“Yes, Let’s Do This Again Soon! Just Next Time Without Hoping Over Fences.” – Laura Saladino

A week behind, how did this happen? Well I guess that’s what happens when you go out of town for the weekend and work during the week. But no worries, you shall be all caught up in no time. I’ve got the Strokes on in the background and a diet coke by my computer so let’s do this!

Wednesday was met with a somewhat empty office as Josh, Super Star Intern Sarah and some of the production people were on the set for day 2 of the BBC shoot. I kinda made a side remark to Ben about the shoot asking if it was going on all day and he said, “Don’t worry Devon, you’ll get to go to a shoot.” The man already knew what I wanted without me asking for it, brilliant! He then told me how he appreciated me going round his flat5 yesterday and that I was willing to do it showed a lot of initiative. Cheers Ben! Does this mean I’ve won gold stars and intern points?? As I was going to the kitchen to make tea (I know, I know, what have they done to me?) I noticed that Georgie was back! I’m not exactly sure what she’s working on since she’s now on the other side of the office, but I’m glad to see her again! She’s one of the few really pretty yet still incredibly nice and down to Earth people I’ve met in my life. The morning was pretty uneventful as I really just gathered more information about events to make a sort of ‘presentation’ to give to Ben and Matt so we can come up with some new ideas. The only noteworthy thing is that the girls in Production have come to love that “I Wanna Be a Billionaire” song (ughh, I guess it’s still ‘new’ in the UK) and like to play it on repeat. This resulted in Ben calling them on the phone from across the office and asking them to “Turn that sh*t off right now!” Couldn’t agree more.

After lunch, Ben announced that he was going to have a meeting with Harry Redknapp, a famous football manager, the next day and decided that he needed more knowledge on famous football managers of all time. Who to give this to? Ah! Why not our American Import who knows loads about football (*cough* soccer) and teams and their managers? Sounds like an excellent plan to me! As Ben’s explaining what he wants from me, he says,

BEN: I want you to read all this stuff and summarize it for me. Like Johnny 5, have you seen that? Do you know how he reads a book? I want that to be you and then you summarize it. Yeah?

Ohhh to tell him or not to tell him? Since this is the second Short Circuit reference I’ve heard him make since I’ve been here I opted to tell him.

ME: Umm Ben… you know that movie, Short Circuit with Johnny 5, yeah?

BEN: Yeah, that’s what I’m talking about. I want you to summarize like Johnny 5.

ME: Yeah, no I know. It’s just, you know Johnny 5 the robot? My uncle is the voice behind the robot.

BEN: *quietly* Shut. Up. Are you serious?

When I nodded he pushed his chair back from the desk and stood up and thought it would be an amazing idea to tell the whole office.

BEN (shouting): Did everyone just hear what Devon Martinez just said? Did everyone here that?! Her uncle is the voice behind Johnny 5 the robot!!

Enter the whole office erupting in a bunch of ‘NOs!’ and whispered excitement here. Ben literally went running around the office spreading the news to everyone who possibly didn’t hear him while Matt leans over and starts asking all these questions and demanding that I get him on the phone right now.

MATT: Are you serious? Get him on the phone right now! I want him to do the voice! Will he do the voice? I love it when he sings the Bee Gees. What does he sing, More Than a Woman? Will he sing that? That’s my favorite part in the whole film. *does robot voice and hands* ‘More than a woman. More than a woman to me.’ Get him to sing it!

BEN: Ohh I can’t believe we’re going to get to talk to Johnny 5! And Josh is going to miss it! Brilliant, he’ll be so jealous! God, I can’t believe it. He’s your uncle, like your truly related to him?

ME: Yes, he’s my mom’s brother. He’s done some other stuff too. Like you’ve seen Men in Black, right?

BEN/MATT: Yes.

ME: Well, he’s the voice of the Pugg dog Frank, and he did some of the puppet and voice work with the worm/coffee guys.

BEN: Shut up!

MATT: GET HIM ON THE PHONE!!

Hahaha. Ben then had to jump on IMDB to make sure I had his name right and that I wasn’t lying while I gave them my Uncle’s full resume. Look who’s racking up on those cool intern points now! All for things that I didn’t do. Not so cool, but we’ll get there, right? I left the office that day promising to get in contact with my Uncle and earning the ultimate cool status from Ben for cool family members. Cheers Uncle Tim!

