London!!! Living in Style

Sorry it took me so long (2 months to the day), but I did take 1500 photos on that trip!


I LOVE the London Eye! To think they were going to tear it back down after the Millenium! It's quite funny, when I took it many years ago, which was a LOT of FUN, British Airways was running it and they actually called it a flight!


Here a couple of pictures of the Thames Festival parade! Their costumes were AMAZING and watching the fireworks over the Thames was really mesmerizing. They had some effects close to the water that I had never seen before, but which really worked well with the reflection in the river!

Ah the Victoria and Albert Museum! The have lots of pretty things in there, like this little toy castle, but they are most famous for their textiles! So look at all those beautiful tapestries!



Aren't they just stunning! Folks back then knew how to dress their living room walls!

Now that's what I'd call sleeping in style! I want that bed!

After admiring all those pretty things folks used to have in their living rooms and since Adrian would let me have a cat nap in that bed, I needed a pick me up, so we went to their cafeteria...

We had the most delicious pastries and a great cup of coffee in their period cafe house rooms that were decorated by single artists like William Morris for the very purpose of giving folks a stylish place to take their cuppa tea and repose before exploring more of the collected exotic wonders that Victorians had to go to the museum for, because they had never seen them. They didn't have a telly, innit!

Now after indulging the senses in all that medival or otherwise old splendor, it was quite a shock to encounter the new supermodern Dyson hand-dryer in the loo! I felt quite victorianized or provincial, but it was definitely a very pleasant shock. You slowly stick your 'ands in and pull 'em back out and the jet stream in the dohickey is so strong that is basically squeezes the water off your hands! Guess what the friendly and empathetic woman posing for me is! Yep an American tourist!

The V&A is really FUN, because it is set up for people to have fun with that stuff. So you get to touch and try stuff on and it isn't some replica either, it is the real thing! A real medival ruffled collar and a real ming vase and a real whatchamacallit that keeps those huge skirts looking stiff!

That's me leaning against a real Ming vase, when an earthquake hit us, just my luck!

Phiew, the tremor passed and the vase is still in good shape. They made those things to last for a few thousand years, a little tremor doesn't even crack the glazing!

He's nothing if not a good sport! Our Adrian :-)

Back on the streets of London, you can see, that security has been stepped up all over the place, so they have Storm Troupers guard the County Hall now!

Ah, here a few more photos from our little boat cruise on the Thames:

Tower Bridge

(Adrian told me, that a Texan was trying to buy it for good money, but got the name wrong in the negotiations, which he won and got the rather minimalist London Bridge instead (teehee))

And here the Tower of London itself: Being imprisoned in style!

But not everything in London is old! There are crass contrasts between the old and the ulta-modern coexisting in close proximity. I don't know about you, but I love it! Nothing worse than having a bla, non-committal, non-offensive piece of misguided architectural cowardise water down a citiscape of magnificence!



I dare you to say "weather whale, wheater whale, weather whale" really quickly!

The Houses of Parliamant!

Here the oldest part of the Houses of Parliament! The cradle of democracy! We had to squeeze within 8 inches of shiny black Uzzis to be let in. Sad really!

After all that a pint in a comfy London Pub was well deserved! Here's and cheers to Englands Public Houses!

The next day we popped round Downing Street 10 and 8 especially since I had just read that they have a new cat after Cherry got rid of the old one and then they got rid of Cherries husband. They are all called Howard and they are allowed to roam free, so I just wanted to have a look, if the kitty was around, but no luck. The guard did give me a very stern look because I was giving the backyards of the PM a very close look for any signs of Howard, which he obviously couldn't know.
Rule Britannia, Britannia rule the waves!

Adrian wanted some cheese for his crackers, so we went to do some grocery shopping in style. Lunds and Byerlys, Kowaskie's etc eat your heart out!

Shopping for luxuries in the Luxor Hall!

After a stroll in Hyde Park I really needed a pit stop and as I walked down the steps to the public convenience I was preparing myself for the worst because the smell did not bode well, not well at all! So I was not prepared for the best, which was this brightly lit, spick and span bathroom with tasteful mural tiles depicting scenes of the city and greating me with a smell of roses, yes I said roses and I meant it.

