Yesterday and Today

Sorry that I didn't update yesterday. I don't think anyone really reads this thing anyways, so I guess I have no one to apologize to, but what the hell... I'm sorry.

I got sick last night and was sick most of the day today so I've been kind of limited in my energy.

Here's the London update:

Yesterday:

Yesterday my dad, mom and I went to the Tower of London and saw a bunch of torture tactics and the Crown Jewels. We also had this amazing beefeater give us a great tour! Next we went to the Tate Modern Art Museum. Freakin cool awesome museum! There were Picassos and Rothkos and Duchamp like it was a finger painting on some moms refrigerator. Not like they didn't appreciate or exhibit these paintings well, because they did, but it was like no big deal to them, for me it was a huge deal to see these paintings.

So that was really really neat. We also had lunch on the top floor at the Tate Modern Restaurant. We had a mezzaluna platter (cheese, hummas, dips etc.) for an app. Then we split fish and chips and an open faced roast beef sandwich.

Next we met Emme @ a pub called The Anchor and Hope. We all had traditional British fare. Emme had a fennel and some kind of cheese that I can't think of the name. Dad had seafood chowder, and mom and I split a whole crab.

Then we went to look around picadilly circus for a little bit and went home.

Today I woke up not feeling too well. I've got my sinus stuff acting up, so I didn't sleep well and I kept falling asleep everywhere we went today. First we decided to go to the British Museum, basically just a really neat history museum. I loved looking at all the artifacts and the Egyptian exhibit was really neat. After the museum we searched for this place to eat at called Hummus Bro. It was awesome. It basically was a Chipotle for hummus. They would put hummus down on a plate and you would tell them if you wanted Chx, beef, etc. It was sooo good. Next we wandered around the town for a bit and then we went and picked up our theater tickets. We ended up going to see this show called "39 Steps" it was a comical adaptations of the Alfred Hitchcock movie, but it was only a cast of 4 people who played up to 150 characters. It was hysterical and wittingly funny.

Then we decided to go to this place that Emme loves to eat at called My Old Dutch. It was a Crepe house that served all of these different kinds of crepes. My mom and i split the Chicken Curry Crepe and a Lemon Honey Crepe. They were huge and they were quite tasty.

I feel so grateful to be here and to be able to see my sister!! She is having such a great time and she has made some wonderful friends and memories. Even though she's so close in age to me she has always been my little sis who I have always seen as little kid emme that I need to look after (older child syndrome, I'm working thru the issues). But watching her in London has made me see her in a different light, and I also think she has grown a lot while she's been here. She's always been so independent but I've never seen it to this extent. Basically I guess what I'm trying to say is this trip has made me more proud of her and I just really hope the best for her life :)

Tomorrow we get up at 5:00 am london time, midnight dallas time! All I know is that my sleep schedule is going to be screwy for the next couple of weeks. So hopefully I'll be able to sleep on the plane tomorrow and be ready for work on Friday. I've had the best time being in london, it was a wonderful break and I'm feeling refreshed with a new perspective.

Cheerio!

Day 2

Today was a great day in London:

First we started out on a bus tour. Now this normally would be too touristy for my family, but it ended up being a great deal. This bus would take us around town to all of the hot spots in London and we could get off for as long as we would like, and take pics, go into the point of interest, or do whatever. Then later on we could just catch the next one that came along, no charge, and it would just keep going to the next spot. So we got some really great photos and a real quick nice tour of London. This also included a boat tour, so we got to see London from another perspective too.

Next we went to the theater district and caught tickets to go see Lion King. AMAZING SHOW!!! Absolutely amazing! I loved the music, the acting, and the costumes were fantastic. I could go on and on about it. Oh and they served ice cream at intermission, why we don't do this in america i don't know!!!

Next we headed to this cute little bar to have some drinks before meeting Emme's friend Ann and her mother for dinner. We went to this neat little dive called, Gourmet Burger Kitchen (GBK), and my burger was this: No bun, bottom layer of grilled eggplant, next layer grilled sweet potato, next layer camberet cheese (like brie), next layer grilled red pepper, next layer grilled portobello mushroom. AMAZING! all over a bed of rocket (arugala here). Then we came home from our long day away, and are awaiting really scary weather!! Some really high winds and rain... eeeegads!!

Tomorrow we are off to the Tate Modern, maaaaybe the tower of london if the weather isn't too bad and the lines aren't too long. Then tomorrow night we might be going to see another show (maybe billy elliot). We're just kind of open w/ our plans, so i'll let you know how it went.