Thursday we went to the Victoria and Albert Museum for class. This is quite the interesting museum. It doesn’t specialize in a time period or any one thing specifically, but just has random things from everywhere. And I mean that in how the organize everything as well. They’ll group things together in similar groups. Like this stuff is all statues, let’s put them in one giant room. Doesn’t matter time period or who made them or where they’re from. And this is all casts. Let’s put them in one room! And stained glass, give um a room!

The thing we were going to look at were the tapestries from the Sistine Chapel which were actually done by Raphel, not Michelangelo. The cool thing about this exhibit was the fact that the cartoons (not like how we think of cartoons. It’s what they call his really big drawings) Raphel drew in order for the tapestries to be woven were brought together with the actual Sistine Chapel tapestries in the same room for the first time in I don’t know how many years. So we’re all supposed to go and soak up this rare opportunity! It was really very cool, but sadly, no pictures were allowed in that room, and for once, I obeyed.

My favorite part was the actual museum itself. It had a really cool courtyard outside (which of course we didn’t’ actually get to go to, but I might just go back!) and even the staircases were full of artwork. Where else can you climb stairs that pretty in a public building? Certainly not in the US you can’t!

My theatre class was also supposed to go on a field trip that afternoon, this time it was back to the Globe for a tour. Only problem was that something or other got messed up while ordering our tickets so that we were no longer going on the private tour like we thought, but on a public one that was quite pointless and quite frankly a waste of my time. Not only was the lady in charge very rude and mean, but she told me nothing I didn’t already know and didn’t even let us touch the stage.

God forbid you try and actually get on it like I did, cause then she’d yell and put up a huge fuss (even though other groups got to do it!!) The only thing she let us do was take pictures. Pfft. Yeah, you’re cool lady. The good thing was that we got out of class a whole 2 hours early, which was perfect for me because I had to prepare for movie night!

So after a successful hunt for microwave popcorn and cleaning my room, Laura came over to watch a movie. It was so good to see her since we haven’t hung out since the group’s been together and I got to hear all about her Paris trip! And we got to watch Whip It! and eat popcorn. All in all, it was an amazing night. It got a little interesting when I decided it would be a good idea to find the secret door in the basement I’ve heard so much about that comes in handy for sneaking people past the security guards. Haha, bad idea. We got lost for about 5 minutes in the sketchy garage area of Marylebone and we couldn’t get back in the building because the door locked behind us. Thankfully, I managed to find the way out. After you go through this door and up these stairs and hop over the little fence at the top that is! So after seeing Laura out and agreeing to use the real door next time, I went back upstairs to finalize any last details for my trip, because this weekend I went, that’s right, to Oxford, Bath and Stonehenge! You see how I ran out of time now?

Love,

A-very-happy-she-found-the-elusive-microwave-popcorn-in-London-Devon

“This Is A Bit Weird, Isn’t It?” – Ben Crompton

I was expecting Sunday’s weather to be overcast and cold since Saturday was leaning more towards that way, but surprisingly, it was one of the best weather day’s I’ve had in London thus far! Beautiful clear skies, sunny and bright, and wind! I love the wind, it makes the air feel so crisp and it just smells of Fall. I knew it was the perfect day to go find Regent’s Park. So after a chat with my good friend Mitch back home, I packed a bag full of postcards and pens, put some St. Vincent on my ipod and went to find the park. I wish I had brought some bread though…

Turns out Tom is right when he said, “It’s right THERE, love” because this park is seriously right around the corner, and it’s huge! (Apparently it’s even larger than I thought and I missed a whole section full of fountains and a rose garden. Who do you think takes care of a public rose garden?) The section I stayed in runs along a stretch of water? I guess you could consider it a river, but I dunno if it’s a real one or not. Anywho, first thing I see are these giant geese! At first I was like those are some huge ducks, but their necks are too long and they’re too big to de ducks… oh my lanta, they’re geese! I’ve never actually seen a real goose before Sunday, go figure. They make the pigeons (which are incredibly fat here) look tiny. There was a small child who wanted nothing more then to try and hug one of them, but to his disappointment kept being dragged away by his parents. I went for a nice little walk taking pictures and such and then finally settled down on a bench to do some writing. I was joined by a couple who wanted to eat their lunch, but I was in too good of a mood (and had my music) to really care. The squirrels did though and they came out from their hiding places to see what the couple had to offer. I swear this squirrel would have sat in my lap and eat out of my hand if I had any food. As it was he climbed right on the bench next to me and let me pet it before scampering away when the lady got all mad.

