ADIML: Monday, November 5, 2012!

This is Monday, November 5, 2012!
A typical work-day in my time here in London. Perhaps not too thrilling…

Hell yeah, beat my 8:30 alarm in waking up by 6 minutes. Oddly satisfying at these moments.
My window faces East, I get the benefit of a glowy morning wake up every day.

The light switch is conveniently an arm’s reach away. This usually means I turn on the light and stare at things until I see something that causes motivation to stir me from my comfy sleep position.

Bedside table…complete with old dishes (including a chocolate wrapper), diet coke evidence and cuties!
(Spoiler: the cuties I’ve tried from Tesco are not cute or good.)

I’m disgusting, right?

I move my computer to the desk. (That means I’m standing! Yay!)
There are so many things on my desk that are gross.
Yeah sometimes when I put too much lipstick on I wipe it on the nearest paper thing (which meant that box of bobby pins).
Yeah sometimes I save tiny bottles of wine for novelty’s sake.
Yeah sometimes I hoard festive mugs…

T__T

AND LOOK my first iPOD. I’m so excited about it. Alyssa kindly gifted it to me when she had an apple upgrade situation.

Charming red brick window view.

Ah, the classic post-sleep mushroom head syndrome that happens thanks to my new hair. My head is like a perfect circle.

Straight from the heater to the feet, smart thinkin’ cookie.

Horrifying serial killer light in my room.

I navigate the staircase.

Good morning kitchen, good morning (some of my) flatmates!
I love this window, it has the potential for such a nice view – but mostly it faces a dirty fence and I love that.
Also this telescope has never been used in my presence, I wonder who it belongs to.

Ah, the lovely blessing that is the disgusting invention of instant coffee.

I move the party-in-a-cup upstairs to my room.

Doing the e-mail thing. I recently cleaned out my inbox that had 4,000 unread messages to a swell ZERO.
I mean, now there’s a few more…but I try to keep an organized mess now.

My window likes to sweat.

Sometimes when you cut your own bangs in a hurry you cut them like this.

Because I knew I was going to stay a bit late at the office, thought I’d post an update on LJ and head in later than usual.

Throw on the ol’ dress.

I pack up my bag. I travel pretty heavy…
I firmly believe if I’m going to buy a book unused and all the books are 8.99, I’m going to buy the one with the longest page count.
Logic.

Sometimes the dress/black tight combo makes me feel like an elementary school teacher.
Have to resist teaching children on the morning trains, it gets hard guys.

Blurry weird photo.
Layer added, ready to go!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Throw on mysterious Track 19.
I guess this is what happens when all your music comes from mixed cds your friends give you. Hmm.

Later, guys.

The best textured wallpaper in the entry corridor.

A sunny morning in the neighborhood, how delightful!

Time to strut. Never realized how much faster you could walk when you put on upbeat music to match.

One of my favorite things about my neighborhood is the barbed wire on this mysterious brick wall.

My favorite mysterious water wall stain.

The routine morning walk to the station

Tempted by this hardcore red signage every morning.

The mini cab tunnel. It’s always a fun surprise to see how many new piles of bird shit will be found inside!

Turnpike Lane Station, my home sweet home.

I feel so loyal to this station. I know where to stand, when the cars are the most crowded, and have this magical ability to wake up directly as the train pulls into the station.

And the best part is that most travelers coming from King’s Cross or Heathrow haven’t boarded the line yet, so there’s no luggage to avoid (usually the problem with the Piccadilly line)

Destination reached: Leicester Square!
It’s about a 30 minute journey between my place and this tube stop. Not bad!

Ah glorious sun! Sometimes London looks weird with blue skies to me.

Should I wait? or should I run?

I do that thing that I’m certain all driver’s hate where I stare at their signal to guess when it’d turn green.
Then I dash for it. Only a few times have I done the oh-god-almost-got-hit turn around.

I made it half way.

Into my favorite passageway…

I like this way because often they are unpacking/prepping at the backdoors of these theatres.
Sometimes you can see into the backstage area – and as a weirdo, I’m a fan of that.

Also a lot of pigeons hang out here. Also waiters are always sitting and smoking looking like they hate their jobs/don’t want to make eye contact with me. So often I smile knowingly at them.

The hustle and bustle of St. Martin’s Lane.

I was kindly allowed by Mozilla to spare me a desk, an outlet and some wifi to do work for TED.
I don’t work for a UK company or anything. So I’m not too fancy.
I just continue my intern projects from this desk about 3/4 days a week.

They have a really awesome communal space as I believe (I could be wrong) most of the people in this office are remote/here on business. The kitchen is out of this world! And they are kind enough to allow me to help myself from the array of snacks AND diet cokes…heaven.

Here’s my lil’ computer on my desk.
Yeah, so I work from here from about 11 AM to 6 PM on this day.

And when I leave, it’s already dark.
The sun goes down around 4:30 PM, it’s ridiculous. I guess it does make everything feel more wintery all of the time.

The street that the office is on really lights up at night. I guess it’s technically West End, so there’s a lot of hustle and bustle around the theatres.

I’m hungry and uncreative, so I make a quick stop at Pret.
Hurts me to buy dinner like this – but I haven’t purchased new groceries yet and I’m not going straight home. Blegh.

I take my sandwich/wrap thinggy to go.

I’m just around the corner from Trafalgar Square, have to take advantage of that scene!

I find a nice vantage point on a bench and sit down to enjoy the atmosphere.

I gobble down my Jalapeno chicken wrap. WHICH ISN’T EVEN SPICY.
Ugh. They are so free with that word, it means nothing here apparently.

There’s pretty huge ruckus on the steps to the National Galleries, and I remember…
Oh yeah. It’s the 5th of November…Guy Fawkes day.

Make my way back towards the underground station.

Piccadilly line toward Cockfosters, please.

Here we are, King’s Cross.

Into the world…

I walk in the wrong direction like 6 times before confirming a good route at last.

Noticeably less buildings…getting nervous that I’m still walking in the wrong direction, as I’m in search of an event venue.

King’s Place! I made it!

It’s very mall-like. Hmm.

Into “Hall 2”.

I’m here for a lecture series. I was invited by the director of PhotoVoice, this awesome UK-based charity org that I wrote an entire blog for back when I was in Internet Communications at Chapman. Link Here for those dying to be bored by some really long entries. But he got in contact with me and told me he enjoyed my words, invited me to the lecture series.

Unfortunately it was Tim Flach…and I’m not a big fan. But since falling out of love with photography, I’ve been wanting more than ever to surround myself with it. I need to redirect my brain energies and tackle my creative problems head on, I think. So I think the more ideas of the way making photographs is around me, the better.

Scary photo of me with pen in mouth, prepped for scribbling vigorous notes.

Ugh, even the moderator wasn’t very stimulating.
Meh – I feel bad not enjoying it. But it wasn’t that I disagreed with the things he was saying, but it’s like they were too simplistic. But he was describing how he’s a commercial photographer, and I think self-labeling in that way is actually brave.
But he’s published like 3 successful books, so I guess I have to say congrats to the guy.