Last night, Richard and Jeanette's internet was down, which was disappointing.  I just got back from Stake Conference, though, and after helping Jeanette with Thanksgiving dinner preparations, I discovered that their internet is now working.  Hurrah!   So here comes the story of my weekend, folks. . .

My coach to London left from Brighton at 1:30 on Friday, and I figured that as long as I was paying to ride into Brighton, I might as well spend the morning there.   So I did!   I left for Brighton around 10:00, carrying all of my weekend necessities in a single bag.  When I arrived in Brighton, the air was freezing and the wind was blowing so fiercely that I kept expecting bits of myself to detach and fly away!  In fact, if my hair weren't so firmly implanted in my head, I'm sure it would've blown right off.  I'm almost surprised I didn't just blow away altogether, a la Mary Poppins.  :-)  Despite the wind, I managed to take a lovely walk along the beach front.  In fact, the wind had wrested the water from its usual languid calm, and the waves were crashing and splashing against the piers in quite an exciting, dramatic way.  I then walked past the Royal Pavillion (the gaudy Arabian-British palace built by the Prince Regent), snapped some pictures of fountains and monuments, and then just wandered up and down streets.  Eventually, I made it to Churchill Square with its famous shopping center, and there I began my VERY long search for nativity.  (Mama, Dad, and Dylan:  Kati asked me to bring home an English nativity that she could give her mom for Christmas.)   I found plenty of Santa and snowman statuettes, but no nativities.  It was fun to soak up the Christmas atmosphere in all the stores, though. 

At 1:30, I made my way to the Pool Valley Coach station and hopped on the bus bound for London.  The ride went smoothly (I slept most of the way!), and although I was feeling a little carsick, my first glimpse of London set me back to rights. :-)  With each familiar sight, I felt a little thrill run through me.   Oh, how I love London, and oh how sorry I'll be to leave it!   I can't wait to see my family and friends at Christmastime, but I'm certainly going to miss my beautiful, ever-exciting England.  The coach let us off at Victoria Station, and after grabbing a quick sandwich for dinner, I decided to walk to Parliament Square.  Dusk was already falling (the days are SO short now!), and all of London was ablaze with lights.   I had a glorious, up-close view of Westminster Cathedral rising out of the darkness (what a structure!), and then I saw Big Ben.  It's even more imposing and breathtaking when it's all lit up at night.  During the summer, the days were so long that I was always home in bed before it was dark enough to see Big Ben light up.  I'm glad I didn't miss the experience!  I then walked down Embankment, past Cleopatra's Needle and all the beautiful, lighted bridges and buildings, to St. Paul's.  I read "North and South" under a tree in the churchyard for a bit before heading into the tube station to go to Richard and Jeanette's.  But--ACK!--as soon as I stepped into the tube station, a mad rush of people began running past me.  Come to find out, the Epping line had been discontinued, and because of an illness on one of the trains, everything was backed up.  People were squeezing into the tube cars like human sardines, and a few people got coats, scarves, and appendages caught in the closing doors!   I didn't actually make it onto a train until an hour later when a friendly boy pushed his way in and helped me, too.  We started chatting, and he offered to get me a taxi home to Woodford.  I politely declined.  Once I caught the right shuttle to Woodford, he insisted on walking me all the way to Richard and Jeanette's, chatting incessantly about anything and everything and lapping up my one-word answers like honey.   I thought I was being about as friendly as a prickley-pear, but when we reached Richard and Jeanette's house, he asked me if I wanted to go out for a drink the next day.   "I don't drink," I said flatly.  He looked a bit disappointed, but he accepted my answer and walked off.

(NOTE:   I didn't have time to finish this email on Sunday, so now it's Monday!)