The best part about the sunny weather was that according the forecast, it was supposed to stay that way all week. This made this week look significantly brighter from my end and put me in a better mood to go back to work. When I went into the office the following day, I was all smiles. The sun was out, I was going to research the hell out of whatever it was they gave me, I’m not really sick anymore and I had gone to bed early the previous night. Ben thought something was wrong with me, he kept asking what happened, I was acting different. I just told him the sun is out and I’m not sick! Let’s go eat lunch outside! And we did. Even my film class was less boring this week. I managed to stay awake the whole time and we watched a movie, Hitchcock no less. Turned into one of the better Mondays I’ve had in a while.

That day at work we also got a new work experience guy. His name is Dan, but it’s a bit weird for me to call him that since my Dan back home is quite different. So I call him Thomas in my head. This guy is like 6ft something, shoulder length blond hair and has like the London equivalent of that messy on purpose cause I’m a cool trendy hipster look. I do like his purple shoes though. I didn’t really get a chance to talk to him, but he sounds like a pretty cool guy. All I know about him is that he went to Uni and had an internship in Bath. What???? I though Bath was like a tourist town let alone a real functioning city that has Unis and Production Companies.

Tuesday was the longest day ever, but also the most enjoyable. When I showed up to work that morning, everyone was in the midst of making sure everything was in order for the Production teams that were going out. One team was going out to film some material for a show currently under way, and the other was go to shoot those shorts for BBC. Ugh I wanted to gooo! But I was only there for a half a day so it wasn’t really possible. My task that morning was quite simple, go and find something interesting happening in the news. Turns out did you know the Awkward Family Photos blog/book is going to be turned into a TV show? I dunno how exactly, but ABC just signed on it. Enter Devon mentally checking out and looking at awkward family photos for a good 15 minutes here. Apparently I was making quite a lot of faces at my desk, cause Ben, who sits directly across from me asked, “Devon what are you watching? You’re making the best expressions, I love it!” Shortly after that is when all the fun began.

Amy, one of the Production people gets a call from Josh saying something or other about the shoot and needs to talk to Ben. All I hear is “Yeah... at my house… in Islington…” What?? Five minutes later I found out exactly what was up. Turns out they didn’t bring a spare battery for the Cannon they were shooting on so they were going to take it out of the camera at the office. But the camera isn’t at the office, it’s at Ben’s flat, in Islington. Next thing I know Ben, comes up to be with ‘his hair all out of sorts’ and starts speaking really quickly.

BEN: Devon, I need you to go round to my place and pick up a camera. Well a battery to be more specific, but a camera.

DEVON: Ok, how do I get there?

BEN: Here, take my Oyster card, that’s very important. And here you’ll need these *he chucked his keys at me* Ok so what you’re going to do is just walk out of here take a left and get on at Brondesbury Park and then take that to Highbury and Islington. And then you’re going to jump on a bus, yeah? It’s number 271 and oh, here’s my address, the bus will take you there and then here’s the alarm code-

DEVON: Urggh, you have an alarm? I hate alarms.

BEN: And then call me when you get there and I’ll explain to you the rest.

*Matt walks in the room *

MATT: Woa! What the hell is going on here??

Bahaha! Woa, indeed Matt. I went from spending my day looking at awkward families to going round to my boss’s flat. How did this happen? While he’s explaining all this to me and I’m trying to find Highbury and Islington on the tube map, Matt is just shaking his head like this is crazy, you’re sending Devon to your house? Ben’s writing his address down on the piece of paper and as he hands it to me, he looks me straight in the eyes and says all calm like, “This is a bit weird, isn’t it?” Hahahaha, um, yes Ben, this is.

