If only I had TIVO

When I arrived in London, I expected the media culture to be more secular and avant-garde than in the U.S. - particularly in our post Nipplegate society. I wasn't completely surprised, then, when I saw FCUK's controversial new Fashion v. Style campaign, which stretches things a bit further than our modern day FCC would allow. Click the link. It's well worth it.

I didn't, however, realize that this tendency to take things a little too far would creep into the (formerly) pure world of Public Service Announcements. Evidently, Brits find it necessary to be explicit not only with sex, but also with public safety messages. This became most clear to me last night when wasting some time watching television. In the span of 30 minutes, I caught two very curious, and actually quite disturbing PSA commercials courtesy of the UK Department of Transportation. They weren't sexual in nature, but in my opinion went overboard nonetheless.

The first was to address "Drink Driving" in the UK. See the ad for yourself here. The second took a look at public safety risks for teenagers specificifally. See it here.

Although I'll admit to being a fan of the somewhat dramatic truth.com campaigns, I found each of these to be surprisingly sensationalist. Am I off base?

Update: I re-read this post this morning (yes, I am that egocentric) and found myself annoyed with, well, myself. To be clear - I'm not a raving conservative (don't you like how seamlessly lunatic and conservative interchange?), and I'm not completely humorless. I actually did think these PSAs were funny when I saw them. But I think I found most of the humor in the fact that a bunch of suits in a conference room actually signed off on these things. And do I always sound like such a prick? Don't answer that. I think it's because I initially wrote this right after work, which meant I was still in "follow-up, touch base, reach out, synergy" email mode.

Also, Tbauma reminded me of another overt ad. We saw this one at a bus stop when she was here in London.

Getting to Know My Colleagues

I've been meaning to post about this for a week or so, so just pretend that it happened today.

As part of my work assignment, I periodically get invited to global employee functions. These boozefests social activities are designed to provide us with an opportunity to get to know our fellow expat colleagues (as if many of us don't already see each other far too much). Usually, these nights are pretty low key.

Last week, however, I met a woman at one of these events who made it well worth it. No, not like that. (Don't worry family, I am still desperately looking for the right girl. And when I do, I promise to get married well before I have the chance to change my mind.) Anyway, this woman made my night. We talked on and off throughout the evening as I made my rounds to see if anyone interesting had showed up. As usual, no such luck. Or at least that's what I thought.

The woman (her name escapes me) is here in London from Australia, and seemed a bit uncomfortable with meeting so many new people at a work event. Perhaps because of this, I saw her hitting the G&Ts pretty hard early in the night. Given that I am considerate, and well, into peer pressure, I made sure to always bring her another one when ordering from the bar. As the night wore on, she became a bit more comfortable and talkative, and shared with a small group of us that she had quit smoking a few months before coming over to London. She wasn't a chain smoker, having just a few a day. However, in order to quit, she starting chewing Nicorette gum.

So none of that is particularly funny. But the next part is. After kicking the habit, she realized she had actually become addicted to Nicorette gum. Now, she chews over 15 pieces of Nicorette a day and has family and friends smuggle it over from Australia (I guess you can't get it here) when they visit. She even switched to the unflavored kind to try to quit (the gum), but realized she actually likes the (un)flavor even more. What?!

She asked us not to tell anyone, but at that point in the night I don't think anything was really binding. I haven't seen her in the building yet, but am obviously really looking forward to it. $20 says she'll be chewing gum.

CityHangover Miscellany

Because I can.

The Mummy: I neglected to mention a curious site in Budapest in my week(end) in review - St. Stephen's Basilica. For those of you who've done the whole Europe backpacking thing (for you silver spoon types, that's the Europe luxury hotel and rolling luggage thing), you've surely seen your fair share of Catholic churches. Those Catholics really had Europe on lock down! Anyway, St. Stephen's Basilica is a lot like other catholic churches, with one exception. It houses a true national treasure - King Saint Stephen's mummified hand. Seriously. This hand is well traveled, too, having been sneaked out of the basilica during WWII for protection. (I suggested that maybe some guy had pulled his sleeve over his hand and used St. Stephen's as his own to sneak it out, but my travel cohorts quickly shot that down.) I'm admittedly unsure of why Steve's hand merited mummification, but much of Catholicism leaves me similarly confused. Evidently for 60 HUF (eh, 25 cents) you can get one of the church's minions to light the thing up. I wasn't aware of this, so I'll always remember Steve-O's hand as resembling a prop from Tales from the Crypt. No offense.

