We just read Yahoo! news that Detroit got pounded with snow. How bad is it?
Maybe we don't want to come home at all. That would mean we'd have to shovel...
Wednesday, January 02, 2008
A chilly day in Londontown
It's pretty nippy here today. The air temperature isn't so bad, but the wind is whipping out of the North Sea and freezing our ears off.
We didn't start off the day on a very good foot. Well, I didn't anyway. About 15 minutes before our alarm went off, something got blown off the bathroom window sill. It was a great calamity. But, not enough to get either of us out of bed.
Fifteen minutes later, I got up to take a shower. Lo and behold there was my make-up bag sunk in the toilet. Now, I realize I was charmed by the Scottish rain. Not so much about English toilet water. From here on out, you'll just have to get used to me in photos with my baby-fresh face.
But my morning significantly improved while I was watching London's version of the Today show. A story came on about a woman who "was saved by a giant pair of knickers." Intrigued, I sat down to watch. Apparently, a woman was cooking when her frying pan caught on fire. Grabbing whatever laundry she had nearby, she smothered the fire. Not much of a story, right? Wrong. The reporter said the woman was save by her "huge size 20 knickers." And on the screen flashes the woman, semi-toothless, holding her smoke-stained panties up for all of London to see.
My jaw was on the floor. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry for the woman. Here's the reporter, in her kitchen exclaiming at the GIGANTIC SIZE OF HER KNICKERS. And there she is glowing in her 15 minutes of fame. How this qualifies as news--"Woman puts out fire with her Jockey's"--I have no idea. But it made me laugh.
When we finally made it out, we headed right for the British Museum and walked through about 2,000 years of history. We saw:
A colossal image of Rameses II (Moses' arch-enemy, a man mummified in the dessert sands about 5,400 years ago. His name is Ginger. No joke.
We also saw the sculpture from the Parthenon. Yes, THE Parthenon. It truly is amazing what you see when you travel. Our Scottish tour guide in the Highlands said Chinese people take pictures of sheep, Europeans take pictures of cows, but Americans take pictures of anything old. Anything at all. ANd I'm sure it's because we really don't have anything old in our country.
The rest of today was spent looking for the London branch of Tim's Mecca: Cadenhead's Whisky Shop. After leaving Edinburgh, he decided he wanted a sample of whisky from each Cadenhead's we find. So, away we went. After that, we stopped in at Twining's tea shoppe again for a little more retail therapy.
Twining's is in the neighborhood of Temple Church of The DaVinci Code fame. Man, that church is fickle. We can't catch it open at all. We might be able to try again tomorrow, but we'll see.
Well, we're off to Harrod's now. And then the Ceremony of the Keys tonight. The ceremony is the way the guards have been locking up the Tower of London for more than 700 years.
Tomorrow, Portobello Road, Imperial College and the Tower of London (for the Crown Jewels) is in the plan. The sun is out right now, so we best enjoy it while we can.
Tuesday, January 01, 2008
I stepped on dead people
Whew! What a ride!
London is non-stop (except on holidays--then it's a grinding halt), mad rush, swarmed historic blob of amazement. We just realized we only have three days left and we have no idea how to fit it all in. So much for a day trip to Bath. I suppose we'll have to come back.
It took us quite some time to find our little apartment. The roads here greatly resemble Rome--on minute you're walking on Smith Street. The next it's a different name and you're lost. But it keeps us on our toes.
The first full day we had in London seemed to be a day of accidental tourism. We purposefully found Big Ben (not the clock or the tower, but the bell that tolls the hour), Parliment, Churchill's Cabinet War Rooms (fantastic! It's where CHurchill and his eight best friends ran WWII), Trafalgar Square, St. Paul's Cathedral (think Mary Poppins--"and each day, to the steps of St. Paul's the little old bird woman comes") and climbed the dome (huff and puff), Twining's Tea Company. Then everything was closing because of New Year's Eve, so we made dinner at the apartment and headed out into the madness.
NYE in London was an experience. We went to Big Ben again, because there was a huge fireworks display, but realized if we didn't get out of the area, we would be shut in with all the mad Brits partying like it's 1999 (they were fascinated with whistles--FWEET, FWEET! So, we took the longest walk in history--from Big Ben back to our place in Chelsea because the Tube and all the buses stopped running. We thought we'd stop at a pub and drink in the New Year, but oddly enough, the pubs all closed at the ungodly hour of 9 p.m. I guess bartenders need to let their hair down, too.
We didn't end up getting back to the apartment until about 11:30 and found a bunch of 14-year-olds laying around in the lobby listening to loud music and generally thinking they look cool. Not sure why they thought that.