Cheerio!

Our First Day!

Well we finally made it here and we had a wonderful day with Ms. Emme Cake! She showed us around her town and we had a wonderful time.

To start off the day we went to our Bed and Breakfast, The Barclay House.
Its a quaint little place, but its just enough room for all 4 of us. Tomorrow we will get a traditional English breakfast served to us by the owners of the house. I'll update pictures hopefully soon of the B&B.

Then Emme took us to this cute little restaurant called The Stock Pot. We each fueled up for our day and headed out. The weather here is kind of nasty so we were bundled up and prepared to walk thru the wind and the drizzle. We set out on our first stop for the day Borough Market. If you love food, this is the place to go. It is a foodie Mecca, filled with every type of indgredient, specialty food, and local food you can imagine. It's all there. The hustle and bustle of the vendors and the shoppers is a lot to soak in, but its a blast once you get used to it.

We then went and saw Big Ben, Parliament and a tiny view of the London Eye. On our way back we stopped by an amazing cupcake place called Hummingbird. Oh my word, I had a nutella cupcake, and emme and mom had carrot cake. They were awesome! Then we decided to duck into Harrods because it was on my dad's list of sights to see :). He's such a funny man!

Next Emme took us to her cute apartment to gather her things and then we came back to the part of town that our B&B is in. We decided to eat close to home tonight because we were sooo tired from the day. So we ate at this fantastic Vietnamese place and all of us had Pho (its like a Vietnamese noodle soup, amazing!). Then we came back to our place of residence for the next 5 days and we're about to crash. We're pretty tired, but hopefully we'll be able to get going early tomorrow on a bus tour and see some museums!!

Cheerio!

WE MADE IT!!!

WE MADE IT!!!
I'm sitting here in the B&B w/ my family. We're about to leave to go out on the town. It's 1 pm here/ 7 am in TX. woohoo. TIIIIIREEEEED!

Anyways, i'll update later. but just wanted to check in and say that i'm here.

So far so... well not so good...

Well things started out pretty crazy yesterday. I got to the airport and there was terrible weather in Dallas. So they canceled all American Airlines flights into DFW, so it was a total mad house in ABIA. Thank goodness for my quick thinking (and witted if I might add) mother, who bought me a ticket on Southwest to get home to dallas.

Well our day continued suit today as well. There was no way that we were going to be able to fly standby out of Dallas today so we decided that we were going to drive to Houston and try and catch a flight on another airlines who would still honor our standby passenger status. So we finally get to the British Air counter and some crazy stuff happened. To make a long story short American didn't add a certain tax to our ticket and we ended up missing our flight.

So right now we're sitting in the airport praying that we are going to be able to get on a flight to London. And we are sending in an extra prayer that we will be able to sit in business class.

Here are some highlights of our trip to London so far:

We saw a mountee (yes like in Canada) in the Walmart parking lot in the woodlands. Horse and all.

Just listening to my parents loving banter with each other. Most of the discussion centered around The Girls Next door and how our family could soooo be a reality show.

Eating subway on the road as we tried to make it to the airport. It's harder than it sounds.

Passing by the prison and the humongous statue of Sam Houston in Huntsville.

Riding a terminal train that was about as small as a matchbox and about as fast as a boat on "It's a small world after all" in Disneyworld.

Hearing my dad begin his British accent for the trip. If you don't know my father, than you should know that his accent will begin to adapt in whatever culture is represented. This includes Mexican restaurants, Chinese Buffets, the british voice on any answering machine. So now that we are going to London, this should be fun.

So if anyone is reading this... say a little prayer that we get on the flight!

I can't wait to see my sister!!!

Cheerio!

History of Love

So I just started reading this book called "The History of Love," by Nicole Krauss. I'm going to London on Friday (whoot whoot!) and needed something to read on the plane, but as soon as I picked up this book I couldn't put it down. Well except to write this post, but I don't like to be too technical.

It's basically about this guy who fell in love with this girl when he was very young, the girl got shipped to America from their home in Slonim. He saved up money for years and years to be able to go live with her in America, then the Germans invaded, and being Jewish he had to flee. Once he got to America he found her and she had married someone else. She had been pregnant when she left Slonim with his child. He vows to never love again, and lives watching his son and his wife from afar. In vowing to never love again, he keeps himself at a distance from everything that requires him to love life.

I just really hope I never turn out this way.