Snow Falling on Geezers

The first Moleskine entry for my second day in London is this: "Visited Charles Dickens' house (also a museum), which is a wonderful place for any writer." Yet another example of terrible note-taking: What in the hell happened before that visit?

I should have started like this:

I awoke early, showered, and walked out of my room and into the B&B's small and simple lobby where a couple of small tables were set up for breakfast, looked out the window and saw that it was snowing. Breakfast consisted of hard-boiled eggs, toast, coffee. I ate as much as I could since my plan was to spend as little money on food as possible. then, with my daypack slung over my shoulder, I stepped outside, took the snow as a good sign, and walked several blocks to Paddington Station where I would catch the Underground.

Or maybe this:

I have stayed in hotel rooms in my life that were filthy, ugly, unsafe--pick an adjective. In Olongapo, Philippines, during martial law, I once spent a night in a room I could not leave between midnight and sunrise. All night a music-loop of about 20 songs played through a speaker in the ceiling, which was bad enough but made worse because one of the songs was Abba's "Dancing Queen." You listen to an Abba song all night long and see how you turn out in later years.... The room in which I slept last night is more of a cell than a bedroom, and while I can endure it, I would not bring my wife here: The bed is concave; the bathroom is the Yugo of bathrooms; the window faces an alley filled with trash and the brick wall of the building next door.

But I didn't start either of those ways, so let's jump back to Dickens and his house, which looks like this:



The Dickens Museum is full of his personal relics: a drinking glass; a snuff box; a cribbage board; some of his clothing (he must have been a small man). There are photos of his children. Another item not in the Moleskine is that the museum was full of French schoolchildren who enjoyed running up and down the stairs or standing in front of the doorways so that I had to pass from one room to another with difficulty. One of their adult teachers was frustrated that the museum shop did not accept Euros; he then spent a good 10 minutes trying to get his credit cards accepted.

After leaving the museum, I wandered the neighborhood imagining Dickens doing the same, enjoying the the light drizzle the snow had become. I also took a picture of this pigeon:



Then, more by chance than intent, I found the British Library, where there are originals of the Magna Carta, works by Shakespeare and Mozart, hand-written lyrics by the Beatles.

Somehow, then, I ended up at Covent Market, where I visited St. Paul's Church and had a pasty for lunch. The last entry is this: "Then, later, I walk around near the Tower of London but refuse the entry fee. The place is impressive, as are the remnants of the Roman wall nearby." Here are pictures of the wall (left foreground) and the Tower (across the street).



That's it--incredibly incomplete, as if I had noticed no details of importance. What else is in the British Library? What's the significance of St. Paul's Church? WHAT WAS IN THE DAMNED PASTY?