What I did in February 2020

[squirmelia]

This doesn't feel like it was only February that all these things happened, it feels like a lifetime ago, in a whole different universe.

February 1st, I helped run an Ingress First Saturday event in Greenwich! 62 players plus a few non-players turned up and wandered around Greenwich looking at their phones.

That evening, I went to jacquic's 40th birthday party at Fontaine's Cocktail Bar. There were cocktails and dancing and I drank a Commodore!

I continued going to an evening class on Sound art: installations and sculptures and we tried recording the sounds of trees and electronics. I listened to bus stops. It was a fun class.

There was a power cut in my area and I read a book with a head torch on.

I went to Limehouse Labs a few times and played Beat Saber, actually used the 3D printer, saw trinitite being tested for radioactivity, listened to the Prodigy via bone conductive earphones, and probably some other things I don't remember now.

Adam and I went to Tower Bridge to see Di Mainstone's exhibit on playing the bridge. We also saw the Nam June Paik exhibition at the Tate Modern and watched strange television sets and moved a tape reader over some cassette tape on a wall to listen to the sounds.

There were bad storms in February and one Sunday I only made it out of the house as far as the river and collected fallen branches with pretty lichen on them and photographed them.

I visited Bromley one Saturday and had coffee with my mum and did a bit of an Ingress banner.

I saw the Nevin Aladag – Fanfare exhibition at the Hayward Gallery.

I ate toffee apple and bourbon ice-cream and halva pistachio ice-cream.

I met up with froodthehoopy for drinks and it was good to catch up.

I went on the Mail Rail train with abigailb, mrs_leroy_brown, Tlrmx and glyn and that was fun! We also looked around the Postal Museum and then ate food at the Apple Tree.

I saw the Dora Maar exhibition and and the Dóra Maurer exhibition at the Tate Modern with obandsoller and then we ate food at Tibits.

I used a field recording of a metro in Russia that someone had made and made a remix of it for a website.

One Sunday, I jumped aboard the boat to Greenwich and did some Ingress banners.

One evening, I went to Vanilla Black with colleagues to celebrate our birthdays and we ate delicious food. I had the edamame bean ice cream, sesame cracker and nasturtium with
crispy soy sauce, pea and edamame bean salsa as a starter, then I think I had doughnut, chilli jam and sesame, falafel custard and pickles, followed by pear and ginger sorbet, poached pear and pomegranate shortbread and rice cracker.

On the last day of my thirties, I ate flying saucers and ran outside to stare up at the sky as the snow fell.

I turned 40 and opened my cards and presents (such as a bag made from bouncy castles! And a book printed with cosmic dust!) and then caught a plane to Porto in Portugal. British Airways gave me a birthday card from the crew and champagne! I remember looking out the windows of the train on the way to the city seeing lemon trees and pylons. I visited the Castle of the Cheese and stared up at the She Changes sculpture and walked along the beach and watched the waves and the surfers. They were great waves! I felt happy to celebrate my birthday on the beach in the sunshine!

The next day, it was still February! I caught the funicular, walked across the bridge and then went for a ride on the cable car and admired the views of Porto. Porto is so pretty! I walked back across the bridge, but on the top section and then did an Ingress banner that let me around Porto. I ate some port ice-cream. In the afternoon, it was time for the Ingress Hexathlon! This involved a bit of hectic game play. Once it was finished, I visited the Sao Bento train station, which had pretty tiling, and then I met up with some other players for sangria and then we ate pizza and tasted different kinds of port.

Comments

[fluffymormegil]

I drank a Commodore!

My inner geek voices the presumption that this was not a cocktail with 64 or 128 ingredients :)

[squirmelia]

Sadly not, but I did choose the drink because the name made me think of that Commodore. :)