Hahaha, a traffic light for people on horses!!!
As it is getting evening we paid our respects to Queen Victoria who is sitting on her thrown with a... er...a...thingy of sorts...
The day is nearing it's end and so is my stay with Adrian in London. Good Bye Adrian and London until next time, hopefully soon! (sniffle)

Just when you thought it is over...

I just went to the rapidsriders website. (Rapidsriders is MNs white water community). Someone had found this kayak post on "Best of Craigslist", that made me roll on the floor laughing! I'll share it with you at the end of this post. It is particularly funny for those who have been trying to decipher my kayak jargon, seriously guys you need to read this!


Just when people start asking me, if the kayaking season is over and when I will be able to take the boat out again I surprise them with an "err, well actually...we go to the pool in the winter."

When I first heard that you can take whole boats into a pool and several of them I didn't really believe it, but I decided I had to see this! First of all I noticed, that those white water boats didn't really look like boats, they certainly didn't look like they would keep a person above water, let alone some of those buff 235 pound lads that were already there!



And here is what this looks like: My friend called it "chlorinated kayaking":







And because I hope to do quite a bit of chlorinated kayaking before the river season starts again with the snow melt I followed my friend's clarion call and joined not one, but two more kayaking clubs: ISK and SKOAC. He's a member of both and probably the best eskimo roller in the Upper Midwest and certainly one of the best instructors anyone could wish for! Now these are for the longer and properly boat-like looking sea-kayaks, but I figure, where there's room for 16+ footers, there's always room for a little 6-footer. They won't even notice I'm there..now wait, maybe I do want them to notice I am there... Anyway, Eskimo Roll, not if but when! I hope to have a very busy winter kayaking to make up for the time lost in summer due to work commitments!


It is really perfectly natural, that boats that don't really look like boats would have to have a description that doesn't really sound like a boat :-) Enjoy!



Best of Craigslist:
BUY MY STUPID COUSIN'S AWESOME KAYAK
My cousin is a grown up child man with all the best toys and here's your chance to own one of them!
Whilst between jobs - though both the one before and the one to come were both long out of sight - he needed a place to stay so he lived with me for a while. He paid rent for a while too, though one while was a lot shorter than the other while. He moved out to live with some buddies and left a bunch of his junk here. Sometimes he comes back to pick something up but somehow it always seems to coincide with needing to borrow money, though he doesn't seem to need to borrow it to pay me any rent.
One of the things he left - one of the largest things he left - is a kayak. A red kayak. It looks an awful lot like this, except it's red:






I asked him to tell me about it and this is what he typed:
KAYAK FOR SALE
PRIJON LUV 8'
Good Condition
River running playboat
excellent for surfing ocean waves
$300.00


Frankly, I was underwhelmed by his effort, but somehow, not terribly surprised. On top of that, the name sounds dangerously close to "prison love" but that's not really a selling point, so forget I said that.
I did my own research, being a citizen of the Information Age, and discovered that according to the World Wide Web, the specs are as follows:[abridged]
The most important part is this though:

Main use: playboat

Dude, how could you not buy your own watercraft whose main use is "playboat"? I don't have any idea what that means, but just reading it feels kinda bitchin! In point of fact, here's what the manufacturer would have you believe:

This Liquid-Utility-Vehicle is the ultimate in whitewater performance, maximum comfort and rad lines. This lightweight play hound has great stability on the flats and awesome control in the vertical world. Custom tailored features like the chine groove, planning hull width and bow & stern keels for play hogs like you. Engage the low volume ends for hesitation-free wheels and spark up the flat bottom for spin-mania. Bow and stern keel lines provide great tracking when moving from one play spot to the next. Superior comfort and an ergonomic fit for medium to large sized paddlers with large. It comes with super groovy, custom foam outfitting. Of course the LUV is made with HTP, which spins faster, rock wheels without grindage and reacts at your command. Stiff, durable, it rules.



Awesome control in the vertical world? Spin-mania? Rock wheels without grindage?? How can you pass this up???
I don't actually know if this one comes with the hesitation-free wheels because I don't see any wheels. Come to think of it, I've never seen a kayak with wheels, but if you get the right wheels for it, they will apparently be hesitation-free and how hard would that rock, dude?
I'm a little frightened to know what the "large sized paddlers with large" are going to do with this boat, so I'm not gonna ask. What happens in the Prijon stays in the Prijon, as far as I'm concerned.
Any which way, shoot the rapids, sit in it in the middle of your living room floor, or just drive around with it on the roof of your Volkswagen to make people think you're cool but get on over here and buy this dumb thing for three hundred bucks. It's totally awesome!



