Happy St. Patrick's Day from London!

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I learned last week that I'd be coming to London, yes London, on business for five weeks, yes five. For the first two, I'll be working alongside my colleagues Steven and Andrew. Then they'll go home to the PNW, and I'll finish the time here on my own!

So today's trip almost didn't happen, due to a mix-up between our flight confirmation numbers. It wasn't clear from our shared TripIt that one confirmation number is only mine, and there's a second confirmation number for the two of them. When check-in opened 24 hours prior to our flight, at least one but I think both of them started trying to check in using my confirmation number with their own last name, an invalid combo. When I then tried to check in myself half an hour later, I found that the booking had been "locked" for too many invalid attempts. Never have I been so validated in my decision to pay $42 to reserve a preferred seat in advance! It turns out, between the one-week lead time on the booking, the third-party discounter website we used, the 34-day stay, the fact that one person made the reservation using a credit card owned by a second person for a flight to be taken by a third person, and all the invalid check-in attempts, apparently we tripped nearly every fraud-detection flag British Airways has. I can't argue with their logic! So, the stricken BA agents at SeaTac returned with a three-page printout instead of a boarding pass when they ran my passport. Thankfully, I had Steven and his company credit card standing with me as a backup plan, but soon BA & I located the paragraph on the fraud alert printout stating that if I could identify the name of the person who purchased the ticket, the location where it was booked, the amount paid, and the address given, then it was OK to allow me to board. I aced it and we were on our way.

And I ended up in my $42 aisle seat with no one next to me! I'm livid that we have to pay to choose seats on most airlines now, but at least this time I got one that was actually worth something extra.

No idea why, but this was by far the easiest transatlantic flight I've ever done. I watched Cloud Atlas, drank a free gin & tonic, ate a nice hot curry for supper, took what I thought was a brief nap, was annoyed to be awakened by the lights coming on and the flight crew serving a mediocre breakfast, and was steeling myself for another 3+ hours when the captain announced it was time to land. Have no idea where the time went and do not intend to go looking for it.

We were anxious about entry to London as we were pretty sure we didn't need business visas, hadn't had time to secure any in any case, and decided to hope for the best. We did fine. I just described our engagement to the border control officer, and she promptly wrote "BV"--Business Visitor, the status we had been pretty sure we qualified for--and stamped me in. While in line for the passport check, I braved international data roaming for five minutes to make absolutely sure I could get my Foursquare checkin at Heathrow, which doesn't have free wi-fi. It hasn't hit my T-Mobile bill yet. Hope it cost me less than the £3.95 they wanted for wi-fi!

The cab ride from Heathrow was exceptionally slow, muchly due to road closures for the St. Patrick's Day parade and festival in the center of the city. We got here and then found out the cab didn't take plastic, but Steven was able to scrape together acceptable payment in US dollars (!).

We're staying at a five-star hotel just one tiny block away from St. Paul's Cathedral. I can see the dome from my room! After getting checked in, we headed out to a local electronics shop and purchased pay-as-you-go SIM cards with the intention of using our smartphones' data plans while we are here. Steven's doesn't work with Google Voice. Mine doesn't work at all, not even after getting back to the hotel and troubleshooting on the vendor's website. Still no Foursquare for me.

Then we set out to find a traditional-looking pub for supper. The place we found, just down from the cathedral, had a few locals in it, but the menu seemed contrived for tourists and they were out of most of their interesting cask ales. So it was just-OK. #londonproblems Steven drank his first beer in about eight months (long story) and between that and jet lag he was happy to be done for the night afterwards.

As we were walking back from the pub to the hotel (via quick trip to Sainsbury's for room snacks), we passed by the front of the cathedral just as the 18:00 Eucharist was scheduled to begin. I said a quick "bye!" and darted in the revolving door (still carrying my 80 bags of decaffeinated black tea and package of ginger snaps). St. Paul's was dimly lit and thick with incense. A semi-circle of chairs, about 8 row's worth, surrounded the center altar, directly under the great dome, and almost the entire nave was roped off to keep tourists a respectable distance away from those celebrating the Eucharist. As with every other church I've ever visited, there's no better way to experience a church than by celebrating a service at it! It helps that St. Pauls' Anglican Eucharist is nearly identical to my hometown Episcopal one (it's called the Book of Common Prayer for a reason), and as always, it was incredibly special to follow a familiar ceremony in such a spectacular setting. It's absolutely recognizable as the setting for Charles and Diana's 1981 wedding, which my mom and I got up at like 4 AM to watch live when I was a kid. Their vows were at the high altar, past the choir stalls where the Royal Family sits, which were roped off but visible from the area where we were sitting. They had a wonderful group from a parish in the diocese, who led the prayers of the faithful with some specific requests for their neighborhood which I can only surmise must be deeply impoverished. Yup, I cried after the passing of the peace--always my favorite observance in any Eucharist/Mass/service in any country/language, plus it made me miss my sweetheart very acutely.

After the service, I went to check up on the guys and found Steven sacked out, but Andrew not ready to settle down yet. We decided on a walk around the neighborhood. What an amazing neighborhood it is! We had a beer (well, water for me) at Blackfriars' Pub (our new pub, as far as I'm concerned), walked down to where we could see the Millennium Eye across the Thames, then walked back to St. Paul's and then down to the Thames again trying to see how far away the Tower and Tower Bridge are from here. Pretty far, but the Millennium pedestrian Bridge is right here and the reconstructed Shakespeare's Globe Theatre (which I built a cardboard one of for school!) and the Tate Modern are just on the other side of that, just steps away from where we are staying! Can't wait to check them out in daylight hours!

Now: bed.

Tomorrow: work. Whaaat? Not vacation?!

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Comments

[Jim]

phone
Has your phone been unlocked by the US carrier to allow it to work with any SIM? The frequency band used by the phone MAY also be an issue. Or another problem entirely. But those would be the first two easy fixes that I'd check, if you haven't already. :)