I have no idea exactly how long I've been working on this entry, but it's been quite a while. I don't know how spectralbovine does it. I tried to post this as one big entry, but LJ told me it was too big. Here's a link to the second half.

First off, a recommendation. I was at my local Barnes & Noble before I left, and I saw this little Moleskine notebook that I'd heard about on the internet. It's from their "City Notebook" line, and I picked it up, and I'm really glad I did. I found it invaluable. It's the perfect size to slip in your pocket, and it has a tube map; a multi-page city map with index; conversion charts; plenty of blank pages to write down agendas, addresses, flight information, and the like; a few pieces of tracing paper to lay over the maps so you can trace routes; and a nice little pocket in the back just big enough to hold a £5 note. (I used the pocket to hold my Oyster card.) It was nice to have all my information consolidated in one nice package. I cannot say enough good things about this notebook, and I wholeheartedly endorse it. It's great.

DAY 1 - Saturday, 23 August

Our trip did not get off to an auspicious start. The plane taking us from Louisville to Philadelphia had problems with its A/C, and we were delayed over an hour with them trying to fix it. Then, after we had all boarded the plane but were still at the gate, the captain came over the intercom and said that they were having a glitch in the electrical system and in order to fix it, they were going to have to shut the plane down completely and then 'reboot'. So we were stuck on a very, very hot plane for about 45 minutes. This was one of those small Embraer regional jets that doesn't come with a galley, so the poor stewardess had to go into the airport and get a couple of liters of water, some cups, and some ice to give to us. We took off well after our scheduled departure time, but we had a few hour layover in Philly anyway, so it all worked out.

The transatlantic flight went off pretty much without incident. I had brought some DVDs with me to watch on my laptop, and I had bought Apple's airplane power adapter because, obviously, the computer's battery wouldn't last that long. I had checked on seatguru.com to make sure that our seats had a power port, but I couldn't find it. I asked one of the stewardesses if the seat had a power port, but she gave me an "Oh, no", like it was a silly question. (Although, looking back, I think she may have thought I meant a regular, two-prong power outlet, which, yeah, would have been silly.) So I read in my book (Snow Crash), did a bunch of crossword puzzles, listened to my iPod, and watched some in-flight entertainment, while I wasn't trying to get a little sleep. I was flipping through the seatback entertainment guide, and it mentioned that there was a VH1 channel on the system, and that there was some World Series of Pop Culture on there! So I had to watch that. The programming was a bunch of really lame videos that I fast forwarded through, plus the last episode from our WSoPC (APS2.0/Wocka Wocka and WW/Twisted Misters). So it was almost like a_good_storm was there with me. I also watched Definitely, Maybe, which was cute if insubstantial.


"Whaddaya mean, you've never seen Dirty Dancing, Kyle? Fine, I'll go up."


DAY 2 - Sunday, 24 August

After we got to Heathrow, we took the Underground to our hotel. Now, a word about the Tube. The vast majority of the Tube stations are not handicapped accessible. So we had to muscle all of our luggage up two flights of stairs on the way out of the station when we got to Tottenham Court Road. Luckily, our hotel was only about two blocks from the Tube stop. Our hotel was the Morgan Hotel in Bloomsbury, which came highly recommended on TripAdvisor. It really is a very nice hotel, with decent-sized, affordable rooms for that close to central London. After we checked in and decompressed, we went to the British Museum, which is, quite literally, a stone's throw from our hotel. We obviously didn't get to see everything there, because it's a really, really big place. But we saw most of the highlights, including the Rosetta Stone and the Parthenon Marbles (formerly known as the Elgin Marbles). We saw plenty of artifacts from Babylonian, Egyptian, Akkadian, and Sumerian cultures. It's amazing how intricate some of that stuff can be and still come down through the centuries very well preserved.

After we got something to eat at a local pub, we went back to the hotel, watched a little TV, and went to bed. We stayed up late enough that we pretty much staved off any jet lag.

