On smart cars and commuting

Today, as I left work and headed out on my walk home, my co-worker and I discussed the probability of getting run over by a crazed London driver (high) and the respect we have for cities that don't allow people to drive in the center.

I've decided that, along with it's environmental merits, the smart car would be my choice of car in a pedestrian/car collision. I guess a scooter would be ok, too. But, mostly likely, if I get run over in London it's going to be by a black cab. They do stop when they have to (like at cross walks and stop signs), but the rest of the time they are getting where they are going and nothing is going to stop them. Especially not a pedestrian.

Me vs. the Smart Car. Who would win?


There are good points to a three mile each way pedestrian commute, though. Today some of my highlights were:
-2 paddle boats full of women in burkas, racing and laughing hysterically
-4 men in suits, shoes off, kicking a football in the park
-6 little geese following their Mom and being corralled by their Dad when they got out of line.

And we've been married 3 years today. That's the biggest highlight of them all!

Pizza and Little Venice (and Ikea)

This weekend was a pretty mellow weekend and we forgot to take the camera, so all the pictures on this blog were taken by someone else.

On Friday, we went over to Meg and Dan's for homemade pizza and The History Boys. I almost fell asleep, but the movie was actually very good and the pizza was delicious.

Saturday, we explored several new parts of town. I was running the other day and discovered that we have an awesome, if small, park near us: Queen's Park. So Jim and I took a stroll to another part of our neck of the woods. Queen's Park is definitely a family place, with lots of kids and their parents running around everywhere. They also have pitch and putt and tennis courts. If we ever find our rackets/get new ones, we will go play there.

Saturday night, Jim took me on a date to Little Venice, which is also not far from where we live. I've never been to the real Venice, but Little Venice in London defintely reminds me of Amsterdam with its canals and houseboats. We started the evening off in a funky bar near the canals and then walked down to a place called Riverfront (or something like that), where we had dinner. It was actually quite the meat market and we were wedged in at a small table on the edge of all the action. Despite the fact that most of the people there were about our age, we felt very old. I guess it's because we are just so mature. Little Venice was fun, though, even though we weren't part of the "scene."

Here is a picture of Little Venice, which I did not take:


One thing that was very interesting is that once you got along the canal a ways, it became a private drive. And that was where all the fancy schmancy houseboats were. Some looked like floating trailers and some were very ornate. Houseboat culture is something I know nothing about, but it seems kind of bohemian and romantic. And I bet it's a lot cheaper than living in a flat around here.

And finally, today we went to Ikea. I don't really need to go into what Ikea was like because now I know that Ikea is Ikea no matter where in the world you are.

Hopefully we'll have more exciting things to post next time!

oh the drama

So, yesterday they launched the new London 2012 logo. And, of course, everyone hated it. All the papers were full of criticism and derision. Then, today they announced that the moving, flashing version of the logo sets off epileptic seizures. It always seems to go from bad to worse when it comes to the Olympics.

It would be hard to be in charge of anything major in this country because there is always more criticism than support. The more I see it, the more I like this little lego style, 80's flashback logo. Especially in neon green and orange!

We don't like nettles

Another weekend, another hike. This time we took Aurelie along with us! Our friend Vladamir also came with us and he didn't complain the whole time!

Our walk began with a trek through wheat fields. In England all the land is public (or something like that), so you can just walk through peoples' fields and yards and horse pastures with abandon. We did all three of those things on this walk, but walking through a family's yard while the little kid was outside playing was definitely the most awkward part.



The weather was very warm yesterday, so we wore our shorts and man capris. What we didn't anticipate were the innocent looking plants called nettles, which were overgrown throughout our walk. Nettles are evil. With barely a brush, they can set your whole leg on fire, starting with massive itching that then turns into huge whelts. The whelts then go through a series of transformations from burning to itching to feeling like vibrating signals from under your skin. And it seemed like just as things started to feel better, we would run into another patch. Fortunately we ran into some nice women (I think that perhaps they were Amish or something like Amish because they were dressed in modest, plaid frocks and it seemed like there was a community of them living in the area), who showed us a plant to use as an antidote to the nettles. I'm not convinced the plant really worked, but it was still cool to rub "Dock leaves" all over us, just in case.


This walk was a little different, in that the pub stop was only about two miles into it. We started late and then the pub took forever, so when we finally got going it was early afternoon, but we still had about nine miles to go. We weren't worried, though, because it stays light until about 10pm these days, so we had plenty of time to tool through the countryside. Of course, we didn't think that we would be walking that long...

At the pub, Jim would not cooperate with picture taking:


The goal of the walk was to reach a castle. Aurelie, who is French, was very patient with our babbling along in our fast American English. At one point, we were yelling about nettles and she thought we said "castle." She was disappointed that we had only reached more nettles. But there were horses to distract her from her disappointment! Jim and Vladamir, the horse whisperer fed them carrots:


And then they convinced Aurelie to feed them, too:


The yellow horse was greedy but still very cute. We liked those horses.

Just down the hill was the long anticipated castle! We had passed through field and over hill, through nettles and greedy horses and finally there it was!!!

The castle:


Vladimir and Jim decided that the castle was going to be the stopping point for our walk and the plan was to take a cab the rest of the way. By this time it was around 5:00. So we enjoyed the OUTSIDE of the castle (because it closed a few minutes befoer we got there) and then made our way to yet another pub. As fate would have it, there were no cabs in this little town, so, after having settled into the idea of not walking anymore, we had to revive ourselves and make it the rest of the way back on foot.


We got a little lost due to some missing sign posts, but many nettles later we got back on track again, scrambled accross a dilapidated bridge (well, most of us went across), and made our way through an apple orchard, where Jim tried to take a quick nap:

We also were relieved to see this sign, pointing us in the direction of the train:


But then we encountered the beast:


This horse was not having any apples or carrots or US. As we tentatively made our way across his field, he started stomping his foot in a very bull-like way. He made some very agressive snorts and fixed his gaze on Jim's red shirt. Aurelie and I ran. Jim ran, too, although he claims was just pretending to be scared. Uh huh.

Aurelie and I hightail it over the fence!


After the horses, we were amazed to see three hot air balloons taking off into the sky. Aurelie had a great idea and we took the balloon lift off as an opportunity to hid out in the graveyard of a nearby church. As Jim and Vladamir walked by, we jumped out! They screamed like girls. It was awesome.


With the aid of some locals (who also lured V and Jim into yet another pub on our way back to the trainstation), we finally made it back to the train...with about an hour to spare. So, yes, we went to another pub. They had a really nice garden!


Our friend Dan won't let us post pictures of him anymore because he has a reputation to maintain, but Vladimir went out of his way to get on the blog. There were so many pictures to choose from, but this one was definitely the best.

When we finally got home, it was 10:30...whew. It was hard to get up for work today, our legs are still itchy, Jim's eye was swollen shut from some unidentified substance, but it was worth it! I'm waiting for the poison ivy to show up any day now...

Edited

Not to worry, Dan. We made sure that no one will ever recognize you in this picture: