My Bike!

Welp... I've taken the last serious step in preparing for my triathlon! I bought a bike! Who knew that buying a bicycle was such an involved process! I started looking for this bike in early December after I got back from overseas and I finally decided on a 2009 Specialized Allez in BLACK (yeah, it's hot). There are sooooo many different things to take into account and the damn thing just gets expensive - the components, the helmet, the clip-in shoes (and pedals), tools, extra tubes, etc. This ain't yo' grandma's road bike! But I've done it (with some serious help from Santa - thanks big guy!)

So, by now I'm sure you're thinking, "Well Chris is crazy!" Well, that much is true at least... but there is a way that you can support me! Just donate to my triathlon! I'm doing this thru Team in Training, an organization that benefits the Leukemia and Lymphoma society of America. All donations are 100% tax deductible... so if you're looking for some last opportunities to save a bit on tax money, then DONATE! Here is the website (just copy and paste this baby into your web browser...):
http://pages.teamintraining.org/los/lavatri09/ccarrington

Donate and help me!!! :-) I have to raise $5500 by mid-March so I've got a ways to go! :-)

L.A. Street Art

There are these really cool signs (or bills) posted all over Los Angeles - people put them up to advertise things like art collections and special events that are going on around the city, but then they never take them down resulting in a modge-podge of materials posted on a metal surface. What is really cool about these is that they are usual pretty much always posted on the transformer or control box for intersection stop-lights. So for example, you can walk down La Brea, starting at Melrose or Beverly and pas probably 8-10 different control boxes before you reach Wilshire, giving you ample material for a cool project. So....

This is what I'm doing. Some of my pics are below - I'm hoping to photoshop them all together to make clusters of different posters. I think it'll be sweet! What do you think???

My Favorite Pics

It takes waaaaay too much time and is surprisingly difficult for me to upload many photos here in blogger (like more than five), so I've put my favorite photos up on flickr instead:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/28971599@N02/sets/72157610627689810

These are my top 20 favorite pics from my recent trip abroad.

Overall I had a great experience traveling to Dubai and London. It was so much fun and I loved seeing the history that London has - places there have been around longer than my country has been around. There's a thought! The only negative side is that now I'm hooked... I'll be traveling again. Hopefully sometime soon and someplace cool.

In the meantime, I'm not sure what I'm going to do with this blog - maybe I'll just keep it to post random nothings and thoughts - who knows. Check back often (like every 5 minutes) and you may be surprised what I can do (or not).

Love ya mean it!

chris

PS: Sunny southern california isn't so sunny right now. Its foggy and wet. BRRRRR.

Streets

I love the streets here. They wind and zip and go in all different directions making absolutely no sense at all. Its refreshing. And you'll turn and there will be some gothic building at the end of one street and then at the end of another you have some gaudy modern building that is currently under construction. These are just a couple of examples...

St. Pauls Cathedral

On Saturday I went to St. Paul's Cathedral, this massive behemoth of a building dedicated to Paul the disciple. This might be my favorite building I have visited since I've been here in London. It is absolutely beautiful and it is HUGE. When the Great London Fire of 1666 destroyed the previous Gothic-style cathedral, Sir Christopher Wren (who's tomb is in the cathedral) rebuilt the more modern Baroque building that stands there today. What is really interesting is that during the Blitz of London in WWII the cathedral basically was standing on its own among burning fires where bombs had destroyed much of the surrounding buildings. There was little damage to the building during the Blitz, a miracle as many of the other buildings around the cathedral were completely destroyed.

The layout of the building is that of a giant cross. There is an enormous dome that sits over the center of the building, and a neat little fact is that the interior of the dome does not match the external design. Basically, there are two internal domes, but it was thought that the building wouldn't be as impressive from the outside if these two domes could be viewed at their actual size. As a result, the dome that is seen from the outside actually encompasses both the large and smaller domes so that the building looks much more impressive and grand. Inside, the bigger of the two domes is called the "Whispering Gallery" - so called because apparently you can sit on one side of the dome and whisper to a companion who is sitting on the other side who can hear words precisely. I tried this, and while it was hard to distinguish between all the 8 year-olds around me trying to whisper, I could sometimes hear some people talking on the other side. The Whispering Gallery is like 257 steps up from the ground floor, all in a spiral staircase. Another 150 steps or so will take you to the Stone Gallery, an outdoor walkway that offers a pretty decent view of London. This is where the outdoor pics were taken. Then another 100 steps or so takes up up to the Golden Gallery, which, unfortunately, was closed down as they're building a new staircase. This is probably a good move as it could be quite dangerous were there to be a fire - the upper staircase is only about 3-4 feet wide.

You're not supposed to take pictures of the inside of the cathedral, however I snuck one or two in because the ceiling artwork is so impressive. Its soooooo high off the ground that it makes it even more impressive that the work was able to be completed!!!

Things I Love - Take 3

This video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-kjM1asH-8&eurl=http://thetuneout.com/

I totally stole this from my pledge brother Evan's blog, however, I can't help myself. I love that she pardoned the turkey and then did an interview in front of the guy that does the slaughtering. And the fact that the turkeys are held upside down and then are jammed into a funnel (for what purpose, I don't know) while kicking for dear life just adds that little something to the interview... :-)

Also, this:

http://www.iscaliforniaonfire.com/

God its Cold Outside!

I'm in London! Yay! :-)

Aside from it being bloody cold outside, it really is a beautiful city. Today I started out by going to Westminster Abbey - this was maybe one of the coolest things I have ever seen. I love the history -its so cool because the history is the foundation of this country and in lots of ways, the foundation of the US. Seeing the tomb of Queen Elizabeth I and King Henry VII was especially interesting - they're buried at the Abbey with Geoffrey Chaucer, Frederick Handel, Charles Dickens, and a score of other people who have changed the way we view the world. Thats kinda cool. One of the most impressive things is the Coronation Chair, the chair that every king and queen that have been crowned at Westminster Abbey since like 1000 have sat in to get their crowns. Thats really cool - unfortunately they didn't allow photography inside the Abbey, but the chair looks like its been beaten up over the years. Definitely an icon of English history!

This is SOOO cool... Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament















Westminster Abbey


















Trafalgar Square


After my trip to Westminster Abbey, I walked past the Prime Minister's house (just the street - the house is actually sectioned off, but you can walk right by the street) on my way to Trafalgar Square. This was really cool - many streets converge on this giant square and apparently its the biggest or most popular square in London. I walked into the National Gallery and saw a Da Vinci work, then went into the National Portrait Gallery which, in my opinion, was much more interesting. After this, I walked around in Covent Garden and Leceister Square, shopped a bit, before hopping on the Tube (Mind the Gap) to go to the London Tower. Unfortunately, I missed the deadline to have the guided tour of the London Tower, so I just did a self-tour of the place. I may go back sometime this weekend to do the guided tour as I hear its quite good.

















Tower of London...












Mind the Gap...






Its quite a change coming from Dubai to London - from a new city in the global sense to one of the oldest. What a change!