So there I went in search of Brondesbury Park, with my London and tube maps in one hand and Ben’s hastily written down address in the other. All I can say is thank the Lord for my ipod! It ended up being about a 30 min ride to Highbury and Islington. But part A, the tube and the part I was least worried about, was done. On to part B, the bus and the one I was most worried about. Which side of the street do I need to be on since the bus runs both ways with the same number? And where is the bus stop? So after walking the wrong way from the tube, being on the wrong side of the street, I finally got on the right 271 bus. (I double checked this fact by doing something I hated, and talking to the bus driver. Look who’s growing up!) I was also very glad I brought my map with me and had looked up Ben’s house before I left the office. I had no idea where I was supposed to get off or how far he lived from the bus stop. Turns out he lives right down the street and I’m a good guesser of the Is it time to get off the bus? game. Then came part C. I didn’t even think C was an issue, get in and grab the camera right? Wrong. I forgot about British keys!

Not only do British people not put their locks in the doorknobs, they use those locks that use those old timey keys that look like real keys. And the doorknob was in the middle of door, not on the left, and doesn’t actually turn. You just kinda push with it. (Yes, it reminded me very much of The Hobbit). So I take out Ben’s keys and my phone and turns out he’s already called me twice. Brilliant. As I’m trying to figure out which key to use on this lock (there are two) he calls me again.

BEN: Ok, so the brown key is for the little bottom one, yeah? And then the silver one is for the top and the alarm code is **** and just let me know when you get inside.

ME: Alrighty…

I then tried very unsuccessfully to open the door with these weird locks that I couldn’t even figure out which was the right way to turn. Left. No, that’s not working this is England, so right? Wait I don’t think that’s working either. How do I know it’s unlocked if there’s no doorknob to test? Wait. I think the top is unlocked, but the bottom is still locked? Or are they both locked? I can’t tell! Why isn’t the door opening?? I can’t believe I came all this way to not even be able to open a freaking door! GAH!

BEN: Are you in yet, Devon?

ME: Yours is the one with the green door, right?

BEN: You’re at the right house, aren’t you? You’re at 148?!?

ME: Yeah, I’m just... having some problems opening the door. I’ll call you when I’m inside.

Seriously couldn’t open this freaking door. And that’s something you just can’t ask someone off the street to help you do. Or can you? Heeeeey Post man who was walking along putting post in the neighbors door. When he got to Ben’s house, I had to ask him to help me open the door mumbling, “I’ve never unlocked a British door before.” I’m so glad this man didn’t ask any other questions than, “Are these the right keys?” because how do you begin to explain that you can’t open the door when you have a key, but that you’ve never been here before and you don’t live there. And then Ben called again:

BEN: Are you in yet, Devon?

ME: ummm, just about…

POST MAN: Ahh, got it!

ME: Yay! Yes, I’m in!! I’m in! Thank you so much!!!

BEN: Is that a man’s voice? Who’s there?

ME: Where’s the alarm?

BEN: Just when you walk in to the right.

ME: Ok. *pushing buttons*

BEN: Devon… was that a man’s voice? Who’s there?

ME: oh um, I had to get the Post man to help open the door for me.

BEN: Oh did he? That’s great! Do you have my keys and is he outside and the door closed?

ME: Ha, yes, he’s outside. I have your keys, door closed.

BEN: Brilliant. Alright my room’s at the very top, yeah?

*me climbing stairs*

BEN: Ok, and I’m the bedroom on the right.

*walks out of the wrong bedroom to the one across the hall*

BEN: Is there a nice spread on the bed?

ME: Do you have a Buddah?

BEN: What? Yes, in the corner. That’s tiny! Why did you pick that to distinguish my room? Are there green stripes on the bed?

ME: Ok, I’m in the right room.

So as I’m going through Ben’s drawers, in his bedroom, all I kept thinking was how much personal space Ben and I are breaking through. And that Adriana would probably kill to be in my shoes right now. And I was very tempted to kinda sneak through the house and see what kind of things he liked and such. But I didn’t! I thought if my Dan ever finds out about this he’ll never let it go saying I’m stalking my boss and going through his things and he wouldn’t be entirely wrong. I’m not that creepy! So I grabbed the camera battery and charger (cause I’m smart and thought ahead!) without going through any other drawers.

BEN: Ok great! Ah Devon, this is f*cking brilliant! You’re going to save this shoot! Now go downstairs, yeah? Are you there?

