European Vacation Days 7 & 8: Say Hello, Wave Goodbye

August 22 was our last night in London, and part of the morning was spent returning back to London from Paris.  After a quick trip back to our hotel room back at Wembley Park, we quickly went back to Knightsbridge because Janice had a couple of returns and VAT  items to take care of at Harrods and Topshop.  We then headed towards Piccadilly Circus to see the famous illuminated signs and we grabbed some lunch at a pub called Tom Cribb.  From the official website:  “The pub is named after British champion bare-knuckle boxer Tom Cribb who, in the 1800s, retired from the ring and later became a publican, at the Union Arms. The pub changed its name to honour his career.”  I had a sandwich named after him and Janice had bangers & mash for the first time (both were very tasty).  I wanted to try a truly British beer, so I had half a pint of Spitfire to wash it all down.

After walking around a bit, we stopped by Cool Britannia, one of the coolest souvenir shops in London.  Unfortunately, I was quite bogged down with packages and it was way too busy in the store to take any proper pictures.  I wish I had because it really is quite a fantastic souvenir shop.

Elliot making my first drink of the evening: The Westerners’ Erofeitch.  Doesn’t he look like a naughty mad scientist?  Note the water and food close by…we knew it would be that kind of night.

My next two drinks: The Perfect Lady (very sweet & creamy) and The Mandalay (slightly bitter with Campari).

To celebrate our last hurrah in London, we went back to Callooh Callay (see my first post here).  The above drinks were all delicious and very mildly named.  Things already became fuzzy for me after two drinks, so I very thankful that we had been eating and drinking water throughout the night.  As the evening got later, the names of the drinks got raunchier.  I’m sure Elliot has seen crazier patrons than Janice and myself, but I thank him for putting up with me, especially after four drinks (Janice can hold her drink much better and went three drinks deeper than I did).  India, another lovely and incredibly understanding waitress, was also very sweet, keeping up with our silliness throughout the evening.

This was the last of the respectfully named drinks: this is the P-p-p-poppy.  I think the stuttering comes from having the three drinks prior.

A very nice picture of Elliot and Janice.  My eyes always narrow the more drink I consume, so I opted for no pictures of myself for the evening.  I’m surprised I was even able to hold the camera steady for this shot.

Janice with a new friend she met whilst I was in the ladies room.  The bluriness of the shot indicates why I couldn’t remember her name…sorry dear!

One of these drinks is called the Spagliato and the other is called Ahhh, Sh!t, It Tastes Like Christmas (as you can tell, I can’t remember which is which).  The last drink of the night was what did Janice in, which is probably why it’s not pictured.  It was a drink we used to have when we were clubbing.  Elliot’s version is called “I F@#!ed the Red Headed Slut”.  And so ended the night…

I’m not sure how we did it, but we filled out applications and turned them in before we left, with the hopes of obtaining membership to The Jubjub Bar.  I’ll let you know if we actually got our memberships approved (*crossing fingers*).  As Bridget Jones would say it was a “v. good night and blurry good fun!”

(Please note that as of September 5, our Jubjub Membership requests were approved!  Now, does that mean that we should schedule another trip out there to collect our key?  Hmm…)

The Metropolitan line.  Our hotel was directly in front of the Wembly Park stop (Zone 4).

These last pictures in London are a bit silly.  One is of the Tube line that we took regularly, which was the Metropolitan.  The second picture I took because I’ve read that Alan Wilder (Recoil/Depeche Mode) grew up in Acton, which is in West London.  On our way to Heathrow, the one of the stops was Acton Town.  Is it the same area?  I don’t know, but I had to take a picture of it (although I know he now lives in Sussex).  I also have to say that I’m very sad that I missed the Spirit of Talk Talk launch party, which happened September 6 (Alan Wilder was rumoured to have been there).  Even if I had known about it, I’m not sure I could have made it work anyway as it would have been just too long to be away from home and work.  Oh well!

