London in September

Owen woke up chipper and ready to go on Friday morning. In fact, he was feeling so well, I took him to school to perform his part in the morning assembly with the rest of his homeroom. It was a skit about "respect" and they did a great job. Owen played the part of a scientist.

An American friend gave us a lift to the train station and two hours later, we met up with Craig at Paddington Station without any snafus. He was able to check into the hotel and we ditched our luggage and spent the rest of the day seeing the sights. Our first stop was The Monument to the Great Fire of London ("The Monument").


Craig really wanted to see this and we got to go up inside. There were many spiral steps, but the views were worth it.
From Wikipedia:
"The monument consists of a fluted Doric column topped with a gilded urn of fire and was designed by Christopher Wren (famous London architect) and Robert Hooke. Its 202 foot height marks the monument's distance to the site of Thomas Farynor, the king's baker's shop in Pudding Lane, where the fire began."
Also, "Wren and Hooke built the monument to double as a scientific instrument. It has a central shaft meant for use as a zenith telescope and for use in gravity and pendulum experiments that connects to an underground laboratory for observers to work (accessible from the present-day ticket booth). The steps in the shaft of the tower are all six inches high, allowing them to be used for barometric pressure studies."


Little knobs on the handrail so kamikazes can't slide their way down

I had booked a spot on the London Eye for all of us that afternoon. The London Eye aka the Millennium Wheel is a ferris wheel which is about 450 ft. tall, is supported only on one side and hangs over the River Thames. About 25 people can fit into each pod (we only had about 12 in ours) and it slowly takes you up and around, affording spectacular views of the city a little bit at a time. We all really enjoyed the ride and looking at London from a bird's eye view.





Houses of Parliament

Big Ben

Charing Cross train station

The County Hall
It is now where you get tickets for the Eye and serves as a general tourist information place.

Owen McCarter starring in the blockbuster film Eye'm Alone
Fortunately, there will never be an Eye'm Alone II.

Cool photo of the park where we played while waiting for our Eye flight

That evening, we all crashed back at the hotel. At around 11 PM, we were then all awoken by the murderous sound of a fire alarm! Everyone except Craig was reluctant to get out of bed and as soon as we did, the alarm was turned off and determined to be a false alarm. Quite the adventure...

I also had purchased tickets to see an attraction called the London Dungeons (not to be confused with the dungeons in the Tower of London) so we went there early Saturday. The London Dungeons is like a haunted house with real actors that put on short skits about gory disasters that have happened in London throughout the ages. Topics included: the plague, the great fire, Sweeney Todd, Jack the Ripper, general information on how people were tortured and hung long ago, Victorian surgical processes... I think you get the picture. There was a mini log flume ride and a drop of doom type thing. Owen swore he saw Sweeney Todd lurking around us in the dark and trying to cut our hair (the seats had air pressure puffs to simulate this). It was so cute how sure of this he was/is. Craig, Evan and I thought it was hokey; Finn and Owen were hooked. FYI ~ Any children below the age of eight would probably be scared to death of this attraction.

Beware of humped pelicans!
In more ways than one...

We walked around and across a lot of the bridges in town. I really liked the Tower Bridge which I had always thought was the London Bridge. However, London Bridge is MUCH newer and more modern because it is just as old as I am!




View of 30 St Mary Axe, also known as "The Gherkin" and the Swiss Re Building while on Tower Bridge
This is probably my favorite skyscraper ever.

View of the Tower of London after crossing the Tower Bridge

Under London Bridge

Millennium Bridge, I think

We also went to Picadilly Circus - which truly WAS a circus, it was so busy - to visit the Royal Academy of Arts but the queue was very long. I overheard that the featured exhibition had just been in the paper which explained all of the crowds crowding to get in to see it.




Craig next to a mini Tardis in Picadilly Circus

We went to Trafalgar Square for the Eid Festival (our first and last) and Covent Gardens for the street entertainment.



After a full night's rest, we headed back to Paddington Station

and only experienced a slight delay between Gloucester and Cheltenham when the conductor had to stop and wait to see if it was safe to proceed past a railside fire (what IS it with this weekend and fires???). We arrived home by 1 PM. Success!

Don't Know How to React

Since Craig is arriving in London early Friday morning, we decided to take a mini-vacation to the big city. I booked train tickets for the kids and I for a Friday morning departure at 10:30. When I told the kids they would be missing school on Friday, ALL THREE OF THEM said "Awwww, why?" in very disappointed tones. Now I was flabbergasted because I would have killed to get a hookie day that I didn't have to beg for from my parents and to London to boot! Here is the reason for their dismay:

1. Owen and Finn have (respectively) clarinet and saxophone lessons on Fridays and neither one wants to miss their lesson.

