is that a cabre i see before me

after a very non descript week at work, i met up with my friend laura on friday night and what better way to end my cleanse than a mexican restaurant...ironically enough, when i ordered, absolutley everything in the dish was on the cleanse menu but i'm pretty darned sure the cooking prep was not allowed. :)

we met at tkts to see what we could see on a friday night. now, if you come to london for and decide that going to see a play is what you want to do, then you must visit tkts in leicester square. not only can you get tickets to pretty much any show (and the long running shows offer 50% off at times), but the profit this little ticket booth makes is funneled back into the local theatre industry whereas when you buy them off random stalls in the square, they keep every penny.

soooooo, laura and i thought this would be the best opportunity to go to those shows we're too embarassed to admit to other people that we want to see. among our top 3...the woman in black, enron, or stomp....dear lord what were we thinking. luckily enough we got the best seats in the house (well second best i'd say but they were pretty darned good) to see the woman in black.

now those of you who know me well, know that if you take me to see something scary you are responsible for keeping me safe while i sleep that night. but i figured, as someone who worked in the theatre for nearly a decade, i can get over it as i understand how some of the backstage scare tactics work. i think that, plus the overreaction of some teenagers in the theatre made the show tolerable for me. its not the best show in town (by far) but it wasn't that bad either. the show relies a lot on the 'hint of suggestion' which again, if you know me and my active imagination, i can think of some pretty freaky things (hello, blair witch! you don't want to know what i was picturing in my head when those people were in the tent...)

however, i slept just fine thank you very much and so glad i did because lo and behold i was going to see some burly men on saturday. as i head over to the international highland games (and strongman competition). i met up with a group from home (ya, we tend to find eachother over here and do things together) and we sat in some scorching weather (yay) to watch men lift tires, throw disks and rocks, chuck a cabre, carry 700+ pounds of barrels and throw the weight (of the equivalent of a 5 yr old kid) up 18 feet.


there were americans, englishman, scotsmen (of course)and even an italian. there was piping, highland dancing, haggis, neeps and tatties, irish paella (wtf!), scotch, and no man was lighter than 120 kilos. in fact the biggest, a russian, was a whopping 170 kilos. he. was. huge. they were world champions, world record holders (some new records were broken that day...one was a 30 year old record) and even olympic champions (some in discuss and one was a bobsledder...weird).


i went over to see these guys up close and personal and seriously, one guy (the one in the pic below)...i came up to just above his belt and his arms were the size of my thighs. my friend laura said - that's the kind of guy you wanna date. you'll always be smaller than that guy. and i thought...um ya, but dating that guy would probably kill me. hahaha


today, my sister returns to aberdeen (always nice to have family in the same time zone) and an old friend from the theatre days is in town and we're meeting up for a pint. should be an exciting week ahead.