Today your journey will begin with a one-hour warm-up at Soho Gym, just a few minutes from your hotel, because you wouldn't want to break a sweat walking to the gym. Much of the equipment won't be familiar to you, so stick to the exercise bike. (Also, the weight-lifting room will be full of large, muscular men, so try not to embarrass yourself.)
Next, you'll spend some time with the owner of the hotel showing him how to use Google AdWords and Analytics. He won't understand much of it, but he will offer to lower the price of your room by 20%. For some reason, you will argue with him, even though you still don't have a job.
Finally, if it's a beautiful day, you'll head out to walk around the city. Heading north on Earl's Court Road, you'll soon pass into Kensington and then Holland Park, a 22 hectare (55 acre) green space in the city, with playing fields, wooded paths, and open greens. Because it's a beautiful day, the park will be filled to capacity. Notice, too, the young ladies sunbathing in their bikinis.
Emerging from Holland Park, you will be in Notting Hill, or at least close enough that your friends and family won't know any better. (They only care because of the movie of the same name, and somehow they will feel better recognizing at least one place you've been.) Next, head east along Holland Park/Notting Hill Gate/Bayswater/Oxford St/New Oxford St/Theobalds/Clerkenwell. Note that although the street numbering scheme makes absolutely no sense (even and odd numbers on the same side, numbers on one side having no relation to the other side, etc.) the street names change so often that it is easy enough to find what you're looking for.
On your right, you will pass the dual parks of Kensington and Hyde (no relation to Jekyll and Hyde), which together encompass 280 hectares (about 800 acres), similar to Central Park in New York. These, too, will be filled to capacity, because a beautiful day in England is, apparently, quite rare. You will find that, in itself, a depressing thought, but soldier on--you've still got quite a ways to go.
Once past New Oxford St you will be in Camden, Holburn, Islington, and/or St Pancras. To be honest, you won't really know where you are most of the time, so try not to get worked up over it. The point is to get a feel for the different neighborhoods, and you will soon realize that the point about this neighborhood is that it's nearly deserted. Since you don't like people, that's a good thing. You're just a few minutes from the City, so it's undoubtedly a zoo on weekdays, but here you can have the weekends to yourself. You'll even find a pedestrian-only street full of little shops and restaurants (some open).
But don't stop to eat, even though it's 6pm, you've been walking for two hours, and you're quite hungry. Instead, head down Guilford Street to Coram's Field, a large gated park with a sign that reads, "Adults accompanied by children only." This will remind you of the most offensive joke you've ever heard*. (The reason for the park is just across the street: The Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children.) Continue down Guilford until it dead-ends into Russell Square, a beautiful little garden that would be the perfect place to live near if thousands of other people hadn't had the exact same thought over 100 years ago. (You are also just steps from the British Museum, even if you don't know it.)
From here, you are close enough to Covent Gardens to visit again and see if it's as nice as you remember. Head south on Southampton/Kingsway to Aldwych, turn left when you should have turned right, and go all around Bush House, home of the BBC. If there's anything even remotely tourist-related on this journey, this is it. Of course, they're closed.
Now head southwest on the Strand until you are comfortable that yes, indeed, Covent Garden is perfectly situated. It's now 7pm and you are famished, but a friend has told you about a vegetarian cafe in Leicester Square and you think you can just about make it (before you pass out) if you take a short-cut through side-roads. Half an hour later, you are back at the Strand, trying to figure out how to get around Trafalgar Square. Your blood sugar is dropping and you're getting really annoyed, but taking it out on Admiral Nelson isn't going to help.
Eventually you'll find your way to Wardour Street, and in your blind search for a street number, you'll walk right by the cafe. When you finally find it, you will be amazed that they are still open, and they will be amazed that a new customer has come in after closing time. Apparently, the food is prepared in large batches and then sold by the scoop--as unappetizing as that sounds--but they have already taken the food "downstairs," which is probably code for "binned it." They are willing to sell you some at full price, and at this point you're so hungry you would have eaten straight out of the bin, anyway. Take your takeaway down Shaftesbury and through Soho to eat at the steps of a statue in the middle of Piccadilly Circus, with traffic swirling around you. (Hence, "circus.")
Finally, take the tube back to Earl's Court, content that your five-hour journey has gleaned three key pieces of information:
- Covent Garden is still your first choice, but Clerkenwell is perfectly acceptable
- Soho is a seedy drug den, which is probably what the guidebook meant when it said, "alternative lifestyle community."
- You can trust your friend for restaurant recommendations
* Joke by email only. Actually, I probably won't even send it to you. Forget I mentioned it.
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