London On Crack

The Queen's Jubliee festivities have begun - and evidence is everywhere!  Every street has bunting swagging between the lamp posts, all the store windows are decorated with corgies and crowns, and the Union Jack is flying from every place one could possibly fly a flag. Forget everything you thought you knew about decorating - London has taken it to a whole different level for the Diamond Jubilee. It is London on crack.

While some may find this kind of display silly, I think that it is cool as crustless cucumber and cress sandwich. It's nice to see the Londoners displaying a bit of pride for once. Typically they are so down on their own city. Whenever I tell someone I moved here from New York they gawk at me and ask, "WHY?!" Which does not help that I often ask myself that same question.

The Londoners are the first to criticize and apologize for their city, their crap food, and their never ending rain. But one thing you can count on a Brit being proud of is their Queen. They love old Liz and her little dogs too. 

Thus, the entire city has become a shrine to her and her sixty year reign. 

Take a look at some of my favorite snapshots. 

Everyone will be celebrating this weekend with street parties, and no doubt attending the many Jubilee events - mainly the pageant of boats on the Thames and the concert at Buckingham Palace. Of course, no one is working over these bank holidays and everyone will be drinking lots of Pimms and lots of pints. 

I am a little sad I won't be here to see it, since I do think it will be quite cute and fun. Jubilees only come round every so often after all! But I am taking this time to go back to America and spend 10 glorious days in the midwest. But I will be bringing a bit of England home with me and celebrating the Jubilee with a proper English garden party at my house. 

England has grown on me lately. A bit more like a weed than a flower, but grown none the less. Relocating here has been a bit of an emotional roller coaster - first complete joy and excitement, then lonlieness sunk in, followed by misery, slight depression, and self-loathing for making the decision to move here. Then I just sort of came to terms with the fact that I'm stuck here - and I put on a brave face and sucked it up. Now, I have weirdly found that I am actually starting to enjoy (ish)  life here. 

The weather has been gorgeous for the past two week and I realized I actually have made some good friends so I think that definitely helped. All last week when it was 75 and sunny instead of going to gym I went on 3 hour walks around different bits of the city. Up to Big Ben and Wesminster, through the tree lined streets of Notting Hill, in and out of fancy shops in Knightsbridge and Belgravia. I met friends for supper at Southbank, I stood outside on the street among my fellowmen in Mayfair with a Pimm's, soaking up the sun. I stayed up late in our common room with my flatmates watching British tv and chatting. I indulged in Honeycomb and clotted cream ice cream - and I guess somewhere in the middle of that it  just hit me. London is, actually, pretty awesome. 

So it took awhile, a long while actually for this place to feel like home. But everyday, I'm slowly adapting and starting to feel like I know the ropes.

I've started unconsciously saying "lift" when I mean elevator, and "hire" instead of rent. I don't only think of ice cream when someone says pint, and I see nothing strange about someone drinking one at 10am. I've stopped caring that the grocery store doesn't have ReddiWhip and have embraced the complete deliciousness of clotted cream instead. I tell the cab driver where I'm going before I get in, and refer to pounds as "quid." I no longer eat all my meals from Marks and Spencer,  but make food with ingredients from the fresh market, which tastes "really nice." I guess I'm becoming a little English-ified.

While I have discovered this new found admiration for the country my own once split from, I am thrilled to go back to the United States for a much needed holiday.

I've been looking forward to this trip for so long, I took extra care when planning the flight so that I could leave Friday night after work, so I could sleep in my own bed in my house Friday night, so I could maximize every moment. 

So you can imagine my dismay when I arrive at Heathrow today, to find that my flight was delayed 3 hours. That 3 hours meant I would certainly miss by connecting flight and therefore would be sleeping on an airport bench in Washington DC airport tonight instead of wrapped up in my down comforter. In the whole of flights and routes out of Heathrow, there was no other possible way for me to get within a decent radius of Ohio. 

So what did I do? First I got very upset, called everyone I knew to complain and cursed United Airways and everyone associated with it. 

And then I remembered that great English motto that has gotten me through the rough times here. "Keep Calm and Carry On." 

So I went to The Tin Goose - the fancy little pub inside Terminal 1, and as it was tea time, I sat down for a cream tea: a lovely pot of English Breakfast, buttery scones, fresh clotted cream and strawberry jam. My own personal tribute to Her Majesty, a proper last mean in England for a while. 

Cheers!

As I nibbled away, I realized that whether I made it to Cleveland tonight or not, at least in a few short hours I was going to be in America. I could buy New York magazine and watch recognizable shows on television and call people without enormous overseas charges!!

In America we have saying - if life gives you lemons, make lemonade. Well the English don't say this of course, because none of our idioms and expressions translate.  But I think this one can easily be adapted to "If life gives you lemons, make lemon curd - and put it on your scone."  And so I did.