The British Museum. (Mom is in the green shirt.)	The Rosetta Stone.
The tip of the Great Sphinx's beard.	"Welcome... to Jurassic Park."
The Parthenon Marbles (a/k/a the Elgin Marbles).	More of the Marbles. The Greek government is really pissed the British haven't given them back.
"Centaur... THIS! IS! HEADLESS SPARTA!"	The inner pavilion at the British Museum.
Ancient Babylonian geometry text.	You don't usually see mummies with full beards.
A tablet relating the Babylonian flood myth.	Our hotel in London. The proprietors were very nice.
The law firm from L.A. Law was right next to our hotel.	Our hotel room in London (as seen from the door).
Our hotel room (seen from the window). The A/C is above the sliding door.	The remote to the A/C. I've never seen one with a remote before. The stupid thing blew almost directly on me. I had to build a barrier from spare pillows to keep from freezing.

DAY 3 - Monday, 25 August

Day 3 started with a trip on the London Eye, which affords a very nice view of the whole Westminster area. After that, we went and took the audio tour of Westminster Abbey. It's such a beautiful cathedral, and there are so many different people from all eras memorialized there. I even saw the stone memorializing Edward Bulwer-Lytton, the author who memorably wrote the opening line "It was a dark and stormy night." As we were finishing up the tour, I noticed that they were getting ready to hold a short communion service there in the nave of the cathedral, so we decided to sit in. Mom even went up and received communion, which I think is pretty cool and very memorable.

After we left the abbey, we were going to walk down to 10 Downing Street to see... well, the door, I guess. But the road was blocked off on Downing Street and there was no way we could get down there. So we walked on down to Trafalgar Square and saw Nelson's Column. Then we walked down the Mall to Buckingham Palace. They had just had the big party there the night before celebrating the official handover of the Summer Olympics from Beijing and were still cleaning up from it. We took the tour of the Royal Staterooms, including the gigantic dinner room and all the place settings and assorted folderol. After leaving the palace, we had lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe and walked up to Piccadilly Circus and then made our way back to the hotel.

The London Eye.	The Houses of Parliament (as seen from the Eye). Remember, Big Ben is the bell, not the clock or the tower.
The façade of Westminster Abbey.	The cloisters of Westminster Abbey. It's the only place inside the confines they'll allow photography.
The Mall leading up to Buckingham Palace.	They'd just had the big Olympic handover party the day before. If I'd have known about it, I might have gone.
Buckingham Palace. The Union Jack flying signifies that the Queen is not in residence.

DAY 4 - Tuesday, 26 August

On day 4, we took the tube to St. Paul's Cathedral and looked around. We walked up to the inside of the dome to the Whispering Gallery, and then up to the the outside of the dome to the Stone Gallery. And that's a lot of steps. A *lot* of steps. It's about 100 ft to the Whispering Gallery, and then another 75 feet up to the Stone Gallery. (We could have gone up another 100 feet to the Golden Gallery at the tippy-top of the dome, but, yeah, that wasn't going to happen.)

After viewing St. Paul's crypt, we walked down to the Millennium Bridge and crossed over to the Tate Modern gallery, which the British converted from an old power station. Some of the art was really neat, like the Magrittes or the Lichtensteins that they had on display, or the room that was old Communist propaganda posters from ceiling to floor. And then there was the room that had short clips from about five different movies featuring women with psychokinetic powers, like Matilda, Carrie, and The Craft, playing simultaneously. And they would tint the clips with different colors. And then, when the clips would end, the clip would move over to another screen and another tint. It was... interesting. But some modern art I guess I just don't get. Some guy flattens a bunch of silver spoons and trays and things with a steamroller and then hangs it from the ceiling, and that's art?

From the Tate, we walked down and did a tour of Shakespeare's Globe, a recreation of the original theater that burned down in the 1600s. We got to see some rehearsals for a new play that is being put on at the theater set during the French Revolution. We also got to go through the museum that they have there and view some of the period costumes they have on display. We also watched some people choreographing a mock sword fight, which was interesting to see.

After we left the Globe, we walked down to the Tower Bridge, and walked over to the Tower of London (and, I swear, I *never* made the connection that the bridge was named after the Tower of London until I was there. Sometimes it's the obvious things that slip past you.) Unfortunately, we got to the Tower about 15 minutes after they stopped selling tickets for the day, so we would have to come back later in the week to see it.

