Finally, a good night's sleep

So, got here Wednesday, stayed up forever, slept 7 hours and thought, "wow, that was easy."

I thought too soon.


Thursday night I woke up at 2:30 am and didn't go back to sleep until 5. And then slept until 10:30, of course. Friday night I took a bath, had a glass of wine, and couldn't fall asleep until 3:30 in the morning. And again, slept until 10:30. Some of you got lots of email because of my sleeplessness.


And then last night. Normal. Totally normal. Yahoo.


I'm getting lost everyday, but at least I'm getting acquainted with my new town. I rode the bus with a crazy man with no teeth who kept saying something about "4 years" and the "bloody go'er'ment" but I'm not sure what he was talking about; I smiled and nodded at what I thought were appropriate moments.


I'm carrying my camera everywhere, but the batteries ran out, so I wasn't able to document my long winded walk in the wrong direction, which included a lovely park and huge beautiful houses.

Okay, I did get just one picture:

Wild berries from the park. No, I didn't eat any of them.

Okay, so my eating has been totally off since I got here. I eat like one meal a day, and then have a cookie or a piece of toast. Add that to all the walking I'm doing, and I wouldn't be surprised if I lost weight.

Although, I've not yet gone to a pub, so that might cancel out any extra calories I've saved during the day. Also, I'm having dinner at Y's brother K's (and his girlfriend P's) house tonight, and if dinner at her father's house was any indicator, I won't go home hungry.

However, one of the nicest things Y's father did for me was fill the fridge and cupboards with food. I've found a new soup I like:

Can you see what's with that Broccoli? Stilton cheese. Stilton cheese people! Yum, double yum, and yum diddy yum.

I was supposed to go into London with someone I met in Washington DC who is now in South London, but this morning the evil Ms. Jet Lag got her. I guess in moving on from tormenting me, her horribleness had to go somewhere.

So, I thought I'd go on my own, you know, all brave and all that. Nope. I got to the train station a little early, so I could buy my ticket from the machine, because one can't buy a ticket on the train itself.

Well, there was someone there who didn't know what he was doing, and the 6 people in front of me were getting frustrated. Me? I was just glad I wasn't the dork fumbling with the machine.

I missed my train, and took it as a sign. I was supposed to go shopping instead. Yep. Even if it was just window shopping. I found a Boot's shop, which has this great cheap cucumber cleanser that my friend brought me back from England several years ago, and I've never found anything like it again.

Don't tell me Boot's is in Target, I know that, but not everything over here is over there. Smarty pants.

Then, joy of joys, I found the UK's equivalent to TJ Maxx:

Oh, I had a good time in there. But you'd be proud of me... no clothes, no shoes were bought. I was strong. But I sure know where I'm going when I need a warm sweater or something this winter. Yes, I bought some tea towels; I had to get something, right?

I also passed on some very cute, very comfortable sandals that were on sale at Clark's. 'Cause see, 34.99 pounds sounds okay, until one realizes that's about 60 bucks. Not making those kinds of purchases right now.

But they were cute.

And comfortable.

Oh, and here? I'm between a size 4 1/2 and a 5 in woman's shoes. Makes my feet seem even smaller. Because that's such an appropriate thing to be proud of.

Maybe if I go back there, and they're still there, it will be a sign that I should get them.

What do you think?