As Matthew and wintermute have already said, the three of us plus Zarniwoop met Gahalia today. The day began for me at the insanely early hour of 7am (On a Saturday!) because I needed to be at Victoria Station by 9am. I was supposed to be meeting wintermute there for breakfast, but he overslept and couldn't make it. Some people!

We finally gathered outside the church where Gahalia was staying just after ten and walked up towards Tower Bridge with her friend Liz coming along. Having just walked over the bridge we turned round so Liz could meet her own friends. The, having met and lunched (Where an excellent discussion about Chat was had) we again travelled over London bridge for the third time in two hours. We took the tube to Leicester Square where we wandered around taking in sights and then went up to Oxford Street. Soon after we found something to climb on, thus making it a *proper* Rinkmeeting and bought British Smarties (Chocolate in crispy shell) to show Gahalia the difference between them and American Smarties (Bland fruity thing).

We also bought Jaffa cakes. They are the best biscuit ever.

Gahalia then plied us with Junior mints, which I can only describe as a compressed After Eight mint. Which also means very delicious. I was reminded to buy Flake for Elly and Sosi for the RU this year.

Soon after, we bought ICE CEAM, whereupon it immediately began to rain, thus showing the perverse nature of British weather.

Following that we went to Harrods and proceeded to be horrified at the prices we weren't about to pay. Having been so English, we had to be American so dropped into McD's for a drink.

We eventually ended up back at Leicester Square, having lost Zarniwoop along the way, who went off to watch Arsenal win 3-0.

Liz and her two friends went off to do their own thing while the rest of us went to see "The Reduced Shakespeare Company." I have not had such a laugh in a very long time. I would never have believed 3 Americans could come up with something so funny ;-) In fact, Americans will get a LOT out of seeing it, and I'd urge any who come to London to see it. Especially Californians!

We then went for Pizza. It was typically *British* service and yes, we left a tip, about 8%, I think.

We'd collected Liz and waved Matthew off when we went back to the church and the four of us left played "Apples to Apples", a very fun game I will look out for here.

All in all a very fun day and one I hope to repeat.

Bea"Nearly missed his stop on the train home"sty