Down and Underground, Skeptics and Soane, Nat Gal and Nudists.

Saturday, I spent an inordinate amount of time at the London Transport Museum.  If you recall my obsessive infatuation with the Tube (previous post), then you'll  understand when I tell you that this place was Heaven.  It was cleverly built; you had to take an elevator to the top floor to start, an elevator of course being a mode of transportation.  I see what you did there, Museum of Transport.  While it was understandably a venue dedicated to technological development, it also provided an excellent overview of London's history and culture.  As the railways burgeoned, London followed suit, then required more railways which allowed it to burgeon more and then require more railways and so on; so it was also a museum about London's growth.  It was amusing to see that even the first public horse-drawn carriages had been double-decker; I guess the modern-day red buses come by it honestly.  They also had lots of very old Underground posters, one of which advertised Kew Gardens as having "fancy ducks," which generated a bizarre image of a duck with a monocle and bow-tie; clearly I'm going to have to go to Kew to check this out.  I was also amused to see that kettles of tea appeared to be used as a form of measurement multiple times -

- and that some things (most things?) about this country have never changed -

Also, I had no idea how many times the transportation system here has been saved by Americans.  I guess there's money in it, but still, I felt a little patriotic when I kept seeing captions like "An American businessman saves the Tube!"
I then transported myself by foot (I was pretty self-conscious about using such an unevolved technology but it was still pretty effective) to the nearby Soane Museum, which is actually just Sir John Soane's old house.  Soane was a famous architect who was responsible for creating Britain's first public art gallery, the Dulwich Picture Gallery (previous post).  He collected artifacts and art pieces with zeal and put them all in his house.  They take up so much space - literally covering all walls, floors and ceilings - that the house is unlivable, but it's a pretty fun experience to walk through an old English town house and run into a sarcophagus.
After popping by the Hunterian Museum again for a final farewell, I was making my way home when I found myself, along with hundreds of pedestrians and unhappy taxi drivers, unable to use Tottenham Court Road due to a nudist biking parade.  The looks on some of the shocked Englishwomen's faces were priceless.  I don't think that sort of thing is as prevalent here as it is on the West Coast. I will refrain from posting pictures of this absolutely hilarious sighting in case there are children reading this blog.

On Sunday, Kelsey and I journeyed to our Mecca, Down House, to pay homage to Charles Darwin.  It was a really meaningful and fulfilling experience for both of us.  Besides being the home of the Darwin family, it was also simply a beautiful house and property.

It was fun to see his experimental gardens and beekeeping house, where he produced data used in On the Origin, as well as wander along the paths which he was known to favor when he wanted to think about his theory.  We got a bit teary-eyed when we were in his study, where he wrote The Book.  Unfortunately we weren't allowed to take pictures... so don't tell anybody about this one -

We met a Canadian gentleman there, who had the strongest stereotypical Canadian accent either of us had ever heard - and we're both from states bordering Canada.  We ended up taking the train back with him, and had a grand time talking to him.  He was an electrician, and a lot of neuroscience has to do with electricity.  So, when he told us he didn't know anything about neuroscience, we pointed out that he probably understood some of it better than we did.  Combining forces, I think all three of us ended up understanding each others' endeavors better.  Just goes to show that people are always your best resources.

After spending Monday in the National Gallery (or as it is affectionately known, Nat Gal), which houses such an impressive collection that it is incredible to me that it is free and always without lines, Kelsey and I met up to see a lecture by Jon Ronson.  He's a journalist most famous for The Men Who Stare at Goats, The Psychopath Test and being portrayed by Ewan McGregor in the film version of the former book.  George Clooney, Jeff Bridges, and Kevin Spacey were also in that film, incidentally.  So he's kind of a big deal.  Despite his fame, he was very laid-back and very funny, though he had a lot of poignant remarks about the psychopath test and the DSM.  The crowd was very responsive and actually asked good questions - it never occurred to me that Q & A could actually be insightful!  But there it was.