ME: Yes

BEN: Ok, have a look around. It’s pretty clean, huh?

ME: Hahaha, um yes, especially for a bunch of guys.

BEN: Impressed, eh? Now turn on the alarm and lock the door behind you love.

But now I knew how to get home! The whole trip took almost 2 hours. When I came in the office, they were all sitting round eating lunch and Ben jumps up and gives me this massive hug. Haha, ok, I didn’t really do anything, but sure, I’ll take a hug. Elena asked if I went through his things. Hahaha. "Well, I would have!" was her response. After that I literally only had about thirty minutes to eat lunch before I had to go back on the tube for class. Oi, seen too much tube for the day, thanks.

Next was the extremely pointless Internship class where last week we got into a major discussion about the point of the class. So this class, they printed out our little handbooks for us and the teacher, whose name is Xanthy and who I keep wanting to call Anthy (shout out to Anthy!) is trying to go through it and explain things to us. But I feel like she’s just making it more confusing. The woman is very nice, but a bit scatterbrained. Example, “Ok, go to page 6 to read the Learning Outcomes.” I’m on page six, looking at the learning outcomes. “Oh it not on page 6… it’s on… oh wait. Yes yes it is. Alright, so!” And then making sly comments to make us feel bad like, “if it works, then great and if it doesn’t, well then I’ll go in a corner and cry again *nervous laughter*” This class is so pointless and is way more work than I wanted to do and the whole British idea vs American idea of an internship class still needs a little work. One guy asked, “So… just to be clear, we have to get outside sources to write a paper about our work, at work?” Xanthy, “Yes. This is a theory class.” Really, cause I thought this was an internship class and that was why I had to go through my boss's drawers today.

After class Nicole and I went to Hammersmith to see The Big Fellah, a play set in New York and dealing with the Irish and Bloody Sunday and all these events that followed after. I probably would have enjoyed it more if I knew more of the history behind it all, but one thing I can say is that their American accents needed some work! When are going to see something that isn’t political? All this heavy theatre is getting a little much for me, I need something light. Like a musical or a comedy. As we’re headed home, Nicole got a text from Nick saying that Anthony the 45 year old man on my floor, wants us all to go out to a pub tonight. Bahaha, like that’s happening.

Love,

A-now-I-can’t-say-I-haven’t-seen-my-boss’s-bedroom-Devon

“My Gosh, It’s Like Teaching A Baby To Walk!" – Milly Wade-West

Sometimes I wish my blog would write itself, or that I could mentally record my thoughts and push a button and bam! It’s all written down for me with perfect spelling and grammar. Unfortunately, that kind of technology has yet to be invented, so I’ll have to do this the old fashion way. Ok guys, get ready. Four days coming at ya starting now!

Wednesday was a very long and upsetting day. The office was alive once again with Ben and Matt and a large portion of the production people back and I was given a very boring task to do. More specifically, I was given research. *sigh* I know that research is necessary when developing shows, I know how important it is, and yet I still completely loathe it. I keep trying to tell myself to do a good job so that Ben and Matt will love me and think I’m worth having around rather than someone the have to keep around, but I’m finding it harder and harder to get enthusiastic about research. These are the moments when I envy you Julie Harrison. How do you do it? I find it impossibly hard to be motivated about something I don’t care for, and I really need to work on that. The other thing that was freaking me out was that I was supposed to be doing research on “what they ate and wore and stuff”. Keep in mind this is for a TV show. Those are the types of things I feel like you should talk to an expert about! These are all period specific things! I dunno how detailed they want this to be. Not only do I not know how detailed they want this, I have no idea how to use a British Keyboard properly. For the most part, it’s very much the same. Except when you want to capitalize something, delete something, or hit return. Those keys are just in slightly different shapes and are located in slightly different areas so that I always always ALWAYS am hitting the wrong key. I’m also convinced that my space bar is somewhat jammed. Everything I type is messed up and has red squiggly lines underneath entire sentences due to things not spaced properly and I have to go back and figure out where the words are. This resulted in me ‘pecking’ the keyboard with my index fingers. I am frustrated. I am tired of research. I am freaking out and having a bad time at my computer.