I took a couple of final pictures on the plane ride home of our route on British Airways.  I love the individual video screens that are available on these long flights because it allows me to watch several movies I would never have otherwise watched.  I watched The Five-Year Engagement and The Hunger Games on the way home (I can’t remember what I watched on the way to London because I was fighting a cold that I caught on the way). I also took a picture of our dinner that night because I also love meals on long flights.  I particularly liked the dessert, and our nice gentleman flight attendant gave me another one after my meal (it was a cream passion fruit custard, with chocolate shavings on top, SO good).

I had such a great time with Janice and I’m glad we got the chance to get away and spend some time together.  I’m also glad I was able to be there for her first European trip, showing her places I had been and discovering new places.  I think there may be another European trip in the future (we’re shooting for Germany), but it will be with my husband and son.  Cheers and thanks for reading!

Please note that most photos were taken with my iPhone unless otherwise noted.  Photos 1, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9 and 10 were by Janice Gutana (photo collages are counted as one photo).

San Diego Restaurant Week: September 16 to 21

Can you believe it’s that time yet again?  Foodies rejoice, it’s time to rev up your taste buds and hit the town for San Diego Restaurant Week.  My girls and I are headed out again, and I’m trying to steer them to somewhere French because I’m still on a Euro kick.  If we choose something different, then I’ll take my hubby and son (I hope they’ll eat French cuisine).  I’ll be sure to tell you all which restaurant we settled on in an upcoming post.  In the meantime, for those of you here in San Diego, check out their list of fantastic eateries by clicking on the picture above.  Cheers!

Photo courtesy of the San Diego Restaurant Week Official Website

Journées Européennes de Vacances 5 et 6: Bonjour Paris!

Bonjour and merci Bing Translator (formerly Babelfish) for the translation of the title of my post!  If you haven’t guessed, it should translate to “European Vacation Days 5 & 6: Hello Paris!”

Photo from the train entering France.

August 20th and 21st, we spent in Paris, France.  Although I would loved to have spent my entire trip in London, Janice brought up a great point that we should see one other country while in Europe.  Although I had already been there because my husband and I went on our honeymoon, we figured the easiest jaunt to another country was to take the two-hour Chunnel through Eurostar to Paris.  I tried to sleep, but instead spent the entire ride listening to Spandau Ballet because of the Rewind Festival the night before.  We actually arrived at Gare du Nord (North Station), but Janice booked a room at the Mercure Hotel location that was walking distance from Gare de l’est (East Station), which was close by.

The Mercure Hotel on Boulevard Magenta. 

I’ll again rely on my pictures to tell the story of where we went in Paris for the two days that we were there.  It was quite the fleeting trip, because I tried to make sure that Janice saw all of the most popular of sights during our short stay.  The best part about the trip for me was the food, which I enjoyed because we actually got to sit awhile at each little cafe.  À la prochaine!  Next post:  Our last day in London!

Our arrival at Gare du Nord, a street sign close to our hotel, and our first stop on The Metro.

Janice’s first introduction to authentic crepes in Paris.  This one was filled with Nutella and bananas.

We took pictures outside of The Louvre because we were too late to take a proper tour (and we couldn’t go the next day because it was closed).

Jardin des Tuileries, which is the Tuileries Garden, between The Louvre and Palace de la Concorde.

We saw something being filmed while walking around the streets of Paris, close by The Louvre.

A cool Metro station entrance.

The cafe where we ate breakfast each day we were in Paris. Our waitress was so sweet that she made sure to warn us about pick-pockets, and she loved my Wendy Brandes ring!

Some of the delicious food and wine we ate and drank while in Paris: creme brule, pino grigio, eclairs and Quiche Lorraine.

This is the awesome bakery where I bought the eclairs.  Janice bought some kind of Nutella goodness.

Marché Saint-Quentin (St. Quentin Market), which was right outside our hotel. If you watched “Cars 2”, you’ll know why it’s funny that Lightning McQueen was in the market!

