bestdayever.

Today was probably the sweetest ever. I caught the train and made it to Victoria Station within 40minutes (a feat, I tell you, a feat!) in time to watch little Billy Elliot dance. Unfortunately, tickets to watch Billy dance were sold out and so we (me, my Auntie & Unclie) hopped a train over to Leicester Square and got tickets to 'Blood Brothers.' Yes, I did see it a few weeks ago, but I felt quite priveleged accompanying these two dear people to a musical I think most highly of that neither had seen. Unclie gave it a standing ovation. We proceeded to Piccadilly for some wine accompanied by dinner (for me, anyway) and then Auntie & I (or rather, mostly me) had this OUTRAGEOUS idea to go to a pub and then wait by the stage door for HotJesus (TM). We went to see 'Whistle Down the Wind' on Wednesday and were very disappointed when Fat, Pasty, Kevin JamesxPaul Giamatti Jesus showed up instead for the matinee. Instead, we did better, my Auntie being the amazing lucky miracle worker that she is: we hit the Palace Theater just at interval time and several people were smoking and drinking outside. Well, heck, and we went in. A girl asked for our tickets and my Aunt feigned ignorance (like she does so well!) and the girl let us in on the basis that we were good, honest people who just wanted to watch the rest of our musical and were a bit too daft to remember our tickets when we went outside (oh, I feel bad.) So, we scoured out some seats on the ground floor (7th row) and sat down to enjoy the HotJesus (TM) feast. Ahh, and there he was, letting himself down from the rafters by sheer arm muscle strength alone. We got some more wine and joined in the laughter from the gay couples in front and next to us (how I love them!) and ignored the scowls from the all-knowing boring looking never-have-sex-anymore couple behind us. So, leaving the theatre, that brings us to Figure 1.

Figure 1: The show's groupies. There weren't many of them. There were three. Me, my auntie, and this weird guy who was waiting "to see if any famous people came out." Well, we said, there's HotJesus (TM) and Fat Pasty Jesus and not much more. He left soon after we took this picture. Going on half an hour of waiting (thank goodness it was decently nice out) we just decided to walk into the stage doors and have a chat with the guard there. My auntie asked him if Jesus had left yet and he said he didn't think so. Then he even rang somewhere to ask if "Tim" had left. "Oh, no, he's just in the shower," he said. We were excited and continued to chat with the old guard.

Went outside, had a smoke with my auntie. (You're too young, she said! even though it was her idea.) And soon enough, HotJesus pokes his head out the door and motions us in. Oh, Hot Jesus, I said, please let me have your babies. No, instead, he gave me two European kisses (I can still feel the Jesus Stubble) and chatted with us, a very, like the guard said, "nice bloke." He told me to behave in Amsterdam and told me he was from Australia. And then I took a Kristina is Delirious and Drunk picture with Hot Jesus. And I will cherish it forever. I am in love.


(god, i am so lame.) the end.

p.s. Tomorrow I am going to Amsterdam for a three-week trek around Europe and then back to London for a few days before I head off to Japan. I will tell you the most sparing of details (probably just a sad little general summary) when I get back.

on march 23, the cadbury machines on the underground were working for the first time in over two months..

... in celebration, I bought some mini creme eggs.

It was not just the wine that was heady, I realized this morning - it was the city. I think everybody should cross a bridge at the start and end of every day. There is no doubt a sense of the epic - even when its just a few steps.

Waterloo is barely a bridge. It is a smothering of monumental images that somehow lose perspective and smash up against one another into an onslaught of magnificence your eyes can't really handle. It is necessary to lieterally squint like the sun is too bright because the power of the images in your retinas is too strong. Everytime I look across the river at St. Paul's with the tall white and red cranes hovering over the buildings surrounding it I can see it only as a print - I cannot believe it is real. I have found my place to write in the city. What was I thinking when I thought it would be inside a coffee shop? Noise and cash registers do nothing for me, but this first lengthy feel of the sun has done everything.

