The Book of Mormon

TLOML and I saw The Book of Mormon last night, thanks to the savvy foresight of our favourite cultural guru. It's the hottest ticket in town right now and she booked it, it seems to me, before Parker and Stone had even hired the theatre. Seriously, she's that good.

It was a treat to see the show that everyone's raving about. It was great to catch up with our cultural guru over some killer margaritas. (I opted for frozen, because - have I mentioned this? - it's so damn hot here at the moment). And it was a huge treat to be in a large airconditioned theatre in the middle of this horrible heatwave.

Given that The Book of Mormon is a musical from the creators of South Park, I was expecting hilarity and irreverence. But who knew it would also be so educational?

We don't have a lot of Mormons in the UK, so I had a lot to learn.

Did you know all Mormons have to wear special Mormon underwear, which looks like a kind of Victorian romper? And that they believe after the resurrection, Jesus popped in to America on his way up to Heaven? And that most of this and their other tenets are based on the translation some dude made of some 'gold plates' with ancient scripts he found in his backyard in upstate New York, which an angel called Moroni tipped him off about?

Me either. You live and learn. Join me on my educational journey by watching this neat summary of what the Mormons believe:

And a history of the roots of the religion:

Genius.

Welcome to hell / I heart NY

'Welcome to hell' is what TLOML said when I showed him this weather forecast. (In American this is 104 degrees!) TLOML is right. It is hellishly hot.

We miss Malibu's temperate clime, the ocean breeze and cool starry nights. Sigh.

So I'm cheering us up by pointing out great stuff about NYC that we didn't get in the 'Bu. Reasons to heart NY.

Like the fact that tonight we are going to see the Book of Mormon, satirical and musical work of genius and the hottest ticket in town.

And we can saunter down leafy streets like this:

Chelsea has lots of lovely brownstone streets. I like.

And cool buildings that pop up out of nowhere like this:

It's unassuming but really cool. And in the middle of a nondescript block. Just nice.

And this:

And buy slices of pizza from dudes like these pros:

...although maybe not on a day when NYC is hotter than the sun.

Five reasons not to be a hater. I'm trying, New York, I'm trying!

Hot in the city

This post is dedicated to all the New Yorkers I have met who, on hearing I'm from London, say 'wow, betchya don't miss the weather'.

Actually, I do. The weather outside is frightening! Leaving the apartment is like walking into a steamy shower room. I retract all my previous advice about walking in the sunshine. New advice: DO NOT WALK OR OTHERWISE ATTEMPT TO PROPEL YOURSELF ANYWHERE. At least not between 6am and 10pm.

Unless of course one of those massive thunderstorms roll in - as they often seem to do - in the late afternoon. In which case, it will be lovely and fresh outside. For an hour, till the temperature rises again. Grrr.

It's extremely hard to look as fresh and lovely as this young lady when it's so hot that, literally, your calves are sweating.

Malibu has famously amazing weather so of course the contrast I experienced on moving to NY  is pretty painful. But even compared to London, New York weather SUCKS.

I don't know why London gets such a bad rap. Just look at the facts:

This chart shows average high temperatures in London versus New York. Look at that crazy summer high! And the crazy low (and the average low in NY is well below freezing)! How on earth are people supposed to equip themselves for tropical heat and artic cold, in a city where the average wardrobe is the size of a shoebox? Frankly it's inhumane.

And the rain... to think London gets labelled as rainy, when NY has literally double the rainfall.

The rain is annoying- but it's the injustice I can't bear!


Right, rant over. I'm off to have a cold shower.