Our beautiful bed where we spent three nights in East Finchley, London.
It's the details that count.
The view from our window. How many kinds of sweet flowers grow In an English country garden?
We ignored jet lag on the first day and took the tube into Westminster.
Big Ben rules the skyline.
Did you know that Big Ben is actually the name of the bell that chimes every hour, on the hour? The structure is officially called the Clock Tower. The hour hand is 9 feet long, the minute hand is 14 feet long.
The Clock Tower is part of the Houses of Parliament, or the Palace of Westminster, as it is also known. There are no adjectives to describe this view.
The mind-blowing thing is that every time you turn a corner in London, you see something like this.
Security is tight, but, strangely, not as ominous as when I was here with Bethany in the 90's and the IRA was still a threat.
This enormous ferris wheel is called the Eye of London.
We wandered over the river to take a look and possibly ride it.
The fare was about $30 each so we opted for visiting the sights instead of viewing them from above.
Yes, I am as cheap as ever.
This is on the Thames River Walk and was built to commemorate the emancipation of slaves.
There are a crazy number of cyclists in London and they are crazy too. There are few bike lanes and they zip right along with the cars. We saw more than one woman in a skirt and high heels, commuting from work. About ten cyclists die a year on London roads and many more are injured.
The Houses of Parliament are an imposing view from the other side of the Thames too.
We wandered into a courtyard at the Marriott and this sign made me laugh.
And then we went back to East Finchley and couldn't sleep because we were over-tired.
The end.
1. Never look your fellow traveler in the eye. Look at his knees, check out her funky shoes, read the back page of her newspaper, or focus intently on the station map above his head. If you happen to inadvertently catch his eye, quickly slide your eyes to the left or right and pretend you were casually glancing at the person next to him.
2. Put your walking shoes on. The English are hardy souls who love to run up and down massive flights of stairs. Most stations don't have escalators. Even when there are escalators, the commuters employ a dainty, tripping little step as they dash past you. Stand on the right, please.
3. Accepted activities whilst on the train are: listening to music on a headset (don't hum or bounce to the beat) ; texting on your smartphone (no talking); reading the free evening paper (no laughing aloud); and snoozing (no leaning on the guy next to you).
4. Carry an underground map with you at all times. Use phrases like "Jubilee Line" and "Euston Station" frequently so that people will think you're an old hand at this tube thing.
5. Carry a pocketful of change for the buskers. Some of the best music you will ever hear will be at the entrances to the tube. This guy, from Trinidad, was playing a steel drum that had twenty-nine tones, three octaves worth. He was supremely talented and I wish we had listened longer.
6. Buy a day pass. It will save you lots of money. Riding the train is an expensive proposition. I don't know how Londoners can afford it.
I don't remember the last time I had fresh peaches and blueberries in my kitchen at the same time.
Thank you, weird weather patterns.
Today, I made a double batch of peach and blueberry muffins.
They are but a sweet reminiscence.
Grandchildren devoured them, hot from the oven...
...and whimpered with regret when I informed them that the remainder were going to friends.
But after we delivered them we stopped and played at a park and they forgave me.
And, because I love you, I am sharing the recipe.
I think you should make some.
Right now.
Because they will make you happy.
The recipe is from the Taste of Home cookbook.
With a few alterations.
I love Taste of Home, its recipes rarely fail me.
Berry Cream Muffins
2 c flour
Scant cup of sugar (you know, just tip a bit out!)
1/2 tsp BP
1/2 tsp B. Soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 c fruit (raspberries, like the recipe says, or blueberries and peaches, only I'm sure I added more like 2 c)
2 eggs
1 c sour cream (I didn't say they were low-fat!)
1/2 c vegetable oil (I subbed part of it with olive oil)
1/2 tsp vanilla
Throw the dry ingredients in a bowl and stir. Mix in the wet ingredients and then the fruit. Bake in lined or greased muffin cups for 18-22 minutes at 350 degrees. Help, somebody tell me where the degree key is!
Makes about a dozen muffins, depending on your pan size.
Dang, I think I'll make another batch tomorrow for the road.
Also looming on my mind this week were a gazillion pounds of Italian prunes which I picked for free over the mountain. If I was going to be here when they ripen I would dry them and perhaps bottle some. But, alas, I am not, so I have been giving them away to anyone I could sucker into saying Yes.
I still have a 5-gallon bucketful.
Any takers?
Anyone?
And now, if you will excuse me, I will go work on my British slang.
Crikey, gimme a cuppa.
Eh, wotch out that lorry doesn't knock you on yer bum on the way to the loo.
Eee, I was right chuffed when that bloke gave me a buttie.
