HOT: National Theatre Backstage Tour, Southbank SE1 9PX

Transport for London conspired to work against me one last time on my final day in London....hence I arrived 15 minutes late to the National Theatre backstage tour. Luckily, the box office girl also moonlighted as a tour guide sometimes, so she was able to whip me around the first 15 minutes of the tour before dropping me off with the rest of the group, who were in the carpentry and set design area backstage.

The tour provides an interesting insight into the background workings of one of my favourite London theatrical haunts. We were led through various areas, enroute spotting carpenters mending War Horse puppets, artists spraypainting the huge backdrop for the upcoming production of Death and the Kings Horsemen, passing around various latex items from the props department such as an incredibly realistic hamburger, and being told about the massive drop in the Olivier stage which allowed things like swimming pools to be built (Much Ado about Nothing), giant ship prows to rise above the ice (Fram) and the raising of a hot air balloon (His Dark Materials).

The highlight was walking out onto the stage of the main auditorium, the Greek-inspired Olivier Theatre. Surprisingly for such a large theatre, I didn't feel overwhelmed out on stage, and I could even imagine myself addressing an audience :)

HOT: Royal Opera House Backstage Tour, Royal Opera House, Covent Garden WC2E 9DD

My first day of unemployment and the possibilities for fun seem endless! On the spur of the moment, I decided to join the 10:30am backstage tour of my favourite London building, the Royal Opera House. For 9 pounds you get a detailed 1.5 hour tour of the auditorium (the only time I'll get to sit in the 200 pound Grand Tier seats and take in the view from the Royal Box), see the dye room where fabric and shoes are dyed for costumes, peek into the mechanics of the backstage sets and scenery, and best of all, salivate in front of the window of the morning warm-up class for the Royal Ballet. I was thrilled to see my favourite dancers, Carlos Acosta and Marianela Nunez, complete their pirouettes in their tshirts and leg warmers, although it must have been weird for the dancers with all of us standing there mesmerised, like we were watching feeding time at the zoo. Our guide was knowledgeable, funny and full of good factoids, so if you love the ballet and opera it's well worth the time.

HOT: Somerset House Guided Tour, Strand London WC2R 1LA

Every first and third Saturday of the month, Somerset House volunteers take free guided tours of the building, including hidden spaces that are not usually accessible to the public. They are very popular, so its first in. The tour takes you through the history of the palace/government buildings, and includes a wander through the beautiful cantilevered Nelson stairs, the subterranean Deadhouse with Catholic tombstones embedded into the stone walls and a visit to the Barge House with a glass case holding a long, ornate barge.

NOT: Autobiographical Interiors and Objects, Barbican Centre, Silk Street EC2Y 8DS

I don't know much about Le Corbusier, so I thought a talk about his work by Arthur Rüegg, Le Corbusier exhibition curator, would provide some useful insights. Unfortunately, his 30 minute speech was completely unengaging - he sounded like he was reciting from an architecture textbook, full of esoteric terms and convulated phrases. The only thing I learnt was that apparently Le Corbusier was quite a messy person. I found my mind wandering all the time, the lady next to me kept nodding off and clearly the rest of the audience were numbed into a stupor as no one had any questions.

HOT: Dinner@Dana: Brain Man, The Science Museum's Dana Centre, 165 Queen's Gate, South Kensington SW7 5HD

I really like the fact that there is enough interest about science in London that there is a purpose-built building like the Dana Centre, where they regularly hold free seminars and events which discuss science, technology and culture. For one of their dinner events, they invited the savant Daniel Tamett to speak about his condition and his extreme numberical and language skills. I had read that he he could do complex sums in his head with lightening speed, and that he learnt Icelandic in a week, so I'm not sure why I was expecting a dribbling Steven Hawkins lookalike. Daniel was articulate and interesting, and his most interesting proposition was that as well as having a language instinct, we all have a counting and mathematical instinct.

HOT: Meryl Streep: A Life in Pictures, BAFTA, 195 Piccadilly

The British Academy of Film and Television Arts regularly hosts events which celebrate the life and work of people in the film industry, from Cate Blanchett to Anthony Minghella. This time it was the turn of possibly the greatest living actress, Meryl Streep. She was a funny, intelligent and confident - certainly not self-deprecating and carefully dodged more difficult questions. Reading down her list of works it's clear that she's deliberately chosen to work in a wide range of genres in order to avoid being stereotyped - but the consistent thread through all her choices is her desire to undermine your assumptions or expectations about her character. This is what gives the depth and humanity in her roles. The selected clips from her filmography also impressed me with her mastery of accents (for which she's justly famous) - apparently to convince Alan J. Pakula that she was right for Sophie's Choice she read the director some poetry in Sophie's Polish voice, and to get Karen Blixen's accent she listened to tapes of Jeremy Irons' Danish nanny.

HOT: Ferran Adria, Royal Festival Hall, Southbank

"Food is a language, the most universal of all." So began the theme of Ferran Adria's discussion on the role of food as part of culture, tradition and history. His famed restaurant, El Bulli, receives two million requests for 8000 seats a year (I was sadly one of the rejected this year), and while people may not necessarily agree that it is the best restaurant in the world, it is definitely the most influential. In his kitchen/labroratory (though he decries the science behind many of his creations) he has developed a new language in haute cuisine- foams, jellies, alcohol sorbets, deconstructionism and the use of liquid nitrogen. His new 'alphabet' has allowed him to construct new 'phrases', then new 'sentences', until he revealed a mouth-watering video presentation his artfully designed and gasp-inducing dishes.

HOT: Meals at The School of Life, Konstam Restaurant, 2 Acton Street Kings Cross WC1X 9NA

When you first meet someone, how do your conversations normally start? A moan about the weather? Finding out about their job? Where they live? If they're cute, sneakily deciphering their relationship status?

