Another trip to London

In London there is a giant, sparse, Apple store on Regent street not far from Picadilly Circus. I had an appointment there on Sunday at 1 with the "Geniuses." Long story short is the guy we got wasn't helpful or sympathetic and basically a little condescending, straight out asking at first if I used limewire and then implying everything was my fault for not backing up the hard drive. The hard drive had some kind of mechanical failure and all he would offer to do is replace it (in 10 days or so) for free. But I would lose all my data so I wasn't so happy. He also said iTunes wouldn't allow me to re-download everything I've lost because of piracy issues and hey, they warned me to back up my iTunes library.

He gave me the numbers of some data recovery companies in London and said it might cost between 100 and 1000 pounds to save the data, so I should decide how much it was worth. So that was a sweet trip. Plus, it was raining and cold.

My current plan is to try and save the data myself with some online instructions. Thanks to TJ, who you can see diagnosed the problem sight unseen and then offered a better prescription than the "Genius" at the apple store.

But we did more that day than just get frustrated. We also visited the Shell Wildlife Photographer of the Year exhibit at the Natural History Museum. I really like these kind of photo exhibits. In DC the Smithsonian Natural History Musuem had two: one was the National Geographic Photographer of the year show and the other was a collection of photographs in Antarctica. These kind of exhibits are the only chance you get to see photos of interesting places and things blown up way bigger than in a book or computer screen and without a crease running down the middle. I even paid money to see this one.

At this exhibit they didn't blow the photos up as big as they did at the National Geographic one, where they were usually five feet wide or so. Instead, they used really big slide prints that they put in front of light boxes so the light shines through the transparent photo. It makes the colors really bright. Anyway the photos were great. It made me want to get a new camera, one that has a bit more manual control options but will still be small enough to take everywhere easily.

We also finally visited one of the conveyer belt sushi places that inspired the restaurant where Grace worked this summer. It looks like Grace's restaurant was pretty faithful to the original design. But Grace did point out that this place seemed to have less people in the kitchen making a lot more food. And in addition to the waitresses who bring you drinks there were tap and carbonated water dispensers at every seat. Classy.

Today Grace was in London again, this time to get a visa for our trip to Paris this weekend. It was another six hour ordeal but we got it and we leave on Saturday. We're going with the economics group and apparently there's a big rugby match, France vs. England on Sunday which means everyone will be in a pub or bar all day to watch it. Also, I learned that you can bring as much wine back from France as you want, so long as it's for personal consumption. Wine is really cheap there. I might bring an empty suitcase.