Mind The Gap & Pint

2 Pints of Milk

Today I’ve been pissed off, but I managed to buy 2 pints of milk. When I am really angry or depressed, walking is my remedy, and thinking is such a burden I wish I was an irrational animal. But, somehow, in this area I’m in, I don’t know to which direction I should walk. It’s the return walk that holds me back more than anything, and I really want to save money until my Oyster card arrives - when it does I’ll go on the tube as many times as I please; maybe everyday for all I care. Can’t wait for that! The other option is it being Saturday, but it can’t be Saturday every day, right? So I have to stay. 

It rained today. Finally it looks like the typical London stereotype. Although it didn’t rain for a long period of time. Let’s hope tomorrow is a better day: not weather-wise, but for me. I really can’t talk about the reason, but if nothing is done, one year from now, this blog will shelter the most astounding complaint. Wait and see. 

DVDs, Blu-Rays, CDs…

Once again I’m impressed. And while it will seem a repetition, I would like to maintain this point of view. Don’t get me wrong, London is expensive. It really is, but then you enter an HMV store and you look at the price tag of DVDs and Blu-Rays, and all of a sudden you want to buy the entire stock. You find DVDs at from £3/£4 to £8, that are not bad films, but even great masterpieces. You have Blu-Rays at 7 bloody Pounds, also at £12 or £15! The exact same films would cost me 20 to 25 Euros! For example, the first season of Downtown Abbey, the new British Television hit, is priced at £10 in DVD and £15 in Blu-Ray. You have seasons of (good) well-known television dramas at £20, when they would cost me €45, and I’m not exaggerating. Even boxes with an entire show, from pilot  to finale, are, well, cheap. 

Not to mention music. While the difference isn’t that huge, it is still very considerable. If a well-established middle-class British resident is found out downloading music illegally, he or she should be incarcerated in the Tower of London. The price is really acceptable. 

This is like surfing through the invisibles aisles of Amazon, but without the shipping costs. Plus, you get to feel the package. 

Book store…shop

I was living in a place where the price of a book, any book, was outrageously expensive. If by any chance I found a book at 15 euros, it would be because it was a very promising day. It was the second reason that lead me into reading in English - the first was that I obviously liked it. It is sad to observe how culture is still considered, in many places, as an “elitist product”, rather than something that is needed to maintain our balance and (mental) health, just like food, water or oxygen.  

I went to Waterstones to buy a book. I was going for some classic American Literature, but then I realized I was in London and how cool it would be if I read some Dickens over here. A Tale of Two Cities cost me £6.99! Okay, I won’t convert it into US Dollars, but considering a Briton perceives one pound as a pound, just like a Continental European perceives one euro as an euro, and an American one dollar as a dollar… it is cheap! And I didn’t get a bad edition at alI. It’s a normal book, quite agreeable actually. And most books here are around £7.99 to £9.99. Of course, hardcover books, the latest editions or specific books, like biographies, history and so on are more expensive, but you can’t say the reason you’re not reading is the price. Or that you’re only reading bullshit because you can’t afford something better, because with only £6.99 I got to read this:

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity , it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going directly to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way - in short, the period  was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.

Quite cheap, huh?