Fire at will

You may remember me saying that I have decided to do all of the things. In the case of the past three weeks doing "all the things" has meant not writing blog posts.

Sorry about that.

So let me try, as quickly as possible, to catch you up on all the things.

For starters, of course, I have been taking many classes, from many really cool cats: Niamh Dowling (Movement, Alexander Technique), Bea Pemberton (Neutral Mask, Mime, Physical Games), Rebecca Pollack & Luis Campos (Theatrical Research & Writing), Irina Brown (Narrative Structures & Script Analysis), Gabriel Gawin (I dunno, cool ensemble theatre movement shit. Probably my fave, if I'm honest).

I spent a weekend in Bristol, with my classmate Charlotte, in order to see a Kneehigh show, and you know, be a tourist in Bristol, cause it's cool. 

I stayed with my classmate Lowenna's mum, awesome lady.
Here we have Minxy, her awesome-but-dubious-of-visitors cat.

Had dinner next to an actual Banksy. No biggie.

Hello, Bristol Cathedral...

As always, Cathedrals contain some interesting things.
May I direct your attention to the inscription here?

Okay, I'll give you a closer look:

Yeesh. I'm exhausted just reading about it.

Yeah, and this is just a hinge on the fracking DOOR. Overacheivers.

St. Nicholas Market!

Awesome Market food. Awesome owl glare included at no charge.

Successful haggling for new bear hat = Sweet!

Obligatory Bristol Parrot Pic. Hi Mom.

Cagigal, this one's for you, obvi. Out front of random candy store. WTF?

And all that was just Bristol.

I've also seen buckets of Brit theatre, including Sheridan's The Rivals at The Arcola (I was two feet from Gemma Jones. I die.), The Dog, The Night, and The Knife at the Arcola (Snoozefest. Oh well.), Kneehigh's Dead Dog in a Suitcase at the Bristol Old Vic (Post apocalyptic electric violin puppet finale! Yes!), Belvoir's touring production of Wild Duck at the Barbican (Badass. Wow.), My Beautiful Black Dog and Am I Dead Yet in Bush Theatre's RADAR Fest (Am I Dead Yet was incredible), Our Town at the Almeida (with the ever-glorious Paul Cello, who also basically coerced me into seeing the last two hours of Interstellar at Screen on the Green. So swanky. Very fun.), Hunter and Johnny at Camden People's Theatre, Class Act by Harry Giles at Ovalhouse, Are You Lonesome Tonight? at Ovalhouse, and Engineer Theatre Collective's RUN at New Diorama Theatre. 

So yeah, I've seen some shows. Many of them were really awfully good, too.

I've also attended (so far) four full-day theatre conferences.

That's James Wheale on the left, explaining a dining-meets-installation-art-meets video-game experience in which you eat rare chocolates to gain magical powers.
Yes, James, I am listening...

Swankiest conference schwag thus far. It comes with fruit!

I've also (selflessly) explored several amazing weekly London Markets, but Broadway Market is one of the best I've seen so far, food-wise. I humbly submit for your consideration:

Scotch-Egg-apalooza. Nuff said.

Toffee Apple Kouign Amann. Chocolate croissant loaves. Shut UP.

Wait, what? Duck confit burger with blue cheese, truffle honey, homemade chutney and arugula on a brioche bun? 
Holy mother of Claude.

What? I had to.

Rockin' flowers at the Columbia Road Market, but the accents rock even harder.

Yet another side benefit of doing all the things? Seeing still more great street art. 

What else has happened that you should know? Well…

After weeks of pounding the pavement and the online housing ads, I finally found a place to live in Bethnal Green that I liked. Then I lived there for a month, and discovered I liked it less than I thought, so did some more searching and just moved to Lower Clapton. So, since the last time I posted on the blog I have moved twice. Pics and info on new place will come later. But so far its a keeper :-)

A few more tidbits for ya:

Guys. GUYS. This place is DANGEROUS. Believe me.

English cold is no joke. I mostly sleep in an actual fleece onesie these days. 

Sunday Roast, y'all. That's a proper yorkshire pudding on my beef there.






I also highly approve of how seriously many London cafes take their baked goods.



That's all I've got for now. More soon though, I promise. Really.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Takin' it to the streets!

So yet another thing that I was not at all prepared for was the ridiculous amount of street art and graffiti all over Bologna. Some boldly on the main roads, some delicately inked on a busy corner where you might miss it, and some in the tiny alleys where you'll only find it if you're on a street art treasure hunt. 

Classic Bologna juxtaposition.

Oh yeah, a bit of background: the city of Bologna is a center of learning, a university town, and a real life hotbed of Communism. We saw an actual full-on block-the-streets Communist protest while we were there. Not gonna lie, it was pretty adorable. But yeah, the politics show up in the art, like ya do.

This bunny was all over everywhere: the Where's Waldo? of Bologna, if you will.

There he is again!

I still can't get over how many styles and influences are represented. 

Right?

Just when you thought you had a handle on the style? Nope!

Still Mike, with Owl-o-rama.

Pretty birds

I mean, come on. 

Then there is the roll-up and security door art. I get that it's not unique to Bologna, but its super concentrated, and when shops are open you can't even see it, so most of it is hidden for most of the day. So if you walk around in the early morning, for example, you get a wildly-colorful alternate-universe Bologna. Check it out:

This is in front of a bar called Sherlock Holmes. Obvi.

Political roll-up door art, anyone?

Really though. This stuff blows my mind. Like, I want posters of 75% of these.

Right?

I mean, wtf, Bologna. Leave some cool for the rest of us.

But my all time amongst the covert-Bologna-art movement has to be this mural:

Yeah, it does not wish to fit in a frame. It is detailed and huge.

It's on an alley, very small, nothing on it to do, significantly obscured by trees, and flipping stunning. My lame iPhotography cannot do justice to it. Get thee to Bologna and check it out in person. Super cool.

I die. It has killed me. 

Oh, and a side note: Anandamayi and Aimée, have you been here yet? Some of this stuff begs to be referenced in a chalk art entry or summat. Just sayin'.

That be the art post, folks. Coming soon is Bologna wrap up, and adventures in Bristol!

And, on that note, an overdue postscript of sorts:

Some folks have mentioned that I can't possibly still be in Bologna. They are not wrong. I'm a little behind on the blogging, guys. But wait, you ask, isn't the whole point of blogging to enable folks to follow you in roughly real time? Yes, yes, right, I know, you're very smart. 

I'm on it, I swear. Back soon, y'all.