Saturday, September 18, 2010

Day 6


On Friday, we avoided all things papal, jumped in a boat and headed down the Thames. Landed in Greenwich but not before passing a bunch of buildings described in my Contemporary Architecture of London book. Considering Canary Wharf, Millennium Dome, etc. are located in otherwise desolate environs, the water was the best way to see them. Quite liked the Quantum Cloud sculpture by Antony Gormley (design and analysis here) that, depending on you angle of view, displays a human figure. Waltzed around Greenwich and tried to track down mention of Jayme's relative who was involved in determining a method for longitude calculation at the Royal Observatory - no luck. On to the Thames Barrier and home for an early supper (deeply hypoglycemic since missed lunch) and we accidentally dug into a dish of chicken kidneys - not bad actually. Saw the play "The War Horse" that evening. We all had mixed feelings: strikingly effective and affecting life-sized horse (and goose) puppets but uneven acting and a storyline that, while eternally true (war is bad), isn't novel. Looks like the Guardian concurs.

Jayme didn't washed his feet before the play.
It doesn't seem to rain much in London.
British people are very friendly. One woman walked out of her office and down the street to point out the building I wanted.
Warm, flat beer tastes just like that.

2 comments:

Amy said...

David gave me your blog address. I love Gormleys stuff with it's shifting viewpoints and access.

Amy said...

Ha - that was the most awkward comment ever. Anyway, glad you saw Gormley :-)