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Today I visited Piccadilly Circus, which is a bit like Times Square, sort of.

I also visited Covent Garden Market, which is almost exactly like Faneul Hall Market in Boston. Except all the street performers have cockney accents.

While there, I encountered some kind souls who are helping blind people.

I asked them how they do it — they told me they use spray bottles of sulfuric acid. Bless their hearts.

In 3 hours I board a train to Paris! Catch you on the other side of the Chunnel.

Here it is – the famous recording studio that was named after the album the Beatles recorded there that was named after the road the studio was on*. Excellent!

(*Yes, that’s true. )

I started to shoot some footage of the famous crosswalk, but the batteries on my flip vid died. Thus saving the quiet village of St. John’s Wood from yet another tourist going “Ooh look, I’m crossing the road just like the Beatles! Ooo!”

I did, however, cross the road just like the Beatles. I felt special.

(Also, I realize now that that doesn’t actually say “Oasis is King”. It actually says “Oasis hearts Kim. E.” No idea. At any rate, Oasis is shitty and overhyped just like that graffito.)

Update: Check out this great time-lapse video of an entire day of tourists reenacting the album cover. Good for a chuckle:

Some more selected sketches, all done while riding the Tube (Subway to you Yanks). I’m finding Londoners to be generally more fidgety than I’d like as subjects for candid sketches. There’s one drawing I did this morning that would be here, but I didn’t get a chance to take a snap of it before I gave it away to the lovely lady it was of.
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Well, yesterday was just the perfect day. Starting with my trip to the museum, then back to the hostel for work, where my new broadband wireless card worked far better than I expected. For my dinner break I decided to be adventurous and just picked a random tube stop to find a restaurant. I ended up at an Indian Tapas place. The food was simply exquisite. Then back to the hostel to finish up the workday. After all that, I was debating whether to go back out, or to call it a night and get an early start today. I decided I’d go check out the hostel bar and see where things went. Well, a bunch of the other hostelers were on their way out to a Dub and Reggae show at a club, and invited me along. We took the tube to the very other end of the city (near London Bridge). The line took forever, but it was totally worth it. The show was great. The bass was so heavy you could feel it in your whole body. It hit the resonance frequency of my voicebox, which felt really bizarre.

I ordered some Ital Stew, which was delicious, although not as good as the Jamaican place in Brattleboro does. But it was microwaved behind a folding table in a club so what do you expect. Anyway it was yummy. And then I just danced all night with my friends from the hostel and all the other clubgoers. I wish I had pictures of the night but the whole thing was spur-of-the-moment and I didn’t have a chance to grab my camera. I’ll try and get some pictures of the various hostellers involved later on.

After I’d danced myself out, I took off and walked back to the Tube, which was closed, not surprisingly since it was around 3 AM at that point. So I hired a cab and got a great winding ride all the way from southeast to northwest London, with the cabbie interjecting comments about the various sights.

All right, daylight is burning – I’m off to see the touristy stuff today – Big Ben, Parliament, Buckingham Palace, etc.

Today I finally made it into London proper, saw the Thames and went to Tate Modern to check out some art.

Of the ones I saw, I particularly liked these pieces (among many wonderful ones):
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Like I always do when I’m anywhere except Brattleboro, I’ve been sketching quite a bit. Here are some of the better ones (where the people I was drawing held still for a decent length of time)

Aboard the Gatwick Express 01 31 09

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Saw an amusing sign today. Oh, the Britsh and their odd terminology.

I assumed, logically, that it was a warning that there’s a combination crosswalk and speedbump coming up. But I was proved wrong a moment later…