Notre Dame de Paris

We stopped at a cafe near the Seine river, while walking to the Eiffel Tower. Janice and I were trying to be artsy with our pictures at the cafe.  I liked her’s the best!

I was so excited to find the little Irish pub that my husband and I visited during our honeymoon!  I knew it was the right one because it was next to the soccer shop where the nice store owner gave us a free key chain.  The gal that was bartending at the time introduced us to the music of the group Phoenix.

Tour de Eiffel

Arc de Triomphe and the Louis Vuitton store on Champs Elysees.  The “love me” painted on the wall caught my eye while walking.

Janice’s photo of Cartier at Champs Elysees.

All photos were taken with my iPhone unless otherwise noted.

European Vacation Day 4: Be Kind & Rewind!

Sunday August 19th was the Rewind Festival at Henley-On-Thames, which was the catalyst that spurred this whirlwind trip to London and Paris into action.  This was my first ever festival, and I thought my first festival would be Coachella or Lollapalooza, but I’m actually glad to say that my first festival was in a different country.   Although we would have loved to have gone to both days of the festival (especially to see Rick Astley and Jimmy Somerville on Saturday August 18th), both Janice and I don’t really camp in America, so camping in another country 5,000 miles away from home was most likely out of the question.

I bought these for the train ride to Henley.  Oh. My. SO. Good.

Premium Pear Cider, mmmm!

The line up for both days.  The running order for the Sunday show remained true to the list above.

We discovered that Henley-on-Thames is not as close to London as we had perceived it to be.  A few weeks prior to our vacation, I decided to finally check out how we would route our trip to Henley.  I was glad that I did because I would have never perceived that it would be approximately 35 miles from London, in Oxfordshire.  Being that we don’t have licenses to drive in Great Britain, I furiously looked for transportation from London, and I found that we would need to take the National Railway.  This would mean that while we could get there with no issues and start our concert festivities early, we knew we would miss the last act because we would need to get back to the station in time to return back to our hotel.  In hindsight, we maybe could have just gotten a hotel in Henley and then taken an early train to St. Pancras to just simply connect to our train to Paris.  Don’t they say hindsight is always 20/20?

Concert goers on a mission!  These were actually the folks who initially helped us navigate our way around Henley.  After that, we met quite a few other nice people who helped answer questions as we needed.

The water taxi we took back to the train station after the concert.

Henley is a beautiful, picturesque town.  Janice caught some great pictures of our walk along the river to the festival area.  The venue itself was on Temple Island Meadows, which has been the home of the Rewind Festival for the past few years.  The festival itself was larger than anything I had been to previously.  It felt like the San Diego County Fair combined with a food truck event, but with way better music and bands (in my humble opinion, of course).  I will say that the acts that I wanted see played everything I wanted to hear:  Adam Ant, Midge Ure, Marc Almond and Tony Hadley.  My only regret was not being able to catch OMD, but that’s only because of the aforementioned time constraints.   In fact, we nearly missed Tony Hadley!  But we got to stay through his set because our friendly neighborhood concert goers explained that our train tickets were good for the night because the trains departed every 30 minutes.  My favorite concert moments:

  • Dancing around like a lunatic during Adam Ant’s set.
  • When Midge Ure played “Vienna” and “Dancing With Tears In My Eyes”, I practically cried.
  • Surprised that Roland Gift actually played “She Drives Me Crazy”, and loved that he played “Good Thing”.
  • Completely not expecting to hear “Tears Run Rings” by Marc Almond. I had read previous set lists from his shows, and I don’t recall seeing that song on there.
  • Every. Single. Song. By. Tony Hadley. 

Rather than continue to describe all of the events, I just made selections from both sets of photos by Janice and myself to just illustrate the awesome time we had.   Next post: A quick two-day jaunt to Paris!

Adam Ant fans, no?

Some of the booths at the festival, which included vintage clothing!  Janice got some totally bitchin’ leg warmers there.

Ohmigod, Janice!  That side ponytail and those leg warmers are in full effect.  Totally.

