Today I went to the Victoria and Albert Museum, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. It’s nothing compared to the British Museum, which remains my favorite for now, but still - it was interesting. I only looked at the fashion, instruments, silver, and whatever I had to walk through to get to those places. Oh, and the bathroom. Which, incidentally, they call the “toilet.” If I walk in somewhere and say, “Hi, could you point me toward your restroom,” I get a look like, “you mean where’s the toilet?” Very strange. Also, hard to figure out where the punctuation goes in that sentence. Where’s the MLA when you need it?

Anyway, back to the museum. I found their exhibits to be mediocre-ly (new word!) organized and therefore hard to follow. BUT they have a huge collection of stuff. The silver exhibit is large enough that I got bored halfway through and became very selective about which pieces to stop and learn about. The fashion collection is massive, as well, and they have this ridiculous exhibit of the wardrobe of Queen Maud of Norway (who was previously an English princess of sorts - took me a minute to sort out why her wardrobe wound up here). Apparently she changed at least four times a day and had a staff of people who’s job entailed choosing appropriate shoes and accessories. Sounds good. I’ll have to inform Andy of his new responsibilities.

Funny story. The reason I found out about Maud and her extravagance because this NOISY, presumably gay, presumably American couple was reading the descriptions out loud - and I mean loud - to each other. They were impressed. Oh, but they weren’t impressed by the instruments. “It was OK, I guess, but nothing I haven’t seen a million times. . . ” Well then. I saw them later in the shop, and they were eyeing up a purse made entirely of buttons as a gift for one of their mothers. Guy #1 says, “HOW MUCH IS IT?” Guy #2 says, “125 POUNDS. SOOOOooo NOT WORTH IT.” Which is completely true. I found myself hoping, however, that this friendly but ridiculously noisy couple was Canadian, because if not, we Yanks seriously need some quieter ambassadors.