Sick week, the one month to go mark, and some weekend field trips

Sorry for the delay in posts recently! I started getting a sore throat as I went to sleep Tuesday night and was sick the rest of the week. I'm feeling pretty good now, just a bit of a cough and runny nose still, but definitely better than before.

Tuesday: Tuesday's Crypto class consisted of the students sharing their ideas for the popular media and cryptography papers. Lots of cool stuff. I look forward to reading them. Then, we spent some time reviewing all the serious math we had done the previous week. Good catch-up day. Then, I came home and did some work until dinner time.  I had made a reservation at Maze by Gordon Rasmey for Ed and I because I wanted to try the other famous British chef (since we had already done Jamie Oliver). We did a 4-course meal deal thing that included a bellini. They brought all kinds of extras including the crazy breads/crisps plate you see below. Then, first course for me was a parsnip soup w/ some haddock and Ed had a raw beef marinated in ponzu that was amazing. Second course was grilled octopus for Ed and smoked mackerel for me. They even brought my plate out covered in a dome and opened the dome at the table and all this smoke came out. Super cool. Ed's dish was better though. The grill flavor on that octopus was amazing. Next up was a fish course for Ed and pork for me. Both were good, but I think mine was better. Desserts were also amazing. I had a chocolate/peanut butter bar w/ grilled banana. Ed had some sort of frozen yogurt and fig. Yummy! THEN, they brought out fresh baked madeleines. YUMMY! Well, after this the waiter came over and wanted to know if we wanted a private tour of the kitchen! What?! YES! So, we got to see Gordon Ramsey's kitchen. Not that he was there, but the head chef was and we got to see him. He was hard at work. A fascinating place. We're not sure why we got this treatment. We have two theories: 1. Ed and I were planning some upcoming dinners at our house, so we had pen/paper out the whole meal. Maybe that thought we were reviewers. 2. When the waiter asked at the beginning if we were there for a special occasion, Ed just said "The special occasion is coming to your restaurant." Maybe that did it. EITHER WAY, super cool and a fun night. We walked around Oxford Street on our way home to see Christmas lights and check out some of the Christmas windows (these were at Selfridges).

Star Wars dresses!

Wednesday: Woke up feeling sick, but needed to go to the grocery store. I tried out Asda today. It's apparently the London version of Wal-Mart. It was nice and easy since I also needed a few non-grocery items. And, I was good about only getting what I could carry. I came back home and slept a lot and did work. Late that morning I got an email saying my passport was ready at the Indian visa place! Well, actually it said "a decision has been made about your visa application and your passport is ready to be picked up during the hours of 4:30-6:00PM". I was nervous. A decision? What kind of decision? But, after a little bit of a wait, I got my passport w/ a visa. Yahoo!  After all that excitement, I had tickets to a Time Out show that night, but decided to pass because I felt horrible. It was only a few pounds and when I looked up the show online it looked a bit weird, so I didn't feel bad missing it. I think it was a good move.

Thursday: Struggled through 3 hours of stats class. We were mainly just checking in on projects, but there are 6 of those and I needed to spend a bit of time w/ each of them. It took the whole time. After that, I came home and slept until it was theater time. We went to see our final play together as a group, Charles III. It was actually quite fun. It was a comedy making fun of what might happen when Charles becomes king. Great acting by the people that played William and Kate and Harry and Camilla. Funny stuff.



Friday: I couldn't bare the thought of teaching math on Friday w/ my head hurting and my nose running and my sore throat, so I decided to show the documentary Codebreaker. It tells the story fo Alan Turing and is quite good. I had seen it at a Joint Math Meeting. Anyways, I thought it would be good for them to know the whole true story so they can compare it to the film, The Imitation Game which we are going to see on Tuesday. I hope they liked the documentary. I found it disturbing, but fascinating the first time I saw it. After class, I came home and did my run. I really needed to get a run in and so I sucked it up and did one. Ran along the river away from the people and it was just fine. Then, I went to Borough Market to pick up some items for a dinner we're having this week. Saw another Paddington, so took his photo for mom. :) That night we had the IES staff folks over for dinner to thank them for all the work this semester. It was really a nice night full of yummy food (made by Ed and myself and desserts from the staff), fun entertainment (oven playing again) and getting to know each other outside of work a bit more.

Saturday:  One month to go! Today, it was off to get the students and head to Windsor for the day. The castle is amazing. Not sure if I like it or Buckingham Palace more. I also enjoyed seeing the chapel where the Queen does all the knight stuff. Lots of neat stuff there. After spending some time at the castle, I had some Thai food for lunch, looked at some shops in the cute little town and then went and hung out w/ the swans on the river near Eton. I bought a couple of bags of food and some students and I had all sorts of fun w/ these bad boys (and girls). I made it back to London in time to meet up w/ a guy I met online. We decided to explore the Christmas market along Southbank. Mulled wine. And a Christmas Tree Maze. Awesome. And a search for inflatable rabbits. Unfortunately, it turns out the fancy rabbits won't be there until early December. Whatever. It was fun and fun to explore with someone. But, then it was back to work.

Sunday: Woke up early and got in a quick 5 mile run. I ran into these sweet faces painted on these weird concrete boxes next to the street. Sweet. Then, we were off to Brighton for the last IES field trip w/ the students. 2 hour bus ride on a double decker bus and we were there. Did a little tour of the city. Pier, The Lanes shopping area, and we ended up at the Royal Pavilion. This place is ridiculous. I didn't get a good photo of the front of it, but it looks like a baby Taj Mahal. Inside it's decorated in all sorts of Chinese art. Dragons and bamboo. Crazy crazy stuff! This thing was amazing. No pics on the inside, but believe me...it's impressive. Plus the audio guide had all sorts of soap opera like details of the royals of the past. Insane. After the Pavilion, I went and had Sunday Roast at a local pub. Yum. Then, I strolled The Lanes and did some shopping. Then, strolled the beach. Then, the pier. I rode a little Haunted Hotel roller coaster, played the Dolphin Derby (and lost), and played some arcade/ticket games and won enough tickets for a pencil. Exciting. :) Then, it was home and back to work.

Cool kissing art on the pier

Famous chocolate/candy store

Candy/chocolate snowmen!