After breakfast, we went up to the main hotel because the lobby has wireless, and I cleaned out e-mail. I spent longer than I would have liked, but the In Box is empty again, so that’s all well and good.

Ken went to work and I eventually went back to the room, but as I knew he’d be back after his brief 11 a.m. meeting to check out, I didn’t get involved in writing—I figured I’d dive in whilst sitting at the office. Alas, his meeting started way late, and I ended up sitting in the lobby for an hour. I had stuff to read, at least. The good news was that he didn’t have to go back in to work, so we were free to run an errand and get to Birmingham earlier than planned.

Then we remembered how Britain can be irritating instead of wonderful, in the form of trying to find lunch. First we went to a Chinese place we’d seen. It wasn’t open for lunches. Okay, that’s fair. We were starving, so we figured we’d just go next door to the Indian place we’d eaten at the night before. The door was open; the sign said it served lunch at that time. The host looked a little confused, had us sit down, and scurried into the back. He came back and babbled at us, the gist of which was that the chef was gone and nobody in the kitchen could cook. Um. Okay. Then lock the door and put out the Closed sign. So we went to a generic pub, which had a sign outside that said “Food Served All Day”. Only to be told there was a 30-minute wait for food. Now I’m not only starving, I’m really cranky. Out of desperation, we decided to go to McDonald’s. As we got there, however, we remembered the not-thrilling-but-acceptable chain restaurant nearby, and went there. The service was slow, the food was mediocre (although my salad involved grilled haloumi, which was tasty and unique), and they screwed up our bill (when we finally got it). We probably would have been better off at McDonald’s, at least timewise.

We then went on a quest to find the offices of Celtic Spirits Ltd, makers of Black Mountain Liqueur and other fine and tasty drinks. It took us a while, but we made it just in time, and picked up a few items for ourselves and for gifts.

We had to fight roadwork on the way to B’ham, and ended up taking some B roads, which slowed us down, but was at least prettier. We happily arrived at Amanda/Dave/Gordon’s (Dave is working in London, though), where we’ll be staying for the weekend. Amanda went off to her Aikido class and Gordon picked up a mess of Indian food. We finished the evening full of yummy food and the company of good friends.