britlog

a freight train flips, a fire breaks out in the chunnel and no surprise the eurostar is shut down for a few days.  Glad I wasn’t on that train.  I was on it a few days earlier coming back from Brussels and have to say if I was to be evacuated by foot through the tunnels, I would not be pleased.  Even the 20 minutes in the tunnel at train speeds makes me nervous.  <shudder>

It’s cool out, my heating kicked in today, fall is definitely here.  summer?  ya, it was that one saturday a few weeks ago when my brother ad sister and law were in town.

best thing about it the cold weather? (no not sweater puppies dave) my towel racker warmer is back!!

I spent most of last week back in Canada for my best friend’s wedding (strangely not at all like the movie). Whilst (enjoy that Jaime!) back in Toronto I watched quite a bit of the olympics. Now back in the UK I realise how good Olympic coverage is in Canada. In Toronto I can watch the Canadian coverage, the French-Canadian coverage and American coverage.

Here? I have minimal British coverage. No joke, we have 37 channels and only ONE has the Olympics, BBC1. And it’s mostly talk show format in which several dolled up ‘journalists’ lounge around a couch discussing results, not showing results. Come on UK, you’re 3rd in the medal standing surely you can do better to promote your athletes.

The best part? At 8pm coverage ends because Eastenders is on!!

The weather has turned.  It was just 1 day after Lindsay headed back to Canada that London burst into summer.  The sun is out, the weather is warm and on any given day of the week at almost any given time there are people out drinking on the patio (patio = sidewalk here).  Maybe my memory is fuzzy, but I don’t recall this many people in Toronto outside with beer in hand on say, a Monday.  But here, people drink like there’s no tomorrow, which truthfully, based on weather patterns is pretty accurate.  It may be 27 and blue skies today, but tomorrow it could just as well be pissing rain and 12.

I’ve continued my lunch tim exploration of Mayfair.  Last week I went to see the Drawing Blank Exhibit by Bob Dylan:

Interesting work, reminiscent of Degas.  I think he should stick with singing.
Later that I week I went to Sotheby’s to a proper auction.  There, paddle in hand, I sat and watched people with seemingly nothing else to do with 5000 pounds on a Wednesday at 2pm then bid on Rare and Vintage Wines.  It was exciting for the first 10 minutes.  The auctioneer sputtered out bids at gunfire pace, 4 people sat in a row perpendicular to me taking orders from telephones, and my fellow attendees, clutching their pens, carefully took notes of each lots final price.  After that it got a bit monotonous.  The excitment of holding a bidding paddle quickly faded so instead I choose to study the people around me and guess what their lives were like that warranted purchasing 36 bottles of 1991 red wine from chateux somewhere-snooty.   Surely a few of these people were in the restaurant business.  Otherwise, just how many dinner parties can you have before you get the reputation of serving that SAME wine.  Maybe they were shop owners? 

Then the lots of champagne came around, and my ears perked up.  Fresh from my trip to Reims I studied what was on offer.  16 bottles of a 1986 vintage.  Not bad.  3 magnums from 2001.  Magnum!  I snickered to myself.  I’ll never forget magnum now.

Did I bid?  no.  As tempting as it is to join in the fun and raise my paddle too, at 2,400 pounds I can’t really afford my bluff to be called!

No, not “Oh, Canada!”, “Hockey Night in Canada.”

As you may have heard, Canada’s most important theme song went through a bit of a controversy recently. After CBC refused to pay the $2 million requested by the royalty owner, CBC/TSN picked up the “perpetual royalties” to save the song. To any Canadian reading you understand that this was really big news in Canada: after many decades Hockey Night in Canada on CBC is going to to have to get a new theme song!!!

Being the resourceful people they are, CBC decided to run a contest for the new “Hockey Night” theme song. Great idea, until the part where they decided that entries could be submitted on the Internet and voted upon by people online.

Which bring us to SomethingAwful.com – the people who brought you “All Your Base Is Belong To Us,” among other Internet memes. Nothing good can come of this.