The School of Life aims to get people talking about the things that really matter in life - love, play, work, politics and family. At their conversation dinners (held at the chic, Heatherwick studios-designed Konstam restaurant), your three course meal includes a conversation menu - so along with your roast pork and treacle pudding you debate aphorisms and discuss intriguing questions like:

What do you think makes families happy?
Who have you encountered in your life who has really stood out and why?
If you could give one piece of advice to yourself in the past, what would it be and when would you have received it?

Even though you were talking with a group of strangers, it was only when we had finished running through the menu, revealing deeply personal confessions and anecdotes over 3 hours, that the conversation faltered. I was confronted by the banality of my everyday conversation as we fumbled around awkward silences that petered into sporadic and unfulfilling discussions about the tube, the credit crunch and Wales, unless we bid our hurried goodbyes.

HOT: Campaign For The Titians, National Gallery

Titian's Diana and Acteon and Diana and Callisto are considered the greatest paintings in the Bridgewater Collection, and now they're up for sale. The public campaign needs to raise £50 million to buy the first of these paintings (with an option to buy the second at the same price later) to preserve their public display. I wanted to have a greater understanding of the impact and significance of these paintings, so I joined a free talk with the Director-General of the National Galleries of Scotland, the Head of Education at the National Gallery and art historian/TV presenter Matthew Collings. The most interesting aspect of their discussion was the link made between the spontaneous work style of Titian and the 'painterly' approach of Abstract Expressionism as exemplified by Jackson Pollack, and when they explained to a crotchety member of the audience why it was worth spending £50 million on a bit of canvas and paint during a recession. The dynamic and brightly hued Diana and Acteon is on display with the National Gallery's Death of Acteon until 20 November - see it while you can and support the campaign.

NOT: Kate Summerscale at Living Literature Society, Dickens House

For the first time in HOT OR NOT, I have chosen to split this event into two parts, because I had completely dichotomous experiences at the same event.

Part 1: I had found the Living Literature Society via Time Out and thought that the idea was really interesting - they organise live literature readings or theatrical events, often in historical locations. London is perfect for this, of course, as it was the home of many great writers such as Dickens, Conan Doyle and the Bloomsbury set. So when I was told about their event with Kate Summerscale (ex- literary editor of the Telegraph) at Dickens House, I decided this would be a great opportunity to visit the historical home, hear an award-winning author speak and maybe meet some like-minded literature-reading people. I purchased "The Suspicions of Mr Whicher or the Murder at Road Hill House" and set aside the whole of Saturday to finish it - luckily this impressively researched non-fiction book was an interesting and easy read. The first half of the evening was quite enjoyable as Kate was a lovely, articulate woman and the dim library of the Dickens House was wonderfully atmospheric for her talk. However, the evening headed downhill with the unappetising dinner at the Novotel. While I had expected to hang out with a bunch of pensioners on a Saturday night, I found myself hemmed in the corner with a man of the unfunny, pompous 'chocks away, old chaps' tweed-wearing variety, banging on about how global warming was a myth. I also hadn't anticipated that some of the attendees were treating the evening as a quasi singles-night for over 60s and that I'd get hit on by an old, and obviously lonely, man. It left me feeling quite depressed and slightly sordid.

HOT: British Museum, Great Russell Street WC1B 3DG

Wandering aimlessly through the extensive exhibits at that the British Museum, my opinion of this repository of stolen goods remained the same - it's not high on my list of favourite museums in London. If you're into ancient history, it is endlessly fascinating and if you're a tourist, the mummies and the Rosetta Stone are a must-see. So, if you're neither (like me), I think the best way to appreciate the depth of the collections is to do one of the free eyeOpener guided tours which takes 45 minute to focus on just one part of the collection. We chose 'The World of Money' and an enthusiastic and knowledgeable guide led us through the history of the development of money, from cowry shells, paper money, Roman coins used as propaganda and origins of the word 'dollar'.

HOT: Tate Modern, Southbank

All the HOT or NOT posts so far have been about special exhibitions at the Tate Modern - but what of its permanent collection? While my favourite piece 'The Oak Tree' is no longer displayed, the gallery is still a very worthwhile visit, especially if you participate in the free 45 minute guided tours which run at 11, 12, 2 and 3pm. On a drizzly Saturday and as part of our budget challenge (as a result of a 100 pound not-fun trip to Gatwick Airport chasing a missed flight to Copenhagen - another story) , we decided to go for back to back tours of the States of Flux and Idea and Object. Our guide took us on an informative journey through Lichenstein, Braque, Picasso, Martin Creed, Carl Andre, Mondrian, Brancusi and Sol LeWitt and for me his enthusiasm and knowledge opened up new perspectives and a greater appreciation for the art - or the idea of art?

HOT: Antony Gormley's Blind Light exhibition and 'Imagining the City' panel discussion - Hayward Gallery, Southbank

For the first time in my life I stayed awake for a 2.5 hour lecture and powerpoint presentation after lunch. An absolutely fascinating talk by the Hayward Gallery about the themes behind Antony Gormley's work and the philosophy of architecture and urbanisation. Yalin and I were so shell-shocked afterwards that we decided to reconvene the next day to visit the exhibition. The impressive centrepiece was Blind Light - I won't bore you with a deep intellectual discussion but basically it makes the body the structure, turns the concept of a safe shelter inside out and was an incredibly disorientating yet calming experience. We liked it so much we went in twice. Look out for Gormely's looming sculptures dotted around the LDN skyline as well - the body as the shadow, the background as the foreground. Go and see this - the best exhibition I've seen all year.