The wine gum conspiracy

For some reason I cannot find wine gums. Anywhere. Like, ever. Not long ago they were bountiful, every place I went had mounds and piles and heaps of wine gums. Bright red packages filled with all kinds of gummy goodness. Now they are like some sort of rare gem.

It all started with the union shop on campus. They stopped restocking everything when the school year ended. Before I realised what was happening, they were a wine gum free zone. The loss of wine gums at this particular locale has been especially difficult for me, as I am on campus most days and sometimes want a mid-afternoon wine gum snack.

Shortly thereafter, I noticed that wine gums were lacking from the shelves of other places. That empty bit of shelf space at Waitrose, a glaring absence at Tesco Express in Fulham. What on earth is going on? Is there some sort of sugar shortage impacting their creation? I was actually amazed to see some on the shelf at Superdrug on Sunday. There was a brief temptation to buy as many bags as I could carry in case my suspicions were true. Alas, I refrained.

Luckily, in my attempts to cut back on my afternoon snack sugar amounts, I embraced the curly wurly, which at 22 p and 100 calories, was in my mind a good deal. It's chocolate covered caramel in a fun, braid-like pattern. Alas, they ran out of those at the shop now too and I must resort of eating chomp, which is the same only its 15 p and lacks shape and technique. Although who am I to say no to a mini chocolate bar?

Chav Fashion

Or as I like to think of it "chashion".

As I was walking around town yesterday, I was lucky enough to see all sorts of local youths out and about enjoying their sunny Sunday. The glorious thing about Southampton is that much amusement can be derived from watching these teenagers going about their business. Central London is seriously lacking in those who partake in such fashions. So what is chav fashion? How can I look cool, fashionable and theoretically threatening yet really only be laughed at? That is what I am here to tell you.

Females:
The key here is the head. You can spot a chav girl without looking below the shoulders. Simply pull your hair into a slightly too tight pony, the slicker the better, but don't be boring and put it in the middle of the back of your head, gather it a little to the side. And maybe toss in a colorful hair band to draw attention to your clever off-sides trick. With your hair back, people will be able to notice your beautiful earrings. What better way to draw the eye than with big, thick, colorful hoops. This electricl blue, hot pink. You want to be visible here. You're no blushing wallflower, after all. When it comes to make-up, you don't need to do too much extra. Perhaps a splash of color on the eyelids, but other than that it's okay to keep things relatively normal. When it comes to clothing, the lady chav is not too different than other trendy females her age, breaking out a few layers of racerback tanks, some leggings and perhaps an oversized shirt or two. Footwear is on occasion a nice converse situation, but the ballet flats are still the norm. Top if off with some sort of lollipop and you're good to go! But don't forget that look of slight disdain, or people might forget you are disenfranchised.

Males:
Don't you hate those binding jeans? Can't be bothered to actually put something on with a button and a zipper? Then you're in luck. The key to the latest chav man fashion is track pants. Often seen in navy, white is another popular look. Now, you want these to be around ankle length, to best show off your bitchin 'trainers'. If you're lucky, your track pants will come with a nice band around the ankle, but if for some reason they don't, you need not fret. You can achieve the same look, or perhaps be even more fashionable, by simply tucking your pants into your socks. On the upper half, zip-up lionsdale hoodies work well, as do most all over-sized tees and sweatshirts. Again, just stick with white and navy. To bring the look home, you need a cell phone that plays music. Just upload a few hip hop tunes, the grittier the better here, and play them on maximum volume, on speaker, everywhere you go. On the bus, in the convenience store, walking down the street, don't worry, EVERYONE wants to hear what you are listening to. Oh, and if for some reason you see a police car, it doesn't hurt to hide in the bushes!

Best of luck in pulling off these looks. And don't be shy, be a trendsetter!

Bakin' cookies

I did something last night that I don't think I have ever done before, either here or back home: I made cookies from scratch without a mixer. It was a bold move, but I think it turned out at least decently well. The evidence is here for all to judge.

