:::::: i am ice and clouds :::::::

no, really. i am.

i walked out of the His Dark Materials stage play having forgotten that I wasn't in Washington. Three hours in the world of Lyra and Pantaliamon and Will and Dust will do that to you. This evening has been a series of accidental loveliness. First, on our way to the Tate Modern this morning, we walked past the National Theater, which is funny since I hate theater. No really. I hate it. Anyway,, I usually wouldn't have given it a second glance... but then I saw the poster for the first part of the His Dark Materials stage plays. I started yelping and jumping and it was like my vacation had finally begun. We ran into the theater and of course as Americans, we asked for what we wanted, tickets for tonight. Smug British girls tells us that it is sold out and the first tickets she has is for ummm.... January. Bugger all. Then she tells us we can que up for some 20 or so day seats on Friday morning at say, 9. Hmm... Ok. I look at the poster outside and it says that the play isn't even playing on Friday. Back in I go and find the cutest ticket boy and ask him. He smiles at me and says, let us see if there are any open seats for tonight since last you asked. Umm. Let us, I say. Oh yes, 2 tickets in the 5th row for tonight. View is a bit restricted at times, side of the stage. £10 each. Whoohoo! I say. I make my way out into middle of the sea cold that is the edge of the Thames and smile a tiny evil smile to show Jeff that I have a secret. Tickets! Anyway, so something we didn't even know existed (well sorta) hours ago is now in our grasp. How you read the His Dark Materials books by Philip Pullman? Well, you need to and you will know why this is a big deal and why I am going on and on about it.

So, the stage play was 3 hours long and combined the first book with half of the second book and the daemons were these amazing puppets with actors in black doing the voices and Lyra was spunk spunk and Wil was spot on and wow wow. The theater was full full of little British kids and teenagers and to hear an 8 year old British boy talk to his brother about the stage play of a series of 3 books about the trials of a girl who must fight the church to save the world and lots of other things like portals to other worlds... wow, amazing.

AND before this amazing play, we didn't have time for the Tate Modern, who does when they are on the way to the theater, afterall? .... so we stop by the Saatchi Gallery, which we had gotten a postcard from a man named Mikee on the street about earlier in the day. We had been waffles about going there since it was £8.50 and not free and they seemed to have street teams of folks to get us in. How good could it be? Um. Amazing. Can you say, real dead shark in a huge tank as art? Um... frelling amazing.

lalalala. check it out:

http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/county/county.htm

the shark art is huge and huge and huge... it is by Damien Hirst, check him out.

Ok... so here I am, 11:34 in the basement of a Burger King in London, writing to you. The wall of the Tube said "I am ice and clouds". I put that in my mind and take the stairs to the street...a cold wind blows up my courdory skirt and I feel like the captain of a great ship. And I am glad I wore the tights instead of the knee socks. I am a good captain. I am ice and clouds.