Enter “Hockey Scores,” the brilliant theme created by one of the SomethingAwful message board members. A fine mix of animal sounds an crying babies described as “A beautiful theme encompassing the heart of hockey.” Go ahead, listen to “Hockey Scores” here. Here’s the original thread about it at SomethingAwful.

So, of course, the  monkeys over at SomethingAwful go over to the CBC anthem site and vote it up, and it’s currently the highest rated entry with almost 100,000 views.

It was temporarily removed from CBC’s site (I guess somebody though it was a joke? no way), but was put back after vicious oposition from Internet netizens and protest videos on YouTube.

But it gets better: last week CBC television ran a news piece about the anthem contest and featured the “Hockey Scores” composer:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nYeQCyTQFGA]

I don’t know how he managed to keep a straight face through this interview. “If you think this is one big joke, you’re wrong.” Pure comedy gold.

Thankfully CBC were smart enought to state in advance the anthem content is not a popularity contest: their judges will choose the winning theme.

Interesting thing today was a lunch time pilates class in Soho (sorry mayfair, your expensive real estate make your classes too expensive).  Instructor was sufficiently militant.  I liked it.

Post work was dinner at a gastro pub with Paul and Linda.  Today is their last day in London, it went by fast!

With the big project over, work is definitely stress free (well for me, others not so much).  Which leaves me time to finally get to know my neighbourhood.  Mayfair isn’t just about fancy shops and high priced tailors, no you can also spend your money at one of the many art galleries too.  Today at lunch I went to the James Hyman Gallery to check out an exhibit of Linda McCartney’s photography.

It was actually very good work:

The past few months have gone by far too quickly. Work has dominated my life for most of that time, but thankfully the big project is over (for now). So, aside from cheese on on Saturday it’s been a great weekend in the city. Friday evening I met Paul and Linda at Blackfriars for a pint in a traditional pub. The weather was good so they got to experience the British habit of drinking outside the pub in the ‘garden area’. Translation: sidewalk. I also took them to Wagamamas, a London institution and then to a classic british pub: Ye Olde Chesire Cheese. A pub since the 1500’s it has a solid classic british ambiance. And, if it’s good enough for the likes of Mark Twain and Charles Dickens, then it’s good enough for me and my guests!

Saturday was the cheese shop, then a wander through the Pride festivities and some shopping in Soho.  Later (possibly inspired by Wimbledon)  I ventured south of the river (gasp!) to meet some coworkers for a doubles match.  All I’ll say is that I’m rusty, and in need for a few more practices before I attempt that again.  Penny, my kiwi coworker and I had dinner near the courts in a nice part of Clapham.  I can see why so many people our age live here, it’s quite nice, but a bit too subruban for my tastes (sorry Adrienne!).  And then later still, after a change of clothes, I met Penny at the Absolut Ice Bar.  Surprising to me, only 15 minutes of our 4 hours there were in the ice bar.  Something about health and safety?    My carbon footprint didn’t feel to good either.  (did I just say carbon footprint??  Wow, this entry just screams mid 2000’s).

 Today, the weather turned on us (again).  After brunch at the Wolesley I actually had to buy a sweater, I was that chilled.  And it stayed that way most of the day.  I stayed in doors at various shops and department stores, elsewhere in Hyde Park Paul and Linda were at the outdoor O2 concert festival, probably soaking wet, but probably quite content with listening to Ben Harper live.

I finished my weekend with a trip out to Angel to the trusty old Tinderbox coffee shop.  There I read most of this weeks Time Out London magazine so I think i’m up to speed on what’s happening in the city this week.  Hopefully now that I am long-hours-at-work free, I’ll be able to enjoy some of these things.  At least I hope.

Sylvia and I were in Canada this weekend for my cousin Jeremy’s wedding. On the road down to Windsor we stopped at a good ol’ Canadian service station for a snack.

A Tim Horton’s medium double double and box of 10 Timbits.

Very Canadian. Though I was reminded that Tim Horton’s coffee is crap.

I also went to Canadian Tire to buy some duct tape.

And now we’re drinking Bloody Ceasers. Pretty authentic weekend.