France to go

Once we were in London, we wanted to make our way over to Barcelona to visit Bernat and Miriam. We flew over on a Tuesday morning, and had to Leave by Thursday evening, but we made the most of our short trip.

Sitges

Once we got in, we took the train into the city since we were staying near Estacio Franca, and walked over to our hotel, the simple and modern Ciutat Barcelona. We had a leisurely lunch at Santa Caterina Market with Bernat, then headed out of the city to Sitges, a very pretty seaside town. The Sitges Film Festival was in full swing, and we had tickets to see Blindness, but after walking around town, getting food and drinks, and visiting with some friends who were also there, it turned out we had absolutely terrible seats in the enormous theater, so we decided to skip the 10:30 p.m. movie and just head back into town.

Ben Hur — in chocolate

The next day, Evan and I went to the Palau Musica to get tickets to the architectural tour, but they were sold out for the day. We bought tickets for Thursday morning, then relaxed in the beautiful cafe, amid flowery stained glass and ceramic pieces. Then we headed out to the Chocolate Museum, also in the Gothic District. The entry ticket was a chocolate bar (delicious), there were exhibits on how to make chocolate and the history of chocolate, and there were some impressive chocolate sculptures, like the choco Ben Hur. There was also a confectioner’s expo in the building next door, and we were able to snag some more delicious free chocolate.

Miro sculpture — doesn’t it look a bit like Evan?

Then we decided to head up to Mont Juic. We hopped on a bus to the funicular station, then went up the hill. Just a short walk away was the wonderful Fundacio Joan Miro, which had a huge collection of Miro’s work, including drawings from when he was a child, an incredible mercury fountain and enormous room-size pieces made just for the exhibition space. There was also a gallery dedicated to works inspired by Miro.

Mies van de Rohe Pavilion in the rain

After the Miro museum, we walked by the Olympic stadium and the art museum, and took a series of escalators down the mountain to end up at the Mies van de Rohe Pavilion. By this time it was raining, and we had to pay a bit to get into the small pavilion — which took about 3 minutes to get through. It’s a neat structure, characterized by lots of straight lines, and barely-there room designations, and there are two ponds, one of which has a nice statue in it, but other than a single white-upholstered Barcelona Chair, there wasn’t much else to see. It seemed like it should be a free or maybe 1 euro attraction.

From there, we headed across the street to the Caixa Forum. There were two exhibits going on — a small photo exhibit on motherhood around the world, and a much bigger, more interesting and more extensive exhibit of Alphonse Mucha’s work that featured a lot of classic theater posters as well as paintings and other works by the artist. There was also a room set aside for us to make our own Muchas, with poster templates, crayons, markers and cutouts. We chose to make a bit of a satirical poster, bringing Mucha’s feminine ideal into a grittier production, the show Westside Homie: From Goddess to Gangsta, complete with bling, bullets and stripper shoes. Maybe we had a bit too much fun.

The next day we toured the Palau Musica and were wowed by the beautiful concert hall, with its stained-glass sun skylight, tiara-like chandeliers around the palm tree pillars, and mosaic muses surrounding the stage. It was also incredibly bright and airy, with windows all along the sides. It was unlike any other concert hall I’d ever been in. I wish we could have seen a performance.

We spent the rest of our time walking around the Parc de la Ciutadella and the Gothic District. Evan bought ham, we celebrated Bernat’s birthday (happy birthday!) and we hopped on a plane back to London since we were heading back to California the next day.

Well, it’s been another busy week, but I got to see a lot of people. The Tuesday night blogger meetup was nice, and today I went to the Social Media Cafe/Tuttle Club, where there was a nice, big group to chat with over croissants and coffee. I got to catch up with Mike, Darika, James, Rob, Melinda, Toby, Lloyd, LJ, Josh and Steve, and I met a few new people, including Roger, Justin, Terence and Laura.

The best part of the event was that there was a nice little discussion group afterwards hosted by James and James of Spinvox about the “future of voice.” We talked about the difference between voice and text, where voice recording, storing, transcribing and translating technologies are going, and the implications of having a record of all the things you’ve said.

They also started by having us do a funny little drawing activity, where we added on to shapes, which was supposedly a psychological test that revealed what we thought about ourselves, how other people viewed us, our career, religion, home and love life. Mine were pretty funny, though I don’t know how accurate they were. I apparently see myself as a dinosaur/dragon with a fat tail and spikes, but I think other people see me as a flower… hmm… leave your psychological interpretations below.

And what have I been writing this week?

There were the usual entertainment and fashion posts for Sugarscape, though the site was experiencing some pretty serious technical problems that slowed posting considerably, so it’s possible not all my stories made it up.

I got back on the wagon with writing for Hitched with a post about “Going Green This Summer.” Big thanks to Jamie from WalkIt.com for helping me put some ideas together, and thanks, Luke, for connecting us.

I also managed to do a few posts on Londonist — a nice little piece about “New Cancer Centre Offers Free Support,” and what you’ve been waiting for… “Stupidly Cute Monkey Born at London Zoo.” Check out the video of the endangered little critter below. Sort of so ugly it’s cute, and then ridiculously so because of its fuzzy little head and skinny little limbs.

