So… last Thursday my ickle brother came up to Durham for a couple of days. We didn’t do a huge amount – the touristy stuff in Durham takes all of an afternoon – but it was a welcome break from the current tedium of, umm, not a lot.
He went back home on Saturday afternoon – and I went with him. I know term finishes in three weeks, but nothing really was happening in Durham, and it was good to catch up with friends back in Nottingham. Freestyling and I went to see Kingdom of Heaven on Sunday afternoon.
On Monday I went down to London to visit relatives in Greenwich and to spend a day learning how to cook curry – which was my 18th birthday present from them. But more on that in just a sec. Because I always manage to book trains that give me a ridiculous amount of spare time wherever I’m going, I had most of Monday and Tuesday afternoons in London.
Monday, I ended up at the Science Museum (yeah, I know, I’m a geek), ostensibly to check out the Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy exhibition. The exhibition itself was a fantastic colection of sets, props, costumes and trivia from the recent film – including the Vogons and Marvin. Yay!
But it was the rest of the museum that really impressed me. Now, I’ve not been to the Science Museum (properly) for a long time, since the days when I didn’t really appreciate what it was I was looking at. This time, though, I had the whole afternoon to explore the collections – which was, in fact, nothing like long enough. I had forgotten – or never truly realised – quite how much there really is in the Science Museum. From a working recreation of Babbage’s first Difference Engine to Apollo 10′s Command Module, from Stephenson’s Rocket to tiny nano-submarines, there is a huge, fascinating collection forming a cross-section of the past 2,000 years of invention and innovation.
And on the Tuesday I did this curry cooking thing. Something that I would honestly have never thought of doing on my own, but it was actually really fun and useful. I was easily the youngest there, but the ten of us got on really well. The session was at Deya, a trendy restaurant co-owned by Michael Caine that “offers traditional dishes with a contemporary twist”. Basically, we’re talking a considerable step up from your local Indian takeaway.
Tuesday afternoon I wandered around London for a bit, popping in to Waterstone’s Picadilly (because I can’t help it) and the Apple Store in Regent Street (wow – plenty of people have raved about Apple Stores already, so I won’t – but trust me, it is worth a visit!). I was going to go straight back up to Durham on Tuesday evening, but as I had a flexible return ticket, I stopped at home for another couple of days.
On Wednesday, I popped into Nottingham to talk to my ex-manager at Waterstone’s to see if they would take me back for the summer – they will, so from June 25th I will be a Bookseller again! I had nothing else to do with the day, so I ended up at the cinema watching Sin City. What a film! Again, I’ll review this one eventually in a different post.
Thursday afternoon – back up to Durham. In the evening, the Castle quiz team was playing Mary’s in the quarter finals of the Inter-Collegiate Challenge. Despite missing a team member, we won by 175 points to, umm, 50.
And finally, today, David and I went into Newcastle to see Mr. and Mrs. Smith. Once again, you’ll have to wait for a review, but suffice to say that I did enjoy it!
Tomorrow, Saturday, is Castle Day. Not too sure what that entails yet, but I do know that the bar opens ridiculously early and closes very late…