A Week of London
Feb. 9th, 2001 12:08 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lillibetI had gotten a lot of mushrooms, thinking I would make a mushroom-heavy
dinner for Claudia (who's vegetarian) and Jim on Sunday. Since we
cancelled, I had to use up a ton of mushrooms, so I made Hungarian mushroom
soup on Monday and put mushrooms in the lemon chicken I made that night and
in the paella I made on Wednesday. I think that by the time they do come to
dinner next week, I will have had enough of mushrooms and be ready to make
spinach lasagne again. If you have a favorite vegetarian entree you'd like
to suggest, I'm always looking for new recipes.
On Tuesday I had the great satisfaction of finally getting our filing system
up and running. It's been a challenge to find supplies of a size that will
fit in our filing cabinet, but we managed to kluge something that will work
just fine.
On Wednesday the inspector came from UPS to look at our wedding album and
agree that yes, it's broken. They will reimburse Deb (our photographer) for
the value of the shipment and the shipping costs, and she will have it
replaced and get it back to us, better packaged this time, we hope.
It was such a beautiful day out that I dragged Jason over to Hampstead and
we went on the Old Hampstead Village walk. Our tour guide, Emily, was very
dramatic and eccentric and seemed occasionally overwhelmed by the pathos and
drama of the various sites she was showing us. We did have a nice walk,
seeing where lots of famous people lived (among them the grandfather of
Daphne du Maurier, D.H. Lawrence, Lord Alfred Douglas, Oscar Wilde, Keats,
H.G. Wells, George Romney, etc.). We saw two homes of Constable and his
tomb in the churchyard of St. John's, where Joan & Jackie Collins' mother is
also buried. Of living stars, we saw the homes of Judy Dench (and heard a
great story about her late husband, Michael Williams), Baby Spice and Sporty
Spice, Boy George and the drummer from Pink Floyd. We had a nice tramp over
Hampstead Heath, heard the history of the place and had a good view of the
City. On our walk we met a young couple who've just bought a house in
Waltham, near Boston. He works for Compaq out in Shrewsbury and she in
Cambridge and I got the sense that if we had wanted to delve, we very likely
had friends in common.
On Thursday I went into Trafalgar Square and met Claudia for lunch in the
cafe in the crypt of the church of St. Martin-in-the-Fields. We had a nice
lunch and I got to look through the gift shop, which has a lot of brass
rubbings and some other wonderful things. We both belong to the "I love
movies and never get to go" club, so we wandered up to Leicester Square and
saw the next thing playing that we wanted to see, which was Steven
Soderbergh's _Traffic_. It's a complex film about the drug trade/war and
manages to make its point without beating the audience over the head.
Benicio del Toro's performance is wonderful and Soderbergh managed to get
fine performances from everyone without letting anyone go over the top.
I met Jason back at the house and we went over to Hampstead for dinner at
the Gaucho Grill, where we had a couple of their excellent Argentinian
steaks. The food was great and we liked our waiter, but stuck out front,
away from the main dining room, service was somewhat intermittant. We did
try a new varietal of wine we hadn't had before, Malbec, which is similar to
Merlot, but with stronger flavors that went very well with our dinner.
dinner for Claudia (who's vegetarian) and Jim on Sunday. Since we
cancelled, I had to use up a ton of mushrooms, so I made Hungarian mushroom
soup on Monday and put mushrooms in the lemon chicken I made that night and
in the paella I made on Wednesday. I think that by the time they do come to
dinner next week, I will have had enough of mushrooms and be ready to make
spinach lasagne again. If you have a favorite vegetarian entree you'd like
to suggest, I'm always looking for new recipes.
On Tuesday I had the great satisfaction of finally getting our filing system
up and running. It's been a challenge to find supplies of a size that will
fit in our filing cabinet, but we managed to kluge something that will work
just fine.
On Wednesday the inspector came from UPS to look at our wedding album and
agree that yes, it's broken. They will reimburse Deb (our photographer) for
the value of the shipment and the shipping costs, and she will have it
replaced and get it back to us, better packaged this time, we hope.
It was such a beautiful day out that I dragged Jason over to Hampstead and
we went on the Old Hampstead Village walk. Our tour guide, Emily, was very
dramatic and eccentric and seemed occasionally overwhelmed by the pathos and
drama of the various sites she was showing us. We did have a nice walk,
seeing where lots of famous people lived (among them the grandfather of
Daphne du Maurier, D.H. Lawrence, Lord Alfred Douglas, Oscar Wilde, Keats,
H.G. Wells, George Romney, etc.). We saw two homes of Constable and his
tomb in the churchyard of St. John's, where Joan & Jackie Collins' mother is
also buried. Of living stars, we saw the homes of Judy Dench (and heard a
great story about her late husband, Michael Williams), Baby Spice and Sporty
Spice, Boy George and the drummer from Pink Floyd. We had a nice tramp over
Hampstead Heath, heard the history of the place and had a good view of the
City. On our walk we met a young couple who've just bought a house in
Waltham, near Boston. He works for Compaq out in Shrewsbury and she in
Cambridge and I got the sense that if we had wanted to delve, we very likely
had friends in common.
On Thursday I went into Trafalgar Square and met Claudia for lunch in the
cafe in the crypt of the church of St. Martin-in-the-Fields. We had a nice
lunch and I got to look through the gift shop, which has a lot of brass
rubbings and some other wonderful things. We both belong to the "I love
movies and never get to go" club, so we wandered up to Leicester Square and
saw the next thing playing that we wanted to see, which was Steven
Soderbergh's _Traffic_. It's a complex film about the drug trade/war and
manages to make its point without beating the audience over the head.
Benicio del Toro's performance is wonderful and Soderbergh managed to get
fine performances from everyone without letting anyone go over the top.
I met Jason back at the house and we went over to Hampstead for dinner at
the Gaucho Grill, where we had a couple of their excellent Argentinian
steaks. The food was great and we liked our waiter, but stuck out front,
away from the main dining room, service was somewhat intermittant. We did
try a new varietal of wine we hadn't had before, Malbec, which is similar to
Merlot, but with stronger flavors that went very well with our dinner.