The Tate Modern Gallery (as seen from the Stone Gallery at St. Paul's). The Millennium Bridge is in the foreground.	The spires of St. Paul's (as seen from the Stone Gallery).
St. Paul's Cathedral.	"Michael, do you really think it's wise to put the name right on the street sign?"
The dome of St. Paul's as seen from the Millennium Bridge.	Shakespeare's Globe. Not the original one - that burned down in the 1600s.
The inside of Shakespeare's Globe.	Two guys choreographing a swordfighting routine at the Globe museum.
"One of these things is not like the other / One of these just doesn't belong..."	London Bridge - the one they built to replace the one they sold to the guy in Arizona. As far as I can tell, it shows no signs of falling down.
The Tower of London.	Some crazy lady walking in front of the Tower of London. It wasn't sunny, and it wasn't raining, nor was it threatening to. And she isn't even carrying it over her head.

JOUR 5 - Mercredi, 27 Août

On Wednesday, we took the Eurostar over to Paris for a couple of days. Our hotel was the Hôtel du Collège de France in the Latin Quarter (5eme arrondisement). We walked over to the Musée du Moyen Age (Museum of the Middle Ages), which was nearby. The highlight there is the "Lady and the Unicorn" tapestries, which were the subject of a book a few years ago by Tracy Chevalier (who also wrote Girl With A Pearl Earring).

After that, we walked over to Notre Dame Cathedral. It truly is breathtaking. We also went up into the towers to see the great bell and the gargoyles. I love that one gargoyle that looks like he's resting his chin on his hands and leaning on his elbows. While we waiting down on the ground to go up into the towers, there was a mime with a mask of an old balding man. He would put on the mask and walk alongside people who were just walking down the street. Sometimes, if it were a man and a woman who were walking along, he would walk along and intimate to the fella what he was going to do, and then put his arm around the lady's shoulder and walk with her, just to see how long it would take for her to notice that he wasn't her guy. Sometimes it would take them a while to figure it out. And it was amazing how he would do it over and over again to many different people, and nobody would ever have noticed that this guy was performing on the street before he would get them. He was doing this for a good twenty minutes that I saw.

After we finished at Notre Dame, we walked down the Louvre and saw about half of the collection before we left, including most of the highlights. I was particularly impressed by the Rubens room. I just wonder how long it actually took those guys to actually paint those works that are, like, 100 feet wide by 60 feet tall. After we left the Louvre, we walked through the Jardins de Tuileries to the RER stop to get to the Eiffel Tower. By the time we got to the Tower, it was nearly 10:30 PM local time, so when we went up to the top, we had a splendid nighttime view. While we were there, the French were celebrating a Frenchman being the President of the EU by attaching the 12 stars of the EU flag in a circle near the base and bathing the entire tower in blue light. The views from the top of the tower are beautiful, but it was fairly windy up there and not just a little bit cold.

