Lots of catching up still to do!

Ok I have a lot of catching up to do, so when better to do it on a Friday night in Liverpool! So ill jump right back into it: I went to the tourist info office for my walking tour. The guide gathered everyone together and asked where we were all from. I was first to go so I said new York. She was over the moon! She told me she had just been there, then turns to everyone else and says "if you haven't been to new York before, its worth a visit!" Then there were some other Americans and they said they were from Idaho, and she goes "oh I think my plane flew over there on my way to California from new York." Haha! I seriously love being from new York, I love the reactions I get from people. And the guys love it!! I feel like Jesus when I say I'm from Brooklyn. Like when I said I was from Brooklyn to Neil and crew they asked if I knew jay z. Like seriously, it is such easy pickings being American in a different country, especially from being somewhere as cool as brooklyn. So if any of you out there want to get laid, be sure to just tell people that's where you're from! But anyway, moving on from that tangent, we walked around Manchester and learnt about some locals and the buildings. I spoke to a few ladies, one told me her son is doing a conservation degree at imperial. I then wanted to ask for his # but I didn't think that was appropriate. So The German markets were on in full force, which caused the tour to go over time cause we had to pass thru the intense crowds, so I didn't make it to ethiad or whatever (man city stadium), so instead I went to a new exhibit at the art gallery that was inspired by the Iceland volcano eruption. So after that I checked in to the yha, had a hot receptionist (I think its a rule that all males that live/work/visit Manchester must be sexy) but didn't chat with him at all. I had dinner and met the girls in my room who were both from Spain. One was working at a biotech research lab at man uni and the other was looking for work, and I told her about alexs woes so she thought it would be best for her to move down to london and try her work there. So anyway, I met up with Louis, Alex and alise (this is the correct way to spell her name) and Louis's coworkers at a pub called apotheca and we did a pub quiz. It was all English questions except for "what state is nicknamed the bear state?" I said Montana, but it was Arkansas!! What bears do they have there besides the ones I see on xvideos? After the quiz, most of his coworkers left, but this American guy from Tennessee and these two other guys came with us. It was one of those other guys bday party and he was pretty drunk, so it was quite the interesting antics walking to the next bar. He asked where I was from, and as you can imagine that went over well. Once the other guy whose name I forgot heard I was from Brooklyn he immediately came over and started asking me questions about it. I could have pulled him I'm sure but I definitely wasn't attracted to him. Drunk bday guy said he was from derby and I said I went there and he asked if I liked it and I said I liked notm better lol. So we went to the other bar, it was okay, the music was decent, but I wasnt feeling the people I was with (other than my crew) so I wasn't really having fun. Although the American invited me over to his for thanksgiving and I really wanted to go but I had already booked for Liverpool. So I decided to leave after not too long. Plus I was real tired!! So Alex and alise left with me and we eventually split up and I walked back to the yha. Monday: The next morning I went on the man city stadium tour, got a bit lost on the way there, so I stopped to check a map and the road was real strange, it was like a small, tree lined, brick road, so it didn't strike me as a place where cars can drive down, so I didn't look when I spun lance around after checking the map and I was inches away from getting hit by a car driving down the street. I seriously don't know how it didn't even braise me cause it didn't swerve out of the way either, the douchehead! But yeah I got to the stadium, I had to go to the team store to buy my ticket. So I had seen they had a concession price online so I assumed that was for students, but it wasn't, it went by age. So the lady asked how old I was when I asked for a concession ticket and that caught me offguard so I said 24 which was obviously the wrong answer and i knew it right after I said it. She said oh so you get the adult ticket and I asked how old was the concession and she said 21 or younger. Grrrr I'm such an idiot!! Then I literally had to run to the meeting place since it was starting in 4 minutes. It was a good tour, went to the seats, the exec boxes, the locker rooms (<3333 Joe hart!!) And some VIP seats. After the tour I checked out the visitor center exhibition, then rode around checking out the sculptures and memorials around the stadium. Went crazy looking for b on the bang and didnt see it so I eventually asked the security guard at the store but he said it was removed cause it swayed too much in the wind. So after that waste of time I went back to the same map where I nearly got run over, they had some info about the neighborhood and apparently there was a stegasaurus sculpture in the nearby park so I went there, but I never found it. The park was nice, that's where the canal was so I followed that for a bit (saw a guy with my same bell!) Then when I got to the city centre I went to a pop culture exhibit which had art work on Hannah barbera cartoons, star trek, batman etc. So that was cool. I then went back to the MOSI. went to the same experiment exhibit as the day before, except there were no kids and it was sooooooo much nicer!! When it closed I went to aldi to buy dinner, saw some really awesome Christmas lights on a pub, and just all over deansgate, market street, etc. It was so lovely!! Really got me excited for xmas! So when I was riding through the busy market street I lost control of lance for a second and I rode into a ladys handbag! She was not too happy! So after I got my cheap pizza I went back to the yha. Lots of Portuguese guys for the game vs man utd. One tried to ask me where he could find a plug adapter, but his English was horrible so that took like 15 min just to ask one question. I chatted more with the girls from my room, they are real nice. So I was supposed to go out with Alex and Louis one last time (alise had left for liverpool, and I was heading to wigan the next morning), but I was so exhausted I told Alex I was going to stay in. He said he wanted to see me before I left so I said I would meet up with him at some point Tuesday. Ok so now Tuesday: I went to the police museum which was really awesome. Even the guys who worked there were intrigued that I was from new York. One asked if I wanted to try on some of the uniforms and see the weapons (not the pistols!) So that was real cool, I have some photos of me dressed up!! They had a female cell room that you could walk through, a courtroom and some old artifacts. After the museum I called Alex and met up with him at starbucks, but only for a minutes cause I needed to get on with my journey. So I said my goodbyes, then he texted me a few min later saying he forgot to give me something but I said I couldn't turn back around, so I felt a bit bad but what can I do? I was already running behind schedule. So my official leaving time was 2:39 pm. I got really lost as soon as I crossed over to salford so I had to call mike a few times to set me straight. I was going fine although I never found sustrans route 55 but then the road curved and changed names so I asked a local where the park was that I had to cut thru and he had never heard of it ( and judging by his lack of pronounciation, he was a mancunian his whole life) so I just said screw sustrans and used my gps. So I went along busy a roads but it was pretty straight forward, although I did get lost a few times more. I passed a lidl as I was getting close to the hotel so I stopped and bought 3 frozen pizzas for £2 - amazing deal! I made it to the wigan hotel called bel air (I rode pretty much in the darkness for the whole journey) at 6:15 pm, doing 20.29 miles, avg 8.5 mph. But my compy sensor kit on the rim kept moving so sometimes the compy wasn't working properly, so that's not entirely accurate. So when I checked in I saw they had no kitchen or microwave, so what did I do? I ate the frozen pizza as is!! It was not the yummiest of pizzas.. but that didn't stop me! So Neil came by, the hotel was above a pub so we watched that man u vs Portugal game, then did a pub quiz which we were horrible at, but it was fun nonetheless. Ok no more for tonight, I need some shut eye!