ANOTHER beautiful day! Today we did the Kensington walk from my book (about three miles). After somewhat of a rough start (I'll spare the details but it had to do with me and my book!), we ended up having a very nice time. I found out that the nearby church is St. Mary Abbots, and the bells were a-tolling again on and off throughout the day.

About halfway through our walk we stopped in at the Leighton House Museum, which I had visited in 1996. The difference was that in 1996 they were celebrating the centenary of Frederic, Lord Leighton's death which involved recreating his studio and having period actors in each room. In addition there was a wonderful exhibition at the Royal Academy in which they had Flaming June, probably his most famous work. I was lucky to see it then because it resides in Puerto Rico at the Ponce Museum of Art. It was still interesting to visit his house, though, with its stunning Arab Hall filled with over 1,000 Islamic tiles brought back mostly from Damascus, not to mention his beautiful collection of paintings.

I continue to be amazed at all of the beautiful parks. Today we walked through Holland Park and, in addition to large expansive grassy areas, there were flower gardens galore, plus tree-lined paths. (And did I mention the peacocks?) So many people were out, strolling, running, picnicking, playing cricket, just enjoying the weather (maybe knowing it's about to change?). At the end of our walk we discovered what Gord has decided is going to be his favorite neighborhood pub, the Elephant & Castle. It is quiet, away from the busier streets, at the corner of Holland Street and, coincidentally, Gordon Place.

We stopped in at the nearby Marks and Spencer store--well, their food hall anyway. I discovered that their packages of chicken are labelled with the name of the person who raised them. So different packages list different farmers on them. (As long as they don't tell us the name of the chicken we're buying I should be alright!) I noticed yesterday in the Waitrose grocery store that they have the name of the breed of hen on the egg cartons. Maybe I'll become an egg connoisseur before long.

Yesterday there were a couple of mishaps I forgot to mention. The first involved our French bakery below us where we decided to have lunch. I knew the name of the manager from our landlords and I was planning to introduce myself. You have to imagine how close the tables are in these small places. She was talking to some people at the table next to us and she swung around just at the moment that our waiter was bringing our drinks. Well Gord's latte spilled all over me just before it hit the ground, shattering the cup and making a huge mess. As she was apologizing I took the opportunity to tell her we were her new neighbors. I believe she will know us now the next time we go in though!

The other problem was when I did the laundry. Our landlords spent about two hours with us, walking us through everything. For example, you have to put salt in the dishwasher every so often, and, because London water is so hard, you have to put this powdered lime scale preventer in the washing machine with every wash. We have a whole long list of instructions. I did as I was told, but when I took out the darks from the dryer some of the clothes had splotches of white all over them--not good when half of your pants are ruined! Our landlords suggested we try washing them again without the lime scale and with a different kind of detergent (they felt horrible and even offered to pay for our clothes if it didn't work). I just took them out of the washer and it looks like maybe they're not as stained but I won't know until they're dry. The dryer is another matter. Apparently you are not allowed to vent your dryers to the outside so you have to use a condenser dryer. It takes the moisture from the clothes and stores it in this reservoir that has to be emptied before you use the dryer again. So many new things to learn!