Merrymaking

[liv]

I'm back from a very enjoyable long weekend in England. *bounce*

It was still bitterly cold when I left on Thursday evening, but no longer actually snowing and the journey wasn't disrupted at all by either weather or "security". I woke up as late as I dared on Friday morning, which wasn't very late, and got dragged off to the supermarket with Mum and Granny before I'd woken up enough or drunk enough tea to protest. Spent the afternoon chez pseudomonas having tea and conversation, so that made up for it. Screwy showed up as planned in the evening, followed by Thuggish Poet at around midnight. It's always good to see brothers and have a proper family Friday night meal.

Saturday morning we went to synagogue, where they wished Mum happy birthday, and called me up to read from the Torah to mark the 15^th (!) anniversary of my bat mitzvah, and the wardens were sensible enough about forward planning to make it possible for Screwy to attend too with minimum fuss. There were some minor issues with Screwy's carer getting lost, but it didn't really matter as I was in no hurry and was happy to hang around chatting to friends from the community.

Granny decided she was going to dress me up for the party, which was rather fun. I ended up wearing my exceedingly velvety turquoise culotte skirt, with her gold knitted top and her hairdo, and a tiger eye necklace I had lying around as she insisted I couldn't possibly think of attending a party without beads. I probably wouldn't have come up with the outfit by myself, even if I'd been intending to dress up, but it worked pretty well. And it turned out that there were plenty of highly decorative people at the party, so yay prettiness.

I travelled down with pseudomonas and finally broke the jinx which has kept me away from The Oakdale every time I've tried to go there in the past. It was a really good party, with several of my favourite people (doseybat, compilerbitch, lethargic_man, ewtikins, the aforementioned pseudomonas and a friend who keeps her LJ identity private), and lots of other people I'm always glad to see (let's hope I don't leave anyone out: timeplease of course, deborah_c, hairyears, fluffymark, karen2205 and 791point43, even though I embarrassed myself dreadfully by failing to recognize her, many apologies). And lots of cool people I either barely knew or didn't know at all, whom I won't list because I'm a bit unclear on the mapping between people and LJ handles. More than one person told me that I'm good to hug, which is just about the best compliment in the world ever.

There was plenty of conversation, and a fair bit of silliness, and pool and giant jenga, both of which are games I'd like to play enough to get the hang of properly. And no deafening music or smoking; they even snuffed out the incense when requested. And Duchesse de Bourgogne beer which pleases me greatly by being sour instead of bitter. Two bottles was rather more than I really wanted to drink, which I should probably remember another time. I am slightly peeved that the barmaid lied to me by telling me there was no cider at all, meaning that I was thwarted in my attempt to buy a drink for deborah_c, despite the fact that when she went to the bar herself she got a cider I would have been delighted to offer someone or to drink, for that matter.

Sleep happened at least to some extent, and 791point43 was an angel in the morning and concocted a breakfast of chocolate digestives and tea! Lunch with compilerbitch and doseybat at the fabulous Oriental City, an authentic Chinese-style food hall. Unfortunately it is threatened by developers who want to knock it down and turn it into a B&Q and some flats; if anyone has any political influence at all in the London area, please protest against this stupid plan. And take the opportunity to visit it before it disappears, it really is a unique place. I really appreciated getting the chance to catch up properly with Bat and Sarah. And doing so over exotic drinks and tasty Chinese food was an added bonus.

compilerbitch used her extremely flashy GPS to find lethargic_man's place. He provided me with tea and hugs, always happy things. And we headed out to the Jewish Museum in Camden, because lethargic_man was interested in the Black History Month exhibition there about black Jews. Unfortunately, this turned out to be a series of events which we had missed, and a small gallery of photos of the Ugandan Jewish community which was crammed in a room with a video installation so you couldn't even look at them properly. curious_reader actually managed to make it to one of the talks in the series and has done a nice write-up on the Ethiopian community. I was a little disappointed in the museum, and also in not getting to see curious_reader herself on this trip, but never mind. I think I would have been too tired for a proper art gallery, which had been my original aim, and I really appreciated a relaxed afternoon with lethargic_man.

The remainder of the weekend I spent helping Mum set up her new computer to be more usable for what she wants. This included giving her a link to this journal, so if you're reading, hi Mum! The other happy thing was that I came back to Stockholm to find we have a temporary reprieve from winter; it is warm and sunny again here.

Comments

[rysmiel.livejournal.com]

Sounds like a splendid time was had by all, the which I am very glad to hear. *hug* You are excellent to hug; I'd not thought this would come as news, myself, but I'm very glad that being told so's a good thing.

Also, an authentic Chinese-style food hall is not something I'd immediately associate with it being straightforward to ascertain what items were kosher, which was why I did not suggest any such while you were here; how do you manage at this one ?

[liv]

Compliments don't have to be news to be pleasing. But thank you anyway, it is indeed very cheering to hear things like this!

