London and leaving

I'm minutes away from hopping out the door and heading to the airport to go back to the US. The end of this trip crept up shockingly quickly, and I'm not entirely ready for it.

Last week I was a bit tired of traveling and feeling ready to keep my stuff in the same place for more than a few nights in a row. Now, though, my mood has picked up. I spent my last two days in London, staying at my friend Joy's flat but only seeing her in the last evening due to some pre-existing commitments of hers. Sometimes London exhausts and annoys me, as all large cities do, but these past two days I've been feeling very positive toward this city. I took a walking tour of "eccentric London," which was great fun. I discovered some amazing, dangerous bookshops. I rode the tube and felt a bit like a blood cell, coursing through the arteries of this marvelous living city. There's a blue police call box parked outside Earl's Court tube station (for real!), and this city is a little bit magical. When I visited the prime meridian in Grenwich, I was struck by the hubris of Londoners basically declaring themselves the center of the world (longitude-wise, at least), but you know, they're not entirely wrong.

Still, I'm homeward bound. Perhaps it's best to leave while it's fun (and while I still have any money in my bank account). I may do a few retrospective blog updates about things I didn't have a chance to write about.