london calling: london treasure hunting, everything's better from above, and a young boy finds his inner hipster

i love big ben.  i never get tired of taking his picture.

well, another saturday here in old london towne.  (with an e, because as we all know, everything is cooler when it's misspelled (says holly, one of the funniest girls alive.))

saturday means portobello road.  

amber and i have a really compatible shopping pace.  the kind where it takes you three hours to walk down two blocks.  so we like doing the shopping thing together.  and i for one like doing pretty much anything else with her as well.  

take, for instance, eating paella.  without her, bland.  with her, a lunch of spice-ical wonder and delight incomparable.  (pronounced in-comb-pear-ahb-lay)  we opted for the paella valencia over the one with fish in it.  and it was warm and had big beans and hunks of chicken and mm-mm-mmmm.  note to future carolyn: learn how to make paella.

 {please note how long my bangs are.  they are currently the main source of my desire to shave my head.  other sources include a fear of getting my hair caught in the window between train cars and getting my head ripped off.}

as i went to bed at four last night because i was blogging and getting my pictures squared away (yes blog, i love you.  yes you are important to me.  yes i want to remember everything i did here once i return home), we came home after portobello and i took a nap, then wrote a paper.  how quickly the days go by.  we ate a quick dinner, and then off to the london eye at 7 o'clock.

the london eye is essentially a huge ferris wheel overlooking the city.  you pay 18.60, get to watch a SWEET 4D movie, complete with bubbles, mist, and rain, and then you climb into a glass capsule and sail your way up and over and down.  (sail is used very loosely here.  it's more like a slothlike crawl.)

here are some pictures of the experience.

{amber.  my how lovely she is.} 

{sunset over the city} 

{the whole crew.  yours truly, preston, amber, holly, andrea, and amberly} 

{the sun sets and the lights go on all down the thames. 

while we were up in the sky, i saw a carousel down southbank a little ways.  and you all know how i feel about carousels (they're also on the birthday list).

{my flags.  i found out they're called bunting.  goodnight london.  i love you so.}

i would also like to take this moment to welcome preston into the hipster club.  a week ago, i bought fake glasses and flew my indie flag.  andrea, who already has a hipster heart, found some today at portobelly road.  and now preston has hoisted his hipster flag as well.  we figure it's highly unlikely we can pull off these spectacles (pun intended) in the states, so we're playing dress up as long as we can here.  

p.s. i'm apparently all about the HUGE size pictures lately.  there's just so much great stuff going on in the backgrounds and stuff, i sometimes can't help it.  BAM.