Day 3

So, we'll start off with very little of the titular scissors or cake, but, as promised, none of the scholarly life. I've been in London for three days now and most of my time has been spent sleeping at odd times (jet lag!), walking around, and standing in line while trying to acquire certain needful things. In fact, so much of my time has been spent standing in various lines and/or in various waiting and reception areas, that the first two activities merely feel like temporary respites from the third.

Today was spent comparatively locally, around Russell Square and the various University of London related buildings there. In keeping with my lietmotif of standing in line, I got a library card for Senate House (seen here in all its Owellian glory), the proccessing of which was delayed by the arrival young man from Royal Holloway who'd forgotten his student ID and so was denied a card, and who pitched a fit that included raising his voice, emptying his wallet of all its contents and attempting to jump the entry barrier in order to access a computer and verify his identity using Teh Internets (the librarian said while she was sure there were very nice pictures of him on said internet, he needed the card. And also that she was, in fact, the supervisor on duty. Hee!). Senate House is nice but I don't understand why they don't have the OUP edition of Augustine's Confessiones, or what organizational scheme places the church fathers immediately next to the sports psychology section.

Later, I visited my first "real" UK grocery store (the Tesco express opposite the Tube station does not count, although it does have Walker's Sweet Thai Chili potato chips, with which I am obsessed. More of that below). As the song says, "I don't know why but I had to start it somewhere, so I started there." This was a Waitrose, which I gather to be a rather upscale chain, more along the lines of a Whole Foods in the US, and it had wide, gleaming suburban aisles full of packages of things which looked familiar but on closer inspection proved to be manifestly unfamiliar (much like the process of converting pounds into dollars). It pains me still that I don't have access to a kitchen here, but I did buy some cookies, some tea, some whole wheat bread and some peanut butter, which people for some reason insisted I wouldn't be able to find in the UK. They had both the crunchy and creamy kind, even (I got crunchy). My hall is a "catered" hall, which means that a full meal plan is automatically included with the room, at attendant cost. The food in the dining room is rather, um, uninspired, with the weird exception of the desserts, which so far have exceeded expectations. I'm trying to adjust to eating a larger breakfast, so's to economize on lunch, but it's weird and I find the sight and smell of stewed tomatoes at 8 in the morning distinctly unappetizing. Hence the wheat bread and peanut butter, which should make tasty, filling sandwiches and sit comfortably on my shelf until then.

(As you can see, I am not the only one who feels strongly about the sweet thai chili chips, er, crisps. They taste very similar to bbq-flavored chips but better, somehow. The bag assures me that this is because they use real chilies, but given the fact that Walker's is merely the UK subsidiary of Frito-Lay it's likely MSG or a known carinogen or something. The Walker's Sensations range-- carried in full at the aforementioned Tesco express-- also includes "Carmelized onion and balsamic vinegar," "sea salt and cracked black pepper," "Vintage cheddar and red onion chutney," "lime and thai spices," and, perhaps most intruigingly, "oven roast chicken with lemon and thyme." Obviously, I look forward to trying them all.)

But the grocery store was perhaps the least interesting stop on my shopping intenary today. Most interesting would be a tie between Muji and Argos. Muji is a Japanese store which sells, according to their website, "no brand quality goods". It's little like if IKEA and H&M got together (there's clothing and furniture sections upstairs) and gave birth to children, and these children were a stationary section and a travel goods section. And it was all very restrained and tasteful, and it all costs amounts that a sane person would be willing to pay, as opposed to most things in London. I could have happily spend a great deal of time and a not insignificant sum of money there, but I walked away with only a scented candle meant to address the fact that my room smells exactly like you'd expect a 112 square foot space in a fifty year old building.

Argos is something else entirely. Basically, it's a department store, but rather than the items being on a shelf, you select them from a catalogue, and the number into a kiosk, along with your payment info. The staff goes into the back (a warehouse, presumably), and brings your items out to you. You pay and you leave. And I don't know why but this breaks my American brain so hard: it's probably been going on forever and anyone who's reading this who's lived in Britian is probably going "Yeah. What about it?" But really, if you want to know something about a culture, I think there are worse places to look than when they get their food and their discount home goods.

The one thing I have not been able to find at a reasonable price is a new battery charger for the camera. I don't know whether it's broken or simply not wired to talk nice with any of my various voltage converters, but I'm unable to get it to work and was unwilling to purchase any of the universal chargers the nice electronics salesmen offered me for 39.99 (though I did manage to talk one guy down to 29.99). There will be pictures once I get that straightened out.

Till then-