Take me back to this classical terrace above the Victoria Embankment and let me watch the dirty Thames sparkle brilliantly in the sun, unknowing of the fact that it is itself toxic, filthy and destined to kill anythin ghtat lurks in its water. Let it be and let me watch the iconic double deckers make their way back and forth the bridge, looking for faces that peer out from the top deck.

as eurydice:

After a day of much jest and comfort in the sweet loving company of my Auntie from St. Paul, MN (plus a day in which I finished with four junky magazines in my position, oh! the Oscar fashion pictures) I finished a damn good day with a smashing finish. Smashed (a bit from the glass of wine) and smashed (Unclie's traditional sausage & mash dinner) and smashed (The George pub we ate at, built in 1723, bombed in 1941), I walked across Waterloo Bridge towards Waterloo station. In my slightly hazy state, I realized that the essence of London is contained half above the water and half under. The Waterloo Bridge is not a pretty bridge but at night you could very well want to build a palace right on top of its concrete sturdiness and sit there forever looking out at the river around you. Heading towards Waterloo station, the beautifully lit Houses of Parliament and Big Ben and the imposing London Eye to your right, the lit up Royal Theatre, St. Paul's dome, the tall chimney of the Tate Modern, and the silver Millennium Bridge to your left. And everywhere around you, the sparkling lights of a city still very much alive. After I crossed the bridge, I took an underground passageway right into Waterloo station. I passed a man sitting with sunglasses on quietly singing a strangely comforting tune and I smiled. I don't think he saw me because he was wearing sunglasses. Continuing on, I saw this poem written, in gold font, installed on the tunnel wall. Oh, a city who would put a poem like this deep within its earth:

Eurydice

I am not afraid as I descend,
step by step, leaving behind the salt wind
blowing up the corrugated river,

the damp city streets, their sodium glare
of rush-hour headlights pitted with pearls of rain;
for my eyes still reflect the half remembered moon.

Already your face recedes beneath the station clock,
a damp smudge among the shadows
mirrored in the train's wet glass,

will you forget me? Steel tracks lead you out
past cranes and crematoria,
boat yards and bike sheds, ruby shards

of roman glass and wolf-bone mummified in mud,
the rows of curtained windows like eyelids
heavy with sleep, to the city's green edge.

Now I stop my ears with wax, hold fast
the memory of the song you once whispered in my ear.
Its echoes tangle like briars in my thick hair.

You turned to look.
Second fly past like birds.
My hands grow cold. I am ice and cloud.

This path unravels.
Deep in hidden rooms filled with dust
and sour night-breath the lost city is sleeping.

Above the hurt sky is weeping,
soaked nightingales have ceased to sing.
Dusk has come early. I am drowning in blue.

I dream of a green garden
where the sun feathers my face
like your once eager kiss.

Soon, soon I will climb
from this blackened earth
into the diffident light.
-Sue Hubbard

Oh, a city like the city that is mine.

my my my valentine

There have been plenty of bad days here in London. The bad to good days ratio is probably equivalent to those back in Minnesota. It's nothing surprising, it's nothing new. It really shouldn't be anything noteworthy to exclaim that I have had days where I never want to get out of bed in this beautiful city, and it shouldn't be anything noteworthy to say that I get lonely, and I sometimes get to the point where I just want it to be like the good old days back at Macalester. But I did expect it to be noteworthy. I figured that once I got here my soul would fly and I would be so inspired by the city around me that I would be full of intellectualism and creativity. I would be halfway done with my novel by now and I would have created several works of art. I would be wiser, better groomed, and more sure of myself. Because of London.

Although environment does have the possibility to influence happiness and well-being, it does not turn you on your head and knock every creative vein into motion. If you're in a place too long, you get stagnant, your mind, your body. But if you're in a place too short a time, you never really sink in. So there must be some great equation to balance out how long you should be in a place. But I don't know it yet.

Though I've learned too that location, geographically, doesn't account for everything. Place in terms of- place in your life, place in relation to others, and place geography and city, are all part of the equation. So here I've got geography and city, and I'm in the perfect place in my life to be in London. But it's a lack of relation to others that gets me down. It's the slightly on edge conversations I have with everyone. It's the slight run through in my mind before every conversation. The easiness and laziness of good friend conversation is missing. And to be fair, I didn't find it until about a year ago, so for me to be unable to find it here, within 2 months, would be a big feat, and already I feel I've gotten closer than I ever had before last year. But now that I've had a taste of the sipping-lemonade-on-the-terrace type of conversation that is possible between 2, 3, 4 people, it's sad when it's gone missing.

