New Friends, Pints, and... Shoes.

Last night was a success!  Well, sort of.  Kaeline and I never ended up meeting with everyone else because the plans got mixed up and nobody has any phones yet.  So we went to the Castle, which was a very laid back pub, and had a couple pints and met a few new English friends.  It was a very nice group of older men, probably in their fifties I would think, and one younger man, probably in his mid-twenties.  Because we told them we were from California, the first thing they asked us was, "What is your favorite film?"  So we talked about all the great American and European films, like "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" and "One Flew Over the Cookoo's Nest".  I'm pretty sure we talked about films and tv for about an hour, after which we decided to go over to O'Neil's Pub to check if our friends were over there.  But they weren't.  So we walked back to The Moon on the Hill Pub and went in there to have another pint before going home.  We weren't sitting at the table for very long before a guy came over and sat down next to us.  His name was Damien.

"I said to my friend that we should go over to that table and talk to those girls, but my friend said no because he thought you were lesbians." -Damien

What the fuck?  Do I look like a lesbian?  I'm pretty sure I don't.  We reassured him that we weren't.  I guess in England it is unusual for two girls to go into a pub by themselves.  I was a little offended, but his friend was gigantic and ugly so I didn't feel too bad about it.  Anyway, it turns out that Damien is the new manager of the Castle, and last night was just his night off, which is why he was at the Moon.  The big one, Russell, actually turned out to be a nice guy, so I forgave him for calling me a lesbian.  We went back to the Castle with them to have some free drinks, and in my tipsiness, I challenged Russell to a beer drinking contest for tonight!  You see, English beer is much lighter and has less percentage of alcohol than American beer, which we had learned throughout the night.  I also have a rather large ego about my beer-drinking abilities, which are almost never as good as I think they are.  So of course I can't back down, especially now that Kaeline told all of our friends about it and they are planning on coming to the Castle to cheer me on, but I am pretty certain that I will not win, seeing as Russell is about 10 times larger than me.  Wish me luck!

Today, Kaeline and I slept in until about noon, then went to the downtown area of Harrow to meet up with some of our American friends.  We all figured out our phone situations, had lunch at O'Neil's, and then went to the mall!  We walked right into H&M where I bought these shoes:

It was kind of an impulse buy, but as Saida said, "If you see something you like, just buy it."