Critical Northwest Outpost: Academia Miscellania: Tired, Luggageless, and Loving It...

So, here's some new pics from today. I'll update you with the details of the hilarity of the day later...needless to say I've had to spend a bit of time shopping to keep myself looking decent, smelling civil, and generally comfortable. My initial foray into shopping in London has taught me two things: first, I have no style, or at least no Euro-style, and couldn't wear the clothes they wear here; second, this place is terribly expensive. I initially went to Harrod's, the closest clothing store, and immediately recognized that I was WAY out of my element. The clothes were flimsy, polyester, and skin tight; all things that I do not values in my clothing...especially the skin tight part. I'm sure that most others would also prefer to not see me in skin tight polyester pants, so I guess I'm doing the public a service by not adapting the London "style". Even the jeans here are worn skin tight...really tight...which would likely explain the declining birth rate in England. I eventually bought a pair of pants, a shirt, and underwear at the Gap and it cost 130 pounds...that's $260! The same ensemble in the States would probably have been $100 at the most.

After attending sessions at the RGS conference this morning and shopping during lunch, I decided to take this afternoon and head out to Highgate Cemetery to see the grave of Karl Marx. Of course, if you know me, it shouldn't be a surprise that this was a "must see" of this trip. I ended up getting there as they were closing the cemetery gates and had to bribe the guard to let me in. So 2 pounds bought me 5 minutes at Karl's grave. There were also a bunch of Chinese tourists admiring Karl's monument and I blew their minds when I asked them if they'd take my picture in Chinese. You'd have thought they just saw a ghost...I guess they don't hear a lot of tall Westerners speak Mandarin. I'm glad they understood me, because I could barely understand them. They had really thick Shantung accents.

Well, they want to kick me out of here. I'm writing this under an original map made by Captain Cook and another map made my a Dutch explorer in 1050! The earliest known, relatively accurate, map of the world. This place is amazing. So here's some pics of today's adventures...

The Albert Monument...Queen Victoria's monument to the love of her life.

Another one...look at the little guy at the bottom. This thing is huge.

The Royal Geographic Society Buildings

"Dr. Livingstone, I presume?"

Shackleton, the man

The classic double decker bus (for my kids!)

A workhouse in Highgate. This one was built in 1722. This is where they'd send society's "undesirables" to be "rehabilitated" through slave labor. Surprisingly, the poor, sick, disabled, elderly and others didn't respond to treatment...what a shock!