Poshdeluxe

i’d like to point out that, the morning after sleeping in the communist bloc, i did not take a shower. THAT’s how much i wanted to get out of there. plus, there were no towels, so i guess that was a big factor, too.

henri and i dragged our luggage across town to eagerly settle into my dear friend olivia’s apartment. olivia and her bf were off in mexico city to apparently have a few run-ins with mexican wrestlers (seriously), so we had the place all to ourselves. and it was WARM. and the TOILET WORKED. and there were TOWELS.

i celebrated by taking a shower. henri celebrated by taking a nap.

finally ready to face the world, we headed to my most favorite place in london, the tate modern. do you know WHY it’s my favorite place?

cos it’s the type of museum that hosts an artistic installation of SLIDES. real, shiny, twisty turny SLIDES!

i know!!!!!!

it’s like crazy straws for giants!

unfortunately, you have to get (free) tickets to the slides, and they were all sold out. but i managed to live vicariously through an old, slightly arthritic man who yelled, “woooooo!!!” during the entire duration of his journey. he was great.

after wandering through rooms heaping with marvelous art, henri and i headed over to leicester square for dinner and a perfomance of “avenue q.” see, i was all proud of myself, cos i’d gotten this dinner & play deal that allowed us to enjoy a tasty gourmet meal at a place called apex before the show. the internet told me that apex was “right around the corner” from the theater, so we’d have plenty of time to eat at 6 PM and then catch the show at 8:30.

we went by the theater to collect our tickets, and i asked the box office manager, “where is apex?” he said, “i’m not sure… but it’s close.”

we asked the ushers, and they had no idea.

surely, henri said, it must be around here somewhere.

do you know how many restaurants are around leicester square, which is basically the london version of broadway, i.e. times square? i do. BECAUSE HENRI AND I SPENT 45 MINUTES RACING DOWN EVERY FREAKING STREET IN THE GREATER LEICESTER AREA.

our quiet assurance quickly turned to desperation. it was like losing a child in the crowded, strange streets, except it was my posh meal, which obviously in my eyes is about the same thing. i felt like sally field in that tv movie that everyone always references. “NOT WITHOUT MY TASTY BUSINESS!” except my outfit was way, way better.

henri and i came up with a system where we split up and agreed to meet back up on a different corner every five minutes. we asked every pedi-cab driver we saw. we went inside convenience stores and asked the owners. even the guy with the yellow reflective vest and grubby map, who claimed he worked for the city, couldn’t cough up any information with which to scam us.

i guess you could think of it as a v. v. efficient and speedy way of exploring the leicester area. for example, we got to see these cool chandeliers over the street:

at this point, my obsession for taking pictures was still competing with my obsession for eating, but soon i started treating my camera like a bastard stepchild (and that’s when you KNOW i’m hungry).

finally, desperately, we headed into a nearby radisson in order to trick the concierge into thinking we were guests for whom he should provide services. the conversation went something like this:

s: hi, uh, could you look up a restaurant for us, please? it’s called apex.

concierge pants (cp): is it connected with the hotel?

s&h [both unsure as to whether cp is trying to determine whether or not they are guests]: uh, yes? but no… i mean, it’s not in the hotel. it’s around here.

cp: apex?

s: apex.

cp: hmm… (typity type type) well…

s: [about to tear up as she thinks of her lost and lonely dinner]

cp: ahh… do you mean apex, the restaurant at our sister radisson?

s&h [still afraid of being called out as imposter guests]: wha?

cp: there is another radisson nearby, on leicester square, that has a restaurant called apex.

s&h: THAT’S IT!!!!!!!!!

cp: ok, here is a map…

s: THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU SO MUCH GOOD BYE!

seriously, what are the chances that the restaurant would be in another radisson?! clearly my stomach was wielding some sort of cray control over the universe.

joyfully, we ran all the way to… where we started. we had begun our search less than a BLOCK away from the restaurant but were distracted by this super electric neon carnival!

you’d be distracted too, right? and did i mention there were bumper cars?!!! oh there were.
plus, to be fair, the restaurant sign was completely unassuming, AND the internet had NEGLECTED to tell me that apex is spelled like this: @pex.

what kind of junior high serial text messager named this place? GAH.

ANYWAY

so thankfully, they let us in, even though we were 45 minutes late. and that’s when i had the most tasty tasty tasty goat cheese @ppetizer:

see that thing on the left? yeah, that’s an ONION. and get this: I ATE IT.

THAT’S how good this @ppetizer was. and/or how relieved i was to find my daughter.

after we managed to relax and enjoy our delicious me@l (ok, stopping now), we headed back to the theater to watch “avenue q,” which amber had recommended. this is what the theater looked like:

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the show is basically like sesame street for adults, and it turned out to be really, really good. like, there was a song about searching for a purpose in life, a puppet who was trying to come out of the closet, and a pair of “bad idea bears,” who made people drink absinthe daiquiris. really, that’s all i need in order to be entertained (and seriously, i’m pretty sure those bad idea bears are from austin).

the next day, i took henri to my favorite london eatery, wagamama. you may remember seeing pictures of amber and me during our trip last summer, cos i always take noodle-eating pictures there. well, this time was no different…

EXCEPT for the fact that yes, that dumpling is deep-fried. due to some, uh, miscommunication with the waitress, they deep-fried the crap out of our sweet little dumplings instead of delicately pan-frying them.

so, like any good, patriotic american, i asked for a replacement. USA USA USA.

then, of course, the german couple next to us specially requested for their dumplings to be deep fried.

WHATEVER.

we were planning on a pleasant walk around kensington gardens, but then it started to rain in a v. nasty way. so, like every other tourist in the city, we decided to hit up the british museum.

the main hall of the museum makes everyone feel like they could be a photographer for national geographic. or at least, a cheesy calendar. cos i mean, look!

henri was dutifully impressed, especially when we entered the reading room.

i can’t help but feel bad for the people who actually really WANT to use the reading room. like they’re working on some huge important earth-shattering thesis, and they’re Just About to Have an Epiphany, when suddenly a hundred flashes go off and they’re reminded of their third birthday (cos smart people remember that far back) when mom and dad just couldn’t stop taking pictures and the flashes made them too blind to eat cake and then they started crying.

so yeah, i turned my flash off, just in case.

there’s a room all about the enlightenment period, which features a big ole stone foot:

and a model of the solar system:

right.

there’s also a huge temple with ghost-like, headless ladies dancing on the porch:

near the temple, there was a sign asking, “what’s the big deal about the __ temple and the british musem?” (or something like that). it was a reference to the fact that the british basically stole all of this stuff from other countries and never returned it, like a library book but waaaay worse. the sign said, “want to read about the official response of the british museum? take a brochure!” but there were no brochures. i wondered if there were any brochures to begin with, cos that would be a really great joke.

the museum closed, so we took the tube to meet.. AMBER! yes! finally! the illustrious, raven-haired heroine enters our story!

here she is, at the bar of the institute for contemporary arts, which is poopy cos they wouldn’t let me take pictures of their exhibit. BUT they do have a bar, so i can’t absolutely hate them.

anyway, amber and i squealed and hugged and did a little tippy toe dance, then we proceeded to eat french frieds (chips) and dish about our holidays. henri and i were so glad to have her join in on our (post-apex, post-communist bloc) adventures.

which will be blogged about… soon.

until then, go eat at yr favorite restaurant and @ppreciate knowing where the heck it is.