Tourney Pool: Remember when I mentioned that I had organized an NCAA tourney pool for my London colleagues? And remember when I posted an excerpt from an email wherein one of my colleagues shared her tourney favorite - the New York Knicks? Well, friends, I have some news to share. Said colleague is currently in 3rd place in our pool (there are 29 of us), and she has a damn good shot of winning the whole thing. I spent the first 20 minutes at work on Friday morning feeling pretty emasculated, but I've since decided that I was simply hustled. (As Ice Cube, and subsequently Bel Biv Devoe, said "Don't trust a big butt with a smile". Have truer words ever been spoken?) I'm currently avoiding any responsibility for my own 2nd quartile performance. Instead, I'm blaming it all on Adam "trash stache" Morrison and his Gonzaga Bulldogs. How the hell do you lose a game in which you were up by 17, and actually leading for the first 39 (of 40) minutes? That ain't right.

Movies: I recently saw a great movie, called Hidden (Caché). I highly recommend it, although be aware that it is devoid of a clean-cut Hollywood ending. The premise is pretty simple - a well off family begins to receive videotapes in the mail which basically show their home being watched. The film is about the slow unraveling of the family as they search to understand where these tapes are coming from. One of the best films I've seen in a while.

Music: I've been in a bit of a lull when it comes to new music, which has resulted in far too much iPod airtime for bands like Wilco and Sufjan Stevens. To freshen things up, I went on an iTunes rampage today. I'm not sure if this was a good thing, though. After a few hours of Bright Eyes, My Morning Jacket, and The New Pornographers, I kind of feel like slitting my wrists.

Budapest

And just when you were hoping I'd finally gone away. Has anyone else experienced Navarre like speed on Blogger this week? I feel like a Netflix member being throttled. And just when I had graduated to comments spam?! Say it ain't so.

Anyway, we've got some catching up to do. Let's start with a week(end) in review, and then move on to a few miscellaneous updates.

As I mentioned last week, I spent Friday through Sunday in Budapest, Hungary with some friends from work. One of the great things about being in London for an extended period of time is the convenience of weekend side trips - particularly to Eastern European countries that are just too far away and expensive to get to from the states. I had been meaning to visit Budapest for a while (it has always been in my master travel plan, which, due to its scope, requires more funding than a botched Iraq rebuilding campaign), and was expecting something along the lines of Prague circa 2000. I couldn't have been more off base.

The city was beautiful, and actually the perfect size for a weekend trip. But unlike Prague (at least back when I visited), Hungary feels a lot like the rest of Europe. Although the country hasn't adopted the Euro currency, it seems to have adopted just about everything else (e.g. fast food restaurants, H&M, and a plethora of western themed bars). I imagine this is an inevitable result of its recent EU membership? Of course, as bright-eyed American tourists, we made the most of the situation.

Our first night kicked off with a traditional Hungarian meal. I started with a delicious Goulash soup/stew, and then had a main course of pork medallions served, according to the waiter, "Hungarian style". If I could pronounce the name of the place I would recommend it to you, as the food was well worth the 45 minute walk we subjected ourselves to by not confirming which street we were looking for. Foiled again! Given that Friday was St. Patrick's Day, we settled in for the rest of the night at Budapest's first ever Irish bar. I can confirm, once and for all, that no matter where you are in the world on St. Patty's day there are drunk Irish guys in kilts making fools of themselves.

We spent the rest of the weekend mixing sightseeing with hearty eating and drinking. Despite being a bit disappointed in the overall feel of the city, I was quite impressed with a few museums that outlined the country's history. In particular, I hadn't realized the full scale of Hungary's fascist and communist roots until visiting the House of Terror (I really do believe that something was lost in translation with that name). The museum is housed in a building that was first a Nazi, and then a Communist regime headquarters - the basement was actually used to torture local deviants. Outside of the sheer atrocity of the events that took place, everything resonated with me a bit more given how recently it all occurred. Many of the leaders of these oppressive regimes are still alive, and the last Russian soldier didn't actually leave Hungary until the 90's.

"Shifting gears" (Corporate speak! Lest you fear that CityHangover has decided to pursue some type of political agenda), I will also share a brief account of my ongoing travel woes before signing off. In summary:

Some "bloke" decided to commit suicide on the Gatwick Express train tracks (selfish, if you ask me) minutes prior to our train's departure to the airport Friday morning. As a result, our train was delayed, re-routed, and well, mad late. Fortunately, I became 2 for 2 in racing through the Gatwick airport and being one of the last people let on the plane (I've yet to walk through that place). If you're keeping score, that's 2 for 2 at Gatwick, and 0 for 1 at Stansted. Unfortunately, this time my luggage adopted its own batting average, and I spent yet another weekend trip searching for inexpensive underwear.

This post is already far too long, so I'll save my other updates for next time.

On Laziness

Have you ever been alarmed by the depths of your own laziness?