To make matters worse, Sarah the star intern (whose been doing research on this one project for the past three months) printed off all her information and there was I swear at least 50 pages of information! And of course Ben and Matt loved it. And of course I had nothing worth noting to contribute in our meeting. I left work thoroughly beaten down and wanted to just crawl up in my bed and watch TV. So I watched Dexter and ate the last of my vegchili in bed. I’m having a hard time loving the pre-production world right now.

There was one bright spot in the afternoon. It came from who else, but Josh Buckingham, who sometimes, I cannot be happier that he finds it entertaining to tease me, I need to laugh. About every 2 hours or so, someone will waltz through the office asking if anyone wants, ‘a cuppa tea?’ Usually I say no, I’ve already had one in the morning, and I mean how many times a day can one possibly drink tea? But this time I said ‘yes’ and it just happened to be Josh who was doing the asking:

JOSH: What kind of tea do you want?

ME: Uhhh, the regular kind?

JOSH: You don’t want like lemon and ginger or Earl Grey or something?

ME: Earl Grey?

JOSH: Do you like Earl Grey?

ME: Umm, I can’t say that I’ve truly had a cup of Earl Grey before.

JOSH: WHAT?! You’re having Earl Grey then. It’s proper British tea.

Sarah was helping him in the kitchen and he was about to add milk to my tea, when Sarah stops him explaining how I don’t like milk in my tea. “That’s alright, Earl Grey shouldn’t be diluted. She needs to experience the full thing.” Cheers Josh. He then started ‘preparing’ my tea with this ridiculous American accent. It was both very sad and highly entertaining and made me laugh. He then delivered it to me saying, “Ahh there’s a cup of proper British Earl for you.” I think Josh is turning out to be my favorite person at work.

Thursday was a much needed fabulous day. The weather was beautiful! It was sunny and yet slightly windy and just a hint of a chill outside. It was so nice I decided to walk to class. I’m surprised I had enough time to get there considering I left after the alarm and it’s like a 30 minute walk. Oh did I mention how our crappy little dorm likes to test the fire alarm EVERY THURSDAY morning at 8:40 AM? Yeah, no joke. It’s wonderful! The best part is that they actually start it a good ten to fifteen minutes early. So it will go off for the first time around 8:25 and then again at 8:40ish. I just try and tell myself that I have class at nine so it’s like an ‘if you haven’t left yet you shoulllld!’ reminder. This week my art class went to St. Paul’s! For those of you who don’t know, the steps of St. Paul’s is where the Tuppence Lady in Mary Poppins sits with her pigeons, and it’s also where Princess Diana and Prince Charles were married. Have I mentioned how much I love this class? An hour lecture, then a thirty minute break to get to the location which means Devon can stop and get a pastry on the way, and then an hour and a half of walking and talking about something beautiful and interesting. Love love love!

On the way to St. Paul’s, Me, Nick, and a bunch of his friends stopped at this little bakery to get some tea and breakfast. There’s one British girl in the group, whose name is Milly, and she’s hilarious. Although she’s originally from somewhere in England, she attends University of Denver full time and is ‘studying abroad’ in London this semester. Sort of like a permanent study abroad for college and then ‘studying abroad’ at home type of deal. Her and I had a conversation last week about how amusing it is for her to be ‘back home’ and watch all her American friends stumble around confused. Ha! The tables have turned! But anyways, we all got on the tube to get to St. Paul’s and one of the girls in the group, Michelle, was very concerned about whether or not she could drink her tea since the tea bag was still in it. Does that mean it’s ready? Can I drink it? She starts asking Milly all these questions who just sighed and said, “Yes it’s ready, of course you can drink it! My gosh, it’s like teaching a baby to walk.” Bahahaha.

We finally get to St. Paul’s and it’s simply stunning inside. There was a ‘no’ camera policy which I snuck around by taking pictures from inside my bag, so take in the splendor and thank me for my illegal behavior.

We had these little audio guide things like we did at Windsor, but there was one point when I was standing underneath the dome, looking at the mosaics and paintings when the choir started singing. I have never previously heard a real choir in a grand hall where the acoustics are magical and their voices ring for seconds after they’ve stopped singing. I took off my audio guide and simply stood there. It was the most beautiful thing I’ve heard in my entire life. It was a girls choir of less than 20 girls and they were simply rehearsing for something or another but I was speechless. It was one of those times where you get completely caught up in the moment. Here I am. In London. Looking at the ceiling of St. Paul’s. Listening to a choir. It was simply indescribable and if ever there was a time for me to start crying in church that would have been it. (admittedly, I got slightly teary).

