almost as creepy kewpie babies

among other things, i've noticed that parents put their small children on scooters and drag them around town. i guess they're worried that the kids' legs will fall off or something if they're forced to walk on the sidewalk; and clearly a scooter is far more aerodynamic than a regular stroller, particularly if you want your kid to go flying down that hill at the bottom of the street. i had some ingenious alliterative name for this generation of scooter babies, which katleen approved of, but it now escapes the both of us. what i wouldn't give for a memory.

bedtime wisdom

don't let the knife crime bugs bite

down with the people! i mean the man! i mean, smoke more cigarettes!

last night i attended an anarchist meeting in an interesting little bookstore, the topic of the evening: police brutality. their mission: to take pictures of the police who take pictures of protesters and call them out by name. i was a little confused about how exactly those particular actions are intended to destabilize the police force and the greater police state that they have here in the UK, but there's a lot i don't know about the world. edify me cap'n!

tywanna and i are so, so tired.

actually, i decided to wing the last half of my trip, so after agrigento i'm doing it all ad hoc. also i heard i need to watch out for stray dogs. but what they don't know is that i'm a dog whisperer. spspsppspsps woof woof.

tentative itinerary

Mar. 19-22 Catania (climb mt.etna, day trip to taormina on the 21st)

Mar. 22-24 Ortigia (adventures to be determined)

Mar. 24-25 Agrigento (La Valle dei templi; then find SOME way to get to Selinunte: there's no hostel nearby...)

Mar. 25-27 Palermo (adventures to be determined)

March 27-28 Taormina (beach time)

Mar. 28-29 (return to Catania to fly back to London at 4:15)

best dancing i ever did see

I went here: http://www.theplace.org.uk/

and saw them: http://www.vocabdance.co.uk/

woah.

where all my pancakes?

i've been finding clues to a mystery that i've indexed as The Great British Pretense. please observe: today was pancake day, i saw no pancakes; the british started the atlantic slave trade; they like to pretend they didn't.

BUT! i am thankful that there is rhubarb in almost everything!

confession

tywanna just called me the worst grandma ever; i've just been stealing pictures from facebook and other people's blogs rather than taking my own, because i don't really like to take pictures... maybe i'll take a few next time i go out...

in any case, here are some more things that happened:

a few shots of us trying to listen again. tywanna looks like she has it for a second, but then it's gone (i never had it....[i try! i really do! donna vinter is a bubbling wellspring of knowledge, and i'm thirsty! i am, really! i just get distracted by things on the ground and things across the street])

SHE GOT IT!

and it's gone

we went on the London Eye on south bank which is the biggest ferris wheel i've ever been on with little glass footballs that you get inside and watch the view from the windows. it was nice to be able to see all of london in every direction. turns out it's really big...too bad i could only find a picture of the inside of the football...
Kyla and I don't even care.

...Still don't care!

prof. gadsby recapturing one of her sons on south bank.

remembered a couple other things

also this is the shakespeare memorial at southwark cathedral.

it happened like this

i missed the first few weeks of blogging because i was doing part of my winter term project.

here's what happened in photos:

kyla came and got me from the airport. because i flew business class (thanks mom n dad), they gave me a pink thing that meant i didn't have to stand in a line at customs or say anything to anybody i didn't feel like talking to or show them any documentation i didn't feel like showing them other than my absolutely amazing passport photo; and so i finished all that about 45 minutes before i was supposed to. unfortunately kyla only decided to arrive about 15 minutes early. my cell phone doesn't work here, and i couldn't figure out how to call her on the pay phone--turns out i'm NOT an idiot, but the pay phone doesn't make international calls and she still has her american number--i was alone and very scared and there were many south asian people waiting for their various relations. i heard someone's name called over the intercom system and decided i should have her hailed in the same way. then she found me and put me on that underground train system there.

the next day we went to picadilly circus. it's a lot like time's square. we weren't trying to take a picture of "sanyo" we were trying to take a picture in front of this statue. it's there i swear.

the next day my flatmates tywanna and kathleen (who i will often refer to as katleen [no h]) arrived. we go by many names, the most recent ones include "trouble on baker street", "destiny's child" (i'm beyonce, katleen is kelly and tywanna is michelle--tywanna said it was based on physical features, but clearly it's based on talent)

this is the house that virginia woolf lived in bloomsbury square, right around near my school: "although we lived in a square, we loved in triangles." yikes.

we also went to the tate museum of modern? art. i think it was modern. it wasn't the regular one. and there was andy warhol and giant cracks in the floor, so i'm thinking modern. but this is a picture of me and kyla on a balcony outside with a little st.paul's cathedral poking up between us. hi st. paul's cathedral!

then we went to southbank and saw some of the oldest stuff in london. i sat in an old ferryman's seat.

there were skaters and bikers rolling around in this arena, i had my picture taken next to one in action.

even though kyla looks like she's listening intently, she isn't.

i just really don't like valentine's day so i made katleen and kyla go to the musiq concert with me. he is incredible. unfortunately his set was preceded by Avant (which wouldn't have been so bad if it weren't an hour long, jeSUS) and Donnell Jones (which wouldn't have been so bad if he weren't just singing to a track. i mean, at least Avant had back up singers and a drummer). but then musiq came out and everything was right with the world.

by the way, have i mentioned how much i love back up singers? i hesitate to say it, but i think it may be true: sometimes i find them more interesting than the actual artist. i think i would like to be one.