This is my bedroom...Aqua carpeting aside, it is quite spacious and is now the proud home of a giant bed, a rug, two chests of drawers and a huge closet. The windows are also big and warehouse-like, and if you look up the street, you have three great pubs with outdoor seating. You know, the important things in life. About three blocks from me is one of the top 5 restaurants in the world. Great spot to be.
This is the main room. It's tough to get a picture of it, but it's nice. Trust me.
This is our kitchen. Every appliance, save for the oven, is covered in that lovely wood you see before you. The one directly ahead covers the washing machine. Even though this kitchen isn't the prettiest girl at the prom, it is far and away the most spacious one I have ever seen in a London flat. Plus it has ample room to house the many designer kitchenware items my flatmate Jason owns, all of which I'm scared to use--or really even look at--for fear of hurting them in some way.
This is the tenement-style view out of our window....pretty sure it's office space across the way. The whole neighborhood is full of architecture firms....which is great, because I am never around architects.
This is a view looking back at the front door to the flat from the entrance to the lounge. The entry phone to the right is only like the greatest thing ever. It has a view camera and you can see who is calling. Really, what will they think of next???
Again, my bedroom. That orange thing outside my window was once for hoisting things up through the window. It is no longer functional, unfortunately.
There is a main bathroom in the flat with all of the usuals in it: sink, shower/bath and toilet. Then there's this en suite bathroom off my room. It contains a sink and a shower. No toilet. Of the three options, I'm pretty sure sink and shower aren't the ones I would choose, but whatever, I now have a shower...and yes, it requires power. If you can make out the danging string to the right....that's what you pull to get it going.
This is what you see when you come in the front door. To the left and right are the bedrooms and straight ahead there's a foyer and then an entry into the "lounge" (that's living room for you Yanks). The doors are actually called a "Juliet Window" though I accidentally keep calling it a "Rapunzel Window" (seemed to make more sense). So those doors open up and there's a little railing and a view onto the street. I see a waterballoon scenario in my future. Also, I am growing out my hair.
This is Jason's room. He has no bizarre electric shower room, but he does have uber closet space. Am slightly envious. He sleeps in that bag.
And this is the entry to the building. To the left are out mailboxes, which we did not have the right key to for weeks until I had rough up the agent a little. To the right is the most highly coveted feature of our building--the lift.
So that's a very brief view of my new digs. I'll take some more pics once we have it all set up. (right now, it's pretty much my room that's done, and then a bunch of boxes).
Going backwards, the next set of pics are from Scotland. Alex was the best man in a wedding on the Isle of Arran, a very beautiful, but oddly difficult to get to island off the west coast. Peeps in the know called it "Little Scotland" because it apparently has everything Scotland has, only on a smaller scale. Apparently Scotland Proper has some seriously ghetto mini-golf as well (see below).
This is a pic I took out the window of the ferry from Adrossan Harbour to Arran. By this point, we had been delayed two hours on the runway from Heathrow to Glasgow thanks to the coinciding arrival of George W. Bush, who was visiting the Queen, so we had missed all of our connections. As a result, we took a cab to a train to a cab to the ferry terminal, just to have to wait an hour during which we ate every item of food in sight and I read the entire display of tourism brochures. Anyway, I thought the windmills were cool.
This is a dusky shot looking back at where we came from.
That hill you see is called Goatsfall. I would have climbed it but someone needed help with his best man speech.
I wish any of these pics captured just how beautiful Arran was, but this was one attempt.
This was closer.
colder....
Civilization in Broddick. Every person you see here is likely related to the groom or bride in some way.
This is my handsome boyf wearing a skirt. It's rented. And yes, he's going commando in another man's fatigues. Also of note, this is the bed and breakfast where the evil proprietor lives. She was crazy to begin with, literally following us around with a mop to cover our tracks wherever we went. But just to ensure that we truly pushed her to the limit, I accidentally spilled tea all over her rug and carpet. I slept with one eye open.
I took a picture standing on the lawn of the chapel where the nuptials occurred. Pretty, pretty.
The reception was in a marquee (translation: tent) next to a castle. And yeah, the fact that I went to a wedding in a castle the first weekend I was in the UK seems fittingly cliche. It was beautiful, complemented by the groom's vintage Porshe.
The view from the entrance to the marquee.
Le bride and groom. What's missing from this shot is the thirtysomething female bagpiper. Badass.
The gardens next to the castle.
Me and my kilted beau, post successful speech-giving.
This was a complete coincidence.
Kissy face.
The next day, after fleeing in fear of the B&B owner's wrath, we played miniature golf. It was just too good not to photograph. It's what I imagine miniature golf is like in post-Taliban Kabul.
Not sure what's more challenging...the actual hole or the completely uneven pavement. If you wait long enough, you might even get it to stop rolling long enough to actually hit it.
We went to Glasgow for lunch on the way back, so I took this pic just to prove I'd been there. After we got back from Scotland (again, major delays and cancellations compliments of Dubya's return journey), I started work for one day and then headed to Holland for a meeting. We stayed at a resort in the beachside town of Noordwjk.
To the left is my hotel, the lovely Hotels de Oranje.
Directly in front of me when I walked out of my hotel. It was the perfect place to spend two days in a windowless conference room.
Beachy keen.
Looking back at my hotel.
For some reason, whenever I'm in Holland, people take me to the small towns. So I think I have now covered every second-tier Dutch city, yet still have never been to Amsterdam, Rotterdam or the Hague. Baffling. Anyway, this nice place is called Haarlem, former home to Napoleon's brother (or something).
Some big church.
Forget the tulip and windmill thing, I have never seen as many bicycles as I have in Holland.
When we came out of dinner, there was a concert playing in the square. We argued for a while about which language the band was singing in, drank a beer and went home.
So that about brings us up to date on pics. I have a new post a-brewing regarding "firsts"....and not even necessarily my own. I made Alex his first ever peanut butter and jelly sandwich last night! And he says I don't cook...
No comments:
Post a Comment