One of my favorite Britishisms is the term “gutted.” Basically, “I’m absolutely gutted” is just a really overdramatic way to say “I’m disappointed.” But it’s so much more graphic.

I always imagine entrails spilling out, or maybe an entire lack of a gut. And though the term seems quite dire, it’s usually used when a Brit is distraught that he won’t be able to make it to the pub that night or that he has to leave dinner a bit early. I haven’t yet heard it used for anything serious.

It also seems to be begging for a response like, “Don’t get your intestines in a bunch.”

Well, I didn’t know what a bap was when I first heard the word, though it really hearkened back to a very awesomely bad movie, B.A.P.S (p.s. my illustration is off — for some reason, I thought there were 3 main characters, not 2 — that’s what I get for drawing before IMDb-ing). Turns out that a bap is essentially a bun, and the term burger in a bap is quite common, as well as other baptastic foods, like sausage in a bap, which we saw at breakfast. But would “Think outside the bap” work as well for Taco Bell as “Think outside the bun”? It just doesn’t quite have the same ring to it.

I sort of forgot this one since I got used to everyone in Budapest calling arugula rocket. They didn’t understand what we didn’t get in the translation, of course. But I think rocket is a much more exciting and less pretentious name for the fancy lettuce.

Though this stems more from a misunderstanding, chocolate buttons still makes me smile. The first I heard of them, Evan and I were having crepes at Crepe Affaire with his coworkers, and they said something about chocolate buttons in their dessert crepes. I gave them a quizzical look and said, “You call chocolate chips chocolate buttons?” It just sounded so charming.

Turns out chocolate buttons are different from chocolate chips. They’re essentially what we’d call molding chocolate — those flat pieces you melt to make other chocolates — and Cadbury sells them as a snack.

Still, I had pictures of little buttons in my head instead of the more familiar little chips, and thought they’d be especially cute in a cookie.

I often walk by St. James Piccadilly church and have even wandered through its touristy market out front once, but I always wanted to go draw one of the statues there outside the Nero coffee shop (which is basically in the church), so I stopped there again late last week. I grabbed a baguette and a latte, both quite good, and sat down on a park bench in the courtyard by the green drop-in counseling trailer (I know, bizarre). I couldn’t see the statue there, so I moved to a table to get a better look and had a leisurely draw until some guy sat right in between me and the statue, partially obscuring my view. He was leaning over reading a newspaper most of the time, though, so I ended up being able to see pretty well. I think the drawing and everything turned out pretty well, too.

At first glance, you think, well, pitta’s just pita with an extra T. The big difference, though, lies in how it’s pronounced.

Ask a Londoner if they use the word pita (pronounced peet-a), and they say, “Of course!” But then, when you say, “like for the bread,” they’ll look confused and say, “No, like the name.” They’re thinking of Peter.

They, they’ll say, “Oh, you mean pitta bread?” pronouncing it pit-a.

I think why I’m so amused by this is that I’ve asked quite a few Londoners and have gotten the exact same mix-ups and responses every time. It was completely unexpected the first time, and the second time it was just funny.

This was another new one for me. Apparently potholing means going exploring in caves. I had no idea. Good thing I asked, since that’s much more exciting than the image in my head.

I saw Sweeney Todd for the second time last weekend (I saw it in the U.S. when it came out there at the end of December), and I must say, I liked it more the second time around. I enjoyed it the first time, but I found myself too caught up in all the spurting blood and dead bodies and cannibalism, so I couldn’t really enjoy it. I was just waiting anxiously for the next kill.

I still think that Anthony is the weakest part, but Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter are great. As are Sascha Baron Cohen and the little boy. The fantasy sequences are my favorite. Especially when they go to the seaside. Sometimes funny and always excessive, whether it’s the masses of blood, showmanship or singing, I’ve been humming the tunes all week now.

Jacket potato = baked potato

I just said potato when I ordered one the other day since there was only one potato option on the menu.

To make up for my terribly inaccurate drawing of Horse Guards Parade from St. James Lake, I went back on Tuesday and drew it for real. From my spot, I couldn’t see the whole thing, and it was partially obscured by trees. And I also had a lot of people walking in front of me and stopping to take pictures of various attractions and feed the birds (though none so dramatically as on my last trip to the park), which was a bit frustrating. I also think I need to buy a new pencil sharpener. Mine seems to have stopped working.

In any case, enough with the excuses. Here is the much more accurate drawing, though it could still use some work. And definitely the touch of a better-sharpened pencil. Oh, and it was cold when I was drawing, too.

I think the drawing says it all. Bits = Pulp.

Now the question is, which is the more appetizing word? Pulp, for me, at least, is more clear about what it entails and is a much more specific word than bits. I feel like bits can be sort of anything, though it is a cuter sounding word.

Your thoughts?

After 2+ days of being unable to post, the hosting issues are sorted out (apparently a PHP upgrade caused the problem — thanks, John, for helping me out with that).

I’ve finally been able to add the images I wanted to posts from the past week, which are all from my sketchbook. Check them out:

• Lunchtime at Leon
• A Run in St. James Park and Green Park
• Britishism: Zed

Now back to posting regularly. Well, except that I won’t be posting this weekend: France is going to France! (Sorry. Do you know how long I’ve waitd to say that?)