Wednesday, 12 October:
We woke up in our new place! We woke up late for our checkout time at the temp accomodations. This was made even worse by the fact that the central line trains were not running out of Bayswater , so we had to take a District line train to a different station, then transfer to a Hammersmith line so that we could get up to Baker to take the Jubilee line to Willesden Green. I called the place to let them know we would be late, and they ensured us that was fine. When we got there, we went down to the aparment to get the food out of the fridge, and noticed that someone had already stripped the bed down. Uh-oh. Yup, all the food was gone. It wasn't until hours later that we realized the horror of this event, no crushed red peppers! We spent forever trying to find a full size bottle of red peppers and had horded it like it was gold. We made sure that it even went on our carry on luggage, instead of the check baggage because we didn't want to lose it. And in one fell swoop, we were pepperless. After much consoling and crying, we picked ourselves up and tried to move on with our lives. Suzanne was also mourning the loss of her big box of IKEA cookies.
So we headed up to IKEA to rid ourselves of lilac, get more cookies and buy some pillows. On the train ride up, I picked up a Metro newspaper and was reading various articles when I noticed one that said that bus driver complaints have quadrupled in the last few years. The driving is so atrocious that passengers are literally getting thrown to the floor and some have complained about getting stuck in the doors as they are trying to get on. Think the Night Bus in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban movie. Sure enough, as we were walking up to the IKEA bus stop, I got hit by a bus. OK, it didn't actually hit me personally, but it whacked the bag I was carrying in my streetside hand really hard. Two inches to the left, and I would have had a really sore if not broken hand. Make that quadruple plus one complaints.
It is interesting to me that you can get feather pillows with hideous zip off covers for GBP 6.99. These pillows are meant for couches, but are the exact same shape/size as regular pillows. Or for 8.99 you can buy the imitation feather stuff without a cool hideous cover. We opted for hideous. Suzanne got her cookie fix, and we picked up a cheese slicer, which appears to be in short supply throughout every grocery store in London. Other short supply items include storage bags, crushed peppers, herbs and spices (hmm... No wonder English food is so bland) in general, and tomato soup. The ziploc shortage really irks me. I don't need to eat an entire block of cheese every time I want cheese. And I don't need to cook 12 sausages all at once and devour them in a setting. Doesn't this country have leftovers? Is there a ban on Tupperware, Rubbermade, and Ziploc in this country? I am going to start calling this the leftover conspiracy.
We also called Mike to wish him a happy birthday. Of course, we knew that it was around 3:00am San Diego time, but really wanted to be the first to wish him well on his birthday. Strangely, he didn't answer his phone so we were forced to leave a message.
After dropping off the hideous pillows, etc. I went and did some web research on the company I am interviewing for while Suzanne unpacked, cleaned, and generally made our new home wonderful. I got a call from the property agents informing me that the wire was GBP 7.01 short due to a bank fee. So I also headed off to pay them the whopping 7.01 that was missing from our rent. In the early afternoon, I went back up to the apartment and we went to grab a bite to eat. By the time we left lunch, it was raining pretty good, which put a smile on both our faces. This is weather, not the constant sunny and partly sunny we left behind.
We headed over to Whiteley's and picked up a new duvet cover and pillow cover from Muji. This store is really great for people trying to live small, as compact design is part of everything they do. It is obvious that the store is Japanese and geared towards the small living spaces in Japan. We then headed downstairs to M&S (Marks and Spencer) to do some grocery shopping. We both got a little misty eyed at the obvious lack of crushed red peppers in the store, but made it out of there without actually breaking down. I never received a call for my phone interview.
We are contemplating heading over to Pizza Hut and robbing every table of its crushed pepper dispenser. Shhh... don't tell anyone.
So we headed up to IKEA to rid ourselves of lilac, get more cookies and buy some pillows. On the train ride up, I picked up a Metro newspaper and was reading various articles when I noticed one that said that bus driver complaints have quadrupled in the last few years. The driving is so atrocious that passengers are literally getting thrown to the floor and some have complained about getting stuck in the doors as they are trying to get on. Think the Night Bus in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban movie. Sure enough, as we were walking up to the IKEA bus stop, I got hit by a bus. OK, it didn't actually hit me personally, but it whacked the bag I was carrying in my streetside hand really hard. Two inches to the left, and I would have had a really sore if not broken hand. Make that quadruple plus one complaints.
It is interesting to me that you can get feather pillows with hideous zip off covers for GBP 6.99. These pillows are meant for couches, but are the exact same shape/size as regular pillows. Or for 8.99 you can buy the imitation feather stuff without a cool hideous cover. We opted for hideous. Suzanne got her cookie fix, and we picked up a cheese slicer, which appears to be in short supply throughout every grocery store in London. Other short supply items include storage bags, crushed peppers, herbs and spices (hmm... No wonder English food is so bland) in general, and tomato soup. The ziploc shortage really irks me. I don't need to eat an entire block of cheese every time I want cheese. And I don't need to cook 12 sausages all at once and devour them in a setting. Doesn't this country have leftovers? Is there a ban on Tupperware, Rubbermade, and Ziploc in this country? I am going to start calling this the leftover conspiracy.
We also called Mike to wish him a happy birthday. Of course, we knew that it was around 3:00am San Diego time, but really wanted to be the first to wish him well on his birthday. Strangely, he didn't answer his phone so we were forced to leave a message.
After dropping off the hideous pillows, etc. I went and did some web research on the company I am interviewing for while Suzanne unpacked, cleaned, and generally made our new home wonderful. I got a call from the property agents informing me that the wire was GBP 7.01 short due to a bank fee. So I also headed off to pay them the whopping 7.01 that was missing from our rent. In the early afternoon, I went back up to the apartment and we went to grab a bite to eat. By the time we left lunch, it was raining pretty good, which put a smile on both our faces. This is weather, not the constant sunny and partly sunny we left behind.
We headed over to Whiteley's and picked up a new duvet cover and pillow cover from Muji. This store is really great for people trying to live small, as compact design is part of everything they do. It is obvious that the store is Japanese and geared towards the small living spaces in Japan. We then headed downstairs to M&S (Marks and Spencer) to do some grocery shopping. We both got a little misty eyed at the obvious lack of crushed red peppers in the store, but made it out of there without actually breaking down. I never received a call for my phone interview.
We are contemplating heading over to Pizza Hut and robbing every table of its crushed pepper dispenser. Shhh... don't tell anyone.
posted by Unknown at 6:37 AM
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