Before I could make said cookies, I made a special cookie-ingredient trip to Waitrose. Waitrose is a small store, not necessarily at the best of times, but I was still hoping it would have what I required. Flour and brown sugar were easy enough, as was butter. They had some small packets of chocolate chips that were easy to find, but I wasn't sure how many would be required so ended up with 4 (I used 3). Difficulties arose when I started looking for either oatmeal or oat flour, finally finding some in the cereal aisle that was basically oat flour but was for use in porridge. The vanilla was disguised in teeny tiny bottles near the baking powder and 'bicarbonate of soda'.

The preparation process was not that exciting, but I actually had to measure out the butter in a measuring cup instead of just tossing in conveniently pre-cut cubes. There was also a bit of learning curve using the oven in celsius ('test batch' didn't turn out all that well so I had to turn it down a notch). Now the cookies will have to hit the street to see they fare with the English market. I think they're tasty, as did my primary cookie taster. I'm sending the first shipment off to Brighton later. We'll see how that goes.

I'm watching something called 'rugby league'. I am under the impression it's somehow different than rugby without the league at the end of it. It's a bunch of beefy men in really, really tight outfits and very short shorts running around and getting tackled about every 10 seconds. Bradford is playing St Helens. Whatever that means. I should be doing some work!

Scary day in London

I went up to London yesterday with the London roomie. Heading up on the 9:00 am train, we had an appointment with an estate agent to see a place at 11:30 near Fulham. Around 9:30 am we got a call saying that the place was taken. And so began a day of looking for a 'flat' in London.

We decided that as were up there, we should at least walk around and check out some areas and possibly check out some listings at estate agents that we happen to come across. For those of you that have never heard of Fulham (which would have included myself prior to the day before yesterday), it covers the area with the SW6 post codes and is located between Kensington and the Thames, just past Earl's Court on the District Line (it's zone 2). Getting off at the Fulham Broadway tube stop, we took a quick peak at the Chelsea football club stadium and then noticed a plethora of estate agents. It took a while to work up the nerve, but we finally went into one at got an appointment to look at a place in Parsons Green (next tube stop to the south) in mid-afternoon. We got more nerve after this and booked another viewing closer to Fulham as well. The first place was a bit larger than what I was expecting (I was expecting something resembling a walk-in closet), and the second place (in Parsons Green) was literally awesome. By that time we had booked a third viewing, but before that we figured we probably couldn't do better than the second place (which basically had an extra room so you could easily sleep four guests and was 5 minutes from the tube) and called the agent back only to discover that some other folks had gnabbed it about 5 minutes prior. And the 3rd place wasn't that great. All in all, a bit disappointing about losing the fab place, but it's still a bit early to be looking for places and we figure we'll just keep going up once a week until we find something. And if we find something we like, to grab it right away! It's certainly a tough market when you can't very well make appointments to see places the day before and can't stop to think for two hours after seeing something. But I imagine there's more than one awesome affordable place in London.

In brighter news, we had lunch at the new Whole Foods on the Kensington High Street. It was freaking amazing. By far the nicest grocery store I've ever seen, the only thing you could really compare it to is the food hall at Harrods. Salad Bar was 1.79 per 100 grams. I have no idea what that translates to, but it was expensive. The whole place is 3 floors, with the main floor housing the salad bar and 28 check-out lines and the bakery, the main grocery area is downstairs, and upstairs has the sandwiches/sushi/made-to-order foods and the seating area. Oddly, they only had vinagreitte for dressings. I was not too pleased with this. They had amazing look sandwiches, but they cost the equivalent to $12.

Don't even get me started on the failed venture to the O2 Arena.

Next trip is next Thursday, which will be in conjunction with going to see my first West End show.

Drawing the line

First off, let's just note how completely giant the kittens have gotten. While perhaps this picture is exagerrating their length a wee bit, they are still a lot bigger than in their last appearance here. Let's all thank Kathy for sending that one in.

