sunshine, lebanese food, warhol and hot chocolate!

Friday was a good day. The sun was shining, it actually felt warm (by winter standards), and we all went out together for the first time in forever (I honestly don’t recall the last time we were out together for something leisurely. It’s been that long).

Lucas is on the hunt for new black-hooped earrings, so we browsed around Grand Central and Bold Street with little luck. The initial plan was to have lunch at Botan (apparently voted the best place for kebabs outside London) but it was closed when we went by, so plan B was to go to Bakchich for Lebanese street food instead, after quickly nursing Ares at FACT. I was a little hesitant about going to Bakchich, as the last time we ate there, I broke out in a nasty case of hives that lasted four very itchy days. I suspected it was something in the lamb shawarma that I reacted to, as that was the first time I’d had it (previously, I’d always gone with chicken). The waitress was incredibly nice and offered to find out what ingredients might be in the lamb but her blanket term of “some spices” didn’t exactly help. Oh well. I played it safe and went with the chicken again. Ares had some clementine while we waited for our food to arrive, and loudly demanded each piece every time he’d swallowed the previous one. The lady sitting at the next table seemed amused.

We headed over to the Tate after to see the Andy Warhol exhibition on its third last day. I don’t usually pay for exhibitions but it’s Andy Warhol! It was Lucas’ and my second time seeing an exhibition of his, the first being at the AGO back in 2006 (we went to the gallery late, hung out at Sam the Record Man, watching Charlie Chaplin in their shoeshining chairs, and then caught the midnight bus to Ottawa, where we were scouting for apartments all weekend). Raspberry was most excited about seeing Warhol’s iconic banana, but I think she enjoyed the exhibition as a whole. She seemed unfocused, running from one work to another and then back to me, urging me to come over and see something really cool. There was a darkened room with music and films projected onto the walls and Ares had a good time crawling around in there. Every time I offered to pick him up, he’d crawl backward away from me with a cheeky smile on his face (this is his new parlour trick). I felt bad dragging him away from it eventually, but seriously, I’m not spending the whole time in a makeshift disco. He was wiggly thereafter and while I usually put him on the floor in galleries, it was too busy for him to crawl around. It was a great exhibition. I think I most enjoyed seeing Warhol’s graphic design work, particularly his blotted line drawings. We spent a little time in the Art Dock after, building towers with foam blocks to knock over or in Ares’ case, to chew, much to our chagrin. It didn’t take much to convince Raspberry to leave the Art Dock once we said we were going to get hot chocolate in the cafe. She was especially excited as we each got one this time, rather than sharing, as we normally do. I’d promised Raspberry she could get a Warhol banana postcard, so we did, in addition to several others (they had an end-of-exhibition sale so lots of items were half-off). Postcards are my typical exhibition souvenir. We left as the gallery was shutting its doors and the sun was just setting, ending one of the best days I’ve had in a while.