This interpersonal easiness leads to comfort, and the comfort adds points to your general happiness, and happiness lends itself to allowing you to go out on your own on a limb and make and create with this feeling. And when you're down, you're down, because it's new and you're usually so happy go lucky, and it's dramatic and invigorating. Whereas down here? It's lazy and suffocating.

I'm fine, really, good, actually- sometimes I just get tired of Sharon Stone telling me that I can look better now than I did at 20 whenever I look out the window.

Furthermore, I've discovered that Diet Coke is a pathetic diluted brown when held up to the sunlight, not the rich creamy darkness that I came to know it as. A bit, but not nearly all, of the magic is gone. Kristina's Count of Diet Coke's consumed in the last two weeks: too many to count, falling out of plastic bag attempting to hold them in.

a strange title: the final salute.

Went to Highbury stadium the other day, home of Arsenal. They're about to put it out of commission, building a fancy new shiny modern stadium about a block. I'm not an Arsenal fan. Absolutely hated them a couple years ago when my ardour for Manchester United was at its frenzied height (we're talking about crying when they sold Juan Sebastian Veron/Becks and skipping school to watch a big game on the telly). But they've grown on me, and Thierry Henry is a stud. In the fact that he's an excellent, professional player. So, we had nothing else to do and we went to Highbury. . . And it was brilliant! There's something about being there, about being where so many dramas took place, where I imagined thousands and thousands of people gathering with anticipation before a match day. I thought of Nick Hornby walking there, and I recognized the street where floods of fans celebrated after a well played match in the 90s Colin Firth 'Fever Pitch' movie. It was magical, really. And we didn't even get to go inside. Just goes to show the power of football in England. Oh, I love it. I love it.

the art of kicking ass.

I rarely stay up past 2am to write papers - by the time that rolls around, I've been spending every 30 seconds alternating between reloading e-mail and checking websites I know haven't been updated in the last 2 minutes and writing a tepid, measley sentence or two. And yet, last night, after failing to fall asleep to the sweet sounds of Mariah & Madonna (you'd think by this time the beats through the wall would be like a lullaby) I woke up and by the light of my faulty and slowly dying fluorescent desk light, finished the whole damn essay. And it's just about enough bullcrap on debunking Nicolas Bourriaud's relational aesthetic theory to sound pretty damn smart. I wake up - skip a 10am lecture because, gosh darnit, I earned it - buy a pizza and some Diet Coke and I'm good to go.

My mom's been in town since Saturday and I've been stressed about finishing this paper, among other things. But 2500 words later, suddenly the sun is out and I'm looking forward to going into the city and telling my mom about how smart I am. We did something beautiful the first day she was here - walked around Kensington Gardens, Hyde Park, and looked at the fashion exhibits in the V&A. While we were there, a small film crew was filming an older man speaking French and pointing to items within the JC de Castelbajac exhibit. As I strained to listen with my tepid French skills, I realized he was saying "J'ai commence" and other phrases in the first person, and, examining family photographs, realized that this was indeed the designer. Ah, my first brush with fame in London. Eccentric designer today, Gwyneth tomorrow!

Went to the St. Patrick's Day celebrations around Trafalgar Square too, despite the fact that St. Patrick's Day doesn't happen until Friday. I suppose the only day the city can half shut down is on Sunday, when nothing is open anyways. The parade was less than exciting, although the little girls dancing in curls and the dogs dyed green might have been worth all the cold, as well as the group shouting "WE WANT OUR COUNTRY BACK!" which was uncomfortable, because they were in London. We trudged to Trafalgar Square where the Mayor of London was once again celebrating the Irish people and ignoring everything political, and all the guys from Ireland were smiling and nodding along. Then they released balloons the color of the Irish flag and Gemma Hayes sang lots of pretty songs.