This morning brought Westminster Abby. What a place! I've never seen so many famous dead people in one place. Queen Elizabeth I, Mary Queen of Scots, Henry VII, Charles Dickens, Geoffry Chaucer, Handel (think: Messiah), Edward the Confessor (the same chap from Braveheart who was the evil king). Not to mention the beauty of the place. We brought our lunch along with us and sat near the cloisters and ate it. Can you imagine? We had a picnic inside Westminster Abbey. As we were leaving, there was a parade for New Year's just outside. In celebration, special bell ringers were in the abbey, making the most beautiful music from the towers that I've ever heard. It was like a movie.
The bells could be heard through St. James's Park as we made our way to Buckingham Palace. In the park, we saw the saddest thing. There's birds in the lake--pelicans, which are HUGE (at least up to my shoulder). One pelican made his way to the pedestrian bridge and was immediately surrounded by picture-happy tourists. Poor fella couldn't get out of the paparazzi.
After that, we scratched my Harry Potter itch and found Platform 9 3/4 as well as the place where Hagrid tells Harry, "Stick to your ticket, Harry." We went to find the Magna Carta, but apparently, it needs a holiday. We'll try again soon.
So, tomorrow we go to the British Museum, Temple Church (from the DaVinci Code), and to a concert at St. Martin's-in-the-Fields.
Keep watching. We're loving the comments!
P.S. Sorry about no photos. This was an impromptu stop. We were lucky to find this place. Internet cafes are hard to come by around here.
London is non-stop (except on holidays--then it's a grinding halt), mad rush, swarmed historic blob of amazement. We just realized we only have three days left and we have no idea how to fit it all in. So much for a day trip to Bath. I suppose we'll have to come back.
It took us quite some time to find our little apartment. The roads here greatly resemble Rome--on minute you're walking on Smith Street. The next it's a different name and you're lost. But it keeps us on our toes.
The first full day we had in London seemed to be a day of accidental tourism. We purposefully found Big Ben (not the clock or the tower, but the bell that tolls the hour), Parliment, Churchill's Cabinet War Rooms (fantastic! It's where CHurchill and his eight best friends ran WWII), Trafalgar Square, St. Paul's Cathedral (think Mary Poppins--"and each day, to the steps of St. Paul's the little old bird woman comes") and climbed the dome (huff and puff), Twining's Tea Company. Then everything was closing because of New Year's Eve, so we made dinner at the apartment and headed out into the madness.
NYE in London was an experience. We went to Big Ben again, because there was a huge fireworks display, but realized if we didn't get out of the area, we would be shut in with all the mad Brits partying like it's 1999 (they were fascinated with whistles--FWEET, FWEET! So, we took the longest walk in history--from Big Ben back to our place in Chelsea because the Tube and all the buses stopped running. We thought we'd stop at a pub and drink in the New Year, but oddly enough, the pubs all closed at the ungodly hour of 9 p.m. I guess bartenders need to let their hair down, too.
We didn't end up getting back to the apartment until about 11:30 and found a bunch of 14-year-olds laying around in the lobby listening to loud music and generally thinking they look cool. Not sure why they thought that.
This morning brought Westminster Abby. What a place! I've never seen so many famous dead people in one place. Queen Elizabeth I, Mary Queen of Scots, Henry VII, Charles Dickens, Geoffry Chaucer, Handel (think: Messiah), Edward the Confessor (the same chap from Braveheart who was the evil king). Not to mention the beauty of the place. We brought our lunch along with us and sat near the cloisters and ate it. Can you imagine? We had a picnic inside Westminster Abbey. As we were leaving, there was a parade for New Year's just outside. In celebration, special bell ringers were in the abbey, making the most beautiful music from the towers that I've ever heard. It was like a movie.
The bells could be heard through St. James's Park as we made our way to Buckingham Palace. In the park, we saw the saddest thing. There's birds in the lake--pelicans, which are HUGE (at least up to my shoulder). One pelican made his way to the pedestrian bridge and was immediately surrounded by picture-happy tourists. Poor fella couldn't get out of the paparazzi.
After that, we scratched my Harry Potter itch and found Platform 9 3/4 as well as the place where Hagrid tells Harry, "Stick to your ticket, Harry." We went to find the Magna Carta, but apparently, it needs a holiday. We'll try again soon.
So, tomorrow we go to the British Museum, Temple Church (from the DaVinci Code), and to a concert at St. Martin's-in-the-Fields.
Keep watching. We're loving the comments!
P.S. Sorry about no photos. This was an impromptu stop. We were lucky to find this place. Internet cafes are hard to come by around here.
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