As soon as I get the chance and people talk about their SUVs I will mention my LUVs, yep, I have two, and when you visit me at home, you will see them "parked" along the way to the entrance door :-) That way you also know that you are on the right track, just like I find it really so much easier to find my car in a large parking lot, when I have a bright red boat strapped to my roof, sooo handy!!!

A Few Weeks Back in Golden October - How Beautiful is My Lake

After a twelve hour day on Monday I hit a natural break at 4pm on Tuesday and decided to treat myself and swap laboratory neon light for some golden afternoon (de)light at the lake!

At home I doned comfy shoes, grabbed my camera and skipped to Lake of the Isles which I surrounded at 100 pph (photos per hour). No seriously 150 pictures in 1 and a half hours! How can this be? Here's 19 of them for you.

I am going to pretty much let the pictures speak for themselves. Just one thing; I felt so happy to live here and the other day as I was killing time at a store while my car was being readied for the MN winter I saw this image wear sweat-shirt that said: "Property of Minnesota". Gosh I wished that had been my size!

End of October and the flowers are still beautiful!

The light changes with every minute with dramatic clouds veiling and unveilig the sun.

Clouds in water made me think of the beginning sequence of "Jazz on a Summer's Day" with reflections in Newport Harbour.

Kayakers who are hardier than I are still going it!

Gosh, that silver three-quarter moon and the pink clouds were just too beautiful. My pictures are just giving you an idea of it, the colors were much more amazing when you were there!

For my European friends: These are Canada Geese and yep, they are as close as they seem!

Downtown Minneapolis is turning the lights on. How cool is it to have all that in walking distance of a metropolitan downtown, huh?!?

That was just like having a two hour vacation that I could right walk to!

It's you, it's you must go and I must bide.

The first drops of Autumn have fallen.

Even though it is still 73 degrees out at half past ten at night, feeling much warmer with heavy humidity, a powerful change in the wind enveloped me as I was walking back from the lake that I had to visit so urgently. And urgency intermingles with regrets not to have braved the heavy humidity and taken the last meal of the summer outside in the enchanted garden of the restaurant rather than in the convenient moderation of the establishment's air conditioning.

The summer's gone and all the leaves are falling...as the first raindrops of Autumn are touching my face, gentle reminders of a new season starting... before I reach home, the welcome shelter from the weather to come.

London 2007: Emperor and Energizer Bunny – Day One

My trip to Europe is about connecting with good old friends who I haven’t seen in years and who I’ve written and talked to far too little. It’s also about returning to an old home of 5 years and as always discovering new things every day.

I had two things planned to do here on my stay in London: Visit my friend Adrian and visit the exhibition of the Chinese terracotta army. I give you another hint; Emperor was not the a.k.a. for Adrian…

Adrian is one of the best people you can meet ANYWHERE in the world!!! No seriously, you can meet him anywhere in the world! Adrian’s relationship to the world is that of a little boy on a spherical playground. The universe is finite, but the fun to be had really isn’t! He’s been everywhere, including Minnesota!

I love Adrian! He is honest, sometimes brutally, sometimes making you feel like the best thing in the world. He’s a great partner in all sorts of crime. And he makes a luvly cuppa tea! He is always fun, until after about 36h non-stop of Adrian, when I have to either throw him out of the window or better, just take the batteries out for a while :-)

Day one

Fun ad in the Tube

The first afternoon is a bit of a blur, but I remember splendid weather, dim sum at a fashionable London restaurant called Ping Pong and just wandering around feeling quite at home.

This is a very cool fountain designed by Jeppe Hein. It creates four separate chambers that people can walk into and then get trapped in for a while. Walls appear and dissappear on the inside as well as the outside. People were clearly having a blast. Since I was only on such a short visit I decided to enjoy it from the outside. But look at the weather!!!

