Wimbledon - Day 13

Day 13 brought the rains back with a vengeance. I don't have a good feel for whether or not we'll get play in, but I can only hope at this point. Brian made a deal with me, and I got to head to work late instead of being there at the start of the day. That gave me a chance to go pick up my laundry and to get a new calling card and pay as you go voucher for the cell phone. Judy reminded me that these are actually HPODS phones, and that means I need to carry one home anyway. In that sense, I wanted to be able to use it and the calling card from Ireland, so I was down to 51 pence which is the English plural of penny, and well less than a full pound. The calling card might not have been necessary, but it was down to less than 50 minutes of total time, and I didn't want to take a chance and have it run out. 10 pounds seems relatively reasonable for the amount of calling time I have gotten from the phone and the card.

Since I was able to come in late, Judy and I chose to hit the Victoria and Albert Museum since it was free. It houses some very interesting plaster casts of great works of art and design. I am posting a couple of the pictures I took. The first is a lion cast:




And, the cast of Michelangelo's David




It was an interesting museum in general. From there, we went to Harrod's. Harrod's is the world famous department store/arcade. It has a full deli, grocer, oyster bar, and even brews its own beer. We only wandered the first floor and I was blown away. It is an experience for sure. I hope to take Colleen there, and maybe we'll do a small bit of shopping, but I saw some prices there that made my head spin, so I doubt it will be for men's or women's clothing of any kind. :-) I didn't see any 3/4 length men's trousers anyway, so I would only be interested in toys for our niece and nephew anyway. Well, maybe some cool shoes, though I would hate to have to carry them with me. :-)

Rain interrupted play off and on all day. I hedged my bets that we'd get out of here in time for a decent meal, and I may live to regret that choice. I just wanted to be able to hang out with the larger team outside of this place if I can, and a very late night dinner seems the best way to make that happen. :-) In the end, we chose to leave the rest of the folks and head back to the Indian Restaurant again. While waiting there for a table, I had what would have to be considered a much more real brush with greatness. Chris Fowler, Brad Gilbert and MaliVai Washington tried to push ahead of us for a table, but in the end, the Indians would not allow it and they slinked off. I did make solid eye contact with Brad, and he knew I knew who he was, but I was in my venue shirt and still in the "we don't talk to the celebrities" mode. Still, not too bad at all.

We discovered that Zingo cabs actually does work, we just haven't been patient enough. Twice I have tried calling and then "caught one" just before I got connected to the cab through Zingo. It turned out both times, as we got the same driver, he actually was responding, we just weren't patient enough, or thought that we had gotten lucky and didn't need to wait. He's a good guy, and has never shown a lack of willingness to take us into Kensington. We actually had three other cabbies pull off after finding out where we were going. I think Judy had suggested that we try to get into the cab without a destination response and then tell him once we were all situated. I don't know, honestly, and I think we'd be better served to just catch the last train but I keep hearing grumbling every time I suggest it.

Got back to the room and spoke with Colleen for a good bit. Two more days! She'll be here before she knows it. I can only hope the business class experience helps her with the flight, as her prior coach experiences have not been all that solid. Drifted off to sleep a bit after 1 AM and will be heading the venue solo in the morning. I actually look forward to that.

Cheers!