Yesterday's adventure, the rest of the week

I got sufficiently cultured yesterday, as I got to see a lot of central London. It's really beautiful once you get into the city proper, and much more interesting than the suburbs. I went to the National Gallery and National Portrait Gallery, which were very nice (and free!) art museums. The top floor of the portrait gallery has an awesome rooftop view of London, and I think I like the portait gallery better because it leads you through the history of important figures in London, from the Tudors to J.K. Rowling. There was a peaceful Muslim protest in Trafalgar Square next to the museums, and they were in part protesting the extremists in other parts of the world who were setting fire to various things.

From the museums I walked passed St Paul's Cathedral, which is very huge and majestic. I was a little tired so I took the bus to the Monument, which is a tall phallic structure that commemorates the Great Fire of London in the 1600s. The thing is, though, you can climb up the 311 stairs on the inside to get a spectacular view of the London skyline, which I did of course, and at the end they give you a certificate of achievement. From there I walked across London Bridge to my first "real" pub serving "real" handdrawn ale, and it was wonderful. I then walked to another pub to get another pint and watch the rugby match between England and Italy. I'm starting to understand the rules a little better. On Tuesday I am probably going to a football match with some of my coworkers.

From the pubs I went to Tate Modern art museum, which has a lot of stuff from Picasso, Dali, Matisse and a lot of other modern artists. It has less stuff in it than the other art museums, but it was still free and had some interesting stuff. I walked from there across the Millenium Bridge back to St Paul's and took the bus home, tired but satisfied.

The rest of the week was busy, which could be good or bad. I had to go to a meeting on Thursday night of a group of local residents, which meant I missed out on a dinner with other interns in the internship program. Oh well, I will see them Monday morning and will travel with a few of them to Bath and Stonehenge next Saturday.

The good thing at work is that my editor is letting me cover stories from ideas that I came up with, but I'm a little bit nervous because I really don't know much about local governance and I am plunging right into the system. I always get a little nervous about talking to strangers as well as asking for help, but I know I have to do my job and my coworkers are there to help me. This is really the most basic level of journalism, working at a local newspaper, and it's an adjustment from broadcast that I think will help me in the end.

I gotta catch a movie today, Chicken Little, and I get to write a review for the paper, which also might be picked up by other papers around the area, so that'll be good coverage for me.