I'm not kosher kosher, vegetarian is good enough. Most of the stalls had dishes marked with "V" signs, all had photos of the food in question and quite a few had English as well as native labels. It's not one of those places that are immigrant enclaves; I think about half the patrons were from east Asia (I couldn't tell by eye what proportions were from the various countries, but it was certainly a mixed group), and the other half looked European. And all the stallholders spoke at least some English.

My experience of "real" hawker centres, which admittedly was in Singapore rather than China itself, was that they have separate stalls for vegetables, different kinds of meat, fish, noodles and so on. That would be even better for someone who was trying to keep kosher. But this food hall had different cuisines in different stalls, so Thai, Vietnamese, Japanese, South Indian, Indonesian and different regions of China, rather than separating by food type.

[rysmiel.livejournal.com]

Most of the stalls had dishes marked with "V" signs, all had photos of the food in question and quite a few had English as well as native labels.

Ah, right. Surety of vegetarian is not something that could be absolutely relied upon in some of my favourite Asian places to eat here - figuring out what goes into what at dim sum in particular is really challenging, particularly since the workmate of mine who spoke Cantonese moved back to Australia.

[blue-mai.livejournal.com]

um, if that was a reference to me (and i don't know if it was), i've kind of given up keeping my LJ private. it just kind of happened. i still don't refer to it in person, that just feels funny, but i don't mind. it was lovely to see you too, though as usually happens i seem to barely have spoken to the few people i already knew.

[liv]

Yes, definitely I meant you! Makes life easier if I can refer to you by your LJ handle. And I know what you mean about getting enough time to speak to the people you already know well; at least I travelled with pseudomonas, and had some time with compilerbitch and doseybat and then lethargic_man later on. And I managed to have some good conversations with ewtikins, but not nearly enough time to speak to you. Now that you're out of massive academic stress mode I shall try to make proper arrangements to meet up next time I'm in England.

[curious-reader.livejournal.com]

What a shame that I missed you. I did not know which Sunday you were coming. lethargic_man said you were very tired and might not be a good company. I would have liked to see you anyway. Are you actually staying longer in Cambridge or is it just for short time? I guess you are not visiting London so soon again.

[liv]

Yes, it really was a pity I didn't see you. It was a bit of a mad trip, and when my brothers ended up organizing to come home for shabbat, I decided I'd just chill out with them rather than trying to squeeze in more social stuff. It's true I wasn't terribly good company on Sunday afternoon; lethargic_man is awfully good at putting up with me when I'm being clingy and pathetic!

I have come back to Sweden now; it was only a long weekend. I am not sure when I will next be in England but I am contemplating Limmud. I'll try to be more organized next time, anyway!

[curious-reader.livejournal.com]

Sounds like me. I can be also clingy and pathetic.

[curious-reader.livejournal.com]

There is Assif this Friday eve. I cook for lethargic_man and snjstar for the coming Friday eve as no hospitality at the Rabbi's house is offered. If you were coming I can do it for 4. I was once inviting people. I could have fed a 5th person. As we have non-adjustable oven which needs replacing I cook my food at lethargic_man's flat. He keeps stricter kosher than us, I mean snjstar and me.

[hatam-soferet.livejournal.com]

You are indeed a most huggable badger. I'm glad the velvet culottes got an outing!

[liv]

Yay hugs! And yay culottes; I don't wear them much because they are quite unreasonably heavy. But I figured it was a very cold day, and if I didn't wear tights and had just a light, short-sleeved top, I'd be ok. And indeed, the pub was very spacious and well-ventilated, so even when there were a lot of people it wasn't too stuffy. So yay, I got to be elegant and strokable without overheating.

[hatam-soferet.livejournal.com]

Yay strokable! Talking of which, I bought some velvet last week - stroky trousers and a stroky top thing. Now I just need an excuse to wear it.

[ploni-bat-ploni.livejournal.com]

Welcome back to Sweden!

I am delighted to hear you had such a wonderful time in England. Amazing how much you managed to stuff in a couple of days. Sweden is nice and warm and sunny right now. Let's hope the weather holds up for Shabbos :-)

The party sounds convincingly fun! Must be nice to reconnect with your near and dear ones again.

Anyway, here's the same-old, same-old. Did you get my text message?

Take care,
Big hug - and yes, I second that: you are extremely huggable!

PbP.

[liv]

Wow, I'm really liking this chorus of people assenting to the view that I'm good to hug! And yeah, it was a lot in a couple of days, and it was definitely very nice to see some of my people. I'll see you soon, anyway.

[habitkicker.livejournal.com]

To complicate matters further, I'm not 791point43 anymore... *g*

[liv]

Oh, so the change is permanent, then? Thanks for the warning.

[neonchameleon.livejournal.com]

let's hope I don't leave anyone out

I hope you're normally glad to see me...

[liv]

Bah, this is why I should never make lists. I meant to include gnimmel too. Hope you enjoyed the party, anyway.