For a while now, I've been in the habit of snoozing (verb?) nearly an hour after my alarm time. I may just be setting myself up for failure, given that I'm always planning to wake up early to go to the office or to run. It almost never happens. In fact, usually I snooze far past my "aspirational" wake up time, float right by my "on time" target, and find myself teetering precariously over the "very late for work" precipice. Each day I go through the same exercise. (Yes, I know it's ineffective to try to play psychology tricks on myself, but I do it anyway.) More recently, I've upped the ante by continuing to lay in bed until I have to go to the bathroom so bad I can't stand it. Anything to get a few extra minutes of sleep. Weird, right?

Living alone again has forced me to stare more deeply into this heart of darkness. With no one to harass me about my odd behaviors, I find more and more of them creeping into my daily life. For example, tonight I worked late and didn't feel like thinking through a proper dinner. The grocery store (on my way home) seemed like an unnecessary diversion, and spending time and effort to identify a carry-out option wasn't in the cards (although I'm itching to try that fake Papa Johns again). Instead, I dug through my (barren) cupboards and ate the following: sea salt & vinegar chips, a glass of flat Dr. Pepper, a pan au chocolat croissant, a bit of wine, and a granola bar. The funny thing is, I didn't remember I had half of these items in my apartment. (I should note that I had a 3pm lunch due to meetings at work.) Is this what it has come to? I'm already prepared to be mad hungry in the morning.

Unrelated: I am heading to Budapest for the weekend, which means this blog should benefit from some interesting pictures and stories come Sunday night. It also means that I'll wind up with a bunch of Forint (Forints?) in change that I won't be able to convert at the currency exchange on the way back to London. Inevitably, these will be added to the growing pile of Euro, US, Swiss, and low value GBP coins in my top drawer. Did I tell you about the cab driver in Seville who gave me 30 Euro in change (~$35) on my trip to the airport? I still have most of that isht, even after buying bocadillos and a plethora of other useless snacks in the terminal.

Workplace Hazards

When I was home in Michigan for Christmas, my brother gave me a book to aid in my assimilation to British life. The book, Brit-Think, America-Think, takes an admittedly tongue-in-cheek look at the cultural gaps between Brits and Americans. Ultimately, the author hones in on a single difference between how the two cultures approach life by looking, interestingly, at how the two cultures approach death. The idea is that Americans approach death as (nearly) optional - hence the common preoccupation with health, plastic surgery, education, etc. Brits, on the other hand, resign themselves to a fate out of their hands, and therefore are content to roll with the punches and take what comes to them. A Brit would find it useless to try to take too much control of things, arrogant to try to outwit destiny, and, well, uncool to be seen as trying too hard. I tend to avoid sweeping generalizations derived from coffee table reading, but I must say that I'm beginning to agree with this book.

This laid back British approach to life becomes much less charming (and, consequently, much more annoying) in the workplace. Especially for an earnest American like myself. (Stop laughing. My "Curtis" work persona is all business). Take, for example, facilities issues in the office. When I arrived to work on Monday morning, my typical route to my mini-cubicle was blocked by yellow warning tape and and signs instructing me to steer clear of the main conference room on our floor. Upon further inspection (see photo evidence above), I realized that the conference room door had been shattered to pieces. Despite the protective plastic covering, there were small glass shards all over the place. Just when I thought that a year-end review had gone awry, a colleague informed me that the door shattered because a part on the latch was broken. This allowed for the sliding door to slide out of control without proper guidance. The latch had been malfunctioning for months. (But evidently a part is on order, as you can see from the sign above).

The busted glass door itself was only marginally humorous. But when I left today (Wednesday) and noticed that no clean-up had taken place, I really cracked up. People have removed the warning tape and pushed the signs to the side, and you sort of have to keep an eye out for glass shards, but otherwise we aight.

And, apparently, the part is still on order.

The NCAA Cup...ahem...Tournament

I was a bit lazy busy this weekend, but am now finally sitting down to upload a somewhat coherent post. My bad.

As part of this cultural intercambio (say it like "dos chai lattes") of mine, I'm doing my best to give a little something back to these well intentioned Brits. This week, this has taken the form of an NCAA Tournament office pool. Another American colleague and I went to painstaking lengths to not only organize the damn thing (Ok, that was pretty simple), but also to explain terms like "March Madness" and "The Big Dance" to our captive audience. Luckily, one of my new obsessions, Wikipedia, came to the rescue yet again.

For the most part, everyone seems game to get involved, although I think they're more interested in the opportunity to make a friendly wager than in the games themselves. A few have even tried to get me to take their money without fully filling out a bracket. Ultimately, I think this amateurism will make things more interesting. For example, one of the Australian guys in the office turned in his completed bracket today with Arizona going all the way. The reason? Daniel Dillon, a 6-3 Sophomore guard from Melbourne. Another British colleague, who is actually back in NY on a short-term project, had the following to say: "Hey there! This sounds very cool. I have no idea what most of it means but I'd like to join in. What is a bracket? All I know is that I want to choose the Knicks - better support the local team while I'm here!" So good.

