Elizabeth Howard

Elizabeth writes literary non-fiction, haiku, cultural rants, and Demand Poetry in order to forward the cause of beautiful writing. She calls London, Kansas City, and Iowa home.

The Feel of London’s South Side

Last-Chance Londoner, Part II At Coin Street, Gabriel’s Wharf, you are finally there. The gross cement casings of the new theatre parade are behind you. You can see Old London rising up across the Thames, behind its bridges. The clatter of the skateboards has died underneath the Waterloo Bridge. At Coin Street, South Bank yawns…

A Walk in Clerkenwell

Last Chance Londoner, Part I London holds its secrets like a favour. You are only rewarded if you go look for them, and if you ask. I walked today between raindrops, between eras, between churchyards’ gasps of silence and the blat! of a city beside them. I went to St. Paul’s Tube and the City…

Crazy Homies Mexican Dream…

Or, Eating Whacked Burros in a Basement The lengths I will go to for tequila and salsa. We threw a flat-warming for our friends (which meant we had to actually MOVE. I am still suffering dial-up for this.) The result was a very good restaurant recommendation, inspired by our featured drink. The beverage de la…

Different

One Afghani mini-cab driver said in Time Out this week that what surprised him the most when he arrived in London was that “so many people here aren’t white. “I thought that all the men going to work would have the round hat and a stick. (Londoners) have learnt certain attitudes, that have a certain…

Clear Plastic Bag

Lately I’ve been reminded a lot that I don’t have a child. Mom went to Newton, Kansas to be with my sister. She said my sister needed help with her new house. I said, “I guess it’s a good excuse to see Maggie (her granddaughter), too.” “Well, there is that incentive too.” My only girlfriend…

Fruitstock Juices Us

Colin and I were lured by the people streaming through Regent’s Park. I told Frances “it looked like the Trail of Tears, with strollers and picnics.” Colin and I were heading home, from a missed attempt at the Marylebone Farmer’s Market when we stumbled on this. The thing I really like about Innocent Juices product…

Under My Feet

One thing that you lose, when you live a life with a car, is your connection with your feet. I miss my Mazda Protégé. I miss it a lot. I don’t love my life in London, and in lots of ways I can’t wait to be able to just hop in a car again—preferably a…

The Black Hole

Socks. Keys, sometimes. Requests at a restaurant for a lemon in your water or a side of extra sauce that just never arrive. We all know where these things go. They go into this dark place. Well, if you live here, in the United Kingdom, and you move from one flat to another, your request…

Tower after Hours

Well. If you make friends with a yeoman warder, then, eventually, you’re going to have drinks with a yeoman warder. It’s bound to happen. The best place to do that, I guess, is the Tower of London. After we hooked up with Robin at the Pink Martini concert, he invited us to come down the…

Crikey! Cricket!

Just when I thought it MIGHT be safe to go to work at the pub again. Nawp. Sure every other pub in town is sighing with relief at the death of England in the World Cup, but not in this neighborhood. Things are just getting HOT here, and when I say HOT, we aren’t joking.…

Pink Martini and Heavy Hats

If you weren’t at the Tower of London this past Saturday night, you missed two beautiful, and very different things. In no certain order. Pink Martini at Tower of London I believe it may be that communications still occur, via the Atlantic, by Dixie cup and string. And that, my friends, is why the Dionne…

5-7 Units

I’d like to stop. I’m not addicted. I don’t have to have it. The problem is, I don’t, technically, have to give it up yet. No zygote. No pregnancy. No excuse. So why say ‘no’ to just one glass? Just one pint? Just one dram? Sigh. And one, plus one, plus one and, well it’s…

Me and My Bathmat

There are two things I needed to get while I was shopping today: bagels and a bathmat. I got neither, but still managed to spend £200 ($370.50). Such is the dire predicament of shopping in London. I have no bagels, which is fine. I have bread, instead, and we can eat that. Or we can…

How Britain Made Me a Patriot

Nothing about former Attorney General John Ashcroft’s snarling smile, his closed mind, and his Patriot Act could make me proud to be an American. Nothing about our President/Commander-in-chief waving on the side of an aircraft carrier could make me proud to be an American. Nothing about the pathetic two-party system, or the state of our…

Full English Breakfast

After Renee Zellweger made the first Bridget Jones movie, she was quoted in an interview as telling the world how much she liked beans on toast. I don’t like beans on toast. I don’t eat them. I think baked beans on toast are gross, most especially in the morning. It isn’t the beans that offend…