Michelle opened the door for me, and I was surprised to find that Richard and Jeanette were gone and that poor Corinne was laying on the coach with a broken shoulder and upper arm.  Poor thing!  She fell off a horse on Thursday, and since the break is so high, the doctors can't set it in a cast.   She just has to stay completely still for six weeks (no school!), and she's already bored stiff.   When I asked the girls where their parents were, they said, "Oh, mum took dad to the hospital.  He has to stay their overnight."   Come to find out, Richard had some sort of a calcium build-up completely blocking one of his saliva glands which had been causing infections and a lot of pain.  Poor guy!   The doctors actually gave him the calcium rock to bring home as a souvenir, and the thing was larger than a pea.  Ouch!   (He had great fun showing the thing off, and I thought it was completely disgusting.)   When Jeanette returned from the hospital, we chatted about his situation and Corinne's situation for awhile and then I watched a Doris Day film with the girls.  After that, I pulled out "Casablanca" and watched in the name of schoolwork.  :-)   I really am writing an essay on Steiner's "Casablance" score, and I was thrilled to find that Richard and Jeanette own the show!

I headed into London the next day around 9:00 and met the funniest character on the tube!  She works with passionately creative people and teaches British teenagers how to be passionately creative, too.  She was a hoot!  I got off on Oxford Street (London's biggest shopping area), and just window-shopped.  It was great fun; everything was so bustling and Christmasy.  All the streets are hung with Christmas lights and snowflakes, and the stores are all sporting their Christmas goods (although--BAH!--none of these had nativities either!!!).   Truth be told, it made me a little sad to see how commercialized Christmas is over here and how little the celebrations have to do with the actual birth of Christ.  :-(   The best shop on the street was a toystore a lot like the one my mom and I saw in New York.  It was unbelievable!   There were life-sized stuffed animals everywhere, crazy store workers blowing bubbles and horns in people's faces, and five FLOORS of toys.   I also found the theater where "The Sound of Music" is playing right now.  I wish I could go, but the tickets are all sold out.  :-(  Around this point, it began pouring kittens and puppies, so I hopped on a double decker bus and rode to Trafalgar Square.  There, I visited the National Gallery for the upteenth time.   I never tire of the National Gallery!  This time around, they had a wonderful impressionist exhibit, a Cezanne exhibit, and a Dutch winter scene exhibit.  They were showing films in each exhibit which gave an overview of the lives and styles of the painters, and I learned quite a bit.  It was great, and it kept me out of the rain!  :-)   As soon as the rain let up, I walked to Leicester Square and noticed that Rosamund Pike was starring in a Tennessee Williams drama on the West End. (Rosamund Pike plays Jane in the new version of "Pride and Prejudice," and I think she's a wonderful actress.)    Come to find out, that day was closing night for the show, and the matinee started at 2:30 (it was 2:00).  I decided to see if there were any cheap tickets (fat chance!), and it turned that they still had a lowest-price ticket for 15 pounds.  I snatched it up and enjoyed a brilliant show (the people next to me payed 30 pounds for their seats--hee!).   The script itself was very thought-provoking and a little disturbing, but I was mesmerized by Rosamund Pike.  She is a brilliant actress, and the only thing I could possibly criticize was her accent.  :-)  She was just too British to do a true Southern drawl!   The girl who plays Mary in "Pride and Prejudice" was also in the show.    The theater was one of the most beautiful ones I've seen, and all in all, I was very pleased with my decision to buy a ticket.  After that, I did some shopping in a nearby mall (looking, still, for nativities), and then I headed to Covent Garden.  The atmosphere was such fun there!  One man was belting Broadway tunes and another was--get this!--peddling a ten-foot-high unicycle while juggling a knife, an apple, and a ball, and EATING the apple as it flew through the air!   It was mind-boggling!   I was sure he was going to lose his balance, or his apple, or his head.  Here finally, I found a nativity, only to discover that it was made in CHINA.  Bah!   So I headed to Harrod's, but that place was even more heathen-ish than the rest of the shops had been and everything was overpriced (of course).  My final stop was at Sainsburies to pick up a quick sandwich for dinner and buy something to bring to Thanksgiving dinner.   I purchased a big box of gourmet, chocolate-covered biscuits, and then headed "home."  :-)  When I arrived, I found that Richard was back from the hospital!  The whole family watched this reality show involving ballroom dancing and celebrities (kind of like "So You Think You Can Dance?"), and then Richard and I chatted about such things as childhood upbringings and the art of composition.