Of course, given that my own alma mater chose against making this year's tournament (I'm no basketball pundit, but check out Schembechler Hall for some hateration), I'm forced to sit through endless comments along the lines of, "Hey, I chose Michigan State since I remembered you went there." Effing Wolverines.

I'll let you know when the woman who picked teams based on their mascots wins the whole damn thing.

Weird Dreams

Ever since I moved to London my sleep has been disturbed by really odd dreams. I'm not sure what's causing it. It could be the move to an extra firm mattress. (Do I miss my Ikea mattress? Hell to the no. Plus, by selling that piece of isht on Craigslist I met Emeley, and now my life will never be the same.) Or perhaps it's my newfound affinity for the snooze button (an hours worth on average)? Who knows.

I often forget my dreams shortly after waking up, but lately I've been making a concerted effort to lodge each sequence in the back of my mind for future analysis. I have a recent dream that I feel obliged to share.

Here goes. I'm in a Target/Best Buy type megastore feeling very anxious. People around me are focused on protecting this kid that terrorist types are trying to kidnap, and evidently I've been selected as the best man for the job. Something is unique about this kid - like he's a young Bobby Fisher, or maybe the kid from The Last Starfighter. (Or maybe just rich?) Anyway, the kid is sequestered in the hot dog/pizza/frozen Coke area while I stay on guard. I've got a bead of sweat on my brow, and begin scoping out the premises to ward off security threats. Within minutes, however, the kid is gone. What?! I start freaking out, but somehow have the peace of mind to put on a bluetooth wireless headset (very cool) and then proceed to login to Skype on a laptop (which, of course, shows up out of nowhere). I begin to bark orders at my fellow operatives via Skype (I'm clearly in a leadership role in this dream) to seal off the area. I believe I start to say something reminiscent of Tommy Lee Jones's "...Every warehouse, outhouse and doghouse" line from The Fugitive. Then, all of a sudden, I wake up.

What does this mean?

Here's a Little Story All About How...

I finally got out to one of London's überclubs this weekend - the dramatically titled Ministry of Sound. I tend to prefer low key pubs or shady (sometimes) Asian bars a la 46 Grand in NY, but a T-baum was in town so all bets were off. Plus, DJ Jazzy Jeff was there to guest DJ. I have to admit, I was a big fan of Parents Just Don't Understand. And according to those who know, Jeff is now actually a reputable DJ from Rome to New York City.

Of course, I was tasked with keeping up with undergrads all night so DJ Jazzy Jeff didn't get my full attention. This wasn't at a Weezergate 2005 level, but when we were belting both The Victors and The Fresh Prince of Bel Air theme song in the tube I knew I was in for a great night. (As an aside, at what point did The Victors become the new rabble-rousing party anthem? I'm not protesting. In fact, I love it. But just asking).

And no, there were no glowsticks.

The CityHangover Price Index

At this point, it's no secret that London is expensive. Being "from" New York City and all (North Shore, and now Joey, put it best - "You flew here, I grew here"), I was expecting only a negligible cost of living increase. Ha! Such naivete.

Fellow Yankees have suggested that I avoid the conscious conversion from pounds to dollars to prevent purchase anxiety. I've started to do so, but also wanted to dig a bit deeper into these price gaps. Who knows? With a bit of clever analysis perhaps I can find ways to stretch my dollar. Pound. Whatever.

And with that, I provide you with the inaugural CityHangover Price Index. My, um, basket is indicative of things I tend to spend my money on, and all London prices were converted at yesterday's final currency conversion rate. (1.749 dollars to the pound):

	NYC Price	London Price	Premium
Monthly subway pass	$76.00	$148.67	96%
Movie ticket	$10.75	$17.14	59%
Six pack of beer (Hoegaarden)	$11.99	$9.60	-20%
Chicken pad thai (takeout)	$8.00	$12.24	53%
Dry cleaning (pants)	$5.00	$10.41	108%
Bottle of wine (Ravenswood)	$12.99	$10.48	-19%
CHPI	$19.10	$32.04	68%

Notice any outliers? As Corso would put it on College GameDay, "I say nothing!"

Going Postal. Again.

In case there was any lingering doubt that my postman, ahem, postperson, is insane:

When I entered my apartment building a few days ago I was welcomed by an abundance of letters spread neatly on the floor. The (9) mailboxes were completely empty. What is this?

This time, I left all of Mr. P Singh's mail down there. I'm already harboring far too much of his isht in my small apartment.