Went to Hampstead. Saw John Keats' house (maybe exciting for English nerds like Geoff, I've never read the guy) and it was a very nice house. Impeccable neighborhood. Friendly neighbors! Too bad about the tuberculosis. Still want to move there and own a black lab and let it run all throughout the Heath and then take it with to pick up my small child from some hoity toity fancy brick school. While somebody else makes all the money for me while I write my novel, run a small gallery, and hang out with my kittens.

"In the more fugitive, trivial association of the word exotic, the charm of a foreign places arises from the simple idea of novelty and change: from finding camels where at home there had been horses; from finding unadorned apartment buildings where at home they had had pillars. But there may be a more profound pleasure: we may value foreign elements not only because they are new, but because they seem to accord more faithfully with our identity and commitments than anything our homeland could provide." - The Art of Travel, a book singlehandedly bringing me comfort on my journeys to and from on the Underground.

I still love Henry VIII.

hollywood has ruined everything.

I love the occasional pun or two. I always love the bad pun. I always love the (no pun intended) inserts into texts, even the (pun intended) inserts. I love puns here, there, and every which way. I love every single pun in every single Disneyland ride. I do not, however, love puns that aren't even puns. I do not like people, and even more so, establishments that try to be cutesy and squeeze in puns where they are not wanted. Like in every single menu item. Like the Tinseltown Diner in Hampstead, otherwise a lovely, beautiful neighborhood I eventually want to move to and grow domestic in (see forthcoming entry), which ruins everything. Despite the Minneapolis Dinkeytown reference.

simply:

My favorite moments of the day: 1) The tortoise-shell cat who meowed and let itself into the gallery my class was viewing on the second floor of the pub. And who, I noted with pleasure, liked me more than anybody else. 2) My potato wedges that left everybody at the table around me speechless and loving me for sharing the wedges with them. 3) The entire dance floor at the Soho club caled Ghetto errupting into a frenzy and singing along when Kelly Clarkson came on.

on art:

Just now as I was heading towards the doors of the library to go downstairs and check out the pretentious books about relational aesthetics demanded by my 'postermodernities' class, a student walked through the doors and I tried my hardest not to look but there it was: right side of his face purple and rubbery, complete with eye patch. And yet I felt the need to report it here. Physical deformities (a harsh word, I know) never fail to stop me in my tracks in their awe-inspiring weirdness. I remember a man who hobbled towards me outside the Forbidden City in China, and I can't even describe exactly what was strange, except that everything was. His skin was not where it should have been. And the student, I know this guy was in a fire. And it's horrible. And there are people who stop and look, and there are people who purposefully don't look, which may be even worse. So I don't know. Maybe its because I was thinking about my essay question: 'Analyze instances of relational aesthetics and the types of social space they attempt to produce.' See, I don't even know what that means. You know I don't know what that means. No, I want my neon lights & sixties revolution & Nazi women in Germany topics back because these words frighten me: 'relational, aesthetics, social.' Along with the generally scary 'analyze, attempt, and produce.'

I'm feeling a bit braver though, even than yesterday. A rainy day in London and some more excellent points made in class by yours truly perhaps helped. Last night I realized that I haven't really taken any pictures of London. The London that I walk through every day and the reason for that is understandable and simple: I want to appear that I live here. I want to walk down the street and have everyone assume I've lived here most of my life. But there are certain things you have to capture: and that's the way the streets feel, and most of all, how the Underground feels, and what it's like to party in the flat upstairs like I so often do. So I'm trying to step back. I imagined leaving London for the last time and realized that when I leave, the things that I remember will not be the view from Hampstead Heath, but the view from being pressed back against the doors of the train.

I went to the Photographers' Gallery today (above). It's turned into one of my favorite galleries, as it has a really cozy atmosphere, despite all the white you see here. In the other gallery, a large table sits right in the middle of the viewing space. The cafe is right up next to the gallery and you can sit, drink, and read art magazines as people shuffle about you. Today I saw Alec Soth's work, 'Sleeping by the Mississippi,' who's shortlisted with three other artists for an international photography prize, and I liked him the best even before I found out he's Minnesota born and raised and teaches at MCAD.

