I'm So Excited

I'm so excited! After 6 months without a computer I finally did the deed and bought myself a new laptop in London yesterday. Over the past few weeks I've been looking at various computers on-line, but in the end I decided to get another ASUS. It's very cool and even has built-in camera. The best thing is that when I leave the UK I can claim back the VAT, which given that VAT in the UK is 17.5% is a considerable amount of money. I went to a lot of shops yesterday and did a lot of walking up and down Tottenham Court Rd. In the end though the prices were much of a muchness.

So now I no longer have to use the dinasaurs that are masquerading as computers here where I'm living. I mean it's been great having access to a computer at home as well, but the two computers here are very badly configured and don't even have some of the basic software like Adobe Reader. All of the St.Clare's buildings are set up for wireless computing though and all I had to do last night (despite being exhasted by the time I got back from London) was enter the various codes and voila.

While I was in London I managed to fit in a few cultural activities as well. In the morning I visited the Victoria & Albert Museum, which is a various treasure-trove of various items (stolen?) from around the globe. I'd never been there before, so it was fun exploring the various galleries. There's a lot of it I didn't see, but it's impossible to do justice to a place like the V&A in one visit. At the end of last month the new Islamic gallery was opened, so yesterday they had lots of activities with an Islamic theme going on, including some beautiful Turkish classical music in the central courtyard.

In the afternoon - after I'd bought my computer - I spent an hour at the British Museum. The place was packed (as are most places in London at this time of the year), so I avoided all the popular galleries and spent most of the hour in the Asian and Islamic galleries.

Today is Grace's second birthday, so as soon as I get organised I'm off to West Oxford. It's also the 61st anniversary of the first atomic bomb being dropped on the city of Hiroshima.

Happy Birthday Grace!