Our pile o’stuff.  I think we were the least prepared to be there.  Next time, we need to at least bring a throw blanket, mat or towel!

Originally, I brought the umbrella in case it rained. It turned out to be useful to keep cool!  And yes, that is yet another Joy Division shirt that I’ve added to my collection.

This lighthouse/windmill looking building was actually a giant slide!  At first, it was mostly kids coming down the slide with their parents.  Later into the night, alcohol fuelled everyone’s inner child to take a ride.

Adam Ant and The Good, The Mad and The Lovely Posse

There was karaoke for the crowd between sets.  Duran Duran anyone?

Everybody Wang Chung tonight!

Carol Decker of T’Pau putting in some heart and soul into her hit song of the same name.

Midge Ure looking and sounding wonderful after the mini-fiasco of the first song (his mic was completely shut off for an entire song).

Marc Almond not only sang “Tears Run Rings” but also “Tainted Love” and “Say Hello, Wave Goodbye”.

We were excited to know we could stay for Tony Hadley!

Tony Hadley sounded so amazing live.  Although I know the favorite was “Gold”, my highlight was “Only When You Leave”.

My iPhone lighter for when Tony sang “True”…

This group of concert-goers sat behind us.  They were so awesome and answered many of our questions.  They also ave us glow sticks to carry our celebration into the night.

Janice spotted some interesting characters in neon.  I don’t think I have seen that much neon collectively in one place, except at a mall back in the actual 80’s.

Teen Wolf attacked me on the way out of the festival (or was it the werewolf from “Thriller”?). Either way, I survived!

Topshop at Nordstrom Starting Today!

Ah, the Anglophile in me just did a somersault!

TOPSHOP AND TOPMAN WILL BE AVAILABLE ONLINE AND IN THE FOLLOWING NORDSTROM STORES:

  • September 7
  • Garden State Plaza (Paramus, NJ)
  • Southcenter (Tukwila, WA)
  • September 9
  • Irvine Spectrum Center (Irvine, CA)
  • Valley Fair (San Jose, CA)
  • The Plaza at King of Prussia (King of Prussia, PA)
  • Dadeland Mall (Miami, FL)
  • Chandler Fashion Center (Chandler, AZ)
  • Oakbrook Center (Oak Brook, IL)
  • September 10
  • Ala Moana (Honolulu, HI)
  • Barton Creek Square (Austin, TX)
  • Burlington (Burlington, MA)
  • Phipps Plaza (Atlanta, GA)
  • San Francisco Centre (San Francisco, CA)*
  • South Coast Plaza (Costa Mesa, CA)*

*Topshop only

(Photo and information from Nordstrom.com)

 

European Vacation Day 3: Take Me to the River (Thames)

On our third day in London, we decided to take the advice of one of our cabbies and start off at The Houses of Parliament and just walk all the way down to the Tower Bridge.  But first, we grabbed a bit of breakfast, so I thought I’d share what I had.  We went to a place that was walking distance from our hotel called the Moulin Grill.  I absolutely love bacon in any form, and British bacon is more like ham than what we are used to in America.  Either way, it was a tasty and inexpensive way to have my traditional English breakfast (no beans, but with grilled tomatoes).

We hopped on the tube on the Jubilee line and headed towards Westminster.  This dropped us off right in front of Houses of Parliament and The Clock Tower, otherwise known as Big Ben.  We took a walk along the Westminster Bridge to where the London Eye is located, which is the tallest Ferris wheel in Europe.  It was quite crowded (I’m sure due to the fact that it was a Saturday), so we choose not to ride it. Instead, we snapped pictures of ourselves with the attraction in the background (only my picture is shown).  After we passed the London Eye, we noticed that we were on a trail called The Jubilee Greenway, which is 60 kilometers long and each kilometer marks one year of the Queen’s reign.  We then passed through the Soutbank, went into Southwark Cathedral and saw many other fantastic sites on the way to Tower Bridge.

My new studded Topshop shoes with my Rebecca Minkoff schoolboy.