Our hotel in Paris.	Our Paris hotel room (view from the window).
Our Paris hotel room (view from the bathroom).	The view from the balcony of our hotel room.
In order to turn the lights on in the hotel room, you had to put the room key fob into a receptacle on the wall. They'd stay on if you took it out, though. I've never seen anything like it before.	Musée du Moyen Age (a/k/a Musée du Cluny).
Notre Dame Cathedral.	The great rose window at Notre Dame.
The Canadian mime with my mother. I'll leave it to you to figure out who's who.	The view from the towers of Notre Dame.
Le sigh...	Le sigh, indeed.
More gargoyles.	Still more gargoyles.
Yet more gargoyles.	You know, none of these gargoyles talked like Keith David.
The bell (at least, the one in the tower they will let you into). No sighting of Quasimodo.	I'm not sure what this guy was doing. I like to think he was eating lunch.
Flying buttresses!	La Tour d'Argent, one of the most famous French restaurants (at least, for those who get their culinary news from Iron Chef).
Street musicians.	Some Parisians eating a picnic lunch along the Seine.
The Glass Pyramid at the Louvre. Designed by I.M. Pei.	You can see the main entrance there on the right.
"OK, I've got my sword and scabbard..." "Here's your helmet!" "Thanks. Am I missing anything... nope, can't think of anything. Alright, I'm off to war!"	The staircase leading up to the Winged Victory.
Venus de Milo.	Milo's the island where they found the sculpture.
Winged Victory of Samothrace. Also known as Nike.	That's the drunkest Baby Jesus I've ever seen.
The Grand Gallery at the Louvre.	Sledding angels is where I draw the line.
"Yeah, that's right. It's all mine, bitches."	La Gioconda.
The Raft of the Medusa. They asked a question about this painting in one game when I was on Jeopardy!, and I'd never heard of it before.	I wonder where this position is in the Kama Sutra.
The Code of Hammurabi. Readers of Snow Crash may recognize it.	I can't remember whether this is Sumerian or Akkadian or what, but Mom was like, "Take a picture of me!"
This guy looks like Harry Shearer in A Mighty Wind.	"Hey, give me that tambourine!" "No way, it's mine!" "Give it!" "Wait, why aren't we wearing any clothes?"
I thought they only tossed beach balls around at Phish concerts.	Sex and the City in the 1800s.
"If I leave here tomorrow..."	"...would you still remember me..."
"...I must be traveling on, girl..."	"...there's too many places I gotta see..."
"...'cause I'm as free as a bird now..."	"...'scuse me, while I kiss this guy!"
"WTF, dude? Wrong song!"	"Sorry."
Reminds me of Ralphie modeling the pink bunny outfit in A Christmas Story.	Seriously, this kid's pants are hiked up to his armpits.
"OK, 'a dingo ate my baby' was semi-plausible. But c'mon, 'a lion ate my baby while I was breastfeeding him'? Really, that's the best you could think of? This is Australia, there are no lions here!"	What's up with this lady's thumb? It looks like a big toe.
"Crap. I ran out of my flesh-tone paint before I could finish painting this cherub. I guess I'll have to finish it up with this hot pink. I hope nobody notices."	I don't remember seeing many – or any – portraits of this era done from the side.
She's lactating. You don't see that every day.	They're supposed to be sisters. But of course.
It's "Clapton Is God", guys. Not "Clapton Is Jesus". (Although some branches of Christianity might argue they're really two facets of the same person. But at that point, it's not quite as catchy anymore.)	The Jardins des Tuileries. The Place de la Concorde is at the end with the obelisk.
I love the sky here. There were some photographers and a model doing a professional photo shoot on the bridge while we were there.	It's Lil' Manny.
Le Tour Eiffel.	The Ecole Militaire (as seen from the top of the Eiffel Tower).

JOUR 6 - Jeudi, 28 Août

We started off the day with a visit to the Panthéon. It's an old cathedral that was repurposed after the French Revolution into a memorial to the notable French dead. There are a lot of great scientists, writers, architects and inventors buried there, including Voltaire, Louis Braille, Marie and Pierre Curie, Victor Hugo, Emile Zola, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. It also was where Foucault first did his pendulum experiment that demonstrated the rotation of the Earth.

After that, we went to the Arc du Triomphe. Mom didn't feel like going up to the top of the arch, so we just looked around the base. Now, I'm not much of a crier. I rarely shed a tear. But I have to tell you, both here at the Arc and at Westminster Abbey, I choked up a little at England and France's Tombs of the Unknown Soldier. I guess it just gets to me to realize the scope of the conflicts that those soldiers served in.

After a little bit of a walk along the Champs Elysees, we headed down to the Hôtel des Invalides, which in addition to being a working hospital, is also the location of Napoleon's Tomb as well as a military museum (how's that for a contrast in purposes?). After that, we walked down a block or so to the Musée Rodin - and that ought to give you an idea of the size of Rodin's output if he has an entire substantial museum devoted to his work. It's weird to see some his work, where it looks like the figure is emerging from the base stone like it were a pool of water.

After finishing at the Musée Rodin, we made our way to the Musée d'Orsay, which used to be an train station and is now devoted to more modern art (ranging from the mid-19th century forward) as opposed to the Louvre, which has more older works. They had entire rooms devoted to some of my favorite artists, like Toulouse-Lautrec, Seurat, and Honore Daumier. I think, of all the museums I visited on this trip, this was my favorite. We had to leave earlier than I would have liked to have; I probably could have spent an entire day in there.

We ate dinner that night at a little café, because our meals in Paris thus far had been sandwiches at the Louvre and breakfast at McDonald's, so we at least wanted to have one "French" meal while we were there. So, of course, I had cannelloni. But I did have crême caramel for dessert. Mom had French onion soup and kebabs, which were so rubbery and hard to chew she could barely eat them. She complained for a long time about those kebabs.