And then the desire to stick my hands in chemicals and watch the crisp images of my photos appear with a horrible slowness washed over me as it hasn't since highschool. I've become very tired of my digital camera: it's old, and no matter what I do, what shows up on the screen is rarely what I saw or wanted to convey.

I found a bookstore in London (it's so large, I don't know how I've never seen it before) called Foyles, which claims it's the most famous bookshop in the world. It looks more like a Borders inside now, but the range of books is amazing. I had already been in a cafe at Borders researching Europe travels, but if I was not so tired I could have spent hours in it. Nevertheless, I was so in love I bought a book of travel writing (hopefully to assuage my fears and the stress that bubbled to the surface while trying to flip through four country travel guides) on a whim and a staff's recommendation write-up and also one of the many amazing little books that Penguin has recently published. Jonathan Safran Foer. Oh, you know every girl has an author crush on you.

3/5 ain't bad.

I feel a distinct lack of London in this blog over the past few weeks, but then again, I've felt a distinct lack of me. All those who know me won't be surprised to know that I get anti-social (something I would have been sterilized for in Nazi Germany) and draw into my turtle shell (much like Natanya Francey-Pants) but thus far, it's been the longest period of turtle-shell-wearing since 2004. Maybe it's the fact that I don't know people as well here (which may be the entire, easy case) or it's the fact that I'd rather feel lonely by myself than with others around me. Who knows, but the point of this wasn't to get into my head, rather to get into London.

London still has the uncanny ability to do my soul well. Things are always going on. The other day I walked by the Houses of Parliament and there were lots of reporters and cameraman set up outside the gates, the same as with No.10 Downing Street. No doubt the PM was in town. At the Tate Britain, I went into an installation that felt like something out of a creepy science fiction, like you were always on the run, like the lights were always searching for you. Electric pings and pangs of music reverberated against walls and string and the lights dimmed and darkened and I strained to read the words on the wall written in what only black lights could read. Along with that, an installation about birds in one artist's backyard. He named the magpie Evil Bastard.

Walking back along Whitehall, I noticed the horses and the soldiers mounted on them, so famous in their British stillness. I also noticed all the war hero statues and remembered that Shelli told me that if a horse was reared back, it meant the soldier had died in battle. If one foot was lifted, it meant that he had died from wounds obtained in battle. All feet? Died of natural causes. I don't know if this was true. No rearing up horses on Whitehall though. No dramatic deaths. Oh, those stuffy Brits, can't even bother to die dramatically in battle.

"I'm so glad that I'm an island."

nothing to do with london: oscar fashion.

As promised, I bring to you, on a gloomy misty day in London, a fashion rundown of the Oscars2006. 78years of Oscar ceremonies has proven that the dresses are simply the most exciting thing about the Oscars, yet nothing was really exciting about this one. (Granted, I didn't watch the ceremony over here, but that's what I heard.) So best dress? Michelle Williams, of all people, a Dawson's Creek alumni. She does get points for naming her baby Matilda, however, inspired by the Roald Dahl book. It was yellow, unique, and therefore the best. Otherwise? Eh. I liked Uma Thurman and Salma Hayek's. And although everybody hated it, I dug the ridiculousness and the flounciness of Naomi Watt's dress. I also appreciate Charlize Theron's ugly dress as it reminds me of Boccioni's Unique Forms of Continuity in Space , a futurist statue. (Oh, what pretentiousness!) Also really sweet: the trend of dresses with pocketsas seen on Maggie Gyllenhaal, Sandra Bullock, and Amy Adams. Oh, the joy. Ugly dresses? Not many, but Jennifer Aniston's boring black dresses always piss me off a little. And Jessica Alba? You wear a fancy gold Versace dress wouldn't you, now that you're suing Playboy and really, what is it about her? Why is she so damn popular?

Ah, well, back to our regular scheduled programming. It's gloomy, it's cold, and once again, work is my imminent task.

side note: i love technology.

Come back to the room, decide to check up on E!Online for red carpet pictures. Instead, find that I can stream the entire red carpet show right here from London. No telecast, but the red carpet is the best part anyways. Thought I was going to go to bed early. Guess not. Oh, I'm content. I'm very content.

akin to being distracted by shiny things.