Then came the fun part of the trip. THE STAIRS. There are three galleries in St. Paul’s, the Whispering Gallery, the Stone Gallery, and the Golden Gallery. We climbed 257 steps up to the Whispering Gallery, which is still inside the Cathedral, but at the very highest point before the ceiling for the dome starts. This was frightening! Did I mention how I’m terrified of heights? You climb all this way up to find there’s this 4 ft. railing standing against you and the entirety of St. Paul’s. Above you is this huge curved ceiling full of incredible artwork of the dome and below you is the entire church. It’s like the times we went to the mall and I’d lean over the railing just a little bit and my sister would come up behind me and scare me. Only worse. Because you’re much higher up, and the space is just so much more vast. I was freaking out and making this kind of panicy noise, which isn’t really allowed in the Whispering Gallery because since you’re still in the church, and since you’re so much closer to the ceiling, the way the acoustics work, everything is much louder. There was a great deal of “shhhing!” by the little guard guys (not at me! At the chatty mcchattersons). The whole time, Chloe is trying very hard to not start laughing. As we left to continue our climb to the Stone Gallery she asked me:

CHLOE: What is there to be scared of?

ME: Umm falling. To your death. And you saw the whole thing previously in your mind because you’re looking at how high it is!

CHLOE: Well you won’t really feel it will you? I mean the fall will kill you before you know what’s going on.

ME: Yeah, thanks a bunch Chlo, that really helps. I’ll tell myself that the next time I’m free falling in a dream.

CHLOE: Well look at it this way, you picked a great place to die in! Church!

ME: You’re not helping the situation!

We then climbed another 119 steps, for a total of 376, up to the Stone Gallery, which is outside. It was gorgeous outside! The wind felt so good after climbing up these tiny little passageways (a large majority of American’s simply couldn’t fit through these). The whole city of London is just sprawled out in front of you with the Thames in the forefront on one side, and the city part with the financial district on the other. It was spectacular.

The last 152 stairs to get to the very top (the Golden Gallery) were all these rickety spiral staircases. Gah! I was freaking out again. At least before I was in a somewhat confined place. But now…

What if I slipped and fell climbing? What if these stairs give away and fall to my death? Or get impelled on these staircases? I’m going to dieee. No your not, just keep climbing Devon. Did you just hear something squeak? Are they supposed to shake this much? How much weight can these things hold at one time? When was the last time they were checked by a safety person? How do I know they’re really fastened to the wall? What if they come loose from the wall and we’re left hanging on? Do you think I have enough of a death grip to survive? I bet I could hold on tighter than that guy. He’s gonna die. He has no idea, just look at him, totally unprepared, barely touching the railing. Just keep climbing, don’t look at high up we are.

And so it went till we reached the top. And then there was this peep hole in the middle of the floor to show you how high up we are. I wanted to take a picture so I literally made a laughing Chloe hold my hand as I looked over it to take a picture, the whole time making the panicy noise out of the side of my mouth. The Golden Gallery is 528 steps up, and 85 meters from the Cathedral floor. I’m proud to announce that I did not stop once during the whole climb even though there were many members of the group who did!

The view outside is much like that of the Stone gallery, accept for the fact that you’re higher up so everything is tinier, but you can see more. The climb down was much shorter, but the spaces were smaller. It was like perfect cramped Devon size. It’s hard to imagine anyone larger than me fitting in some of those passages, but there were a couple 6 ft guys in our group who somehow managed to do it. We got to the Stone Gallery again just in time for the clock to strike noon. I was expecting some grand elaborate bell chime. But nope, I just got the very boring single ‘dong’, but don’t worry- Chloe said they’d give me 12 of them!

After St. Paul’s Nick, Michelle, and I went to this sushi place where there’s a conveyor belt that brings you your food. It was quite cool! All the plates prices are color coded so you can keep track of how much your spending. And if you want something hot, you just push your little button and a waitress comes and takes your order. You even have water taps in front of you so you can have an endless amount of water (flat or fizzy). It was glorious! And quite tasty.

