Edinburgh

We went to Edinburgh during festival season for 11 days this year (21-31 August) during which we saw over 20 shows! It was wonderfully gluttonous. Three lovely couples generously put us up. So... we decided to take a photo of each performance we went to - or if that wasn't permitted, we took something representative of it... DAY 1 SHOW 1 - POTTED POTTER - The Unauthorised Harry Experience - A Parody SHOW 2 - Tao Samurai Drummers (Lis' favourite of the week) SHOW 3 - North Sea Gas - The Best of Scotland (acoustic music - we were the youngest by a long shot) DAY 2 SHOW 4 - GELABERT AZZOPARDI (the most remarkable thing about this show was that not only had Rick & Mo happened to book for the same show on the same night but their tickets were right next to ours!) DAY 3 SHOW 5 - The Tiger Lillies - The Songs of Shockheaded Peter and other Gory Verses DAY 4 SHOW 6 - News Revue 30th Anniversary (like being back at the Sydney Uni law review) SHOW 7 - Barry & Stuart - Powered by Demons DAY 5 SHOW 8 - Africaaah! (an African Children's Choir) SHOW 9 - Triology (in 3 parts as the name suggests - so woeful we left after part 2 - the photo depicts Dwayne howling in anguish at how bad it was... it was supposed to be a modern take on feminism but we didn't really feel it had moved anywhere since the 1970s especially given that at least 45 mins of it was taken up with playing excerpts from a video of a panel of speakers from the 70s - not even the very long scene of 25 naked women of every shape and size jumping around on stage could inspire us to stay) SHOW 10 - The Dark Party (crazy Australian blokes torturing themselves e.g. hanging a car battery from chains connected to nails through the nipples of one of them, swallowing razor blades... - I had to pretend it was magic, but it wasn't) DAY 6 SHOW 11 - Afternoon Delight SHOW 12 - Chris Cox: Mind Over Patter (very clever - used knowledge of how humans behave to pick what choices audience participants would make - both Dwayne & I were called up at different points, and he picked our choices - incredible!) DAY 7 SHOW 13 - Circa (amazing Australian acrobats/actors/gymnasts) SHOW 14 - Axis of Awesome: Infinity Rock Explosion (Jess & Byron joined us for this - again, Australian group made particularly famous for a song around time of last Australian election) DAY 8 SHOW 15 - The Last Witch (play about the last witch to be burned in the UK - bit too predictable for my liking - The Crucible is better) we also fitted in some Haitian singers who look more exciting here than we thought they were (we saw a few free comedy shows and plenty of street buskers but I haven't included everything!): SHOW 16 - Edinburgh Tattoo (Lis' twin favourite - but it flew by and I wished it had gone on for much longer - the Swiss were the star attraction) the Swiss with their glowing batons (they also had flaming batons a little later): this is at the end when all the bands are out marching back and forth: DAY 9 SHOW 17 - The Really Terrible Orchestra (we thought they'd be clever or fun but they were just terrible - the feel-good side is that it's a group of relative newcomers to music) SHOW 18 - Michael Clark New Work (modern dance - I loved the colours in this performance) DAY 10 SHOW 19 - Charles (I can't remember anything about this unfortunately! and the photo doesn't help really though it is lovely and colourful) SHOW 20 - The BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra We then caught the sleeper train back to London through the night and went straight to work! What a time.

Sponsored by Hovis

Hovis is a bread brand here. A few weeks back, we saw that some Hovis loaves were reduced to clear at 13p (about 20c) each so we bought 2 loaves to freeze and use. Not only were the loaves super cheap but they also had a voucher on each that entitled us to get 30p off our next purchase of a Hovis loaf. Dwayne used the 2x30p off vouchers on full price loaves (so 1.25 reduced to 65p for the two). So far - 4 loaves at 91p... We thought that was pretty good but it didn't stop there... I was walking to work last week and saw that people were carrying super-large Hovis loaves and tracked them back (not far!) to where they were giving them out. And, would you believe, they stuck another 30p off voucher on the free loaf of bread! The next day they were again handing out the super-size loaves so I got another one - with another voucher. We then used the voucher from the first of the free loaves to buy - you guessed it - a loaf that was reduced to 29p! (we actually made 1p on that buy). We still have the second voucher to use at an opportune moment. Hey we may even use it on a full price loaf if we have to! TOTAL: 7 loaves of bread @ 91p (with 30p voucher remaining on stand-by) --> 13p per loaf It's not the bread that's expensive in London.

Good Coffee in London

OK, so London is not renowned for its coffee culture, especially if you are from places like Italy, the Antipodes or just about any country that loves coffee (excluding North America, who, bless their little hearts, think that it is possible to make good coffee by percolation, filter or one of several other sub-optimal methods). BUT, there is a strong coffee culture if you know where to look.

So here is my current top 10 of coffee in London:

(OK, its not currently 10, but the list will change, and someday it will be 10).
I am using new criteria to rate coffee shops, which will eventually appear on all listings. There is an overall score, and rating for coffee, with a separate rating for milk quality (determined from a latte). I have also tried to determine whether free WiFi is available!

And here is a fancy Google map to earn some nerd points, with the next places for review marked with a '?':
View Good Coffee in London in a larger map