In London

What a trip. I feel as if my payment for having it relatively easy the first time is that this time, I am exhausted.

It started on the plane. No direct flight, less leg room, people talking all around me. Amazingly, I still was able to sleep for two hours, but that was offset by the fact that the plane landed at 8am. Those two hours had to last me a long time.

I left one bag at the airport (I simply cannot carry both of them at once) and rode the train into the city. What a dreary day it was, yesterday and today. True London weather: cloudy, raining on and off, chilly at street level and blazing on the Underground. Lucky I have a raincoat--I seem to have forgotten to pack an umbrella.

I returned to Heathrow today to collect my other bag. Those cheats charged me for two days because it was there for 30 hours. Oh well. It was almost as hard to get back to London with it as it was yesterday with my big wheeled suitcase. Both days I got to the Camden Town tube station and then took a cab the last few blocks. I don't think I could have made it further.

My back is so sore today, I think partly from hauling the luggage around, partly from wearing my backpack all day yesterday and today, and partly from the horrible bed I had to sleep on last night.

I'm staying in one of UCL's residence halls for a week because it's about the cheapest place to stay in London where you can have a private room. The room's OK (for a dorm) but the mattress lives up to the full potential of a cheap, ancient, college mattress. The springs stuck into my back no matter what position I took. When I first fell asleep, I was too tired to notice, but when I woke at 2am, it was hard not to. I finally got back to sleep by lying on top of the comforter so I had extra padding and using my coat as a blanket.

I bought a blanket and two pillows today.

I haven't spoken to any letting agents yet about finding a flat, it being a weekend, but I went today to Walworth, where several flats are that I want to look at. The streets themselves (where the flats are) are enchanting (I don't know what they're like inside), but the main road nearby is less so, and it's a bit of a hike from the tube.

I wasn't enjoying London much these past few days and feeling a bit lonely, but I think most of that was from the exhaustion. I've taken a Tylenol and switched from a backpack to a computer bag and so I feel better and also happier now. Tonight I'm sitting in an internet cafe. My plan to nurse a cup of tea in a pub with free wi-fi was dashed when the pub turned out to be the tiniest pub I've ever seen, and packed full. So I came to Bloomsbury, where I still feel the most comfortable, since I lived here before. I saw quite a few interesting characters on the tube tonight: a girl wearing a pink bathrobe, for instance, and another pair wearing what looked like bad reproductions of early twentieth century dress. I wonder what kind of party they were going to?