Don't forget yer brolly and wellies.
Oh dear, hope I haven't offended my two dear English readers!
Next time you hear from me, it will be from Merry Old England.
Go back with me, if you will, to the summer of 1980.
I know, most of you were barely alive, but humour an old lady, will ya?
Jeff and I were newly married and living in a non-air-conditioned, upstairs apartment in Orange County, California. Bethany was born nine months and six days past our wedding day, so yes, I was pregnant.
And miserable.
Nauseous, tired, and hot.
I got a little job sewing drill team uniforms for a high school team and, on the days I managed to crawl out of bed, I sewed and listened to the radio. Ironically, this song was very popular that year. It played over and over until I imagined its only purpose was to drive me irrevocably mad.
Even now, when I hear the song, it causes faint waves of nausea to wash over my body.
And what does that have to do with the price of vanilla pods in Madagascar, you may ask?
Well, it has been in the upper 90's all week and it just doesn't seem to be worth the bother of putting in the A/C.
It is, after all, the middle of September.
We manage quite nicely most of the day. We close the windows mid-morning and start the fans. It gets a bit steamy around dinnertime and then cools down in the evening, so we open all the windows and listen to the crickets chirping as we fall asleep. But I have taken to wandering around in my dreaded muumuu and sporting a minimal amount of supportive clothing, if you get my drift. Which has nothing to do with the steaminess at dinnertime, so hush your mouth!
It kinda reminds of those blissfully miserable days of our first years together.
Josh came over to spend the night last night. We spent most of the the evening watering our new cypress hedge and all of the flowerpots and vegetables. Joshie loves to water things. By the time we finished it was cooling down so we sat on the deck and I said to Josh, If we sit quietly maybe we'll see some bees and butterflies and even a hummingbird.
He thought that sounded pretty neat, so we sat and watched the bees and butterflies and it wasn't two minutes later that a hummingbird darted into view.
We were pleased.
Josh thought I was awesome.
I think.
I took this photo this morning when I heard the distinctive "click click" of the hummingbird. I didn't really have time to do anything but grab my camera and zoom, so the focus is terrible, but it's proof positive of the visit.
I've purposefully planted my flowerbeds with perennials and annuals that attract hummingbirds and I've been tickled with how often they visit. Almost any time I sit on the deck for a few minutes I am enchanted by a visit from one of the endearing little birds. The last verse of this poem sums up my feelings.
Diminutive, defiant darter -
tiny heart in pounding pace;
we savor every fleeting glance
- a streak of heaven's fragile grace.
After Josh had bathed and eaten his bedtime snack and read his books for "22 minutes" (a compromise he wheedled out of me when I told him he had twenty minutes) I tucked him in and said, Josh, do you hear the crickets? His window at home is always closed tightly at night so I knew it would be unusual for him to be able to hear them.
He listened for a few seconds and said, Nana, how do you know about crickets?
Ah, glasshoppah, I am all-knowing!
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I've been playing with my new camera. I love the natural light photos I've been taking but I haven't quite figured out the inside settings.
Witness these of my lovely Josh.
There's nothing as sweet as a sleeping child.
For breakfast, he ate a whole juicy peach, a large bowl of cinnamon oatmeal and two maple-flavoured sausages.
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In other breaking news, Jeff installed our new flagpole this week.
It will fly at half mast tomorrow and we will be thinking of those who died ten years ago.
And of our Charlie.
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I tried out the close-up mode on the camera this afternoon. That is what gave me the most grief on the old camera so I was thrilled with the results.
The flowers were blowing in the light breeze and I was my usually jumpy self, so I'm way impressed by the clarity of these shots. They are only lightly edited.
Cropped.
Another gratifying feature is the accuracy of the red end of the colour spectrum. My Hot Cocoa rose has always defied the camera lens, but it only took a little brightness and shadow tuning to get this picture, which is very true to the actual dusky-red shade.
I earned a bunch of theoretical points at Recycle Bank, the website that theoretically encourages you to recycle more. Considering that they encouraged me to get this magazine for which I would never pay, the fossil fuels for transporting the magazine to my door and the amount of glossy paper to be recycled, I'm not sure how well they're actually doing.
My excuse is that I'm getting the magazine as a gift for Bethany. I had it mailed to me so that I could peruse its wonders before I pass it on.
Martha has a very cunning tip for stacking teacups. Instead of stacking the saucers together in one pile and then stacking the cups in several precarious piles, she stacks them as sets.
Teacup
Saucer
Teacup
Saucer
Teacup
Saucer
Get my drift?
I thought that was pretty clever, should I ever have teacups and saucers to stack.