I also remember getting in touch with things that were trivial tidbits of everyday life in England some 5 years ago. Mundanities like monkey arming your way up the steps to the second level of the double-decker bus, while the bus driver is trying his utmost to give as many untrained passengers a concussion as possible by alternating jet-like acceleration with sudden emergency breaking. I had to chuckle over the pastel coloured bathroom tissue or should I say loo roll? I had forgotten that you can buy this disposable in pink as well as assorted other light colors to match the equally pink or peach or light yellow or… bath tub. Luvly!

Brits have the best ads!

Well, I think I may have to make this post a little more British English and it’s not gonna always be as the Queen speaks, innit? Well the loo roll was still quite charming, but having a shower really wasn’t and made me homesick for the scorpion infested shower I remember from Costa Rica last year. Adrian: “What do you expect? The 21st Century?!?

For my American friends I have to explain a little what they would be looking at here. Imagine attaching this milk mashine like contraption with a woefully too short tube that leads to the rather measly shower head to the hot and the cold tap of the bath tub. And then you start “milking” the taps for water that is somewhere in a range that is agreeable to your average urbanized homo sapiens, while the inlet water temperature AS WELL AS pressure are in constant flux. And because aforementioned tubing is too short you are sort of wriggling your way through the “jet” (I am using this word very loosly here…) while being doubled over like the hunchback of Notre Dame. - I should ‘ave ‘ad a baf! Bu’ I ‘ate taking bafs!

Quite in contrast to that are the new Dyson hand dryers, that wouldn’t be out of place in the next Start Trek Series. And to find those the next day in the very Victorian Victoria & Albert museum of all places!

Put your hands together, if you're feelin' it - On Dancing, Kayaking and, of Course - Life...

I was definitely feelin' it at the Dakota Jazz Club with Nachito Herrera as the main act heating up this cool, gray and rainy Minnesota Saturday with latin jazz! Calling him hotter than the burning tip of a good Cuban cigar is only just about describing him! He brought 10 musicians, some of them seasoned and superb, some of them the next generation of great musicians and fresh, but all of them as energetic as kids in their single digits!

There was no way I was going to sit still with that music vibrating through my body! And I wasn't shakin' it alone :-)

It was one of those perfect evenings that only really happen on a whim. The music was pure energy entering not only through the ears but through every part of your body, the food and atmosphere was nurishment for the senses and the company of good friends was water for the thirsty soul. Why are we filling our lives so full that those things hardly ever happen anymore?

Crackling with energy at the end of the evening, plans were made to go out for some fun swing dancin' as soon as we can swing it :-)

The whole day had felt different than a lot of days in the last few months. Despite the grizzly day and having to trudge around my favorite neighborhoods hunting for a new place to live, there wasn't a cloud on my spirit, all blue sky! Ok, I wasn't singing in the rain, but I wasn't far off either :-) That is quite unlike the last few months, not sure when it started, because for the longest time I felt that 2007 was an exceptionally good year, just as I had predicted for myself at the end of the last one.

Actually the whole week had felt different. Starting my Salsa class on Monday to refresh my moves after a five year break from dancing quite intensively with one of the best and may I add sexiest Salsa teacher's in the UK! I wouldn't say we were friends, but passing by my hairdresser's as I am getting a cute new style, he would drop in for a chat. Nice huh! But I digress, although the class didn't quite live up to dancing in Carlos' classes I did two things. I looked up basic swing moves on YouTube that very night, immediately tried them and took to them like a duck to water, even if I say so myself. (What is the difference between a triple step and a basic jive step? 'Cos I can't see one!). And I went back to some e-mails from earlier this year, where I had asked Erik for advice on dancing shoes, he in turn (:-) got his friend Kian involved to comment on specific girl dance shoe issues. I was headed for their favorite outfitter the very next day.

I entered the store and it was love at first sight! Black velvet Oxfords that replicated a swing dance shoe from the 1930's and incidentally look like close sisters to a much loved pair of street shoes that I had bought some 15 years ago and moved first to the UK and then halfway across the world to the US. I tried many other shoes, but none could match the fit of the pair my eyes first fell on. Since I am not a perfect 10 :-( but only a 9 1/2 :-) they had to be ordered and and I should be holding them in my arms in about a week or so. My feeling is, that I could have gotten them much sooner, if I had ordered them on the Web, but where would I go to try on the shoes and get great advice, if I don't support the local little store! And sweet anticipation is definitely half the fun :-)

Again the next day I hear of a group of folks going to a swing party with a lesson to get you started. The universe seems to conspire to assist me with getting back into dancing! I signed up, although I can't believe I am making plans as far out as October, when going to the Dakota on a whim had felt so good!

