Coffeehouse.co.nz

While Mike’s mum was here she shouted us a night out at the people circus, which most people know as Circ de Soliel. The show we saw was Alegria, which means ‘joy’ in Spanish.

It was held at what we reckon has to be one of the best venues in London, the Royal Albert Hall. After finding our seats in the circle area (which I have to say were extremely high up), we only had about 10 mins to wait till start time.

It’s quite hard to remember just what we saw. There was a lot going on, and for me it was way better than sitting through a musical! There was a bit of an intro which included some french solo singing (not sure what was being said but it sounded vey good). It all included a bit of a solo trapese swing artist, a man (who was really stong) doing some then some amzing stuff on some poles, then to some cross shaped trampolines built into the stage with a number of acrobats perfroming there. And a bit of fire twirling. Another highlight was two contortionists as a double act – we were amazed at their flexibilty and a lot of the time were unsure of just what way they were facing! And then some high trapeze acrobats.

The stage was really amazing. What we mean is they constantly changed the set and it was intiguing to see the way they changed things around, we’re still not quite sure how they did it. Oh and the other thing that was great were the clowns in the show, they were quite funny and kept you entertained.

All in all a good night out! Thanks Jude (Mum).

Today was a trip just down the road to Greenwich so that mum could stand on the date line. Just something that you need to do when you come here. And the walk through the (free) observatory museum is quite informative too.

But the real reason I like going there is that you’re pretty much guarenteed to see one of my favorite animals. Squirrels! Yes, I know that they’re basically a pest, but they are so cute! So we always take a few nuts along to feed them. Not so many out this time of year, but enough to keep us entertained.

But this time, as well as the squirrels, there was a bit of a bonus. A small fox that was so tame that it kept taking bits of food that someone was throwing through the fence. Must have been coming up to about a metre from us standing by the fence. Cool to see.

Oh, and there were hundreds of pigeons too, but as I hate them I didn’t take any photos of the scanky buggers.

Today we went to see another London site that we’ve walked past many a time on our weekend walks, or on our way to work, but never been into… The Tower of London.

Not a bad place to visit, with a lot of flashy jewellery that the Queen could rattle quite well at special occasions.  And the biggest gold punch bowl that you could imagine. That must have been some party that needed that!

Also lots of old weapons and stuff, from the time it was an armoury.  including, surprise, surprise, some really, really uncomfortable armour.  How the hell they moved anywhere, let along fought anyone in it, I have no idea.

Reading about how much gunpowder was stored there was a bit of an eye opener. And how close the fire of London got to the stash of barrels. And how much of an extra demolition job on the city would have happened if it got just that little bit further!  There was a lot of gunpowder there, apparently.

It was also really interesting walking around there and relating it to the Neal Stephenson series describing what went on there.  Seeing the “cells” that the prisoners were held in, and the traitors gate etc.

All quite impresive, and another place we can (finally) tick off the list of London sites that we’ve been to.  After how long here!?

It’s really interesting to have a visitor that is not so used to things that we hear and see everyday who can point out to us see just how odd some of those regular things are when you have no idea of any context.

“If you don’t touch your oyster on the way in and out of the tube, you’ll be charged the maximum cash fare”, bleats the loudspeaker at the tube station… Often.

When it’s pointed out, you can start to see the confusion that might arise for someone with no idea what’s going on!

It had to happen some time. The christmas tree is going up today, and apparently to properly decorate a tree you have to be driinking champagne. Not quite sure how that works, but I was easily convinced, and it does seem to be a tradition of ours now.

I’m sure that we don’t have enough lights, but I suspect that I’ll be told off if I get too many more for it… Though I might still see what I can sneak on there a bit later. But once the lights were on, that’s about the end of my job.

I was allowed to help with putting on the rest of the decorations, but only if I strictly followed instructions, so I thought it best for domestic harmony if I just left Bec to it. So my job is now to say “yes” whenever asked if things look good. Which I do damn well, if I do say so myself!

But we have so many decorations that Bec’s getting quite confused and upset about what to put on the tree, and what has to stay in boxes for the year. We inherited all of Megan and Michael’s decorations when they left (and it’s their tree too actually – our old one was a bit shorter by about 2 feet), so we’ve really got two full sets for one tree. Actually, I think we might even have enough for three trees. Four at a push. “When you don’t have enough decorations it’s a lot easier” Bec’s just whined, flapping her arms.

The trick is knowing when to stop, I think. But she seems quite happy organising all of the leftovers into piles based on colour and size anyway… Oh, and shape too, apparently!

So now it’s up for another year. Not quite the same as having a real “live” pine tree, with the traditional christmas pine smell, but good enough, and a lot less mess! And probably a lot easier than trying to get a tree home on the tube!