On the way back to the train station to head back to London, we stopped off at a small English-language bookstore in the shadow of Notre Dame called Shakespeare and Company, which is supposed to be run by a descendant of Walt Whitman. It seemed like there were books stuffed into every nook and cranny of the place. I picked up a copy of The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, which won the Pulitzer for fiction this year.

Note to QT: It's a "Royal Cheese", not a "Royale with Cheese".	It's a pancake filled with ham and cheese. It was really good.
Usually if a scooter has three wheels, it's two in the back and one in the front.	The Panthéon.
Lots of monuments in the Panthéon. This one's for Denis Diderot, the man who compiled the first encyclopedia.	Foucault's Pendulum. I don't know if it's the same set-up, but Foucault did his original experiment there. I still haven't figured out why the cat is there.
Saint Exupery, the author of The Little Prince. He disappeared on an aerial reconnaissance mission in World War II.	Voltaire.
Victor Hugo.	"Alexandree Dumb-ass. Dumb-ass." "Dumb-ass? 'Dumas'."
Louis Braille. They actually had Braille lettering outside the room.	Joseph Lagrange. If you've ever had to calculate a Lagrange polynomial, you recognize the name.
The Curies, Marie and Pierre.	Jean-Jacques Rousseau.
I hear the checkout policies are pretty strict here.	The Arc du Triomphe.
The French tricolor and the flag of the EU.	The French Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.
The Champs Elysses.	I think it's funny that the gas pumps are right on the street.
The chapel at the Hôtel des Invalides, which houses Napoleon's Tomb.	Napoleon is in the middle of the open space.
Some of Napoleon's clothing. He really was that short.	Napoleon's Tomb.
Some workers restoring the tile floor around the Tomb.	This old guy had a ratchet mechanism attached to his wheelchair so that he could just crank himself forward rather than pushing the wheels.
Musée Rodin.	Hôtel Biron, the main building at the Musée Rodin. It used to be Rodin's residence, and he willed it - along with his sculptures - to the state on the condition that they run it as a museum.
The Spirit of War.	The Age of Bronze.
This is the torso of The Age of Bronze draped in a cloth. It's amazing how something so simple can change the whole feel of a piece.	The Hand of God. I like how the hand and the figures just emerge from the rough stone.
I like the contrast between the hair and the face.	An artist doing sketches of one of the sculptures.
The Burghers of Calais.	The Thinker.
The garden at the Musée Rodin. You can see the Hôtel des Invalides and the Eiffel Tower in the background.	The Varenne Metro stop, near the Musée Rodin. It features The Thinker and Rodin's sculpture of Honore Balzac.
Musée d'Orsay.	Careful with the pointy objects!
"That sure is a nice cock you've got there." "Thanks!" "I'm talking about the chicken."	"Did you hear that lame penis joke this guy just made?"
The Musée d'Orsay used to be a train station.	At first I was like, why is she holding a cylinder on her head? Then I saw that it was intended to be a torch holder.
Lunch on the Grass. I'm still not quite sure why the lady's naked.	I really like the moonlight poking from behind the clouds.
A portrait of a farmboy by Seurat. I like the texture.	I love the color. (It's by Signac, not Seurat.)
I just love the way Toulouse-Lautrec paints people. And I love the woman's expression.	This perfectly captures two people waking up. That half-smile is great.
More Toulouse-Lautrec.	Van Gogh's Room at Arles.
I've seen reproductions of this painting a million times, but it's cool to see it up close to see the three-dimensionality of the brush strokes.	One of the four billion self-portraits Van Gogh painted.
Monet's painting of the London Parliament building.	Monet's painting of a poppy field.
Monet's painting of... turkeys. I feel a little... woozy. Too... many... unique Monet paintings! Need... stereotypes!	Yes! Haystacks!
Good! Waterlilies!	Now, for good measure, here's a Degas painting of ballet dancers.
Arrangement in Gray and Black Number 1 - The Artist's Mother.	For warden96: a French porn shop.
The café where we ate dinner.	The inside of the Shakespeare and Company bookstore.
More of the bookstore.	The outside.
Gare du Nord (Northern Gate) train station.

Head back to England by continuing on to Part II.