2. Evan and Finn have their first "mufti" day where they pay a pound to wear casual clothes at school for the day and the girls make cakes which are sold at break time and lunch. All of the proceeds from the day are then donated to charity. Cakes, street clothes and music lessons, I don't know what to say... I guess I am going to have to promise a ride on the London Eye to make up for the inconvenience.

September is Pheasant Feathers are Flying Month

So last year about this time, I remember driving to the base and thinking that a truck had dropped a load of brown chickens with pretty feathers one-by-one along the side of the road and they died on the roadside after getting hit. So this year, same time, same route, I see another bunch of the same bird feathers (which I now know to be pheasant after visiting a few pheasantries - the kids are fascinated by pheasants) all along the side of the road. This gets me to wondering why pheasants choose September to commit mass suicide on the British roads. Can anyone tell me why this phenomenon occurs this time of year?

I am not imagining this either. There are nowhere near the number of bird carcasses on the roads at any other time of the year AND as I was stopped at a traffic light, a pheasant ran in front of the car AND as I was driving down a very busy double lane A road (imagine a two-lane Rt. 50), a pheasant ran in front of a bunch of cars ahead of me. He crossed safely (this time) which would lead Darwin to deduce that natural selection is working and the genes for smarter street-wise pheasants will be propagated hopefully, but obviously natural selection is not occurring at a quick enough rate as proven by the number of pheasants on the roadside!

Then I start thinking about the sheer number of pheasants hiding in the British grasses. If this many find an untimely death on the roads or at the business end of a shotgun, then how many survive? Bazillions has to be the answer. They must be the cousin to free-range chickens except they are prettier than most chickens albeit just as stupid. Now for a brilliant segue from chickens: Why did the pheasant cross the road? Because it was September in Britain.

Early Morning Drama

At 0230 this morning, Craig shoots up out of bed and exclaims, "Dang it!" since the alarm did not wake him up for his 0230 coach to Heathrow. I quickly rush downstairs to check on train times (none worked) and then tried to look on the National Express website for the next coach but the website was down for maintenance. Our only option was to have me drive him there (ugh). But by then, my husband's brain had cleared. He has taken this coach before at the same time and remembered that it stops in Swindon for a 20-minute or so layover. So we jumped in the car and headed for Swindon.
Now Swindon is the town of the "magic roundabout" which is a regular roundabout with six other roundabouts spouting from it like spokes in a wagon wheel. To say that I was apprehensive about driving there is an understatement. However, at 0300 hours, Swindon is a treat and so well-marked, I was ecstatic. We pulled into the coach station, the 222 to Heathrow was parked in a bay and we were golden. I am so grateful for Craig remembering the layover because I really didn't want to spend my early Sunday morning driving to and from the airport. I even managed to get out of Swindon solo which is a real accomplishment. The kids even let me sleep in this morning. Now I just need to teach my husband how to:
a) set his internal alarm clock a bit earlier;
b) set the actual alarm clock; and
c) the difference between AM and PM!

Can't Get It Together

None of (besides Craig) seem able to get it together these past few mornings. The mornings are darker, there just seems to be more to pack up and we are all slugs. The boys have lost shoes and planners and forgotten gym kits. Craig is traveling next week and I can only imagine the horror next Monday morning when I get to run the show. As Christina Aguilera sings at the end of Ain't No Other Man: "There's gonna be trouble, trouble, trouble... trouble knocking at my door".

There is a 14-Year-Old in the House

Evan is 14 today. When did that happen? He had a gorgeous day in terms of weather which remained true to form. He always gets the best days. We had brownies in lieu of cake per request and he opened gifts from family. It was a very good thing that his birthday was on a Friday because I think he would have had a coronary if he couldn't play some sort of electronic device on his birthday. We ban them during the school week and it is working out quite well if I do say so. I think all of us are looking forward to a relaxing weekend ahead.
Cheers!

First Days of School

We have successfully made it through the first week of school with only minor hiccups. The kids and I were ready for school to begin last Thursday.

Evan actually woke up before 7 AM and had eaten breakfast, washed up and gotten dressed before 7:30! (This is a miracle.)
Finn had a "Where is my locker key?" panic attack (he found it) and sounded winded when he called to say they had arrived to school. He had to carry in his full gym kit which included two separate uniforms because he wasn't sure if it was a Games or a PE day.
Owen was ecstatic to attend school without any brothers. This is the first time he has ever attended a school without a brother (or two) at the same school. He was also super excited to see old friends and it was heartening for me to watch him run and play with them. He was, in fact, so excited, he didn't even say good-bye!
I had a celebratory coffee with a couple of American parents and then went grocery shopping because our cupboards were getting bare. Now I get to watch the news vs. read it online, something I haven't been able to do when the kids were home because there is always some kids' show on the telly. I am also trying to delay dusting and vacuuming. Sigh. But I do get to make brownies because.... (see next posting)