Good-bye, nerdiness. It's been a good four-day run but I'm tired of you. Gone is my desire to set myself up in the library by the best window and read read read to my hearts content. Two days ago this was me: now, 200 pages of reading about women in Nazi Germany (intriguing!) later, I am finished. Oh it's been a good run. And I'm ready to outline this second paper and start writing it, but I don't think I can wrap my head around it properly. I may very well indeed need a day outside of New Cross tomorrow, as I haven't left it since Thursday. Fresh London air (hah!) and perhaps some art or fashion or a stroll through a park will get me ready. Or, as the default answer, a Diet Coke could help me.

But I think the real problem is that my mind has moved past the sudden stress of realizing I had 3 weeks to write 4 essays and onto better things. My mother arrives this Saturday and we plan on taking day trips into other bits of England, attending a footie game, and doing all the other things that mothers & daughters do. Like cook and fetch water. And talk about boys and do each other's hair. No. But, you see, my mom understands London the way I do and hopefully her company will be welcomed for the entire week that she's here. The real question though is: What musical are we going to see? With only popular Broadway crap in town (Chicago, Mama Mia, Fame, etcetera) and about ten viewings total of both Les Miserables and Phantom combined under our belts, there's not much to see, except for an old Andrew Lloyd Webber replacing Woman in White - Whistle Down the Wind! Quite arguably the worst musical he's ever written. It opened and closed about 4 or 5 years ago within a year. Obviously, not the thing to bring back. Evita is coming, but not until June. What a shame.

The other real reason is my occupation with travel. In 2 and a half short weeks, I will be free of academics and ready to embark on my tour around the world. Instead of stress, I have now embraced the excitement and slight stress involved with planning a trip. I'm planning a lot for my roomie and myself - I hope she slightly agrees to it. (How about it, babe?) And for all you others abroad, I'll be out and about in Europe from March 25thish to April 15th. Obviously, e-mail contact will be essential for meeting up. (Almost all hostels have free internet, bless their souls.) Reading about Amsterdam, Dutch windmills, the chateaux of the Loire Valley, coastal Italian towns, and climbing mountains in the Swiss Alps has freed me from this academic and drunken stupor I've stumbled upon recently.

Also preoccupying my travel research is research for Japan. Ballsy Kristina went ahead and booked some stupidly expensive Japan tickets. Ah well, the draw of cherry blossoms, mountains, and Tokyo Disneyland (as well as checking out this cultural phenomenon) was too strong. Oh, and this stupid kid named A- something.

So another pictureless update from this boring girl in London. In about 10 hours it will be time for the Oscar red carpet show over in California. I am missing it badly. Tomorrow I will be back with a special update of my favorite Oscar dresses. Be sure not to miss it.

Yours Truly.

side note: was there a suez canal crisis?

There's nothing like a bit of nerdishness to get you back into the flow of things. Take a few hours of focused reading last night, plus 2.5 hours in the library today and 2 more to go, plus an interesting seminar including a video by an infuriating right-wing historian about the Suez Canal crisis, and you've got this kid here rip-roaring to straighten out and organize her 'was there a sixties social revolution?' paper in order to place her "A Hard Day's Night" quotations in exactly the right places. Sometimes we forget that we go to college to learn. But I haven't - not quite yet. Sometimes the desire to talk in class, a feeling incredibly rare to me, takes ahold of me and gives me an incredible rush. Which is why people who talk in class are usually jerks - because they love themselves. Like I love myself. A lot. . .

(P.S. In order to cure my eating habits (which were constantly made fun of this past weekend in Ireland, see here for example), I've decided to wear nothing but tights and skirts; tights, which noticeably constrict any sort of expansion of natural form, also noticeably tighten the appetite. I think I had come across this astonishing theory before, but since I really like eating and find no reason to stop, I peel off the tights as soon as I walk in the door. But wearing tights may in fact be economically efficient here in London - which is why so many girls are so stylish. Food is not inexpensive here, and I believe by shrinking my appetite by wearing tights, I will have more leftovers and not be consistantly whining about having my dinner never fill me up. This may mean less trips to the delicious chip shop at 1am, but so it goes. So it goes.)