Janice took this great picture of a sign on a bench.

Random shots around Southbank.

There was poetry posted all along the rails of a pier on the Southbank.  I loved this poem.

Millennium Bridge and Shakespeare’s Globe

The sign above explains pretty much everything we saw on the approach to Tower Bridge.

Clink Prison Museum, Tate Modern, Southwark Bridge

Southwark Cathedral

I just really liked the lines and the way the angles looked in these pictures.

Sights of the Olympics were alive and well while we were in town, and we realized that we were actually between Olympic events:  The Summer Olympics games ended on August 12, but the Paralympics games began on August 29th.  Everywhere we went, we could see the Olympics’ mascots Wenlock and Mandeville.  At one point, Janice and I gave in and posed with one of them as we approached Tower Bridge.

Tower of London

After having lunch at a cute little place called Noodle Noodle, our last stop was Buckingham Palace.  There wasn’t a guard ceremony that day, so we just walked around, taking in the enormity of the grounds.  In the picture below, we are standing on The Victoria Memorial with Buckingham Palace in the background (Janice is pictured on the right).  Below that is a great picture of The Mall, which is a ceremonial route to Buckingham Palace. The last pictures are of the gateway to the Queen’s Gardens, the Queen’s Gallery (we only went to the gift shop), and a marker for Princess Diana’s memorial walkway.

Gateway to the Gardens at Buckingham Palace

The Queen’s Gallery and a marker for Princess Diana’s Memorial Walkway.

It was amazing how long of a walk we actually took from Westminster Bridge all the way over to Buckingham Palace!  But is was a fantastic walk, and I want to thank our cabbie for suggesting it to us.  It was quite a lovely day for a long stroll, and it did take us the bulk of the day to do it.  Next post: The Rewind Fesitval at Henley-on-Thames on Temple Island.

Please note that most photos were taken with my iPhone unless otherwise noted.  Photos 4, 6, 7, 17, 20, 21, 22, and 23 were by Janice Gutana (photo collages are counted as one photo).

Spirit of Talk Talk Launch Party Tonight!

I’ve known about this event for sometime, but my trip to London did not at all coincide with this launch party, otherwise I would have bought tickets straightaway! 

There are a lucky few of you out there who were able to score tickets to the Spirit of Talk Talk launch party tonight at 229 on Great Portland Street in London (see posts from the Recoil blog and the Spirit of Talk Talk blog).  Every time I see Great Portland Street, I just think of the Metropolitan Line because that’s a few stops away from the hotel we stayed at.  I read that  Alan Wilder may make an appearance (*sigh*).  For those of you going, have fun, and I will be there in spirit and living vicariously somehow through you all tonight!

Flyer courtesy of the Spirit of Talk Talk Facebook page

European Vacation Day 2: A Spot of Tea & A Bit of Shopping at Harrods

In the previous two times I had been to London, it had not occurred to me to have formal tea while out there.  The first time I had travelled to London was on my honeymoon, and since that was my first time there, I wanted to take in all of the sights with my new husband.  Our second time out in London was to watch the San Diego Chargers vs the New Orleans Saints in the NFL International Series at Wembley Stadium, and afternoon tea just didn’t fall in line with that kind of trip (plus, I was five months pregnant at the time).  So this trip to London seemed like the perfect time to fit in an afternoon tea with my best friend.  I booked our tea at Harrods, which actually allowed us time to spend the early afternoon shopping beforehand.

Prim and proper on the Tube ride to Knightsbridge (the stop at Harrods).

There are 32 restaurants/cafes in Harrods.  Because there was no way that we could visit all of these eateries during our visit, we played it by ear for where we would go, other than our scheduled visit to The Georgian.  We first visited the famous Harrods’ Food Hall to grab lunch.  I have been to Harrods before and have visited the Food Hall, but my husband and I never actually ate there.  Janice and I each had a hand-carved roast beef sandwich, but I added English mustard to mine.  We also had fresh juices and a dessert.   Janice had the Creme Brule, and I had an oh-so-sweet caramel popcorn cupcake (it has a dollop of caramel in the middle).  It was quite the treat!

