Networking through LinkedIn, going underground, and designer lunches in London

A man I’d never met before came up to me: “Didn’t I see you in that film…?”  No, I don’t think he did, but it made for an interesting start to another morning of networking in the glamorous and tempting Grosvenor Casino.  Tom, an actor and presentation skills coach, invited me to join him afterwards for coffee.   

How have I never before eaten in the beautiful Victoria and Albert Museum?! Its restaurant is completely fabulous and is my new favourite place for both lunch and cream tea. If you pop in to a couple of the exhibition halls in between you can easily do both. There’s also a lovely rhododendron-edged garden café with a water feature to paddle in (if that’s your thing).  Or you can wallow in the William Morris-designed gothic renaissance-style dining hall overlooked by massive crystal ball chandeliers.

I absolutely loved it there!!  Barely had time to look around the galleries, although the fashion hall was breathtaking.  The David Bowie exhibition is coming soon… If anyone would like to take me to that and share a giant meringue with clotted cream I can tell you now, I’m free that day!

The journey to the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea isn’t too bad from east London, although some of the people on the rush hour underground are truly vile. When I get the job of ruler of the world I will be immediately banning noisy bottoms and backpacks from trains. It’s great to have a seat and read Frankenstein on my iPhone (still Kindle-less, still liking the classics), but canvas and bums in faces really does make for quite an unpleasant journey.  

Often, if I can’t be bothered to read, I imagine that we’ll come out of the tunnel to find Armageddon.   (Yes, I know there was a TV series about that in the nineties, but I’ve been thinking it since about 1982.)  So I look around the carriage deciding who I would choose to help me repopulate the world…  This week there was no one; what a sorry state of affairs!  

On the subject of TV, Tom advised me to watch In Treatment – a series I’d never heard of about an American psychologist. I think he suggested it because we’d spoken about our psychology degrees, not because he thought I needed to consult one…?  Some people do think I’m a bit mad to meet up with people who find me on LinkedIn, but it’s all about networking, right?

Not watching a huge amount of TV I do miss some good things, but this week at home we’ve both been astounded at the fantasticness of Homeland. I’m stunned we’d never heard of it; what an amazing series. We sat huddled up watching twelve episodes back to back – not since my original viewing of West Wing have I been so enthralled by acting at its absolute best. If you missed it too, try to catch it now. As you know, I rarely recommend TV programmes but this one is so good I even tweeted about it!  

As a side note, I never watch anything live – can’t stand adverts – so I record it and watch it 20 minutes after it’s started.  I still call it ‘videoing’ although I know it’s not.  And anyway, “In my mind and in my car, we can’t rewind we’ve gone too far; pictures came and broke your heart – put the blame on VTR…” 

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