The Netherlands: shameful!

This post will be about what I did on Friday, because hey! Hadn't posted about that yet, either :P
Will try to update my activities of yesterday and today as well, but I'm not promising anything!

At work we started with the papers and then Lesley came to me again, to ask me whether I could look up the addresses of some more Swedish publishers. So that's what I did, though one thing was quite odd: there were also quite a few that are Norwegian. She also thanked me for doing the thing with the employee's handbook (yay me!).
After that I think I prepared a bunch of colouring books that needed to be sent to some company. I also prepared some more author copies (loads of authors, I know :P).
Then it was 13.15 and Maddy and Christina took me out for lunch. We went to a pub and sat on the terrace (yay for sun!). They ordered fish cakes (had never heard of that before!) and I ordered fish and chips. It took AGES for our food to be delivered, but it was quite good!

We ended up coming back half an hour later than usual, because it had taken so long to get our food.
At one moment, Mauro came downstairs and he started talking to me about the EuroVision Songcontest. "The Netherlands yesterday! Shameful! The singin: bad! The clothing: woooorse!" is what he said (try to imagine it with an Italian accent and said very dramatically). Well, to be honest, I've never heard Joan Franka's song (she was the Dutch contestant), but I've seen the clothing and on that subject I completely agree with Mauro! Don't really understand why she had to dress up like an indian.

To be honest, I can't really remember what I did after that... But I know that Mauro told me that on the end of the day I was allowed to take a bunch of books that I'd like to have (challenge!).
Furthermore, I received an email from Hannah to thank me for my sticking-efforts and to say that it had worked out well (I had left it on her desk the previous day, because she was out). When I asked her when the colouring book that I had provided ideas for, would come out, she told me that if I gave them my address, they'd send me a copy! Won't be until next year, but still really nice!

At half 4 (16.30) I got to start picking out books. I ended up with Jane Eyre, Sense & Sensibility, Hollow Earth, Dress Up Kate (also got one for Charissa and Vera), London Colouring Book (also got one for Charissa and Vera) and the first book in the series of Where's the Meerkat? (I just had to get one of those, because they've become pretty much the best sold books from Michael O'Mara).
Then Maddy and Christina gave me this really lovely little mug which has got some flags on it, as well as small Union Jacks.
I said goodbye to the Foreing Sales department (I'd seen them the most during my work experience) as well as to Maddy and Christina, and then it was time to leave.

Given the load of books that I had to carry around in two plastic bags that were bound to break if I just kept them bangling from my wrists, I had to carry them in my hands and try to remain cool. It was very hard, but apparently I succeeded. I was especially successful at the point that I was holding these bags, my oyster card ánd a frappuccino! Yes, I've got some serious feat for carrying many things at once!
Apparently, I looked very cool, calm and London-ish whilst doing this, because at some point a guy came up to me to ask which way Piccadilly was. Well, the funny thing is: I had no idea which direction I had to walk, but I was able to give the man the right directions!
In front of the Charing Cross hotel I met up with Vera and then we walked over to Foyles (which was according to Tom one of the best bookshops in existence), because we didn't know much else to do. We were a bit disappointed, as we had anticipated millions of fiction-books, but the majority of the books were non-fiction (and often scientific- / research-related). We decided to sit in the café and wait for Charissa to get in touch with us, as we had agreed to go out for dinner one last time.
I texted Char several times and called her once, but we didn't get an answer. We assumed that she was no longer interested in coming, as she had said she would see whether she would come.
So at about 20.30 we walked around for a bit and decided to sit down in an Italian restaurant (I know, again. The deal is, their food is good and often affordable!).

We had a really nice time and at about... well, some time after 10pm, we said our dramatic goodbyes which were mainly filled with 'I don't want to go home already!'. We ended with 'See you on Tuesday!' and then we parted. Yesterday Vera flew back already.