I (heart) London

I may give the impression in this blog that I don't enjoy London, or the British.

Not true!

Oh, there are things that tickle my funnybone, and my sarcastic bone, and my seeing red bone (Decca Aitkenhead, I mean you). But overall I LOVE London, and if I tease, or throw barbs, it's because I care.

Things I love:
Walking along the South Bank at sunset, taking in the free performances on offer at the National Theatre, Royal Festival Hall complex or the Tate Modern
Rows of white stucco Georgian townhouses with brilliantly colored front doors
Wandering down a side street and discovering, thanks to a blue plaque, that someone you admire once lived there
Rowing on the lake in Regent's Park
Watching small children feed the swans and ducks in St. James's Park
Going for a jog along Rotten Row in Hyde Park and imagining what a scene it must have been during the Regency era (or at least it was in all the Regency romance novels I read)
Pubs with beer gardens in the summer
Pubs in general
Gastropubs especially
Black taxis. Best damn taxis and taxi drivers in the world.
The ease and expediency of the tube, even if I do complain about using it in summer
Selfriges
Walking through Holland Park and spotting foxes, rabbits and peacocks
Sitting on the top deck of a double decker bus and getting a new perspective on the streets
Bookstores. Especially Foyle's.
Rows of red brick Victorian terraces, with brightly blooming flowerboxes
Wagamamas
Outdoor opera and theatre
The National Theatre
TKTS
Time Out, most weeks
British women's magazines: always a new one to pick up when I need something with which to kill an hour or so, and somehow not nearly as annoying as their American cousins
Museums: The V&A, The National Portrait Gallery, The National Gallery, Tate Britain & Modern, Royal Society of Arts, The Museum of London, The London Transport Museum, etc. etc. etc. We've become a member of most of them and couldn't be happier about it.
The no-nonsense attitude of Scotland Yard - I admire them so much after watching them handle persnickety journalists during the London bombing investigation

The list will go on - almost every day there's at least one new thing that makes me grateful to be here. Do I miss the States? Often. But we're not ready to go home. We'll see if we ever are.