Yesterday was my first UK public holiday. Did you know that they get 3 fewer public holidays here than in Victoria? Gibbed I say. The other thing I noticed is that not all of the public holidays (called Bank holidays here) happen for an obvious reason. In Oz we have public holidays for Anzac Day, Queen’s Birthday… etc. But here they have some in common with us, but others are simply “bank holidays” for the sake of it. I’m glad. I’d hate to get gibbed any more in terms of holidays.

On Saturday we went to the Tate Modern. I have to say, modern art isn’t my bag. There is an awful lot of rubbish which passes for art these days. I know that nowadays the concept of what constitutes art is open to interpretation, but really – a glass of water on a glass shelf IS NOT an oak tree. I found myself thinking “wanker” after reading many of the descriptions next to the paintings. Some of them were totally ridiculous.

However, the one thing I really liked about the TM was their room of Russian propaganda posters from the 1930s – now THAT was really cool. On the whole I have to say that I found my time at the Tate Britain much more enjoyable.

Sunday saw us visiting the Notting Hill festival, which is apparently the world’s largest street festival. There was an incredible number of people there. What was the festival about? Hard to say really. There was something of a parade going on with a strong carribean theme. There were also a number of Jamaican BBQ stalls, so perhaps it’s a big Jamaica-fest. Either way, there were a number of stages with bands. We got some BBQ pork from one of the stalls I mentioned above – it was truly sensational. We were tempted to go back yesterday just to have it again but decided not to. We followed this with a fairly casual evening catching up with Carley, an old friend of Olivia’s from Oz, her man and a bunch of their friends. It was all good.

Yesterday being the bank holiday, we pretty much lazed around. Our TV reception has been diabolical for the 2 months we’ve been here. How silly did I feel when I realised that all we needed was a £3 cable to make it all better? (The answer to the above question is: Very.)

Did any of you ever catch the British kids show “Rainbow” on tv when you were young’uns? I remember it quite well. Was always a fan of Zippy (see pic), he was a perpetual smart-arse who’s laugh sounded a little similar to that of Rodney Rude. This is a link to a video file you simply must watch, it’s hilarious.

We have really noisy upstairs neighbours, like really. Our apartment is the bottom of three in a Victorian conversion. (I’ll get around to posting a photo some day) When we moved in there was a noisy Spanish family living there. They were mildly annoying. Whilst I was in Italy they moved out and were replaced by an even more annoying and louder Spanish family.

I have never actually seen them. Our paths have simply never crossed in the hallway. I’m certainly not avoiding them – when I see them I see them.

“So how do they annoy you Brian?”

Well, I have two basic gripes with Manuel and Conzuela (not their real names).

Noise.
M & C have at least one young child and a newborn, both of whom seem to spend all day and night crying or yelling. These yelling/crying sessions are punctuated by M & C yelling at the kids or each other. The way I see it, anyone can make as much noise as they like during the day. They have as much right to their version of “quiet enjoyment” of their apartment as we do. I get annoyed when the carry-on carrys on past my bedtime. Am not sure if this is a cultural thing but the kids generally do not go to bed before 11 – 12 at night. Between the crying, yelling and what sounds like the constant moving of furniture (either they host late night aerobics classes in their apartment or perhaps there are actually 12 people living there and they need to unfold all the beds when it comes time to go to sleep), getting to sleep before them is not an easy thing to do.

Smoking.
It may seem a bit rich for me to complain about other people smoking. Yes, I’ve gone through my smoking phases in the past, but have always been conscious of not bothering those around me. Manuel and Conzuela both smoke and have a three pronged attack of annoyance.

1. Kitchen window. When they smoke out of their first floor kitchen window and we have our back door open it wafts into our lounge.
2. Building entrance. When they smoke in the entrance corridor, which is just outside our front door, the smoke wafts into our loungeroom.
3. Front door. When they smoke just outside the front of the door, the smoke wafts into our bedroom.

On top of this they simply dump their butts on the ground in the entrance to the building.

So why am I writing about all this instead of dealing with it? All in good time my friends. I figure the noise one may be a difficult one to solve. But I would like to think I might have some luck on the smoke front. I might practice my non-existent Spanish and pop out to say Hola the next waft I cop.

There, I feel better now.