Monday, February 18, 2008

Taking it easy

We spent much of Saturday morning at Tate Britain in Pimlico, viewing the Peter Doig and The Camden Town Group exhibitions. The latter was interesting more for the subject matter (everyday life in bustling London) than the rather derivative painting methods (aside from the brilliant Sickert); but the former blew me away. I only became aware of Peter Doig a couple of years ago at The Triumph Of Painting show at the Saatchi Gallery and my excitement over his haunting, large-scale natural and built-up landscapes has not waned.

We lunched at the bustling Japan Centre and then bought groceries from Lina Store, Arigato, the Algerian Coffee Shop, Nicolas, Yauatcha and Fresh & Wild all in Soho. We rushed home - partly to catch the disappointing (for us) Arsenal v. Manchester United game on TV and partly because I was feeling quite weary: as my pregnancy progesses, my pelvic area is getting more achy, due to the hormone relaxin that's released during pregnancy to soften the joints in preparation for the birth of the baby.

Afterwards, we made homemade pizzas with artichokes, olives, sunblush tomatoes and mozzarella and desserted on blue tea, matcha lime and kumquat macarons from Yauatcha.

We've taken Sunday easy, spending most of it reading and now we're chilling out with M's mother and sister who will stay for a dinner, cooked by M, of roast lamb with rosemary and garlic. Tomorrow, we meet up with Oxford friends for dinner in a local Turkish restaurant - K who's completing her PhD and couple D and J, who have three children under 5 and will no doubt be sharing with us many birth and baby tips. And this is a four-day working week for us as we're coming up to our 1 year wedding anniversary and have taken a long weekend to celebrate together in London.

Hope you are having a good weekend - it's still not over!

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

SilentOne

Happy anniversary in advance. Have a great one.
You really must write a series on on 'how to spend an interesting weekend' in London. Your weekends always sound like so much fun.

Anonymous said...

Thank you SilentOne! Tips for a good weekend? A copy of Time Out, any of the quality weekend papers, and a big felt tip pen to circle all the things that look good!

Olivia said...

If I were you, I'd have pooped out after the Tate, but you certainly know how to soldier on and fill a day!

Happy Anniversary!

P.S. It's been so long since I was at Yauatcha. I've been promising my friends since before Xmas.

Olivia said...

P.P.S. Have you ever been to Cocoon and if so, what did you think?

I held my 30th b-day there and the Pan Asian dishes were a dream, not to mention the cocktails.

RD said...

Completely agree with your assessment of the two exhibitions. Doig was brilliant. The Camden group interesting mainly for historical reasons - a very interesting window into historical London... BB

Anonymous said...

Hi O - No, I've never been to Cocoon though I've seen it from the street. May have to check it out.

BB - hope you enjoyed your holiday (or are you still out there?).