A close up of our desserts, yum!

After a bit of shopping down the street at Topshop (where I bought the pants from the previous post) and a couple of souvenir shops, we headed back to Harrods to have our tea at The Georgian Restaurant at 4pm.  The restaurant is on the fourth floor and is such a beautiful space that I could imagine someone having a wedding there.  We were decked out in pretty dresses for the occasion, although we did not don any hats.  Our menu consisted of freshly made sandwiches, home-baked English scones, a selection of tea pastries, and of course, our teas (the full menu can be viewed here).  I can’t recall what Janice had, but I had my standard Earl Grey.  It was quite the elegant affair, and I’m glad to have finally had the chance to experience afternoon tea in this way.  This is definitely something I would like to repeat again when next in London!

After our wonderful afternoon tea experience, we shopped a bit more (are you surprised?).  One of the floors was labeled “Christmas”, so we thought it would be just a few bobbles and ornaments as an introduction to the holiday season.  To our surprise, it was Christmas in August at Harrods and nearly an entire floor was dedicated to the occasion.  After that, we did our obligatory souvenir shopping, buying up lots of little trinkets with the Harrods name.  We then decided to have a little bit of silly fun in the toy section. 

We ended our fantastic Harrods experience at the Cafe Godiva, on the second floor.  Yes, you read it right, there is a whole cafe dedicated to Godiva chocolate.  Janice and I had what’s called a Chilled Chocolixir, which is described as “an icy blend of chocolate ganache, topped with layers of whipped cream.”  I ordered the white chocolate one and Janice got the milk chocolate version (full menu can be viewed here).  It was a delicious way to end our wonderful, yet busy day at Harrods.  Next post: a stroll along the Thames river that included trips to Tower Bridge and Buckingham Palace.

All photos were by Janice Gutana except for photos 3, 4 and 14, which were taken by me, using an iPhone (photo collages are counted as one photo).

Winner of the Jamberry Nail Shields Giveaway!

Happy Labor Day all, hope you had a wonderful long weekend!  A winner has been selected for the Jamberry Nail Shields gift pack: Please help me congratulate Michelle!   I will contact you by email later today to get your information so that I can send you the gift pack.  Congratulations Michelle!

Thanks to everyone who participated, and thank you for following Any Second Now!

FTC Disclosure: The Jamberry Nail Shields gift pack winner was chosen at random using Math Goodies.  As stated in the initial post, I received product and was asked to review the product in return.  Although I did receive product, the opinions in this post are strictly my own and that of the person I asked to review the product.

Dots & Sparkles

I know I mentioned that I would do some outfit posts while abroad, but alas, that never came to be.  We were just too busy having fun, running around eating, taking in the sights and sounds for me to be worried about what I wore out there.  I mainly just wore tank tops, jeans and flats, which wasn’t exciting enough to put in an outfit post.  I did do a tiny bit of shopping while out there, and these pants were a part of that spree.  All the polka-dot pants I have found before were more of the mini-dot kind, where the dots looked sprinkled about.  I like that these dots were a larger pattern, and that they were not denim.  The bracelets I’m wearing are also a new addition to my growing jewelry collection and are by Cutey, a company out of the UK, from their Shamballa collection.  They really complimented the dots and added a bit of shine to my outfit.  I’ve worn them quite a bit since I received them and because they sparkle, they can be worn dressed up or down. 

(Next week, I’ll be posting about our tea at Harrods, our walk towards Tower Bridge, and the Rewind Concert at Henley-on-Thames, cheers!)

Outfit – Old Navy shirt; Topshop pants; Bamboo shoes; Recbecca Minkoff purse; Bon Look “Honeybadger” glasses; Michael Kors watch; Wendy Brandes ring; Shamballa bracelets c/o Cutey

FTC Disclosure:  I received free product and was asked to review the product in return.  Although I did receive free product, the opinions in this post are strictly my own.