It's surprising to me how many days the British take off during the holidays. Every time we turn around it's another holiday and half the stores are closed. Annoying.
I got up early and went to the big Harrod's sale. If I had less taste and more money, I could have dropped a fortune in there. Stuff dropped from ridiculously overpriced to just expensive, but the stuff I wanted was either not on sale or only 10% off (that includes the dinosaur eggs). Figures. I did find a pair of earrings and a purple top, but didn't even come close to my budgeted limit.
Walked home and stopped by the Natural History Museum again to see if I could get some better shots than last night (had some trouble with the flash).
Met up with the husband and set out for a day of shopping, which ended up not really working out. We'd misread the sign on a bookstore - they won't open again until tomorrow after having been closed since Christmas. Then we took the train out to East Ham to go to a Doctor Who store which was also closed. The husband very upset by this, as it cost $20 for us to get there. I'm ok with it, I got to see some of London that didn't look like a postcard. People actually do throw trash over their back fence here, too. But there are other issues with the husband than the amount of money spent and we kind of fought the rest of the day about it. I hate it when we get like that, but I don't know how to change it. The husband says it's out of my control, which is part of the problem. I like being in control. I like being able to handle things. I don't like being helpless. Especially when it comes to helping him.
We stopped in Whitechapel on the way back but they don't post any "Jack the Ripper killed 5 prostitutes this way" signs and I didn't have my DK book. The husband says the passage of time makes it ok to turn 5 grisly murders into a tourist attraction, but not ok for the government to use taxes to point the way for the tourists. He's got a point about the taxes, but as for the tourist angle, I think it might have more to do with the fact nobody knows for sure who Jack was. If we had a name and a face to go with the crimes, he'd just be another serial murderer nobody would want to remember. We wandered up and down a street market, then got back on the train.
Went to the London Eye, which I enjoyed and the husband endured. He's not a big fan of heights. I'm ok most of the time - don't like anything where I could actually fall to my death but if it's enclosed, let's go! We had a pretty good view. I even managed to pick out where we were staying - not the building but the area. You can see straight down Downing Street, too, which seems a bit odd to me. I wonder if that was ever a security concern? It was cold, though, right there on the river. We had to cross the Thames to get there and back and the wind was nippy. It was nice to get back to the apartment and warm up.
We stopped at a bakery across from the tube station for breakfast - we both had eclairs. They were really good. The filling wasn't sweet, but the chocolate was. It made for a light pastry, not too much. At least it wasn't another bar.
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