London. Meh.

Well, I guess it's about that time again. I finally have a little free time in which to post a second blog. Right now I'm at my new home in Spain where I'll be living for the next 9-ish months. Let me tell you a little about how I got here.

I got to Omaha as planned and flew out to Chicago where I waited for an hour or so for my next flight. Nothing too exciting. The flight to London wasn't too bad; I slept a little and watched Iron Man 2 again. It was about when I landed that the whole idea of this trip finally hit me. When the plane hit the ground, I thought to myself, "Whoa! I'm in Europe! This is neat." However, it got much less neat when I got in the customs line, as it was rather long. There was a family in front of me as well as behind me, both with some very unhappy children. And they were letting everyone else know it. Some airport staff eventually pulled them out of line and into a different one, where they got to go straight to a customs official and then into London. This was probably the first time I've wished I had a kid. That thought quickly diminished (sorry, Grandma) as soon as I finally got to the front. After that, I walked right pass the baggage claim as I cheered to myself (I had just one carry-on bag) while everyone else from the plane was waiting again and proudly walked out of the airport into London. And then I embarrassingly walked back in to ask how I get to the Tube. Apparently, there was a station right underneath me.

I decided to first go to my hostel to drop off my bag. I found it easily enough, left my bag in the luggage room, forced myself to not worry about it and headed off to do some sightseeing. I picked up a visit-London booklet and headed to the River Thames. I got some nice pictures of Big Ben and the London Eye as well as the river itself. Right next to the eye, I got approached by a young guy who talked me into visiting the London film museum. I wasn't sure what to expect, but was really surprised at what I found. They had all kinds of original costumes and props from big movies, such as the original suit from Batman Begins. There were also a lot of original props like the lightsabers used in the Star Wars films and the guns used by James Bond in some 007 movies. They also had a whole exhibit dedicated to Charlie Chaplan, which included his original hat and cane. Very neat! I am firmly convinced I need to see some of his movies after visiting that exhibit.

I left, got some curry from a street vendor for lunch and continued my walk. After some more picture taking, I begin to feel the effects of sleeping so little overnight. I forced myself to keep going though, hoping to acclimate to the new time zone. It began to rain, which I guess happens in London once and a while, and started to get rather cold. Still being at the river, here weren't many places to find cover. So now I was wet, cold, dead tired, and beginning to feel miserable. I decided to head back. At my hostel, I was in a room with about twenty other guys. But each bunk was it's own little cave, so it was still private. I fell asleep as soon as I was down and even slept in a little in the morning.

I felt a bit refreshed the next day, despite missing breakfast. But I made up for it at a supermarket. Then I went to the British museum and spent way too long and took way too many pictures. I wasn't particularly interested in a lot of the stuff there, but they did have the Rosetta Stone, which was awesome to see in person.

After the museum, I went to the tower of London, but decided not to go in after seeing the price. The outside was still nice to see. It was about here that I realized I needed a picture or two of myself. When I got bored there, I went to Buckingham Palace, but it was too late to go inside. So yet again, I wandered around, taking more pictures of what I could. Once it got later, I began to just wander the downtown area. There's a lot of cool stuff to see, but there's not a whole lot to do by yourself. So I went back to the hostel for bed. I guess I wasn't too excited about London. Or maybe I just wasn't willing to spend enough money. I'll have to go back. For more than two days. And not by myself.

For some reason, I can't but any pictures in the blog. I'll try more in future posts. But I may just rely on facebook for pics.