THUNDERBALL AND GREENWICH PARROTS

[NOW UPDATED WITH PHOTOS!!] I did what I consider the healthy thing and spent Thanksgiving weekend with friends and not on the computer or behind a camera (okay a little bit behind the camera). I'll spare you the normal list of things I'm thankful for (though I'll acknowledge that I'm extremely lucky in my life and grateful for the people in it), and give you some of the smaller things that come to mind just based on this past weekend.

*SEEING MY FIRST JAMES BOND FILM. I know, it's crazy that I've never seen one. Oci told everyone in the Greenwich video store and they all expressed the required amounts of shock and amazement and encouragement on my endeaver, even though most agreed I should start with Dr. No, which the store didn't have. At first, we looked for Bond films and didn't see any. We asked the dude (yep, he was definitely a "dude" and I said he was cute and Oci told me after we left that he used to have a crush on her, but was too young for her at the time) and he reached under the counter and pulled out about 10 VHS Bond movies and displayed them on the counter. This store had a really great collection of all the cool movies and required classics displayed normally on the shelves--why they keep the Bond stashed away like the good drugs you have to be in the know to ask for is beyond me. But, I'll still say that Thunderball was exactly as ludicrous and fun as I had hoped. And Sean Connery was once young.

*WALKING THROUGH GREENWICH PARK ON AN AUTUMN DAY. I've done this a few times recently. It's beautiful, and has an amazing view across the Thames. Last time I visited, Oci and I saw a flock(?) of green parrots.

*COOKING AND EATING WITH FRIENDS.

Figuring out how to make pie crust with Oci. Jason and Oci sitting at the kitchen table chopping mushrooms, leeks, and garlic for the stuffing. Late night discovery of Cats' second lasagna in the oven from the party earlier that day and digging in with forks before going off to bed. (yes, Cats is a person's name) Possibly the last dinner with Mari and Ben for a very very long time. (I've managed to plant the seed of an idea to visit Seattle within the next couple of years.)

*SHOPPING FOR THANKSGIVING IN LONDON'S BOROUGH MARKET.

Jason and I spent Friday afternoon in the market, tasting things, enjoying the sites (piles of wild mushrooms and fragrant herbs, mountains of cheese wheels, little walls made of bakery loaves), and buying vegetables for Thanksgiving, which was held on Sunday.

*SPENDING TIME WITH LAZY TABBY CATS. Jason is usually highly allergic to cats, and we've resigned ourselves to not having any, but we both stop to admire cats on walls when we go for walks, and are sad to have to avoid them. This weekend, miraculously, the cats at Oci's house didn't cause hardly any symptoms, and so we sat up late one night just petting a cat and getting our fill of that purring and kneading thing and the narrowed eyes of a comfy cat.

*TRAINS AND TUBES. Reliable and affordable public transportation rocks. One of my favourite things about living here this past year is how great it is to hop on trains to get most places. Granted, there are some higher-end foodie areas of Wales that seem specifically designed to keep the riff-raff without cars from entering, but other than that, the trains have served us well in the UK and abroad. It's such a logical and comfortable way to travel. London, in particular, is so easy to navigate.

*THE LONDON EYE.

Before we left London, in case we don't make it back together in the few short weeks we have left, Jason suggested we take the highly touristy step of riding the London Eye. After much hemming and hawing and visions of being still on the top of this extremely slow-moving thing while our train to Cardiff left without us, we decided to do it. It's the big ferris wheel thing you see in pictures and it really is humongous. We went at night, and the city lights go on to every horizon. And Westminster and Big Ben are incredibly beautiful.

*INTERNATIONAL INFORMATION SHARING. Cats had a party on Saturday, where I met several of her friends and had a great talk with Phillipo, who does AIDS nutrition work in Nairobi and used to teach fruit farmers in the Amazon how to preserve their produce into jams and jellies for sales to cities. He told me about a project in a Brazilian city (town?) that works to provide all the food for its people by supporting farming in its surrounding green belt. He's enthusiastic and entertaining and excellent.

A pretty varied and random list, I grant you, but varied and random is part of what has been great about moving to a new place and taking what comes. I wouldn't trade it.