I was lucky enough to get asked to go to the ruggers at Twickenham with a friend, so who am I to turn down free VIP tickets, even when NZ aren’t even playing! The game was between England and South Africa, so it was a bit of a struggle deciding who to root for. When I say VIP, it means that we got to go to the O2 tent and have a few drinks and a great big pie. After warming up with some food and red wine off we set to find our seats.

It’s quite different going to a game and being fairly neutral, but in the end I decided to root for England as I guess it’s my second home. I have to say that the game wasn’t the most exciting, probably due to the fact that my team wasn’t playing and at times it was so frustrating as the English were too slow with the ball and god only knows what their back line was doing. It was also great having our own little radios which are tapped into the ref, so you got to know what was going on more than usual (probably looked like a pack of dorks though). Both teams were pretty evenly matched, but the English stole the show at the last minute, which I am pleased about due to their recent losing streak and also maybe now those rugger fans at work will have something to be cheery about!

After the game back to the O2 tent to warm up again and listen to post match comments. Then off we toddled to Londontown to meet Mike at the Temple Walkabout (yes we did actually go there, for those of you that know what it’s like), to watch the All Blacks vs. France game. We even had in good ole Walkabout style some snakebits… I forgot how they give you a sore head the next day. All in all it was a good day out!

A while ago I was looking through Olive magazine and found an advert for the BBC’s Good Food Festival, and grabbed some tickets. So after remembering we actually had to take the tickets with us, off we set across London to the massive Olympia exhibition hall. And was it worth taking the decision not eating breakie. Hell yes!

There were mases of food and drink stalls with samples to try, and we made the most of it by trying as much as we could. And after all the sampling we came home with some various stuff, which actually motivated us to cook more than the ready made soup that we had been planning to have tonight all week.

The majority of the prices seemed to be discounted and there were some really good bargains to be picked up. However, unfortunately we didn’t come home with a bottle of the ‘100% pain’, a chilli condiment that we tried. By the look on Bec’s face, the product lived up to it’s name. It took her a lot of bread and about 10 mins to come right! Strangely enough I really liked it!

As always, there were a couple of random stalls there with not much to do with food… One selling sandals, and a power company trying to get people to change their power supplier. Duh! Of course we don’t want to talk to you about that! We’re there for the food!

Yes, sorry. We are the type of people that run home on Halloween night and close all the curtains and only turn on the minimum number of light emitting devices to be able to see what we’re doing, and basically hide. We even considered cooking dinner by candlelight. But that might have possibly been misinterpreted as getting into the spirit of things, so we just grabbed enough stuff to make a sandwich and ran away to the lounge.

Bah humbug, I know, but I’m afraid I haven’t got much interest in another time of the year that really doesn’t seem to have a great deal going for it other than selling “stuff” to kids.

Doesn’t help that most of the kids running around the neighbourhood in masks on the way home were all about 16 or 17, and not the type of visitors that you really want to have to deal with on the doorstep on a dark night!

Seems to be working so far. No knocks on the door yet. We’ll see if it lasts…

A visit across to the far side of town for a friend’s birthday, and a visit to the Kiwi Kitchen for lunch. Nice little place, with a couple of Jazz musicians keeping us company.

It did remind me though that NZ doesn’t have much of a cuisine to offer though. Apart from the obligatory green lip mussels, paua patties, kumara chips and a bit of lamb, there wasn’t too much that really stood out as anything particularly Kiwi. I guess that’s probably enough.

What better way to celebrate an official welcome to the UK than to attend a football game between a London and “European” side. Arsenal vs Porto (they’re from Portugal, in case you’re confused!) at the new Emirates’ stadium.

Another sporadic visit to an Arsenal game (the common denomenator in any football game I’ve been to. They’d have to be my team now, if they weren’t before!) I managed to get a ticket due to a season ticket holder who’s friends with another season ticket holder I work with being away on busines for the week (thank you, whoever you are!), and it was a superb night out. The first half I was watching from up on the bottom level of the top tier from about the corner flag position, so I could get a really good view of everything that was happening. The second half I wathced from about 12 rows back from the pitch, just past the halfway line. It was fantastic to get to see both types of view in one night. Both as good, but very differnt.

Amazing stadium. Absolutely amazing! Almost brand new, and so incredible! Amazing to be in when a game is on, and even more amazing getting out of once it’s all over. Even walking up to the ground before the game and seeing it on the horizon, it just looks something special.

And a good win for Arsenal. I haven’t been to a game yet that they’ve lost.

I’m just gutted I forgot the camera that night, so you’ll have to take my word for it all!!