The past few days at home have been exactly what I needed—peaceful, relaxing and sunny beyond compare. And it’s hard to complain when there’s air conditioning involved (I still don’t understand how Londoners survive the summer heat). I’ve spent most of my time either at the beach or in my bed, battling my jet-lag so that I don’t take 4 hour naps in the middle in the afternoon. Being reunited with my family and pets has been wonderful; I always forget how much of a homebody I am until I’m away for extended periods of time.
I’m going to pretend like this isn’t my last week in London and continue on with my post like everything’s normal…
Monday:
On Monday I had classes at the Institute and then spent the rest of the afternoon working on my oral presentation for my class which I, of course, waited until two days to start. I mean the weather’s been so nice lately that it was almost painful to think about shutting myself inside! But I knew that I had to get down to business and start working on my PowerPoint. 
MONDAY:
I had classes all day at the Institute and afterward met up for dinner with a friend at a restaurant on King’s Road in Chelsea. We’d seen that My Old Dutch Pancake House had a £5 special on Mondays and had been meaning to go forever but hadn’t gotten around to it until that night. I ordered the Apple & Cinnamon Pancake with ice cream and my friend ordered the Compote of Berries Pancake with cream. The pancakes ended up being very similar to crepes and they were absolutely gigantic; we laughed at the thought that we would be able to finish everything until it became obvious that they were too good to allow to go to waste.
This won’t be a very long post since I didn’t really do anything that exciting on Saturday and Sunday, mostly just catching up on sleep, spending time outside and hanging out at Tate Modern.
Saturday morning I took the tube to St. Paul’s and from there walked across Millennium Bridge towards Tate Modern, where the Matisse cut-out exhibition is being held until mid-September. The exhibition is very popular and because of this I had a 1.5 hour wait before I could queue up to enter the space. And what is a girl to do during lunch time on the South Bank? I bet my dad can tell you… Borough Market, of course! I was excited to try the pies from Pieminster, which I had heard and read are amazing, so I jumped in line and ordered their ‘Lighter than a Feta’ pie. Honestly I was let down because, although I liked the chunks of sweet potato and feta, I didn’t like the pie crust that much and I was a huge fan of the crumble on the top of the pie. Not wanting my visit to Borough Market to go to waste I stopped by my favorite pastry stand to get a spelt almond croissant, which had been my favorite since I first tried one for the first time last fall.
On Friday, I started my morning early in order to get breakfast at a restaurant I’ve been dying to try since before I even got to London a month and a half ago. Granger & Co. is located in Notting Hill and was started by an Australian who owns restaurants all over the world. I had read about Granger & Co. on two different London blogs I follow and I figured that this would be the perfect day so that I wouldn’t have to wait in line to eat. The restaurant is bright and open, and the staff was very friendly albeit a bit forgetful about what I’d ordered to drink. I sat on a bench by the window and made friends with a toddler who kept wandering over to me, wanting to say hello. I ordered breakfast tea and Bill’s Greens and ricotta hotcakes with honeycomb butter and a banana. I had never eaten hotcakes with ricotta so I was a bit nervy about whether or not I’d like them but they were absolutely delicious and I wouldn’t mind ordering them a second time if given the chance.
On Friday, I had classes per usual throughout the morning and into the early afternoon. My first stop after being let out was Masterpiece London, which is an art fair that’s being held in the Chelsea area for the next week that Sotheby’s got tickets to for us. The entrance was pretty neat—I felt like a celebrity walking down the red carpet—but overall I wasn’t very impressed by what the fair had to offer. It almost felt cheap, almost like they sold out compared to other art fairs I’ve attended like Art Basel Miami. There seemed to be more of an emphasis on luxury goods, such as expensive cars and yachts, rather than on the actual art objects and I got the impression that people attended Masterpiece London to show off how wealthy they are rather than to appreciate an artist’s handiwork.
