back from the big smoke

This blogger went to London and all she photographed was this lousy tea and coffee tray! Yes, I've been away in the big smoke this week, at an induction type thing for my job. It turned out to be brilliant. The London office is much bigger and swankier and more exciting than its Glasgow baby sister and we got to visit all the different departments, some of which were absolutely amazing. The highlight was definitely the stenographer. It's such a bizarre skill to have and seeing someone press seemingly random buttons that allowed them to type as fast as they could think was just mind boggling.

We also saw lots of celebrities and I managed to go all paparazzi and take a sneaky pic of Jeremy Clarkson nipping out for one of many fags. Someone asked him for a light, which seemed to send him straight to the depths of despair... I guess if you make a living out of moaning, it starts to rub off on your mood in general. It's a bit of a chicken/egg scenario, I suppose... We also saw Christopher Eccleston (the instant we got off the tube, leading me to exclaim, "Oh my God! We're in London!") and Mark Kermode, whose quiff was immaculate, but who was carrying a surprisingly unstylish red rucksack. I didn't take photos of them. We also thought we might have seen the late great Paul Truman from EastEnders, but I think it was actually a lookalike. Talking of EastEnders, I found out that a colleague (I use the word very loosely as our paths never have and probably never will cross) of mine is a) in EastEnders at the moment and b) Bill Treacher's (a.k.a. Arthur Fowler's) son! I completely and utterly failed to maintain a professional degree of decorum and aloofness when I found this out. My small-town background was painfully clear to all the big smoke inhabitants, I fear, but this may be the closest I get to a real-life Albert Square connection, so I stand by my belief that gasping loudly and standing open mouthed and goggle eyed for a full five minutes was the appropriate reaction.

This was only the second time I'd ever been to London. We didn't exactly have much time for sight seeing (so it was quite fortunate that the office was slap bang in the middle of Celebsville!) but we did go for a wee mini pub crawl (very mini) along Portobello Road, which was fun to see, even at night. We also nosied at some fancy houses in Notting Hill. I was in full tourist mode, exclaiming loudly at everything - "No way! That car is plugged in and charging up on electricity!" and "No way! That looks like a giant's house!" and "No way! There's a chimney on the ground with actual smoke coming out of it!" I was just so impressed by everything really. I might have been more discreet if I hadn't had to get up at 5am to get to London. I wasn't designed to get up at that sort of an hour and I think my brain pretty much broke down.

Anyway, I'm back now and most of you didn't even know I had gone, so I shall stop harping on. I'll be back over the weekend to bore you with some crafty to-do lists. I have a couple of exciting markets coming up next month and have lots I need to make for them. Yippee!