ratio, there was no line for the women's bathroom. How many concerts does that happen at, really? Overall, not too bad for a Saturday night.

Triathlon
Awwwww yeah, it was quite a triathloning weekend. The ITU World Championship Series was this weekend in Hyde Park. The race was on the 2012 Olympic course, so it was really cool to watch. Saturday was the women's race and Sunday was the men's race. The Brits won both races. We watched both days but it DOWNPOURED today (Sunday) during the men's race and there were some nasty crashes, made worse by the fact that ITU races like this are draft-legal. It was really inspiring, maybe I will consider a tri next year. If I only had a bike here...... A fellow U.S. expat and friend DL did the race and kicked some age group ass. Nice job Dave! The men's and women's winners are below (Alistair Brownlee and Helen Jenkins). The photos are shamelessly stolen from DL because I have a crap camera and my photos were sht-.
























Other
So you all know - you can get unpasteurized, real buffalo mozzarella here at the farmers market. It is shipped in from Campania. Uhm yes, Caprese salad to die for. Even the expensive shi- at Whole Foods does not come close. As far as I am concerned, that is a good enough reason to stay here for 2 years as anything. We had a lovely Caprese salad tonight - though the tomatoes are still a bit lacking, still too early. Maybe next week or the following they will be better. Hate you JV for taunting me with your luscious garden tomatoes, and your melons:) I will leave you all with a photo.