Now why did I ask for dance shoes so many months ago? And what was it again I got distracted with? Ah, kayaking! :-) I had decided months ago, that this would be the year to start with Tango, which is when I decided that I needed the right shoe for that. Of course! Because what is more fun than shopping for gear or shopping for shoes? Huh? Shopping for shoes that ARE gear! But then the kayaking season was soon to be upon me and I was even more resolved that this would be the year, where I would put my best effort into this sport that had me hooked into a sado-masochistic relationship of desire and agony. No, kayaking had not been good to me last year, but my addiction demanded me to get as much "councelling" as I could, to try and reconcile. So I delayed the dancing to the months without moving water.

It's as if some kind of toxic fog had been lifted. - The week before I had felt so burned out that I said to myself, "This can't be life! And if it is, then I don't want it!". I wasn't being morbid - something had to change! And it had to change quickly. I didn't even care about my own company anymore, let alone that I really wanted to subject this distorted and mutilated version of myself to any of my friends. I felt dead lonely, which is a really rare thing for me even when I'm alone. I knew that it wasn't the absence of connection to others, but the connection to myself that was down. And I remembered that dancing and singing had always been my friends, had made me happy and had nurtured my sanity in stretches of strain. Burned out as I was I needed to reach out to an old friend like Salsa. Salsa and I were the kind of friends, where things are just easy and comfortable, the kind of friend who just get's you, effortlessly, like a good hipsnap in eskimo-rolling. Turns out that my bond with Salsa is like many of my friendships which, even if we don't see each other in years, we warm up quickly and pick up just where we had left off. Those are my favorite bonds...

But where does the swing come into all of this and where does this leave the Tango? I love Jazz, so it is only natural that I would like to be able to swing. It's as easy as that. And the Tango, well the Tango is going to be something I want to build up to with Salsa and Swing as well as further working on my body. Tango is the most sensual dance. I want to feel ready to play this sultry game of advance and retreat with every fibre of my body.

Recycling worn out gear

So you’ve got this completely worn out piece of gear, that you’ve worn on all these life changing experiences and you’d really rather hang on to it because you remember when… but then you need the space for those other pieces of gear that you bought because they’re going to be great for…and also when you… with N. and N. and A. and J. and maybe even T., C. and R. … Wouldn’t it be easier to let go, knowing that it will reincarnate into a new life on a higher level as an even gnarer piece of gear, forever remembered on all of those pictures posted on your and your friend’s blogs?

Did you know that Patagonia accepts a lot of their own products as well as Polartec fleece from other companies to recycle it and make new gear out of it? They say that they’ve also been using plastic bottles etc. to make new fleece. Which makes me hope, that a lot of our trusty fleece layers make use of those old bottles!

I just came across it and so you don’t have to search around for the info and have more time for the fun stuff, here the skinny on this cool way to reincarnate your experienced gear with links to where I found the info and hopefully without making this some kind of advertizement.

What you can recycle:

- ALL Polartec fleece from ANY manufactuer
- P. fleece (including Synchilla® and Regulator® insulation)
- Capilene baselayers
- P. cotton T-shirts

They say that they are constantly trying to expand the categories until they can take back and recycle anything they sell, so it may be worthwhile to keep an eye on them adding more items in the future.

Where you can send it or drop it off

Ideally and to maximize the invironmental benefit you'll drop it off at one of their retailers, while you are running an errand in the area or going there by bike or on foot or send it to their service center.

What that does for saving the planet according to their website

"By diverting worn-out garments from landfills, we reduce solid waste. Diverting them from incinerators results in an energy savings of 76% and a CO2 emissions [greenhouse gas] reduction of 71%. Garments made with recycled fibers use 50-100% less virgin polyester, which reduces our use of oil."

They also state that transport energy needs are minimized by using ships that otherwise routinely return empty and by encouraging customers not to make extra trips for drop off.

Anybody else doing this?

This is just one company. Hey, if you guys know of similar ops to recycle, please post your comments!