Royalty wierds me out

So I spent most of Friday at Buckingham Palace. I was there for the changing of the guards (as well as many numbers of pushy German tourists shoving or stepping on me for a possible better view) as well as toured the Royal Mews, the Queen's Gallery and the state rooms at the palace itself. The weather was lovely, the grounds impressive and the palace sufficiently glitzy. However, I found myself distracted by the thought of all that accumulated wealth and the fact that British taxpayer’s foot the bill for their grand lifestyle (its official – I’m a geek). As I was strolling the bit of the grounds open to the public for the two months of the year the royal family is away in Scotland, I couldn't help tallying the cost of the grounds keeping, the guards and all the like for what is essentially an extended footpath for 6 people. It makes me feel all sex-pistoly inside, and I just paid an exorbitant admission charge, not a chunk of my yearly wages. But anyways...after that it was off to Carnaby Street to poke around until Jim and Tessa got off work. We met up at Shakespeare’s Head, a traditional little English pub and had a few pints. (Have I mentioned my growing love for Strongbow?....) We then went to this strange little restaurant in Soho called Garlic and Shots. There are two branches, one in London and one in Stockholm. They serve lots of...garlic and shots...and Swedish food. There's something a bit incongruous about eating garlic laced Swedish meatballs while drinking shots named things like "black death" and listening to American metal and punk. It was, however, totally yummy and loads of fun. After many shots and a bit of Murder City Devils we left in search of more pints, which is appearing to be a running theme during my stay in London. Tessa and Jim are having a few friends over this evening for a little get-together; so much of the day has been taken up with bits of cleaning interspersed between episodes of Footballer’s Wives. For those of you not familiar with the show, it the trashiest fun ever, as in totally wild plot lines combined with tawdry sex and dark little secrets. After watching a few episodes you kinda feel like you need a shower…but in a good way.