Smoking Ban

There has been a very interesting ban put on in London. There is no more smoking in any public places (this is extreme for London, everywhere was smokey). It has been interesting to watch the reactions. Somebody at a Pub last night started going crazy saying that next they were going to ban Jews, Blacks (not the term used, edited for the viewers), and Arabs. He said the smoking ban was infringing on his rights, and that it was "Puritanical" and "Fascist". Interesting points that he made. Also, it is extremely interesting that he would make these comments. The out lash in Arizona didn't seem to be as harsh.

The fines are only £50 if caught, which doesn't seem to be that harsh on London standards. Interesting to travel back here and comment on the change 1 month, 1 year, or 5+ years from now!

Weird Weather

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/6267234.stm

Here is a link to an article about the storm that hit London last night. Pretty crazy. These people would go crazy in a Monsoon. It was nice heavy hail, but not as wild as the Monsoons of the Valley.

Bad Weather

There has been awful weather today, all day, so I didn't hit the queue up for Wimbledon tickets.

Try again on Monday.

Weekend Plans

So far this weekend:

1. Attempt to Queue for Wimbledon early on Saturday.
2. Attempt to get tickets to Concert for Diana on Sunday.
3. Photo Safari around London, if time permits.

Stonehenge and Bath

This was another one of our day trips. We got up early in the morning, boarded a bus and went out to see Stonehenge on our way to Bath. This was a great experience, and learned way more than I needed to about these stones that are laying in the middle of a barren field. To connect our trip it is interesting that the inner "blue stones" were taken from the Preseli Mountains, which happen to be right by the Preseli Ventures site in Wales. This is an impressive sight, but not one that I would spend an entire day going to see.

Pairing this trip with Bath is pretty interesting. Bath is an old Roman town that was built because it is the sight of a natural hot spring. This town is pretty cool and hosts some interesting venues including the Roman Bath Houses, the pump house (where you can taste the healing hot spring water straight from the source), one of the only bridges left in Europe with shops on it, and many other interesting points.

I will add some pictures from these locations when I have access to all of them.

The Circle Line Pub Crawl

I have added a link, so I am not going to talk about every single stop on this pub crawl.

Sean, Mallorey, Dave (a buddy from classes here), and I headed out on a Saturday morning to explore this pub crawl. We had directions to all of the bars, and an entire day to hit up all of the sites.

This is a great way to get out of the same places and see the different areas of London. It was a fun time, and great to have done it.

Movie Theatre

While Sean was in town as well, we decided to go see a movie.

We went to a theatre in Leicester Square. Theatre tickets were extremely expensive. It ended up being about $20 to go to the show, but it was well worth it. For those of you that are natives to the Phoenix area, the theatre was a larger version of the old Cine Capri. It was an amazing place to see a show.

Sean, Mallorey, and I saw Oceans 13. This was better than the second one, but nowhere near Oceans 11. They did talk about Frank Sinatra, and his importance to Vegas. I found that to be interesting.

While we were down by the theatre, another theatre was hosting the premire of Fantastic 4. This is an amazing phenomenon. I have never heard so many screaming girls in my life (then again, i've never been by a premier).