Now on my to my main point of discussion: language. The longer I'm here, the more I find myself somewhat accidentally/somewhat not accidentally using British terminology. For example, the other day I said the word quid and immediatly wanted to slap myself, as that is the one word I promised myself that I would never start using it because I find it annoying. But then I got to thinking about whether a total refusal to use local terms is just as bad accepting them wholeheartedly. But then where in the middle should one end up? I think for me the key things are to keep up my lingo-free dialogue with the stateside folk and keep my lingo-level at a tolerable place. In a lot of situations I find myself not wanting to use the local term or the American term. For example, when it comes to finding a place to live in the fall, I don't want to say 'I'm looking for a flat in London' and I also am wary of saying 'I'm looking for an apartment in London', so I just say 'I'm looking for a place to live in London' as some sort of compromise and hope nobody notices. This certainly doesn't apply in all situations as smoothly, but in many ways is the most PC thing to do, I feel. There is also still confusion from me in the pants/trousers and crisps/chips arenas. When it comes to writing my dissertation I freak myself out a bit when I start talking about 'taking public transport to the city centre' but there's not much I can do about that.

Anywho. I'm heading up to London tomorrow for my first 'place to live' searching day. Let's hope it's not too scary/depressing/overwhelming.

Sholing Butts

There is a bus that begins its route up by the halls of residence, so I often see it waiting at the initial stop when I walk by. Apparently, one if its destinations is a magical place called Sholing Butts Rd, which on its own is rather amusing, but for some reason every time I see it from afar I think it just says Showing Butts. You'd have to be brave to get on that bus, no?

Speaking of brave encounters, I saw a real live hedgehog yesterday. I was at my friends house and I peered out the window to see this odd little creature meandering along the grass. My look of disbelief gave away my sighting. Sure enough it was declared to be a hedgehog. Things got especially exciting when one of the dogs saw it and decided to take a closer look. Much like sonic, the little hedgehog rolled up into a prickly little ball. However, unlike Sonic he did not go spinning around at a hectic pace. The dog was shooed away and the hedgehog regained its intended form and continued its meander. It was not very big, I'd say less than a foot long and about 8 inches tall including its prickly bits. And it was also slower than I thought it would be, but that's because Sonic does keep that rapid pace.

Finally, as the entire world is aware, the final Harry Potter book came out today. I'm sure there is much ado about this in the US of A, but I still feel it warrents mentioning that it's been one of the biggest topics in the news for at least a week (the other thing mentioned is that half of the Midlands are under water at present, poor Midlands). Asda nearly got cut off from the publisher for selling it too far below the recommended price of 17.99, but even Waitrose was selling it today for 7.99. Fierce market it seems! As for myself, I'll just wait for the last two movies.

Graduation time

It's the season of graduations at the University of Southampton. Unlike some schools I've graduated from, this place opts out of one uber-giant graduation with just one day of horrible traffic and people in gowns walking around with their families and instead spreads it out evenly over a week. Basically, the rooms where the graduations are held are quite small so things are done in small ceremonies, meaning there are about 6 a day for the next week. Ergo, the campus is crawling with people in gowns with their families for the next week. And by 'campus' I really just mean the library lobby, as this is where they have opted to have the portrait photography. I tried ducking in there this morning before meeting with my dissertation supervisor and was greeted by a line going out the door of people waiting to get the moment etched permanently in time. Oh, and perhaps most importantly, when you graduate from Southampton, you wear a black gown with one of those 'hoods' that is lined in baby blue and no cap. I'm not sure if that is just what undergraduates wear or if that's graduate students as well. For the next week it looks like I'll be studying outside the library.

In other minorly interesting news, I saw a couple Mormon missionaries the other day. While I must admit this is an assumption, when you see two circa-19-year-old boys walking down the street in black pants, white button-up shirts, ties, and a whistful look on their face, you just know what's going on. I'm not sure if they were being successful, but there are at least two Mormon churches in Southampton so they are seemingly doing something right. And they were within about half a mile of one of these churches (very close to my residence, a hidden little enclave that oddly reminds me of home).

It's time to go and search for some food. Half of the food places on campus have closed, the library cafe is crawling with the graduates, and many of the open places have slim pickins.