Day Thirteen: As Seen on the Street

Another day at the school, but that's the really awesome thing about the boring days, they give me a free blog entry to catch up on all the little random things that happen but don't really fit in with another entry. Today is a conglomeration of things that I've seen thus far on the streets of London and thought to snap a picture of.

The sign that could have saved Richard from his heart-racing wife-catch as she tumbled down the stairs, had she payed attention to it on her way up to the 2nd floor of the double-decker bus.  In my defense, I didn't exactly expect the driver to floor it like he did, either.

This is a really cool building seen from a bus window, the streets of London are full of incredibly neat architectural examples like this that make every bus ride and every stroll absolutely fascinating.

Almost every intersection has helpful little guidelines like this painted on the pavement.  Apparently they are used to lots of crazy tourists thronging their streets and being totally thrown by the traffic flow.  (The United Kingdom, Australia, and some African nations are among the major countries that drive on the left. The rest of the world is all right-side drivers, which makes the UK open season on tourists.) However, if you remember to follow the painted street advice, life gets a lot safer. Unfortunately, I'm not sure that it's so much teaching me about traffic flow as it is a reading comprehension insta-checker. 

Their police cars alternate blue and white lights here, no red

All the taxi's in London are what are referred to as Black Cabs.  They are renowned for being among the most expensive taxis in the world. As such, I don't plan on ever having the honor to ride in one. Which is a shame, because they are also renowned for having knowledgeable, friendly, efficient and respectful English speaking drivers who know exactly how to find every location you could dream of, and wouldn't think of upcharging you anything beyond the established fare. (Which is quite high enough, thank you!)

The quintessential English Country Gentleman's clothing store. Note the tweed cap, and the trusty wool jackets. It was SO very ENGLISH that I just had to snap a photo.

There are actually lots of mounted police in London. However, their horses are always very, very beautiful and lovely examples of horseflesh, NOT something that could neccesarily be said of the mounted police in, say, New York, for example.

I have no words.  Except that this is a non-doctored photo, taken in Greenwich