After Theatre Class (where nothing particularly noteworthy happened other than we discussed the Globe theatre and Shakespeare in length), I had a date with Jeni to see “Design for Living”, one of the plays we’re required to see for class. Ironically enough, it’s the last play we’re discussing in December, but the first play I’m seeing in it’s entirety. I absolutely loved this play! It kind of reminded me of Vicky Christina Barcelona accept with two men instead of two women it’s and set in the 1930s. My favorite character was undoubtedly Leo, who seemed to be the best actor out of the bunch and who I found simply enchanting. Yes, Thursday was a much need fabulous day!

I didn’t get to sleep in as much as I would have liked since Jeni and I were going to see another play for class the next morning. This time, we were going to see “The Garbage King” at the Unicorn Theatre. Yup, that’s right. You guessed it. Children’s theatre. It was quite an interesting play but 10:30 is way to early to be stuck in a room surrounded by 5 different school groups of children.

And it was quite a long play at well! 2 hours. And it was surprisingly dark for kids I thought, but then again, I wonder if they even think it’s that dark. I mean, I never found The Lion King as dark as I did when I got older, and then it was a “how did I not find this a little scary and disturbing?” The best part though was Jeni’s reaction to the school boy’s uniforms. She said they looked like “zoot suits. They honestly look like little pimps! It’s terrible.” Hahaha, when you put it that way, it is indeed Jeni.

After the play, we wondered around the area, being in a section of the Southbank we’d never ventured to before. The weather was beautiful again so we ate lunch at a bench in front of the river. We then stumbled upon the Borough Market, which is not tiny at all! It was literally tents upon tents of food!

Butcher tents where you literally see your meat getting hacked to pieces, cheese tents, bread tents, sweets tents, and hundreds of tents selling hot food. We definitely picked the wrong place to get lunch! And it’s definitely a place worth coming back to. We stumbled on a little further and found a little park! Ahhh yes! We sat in the shade and talked for about 20 minutes before deciding that we both needed naps. So we parted ways along the tube for home. I stopped and bought some more postcards before coming home and watching Modern Family.

That evening, Tom’s friend Steve was in town, so Steve, Tom, Jeni, J and I all went out for dinner and drinks. Good times. We found this little pub that looked incredibly tiny on the outside, but you walked in and it turned into a huge tree house! There were stairs leading to different levels and little tucked in rooms here and there the whole time there’s a giant tree in the center of this place. It was quite the happening little place too. Although, the music they were playing wasn’t really the most ‘recent’ stuff. Still, the British very much enjoy their Backstreet Boys.

Today was spent somewhat bumming around. I took a skirt I bought back to H&M and found out they were having a gigantic sale, so instead of returning it as originally planned, I ended up exchanging it for more clothes, ha. I bought more postcards (again) so I finally have the right amount for people I need to send them to, but I need to buy stamps. And write them. I also bought some more British cookies or ‘biscuits’, excuse me. These are like light little shortbreads and go great with tea. I think I could probably eat half the pack in one sitting if I let myself, so I really need to try and convince myself to make them last (but when they’re like 42 pence a pack… come on). I went to Boots to get some more chapstick, only to discover they don’t really have chapstick brand so I bought this weird British version of chapstick which I’m currently very much digging. When I came back in I looked over the desk and discovered that I had mail! My mummsies sent me mail! Yay, thank you mom, I love letters! It even came complete with 'Eamon art', haha.(If anybody wants to send me mail, highlight the P.S. section to see my address) I then watched some It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia for a laugh (shout out to Jules. I watched the Kitten Mitten one, hahahaha!), tidied my room a bit and made some spaghetti. All in all a pretty filling day, but I’m tired, if that’s even possible after a day of nothing. I wanted to try and go to Abby Road this weekend, but since today would be the 70^th birthday of John Lennon, I didn’t really want to fight with the crowds. I need time to fully soak in and appreciate my Beatles’ moment! I mean, it’s freaking Abby Road!

Love,

A-trying-to-stay-busy-to-forget-she’s-missing-out-on-ACL-Devon

P.S. My address is:

Devon Martinez

Marylebone Residence Hall Room 7I (and that's an 'i' not a 1)

London, NW1 5LS

Cheers!