Terra Incognita

ahhh...the fam.....
My parents, sister and family friend arrived in London last Thursday, so the weekend was full of fun touristy things. Ally's loving the language and giggles everytime she hears something she finds amusing. She is also fascinated by the Tube...she hasn't ridden on it enough to be annoyed at the (reliable) delays and problems. :) Mom is in tourist mode; we practically ran from one sight to the next on Sunday. Dad is getting some kind of continuing education credit for this trip by observing the local architecture, city planning and landscaping so we keep losing him behind the digital camera. Mary Beth has been to London a few times, so she's done some exploring on her own. Here's what we've been up to:

thursday
A meeting beneath Big Ben, across the street from the semi-permanent war protests that line the park by Parliament. Dinner at a great Italian restaurant on the Strand. Then it was time for the visitors to crash. Jet Lag. Bugger. I actually hit the bed as well, as I was suffering from a sinus infection. (I was hoping I'd make it through this semester safe...no luck.)

friday
The family visited the V&A Museum in the morning while I was at work. They came to the office and met the staff of W&h before we took a stroll down the Thames to visit the Salvador Dali Exhibit. I'd been saving doing that exhibit until they came because I thought it would be good to go through together, as we have two Dali prints in our dining room. He's a very odd, odd guy. Then we raced to Soho for dinner at Pizza Express (a must if you come to London) before going to see Les Miserables. Wow. Amazing. I bawled. Fortunately, my sinus infection forced me to carry around a pack of Kleenexes. Unfortunately, I used them up by the end of the show. Ally stayed the night at my flat. We slept on the couches, which, I have decided, are way more comfortable than my bed. I might never return to the bedroom.

saturday
We joined a walking tour excursion to Bath, the same place I had been with one of my programme excursions. I'd loved it so much that I thought it'd be fun to take them. We had a wonderful guide named Richard (no, Luke, not your Richard, although the family was planning on meeting him this morning for a Beatles tour. I warned them.). He took us all over the city and I got to see tons more than my previous visit. The weather was fabulous and the town gorgeous. Celebrity sighting: Trudy, our tour guide from the programme. Unfortunately, Richard was in the middle of his tour and Trudy was in the middle of hers, so I couldn't stop to chat.
We got back to London in time to race back to Soho and get last-minute seats for Agatha Christie's whodunnit, The Mousetrap. It was great...don't ask me whodunnit, though, because we (the audience) were sworn to secrecy by the cast not to reveal it. This was it's 50th year of running in London! Again, Ally stayed the night at the flat and again the couch was as comfortable as heaven.

sunday
We had been told the Buckingham Palace guards changed at 11:30 on Sunday. They didn't. So, we headed to the Cabinet War Rooms. Really neat. Beneath government buildings, Churchill had his war cabinet meet in complete secrecy and concrete-reinforced safety. When the last bomb was dropped on Japan, the cabinet members tidied up, locked the door and left everything as it was. Now, you can visit the rooms and see where Churchill lived, gave his weekly addresses to the nation/world on the BBC, and made his major decisions during WWII. It was very neat.
After that, we headed to the Tower Bridge and the London Tower. In the London Tower, we got to see the crown jewels which include the world's largest diamond. My jewelry is quite boring, I've decided. Time to find myself a small, diamond crown of my own. Maybe a jeweld orb and scepter as well. Outside the Tower, I had celebrity sighting number two: Trudy. Again. Crack me up! This time I decided I did have to interrupt her tour (it was really small and it looked like they were jsut conversing, she wasn't deep in explanation). She's great.
We headed to Camden Market next. I don't think I really warned my family how much of a drug culture is there. I thought we should have taken a picture of my mom (7th grade drug and alcohol prevention teacher) holding a bong just for kicks. It didn't happen.
Went to dinner in Leicester Square at the Aberdeen Steak House. Mom, Dad and Ally got tickets to see Mamma Mia for the next night. Bummer that I had class. Then we called it a night.

monday
I had work and class and since I have a paper due in class tonight, I didn't get a chance to see them at all yesterday. St. Patrick's Day night was spent in class, finishing my paper, wishing Protz a happy birthday, chilling in a pub (where they don't have green beer...we guess that's just an American thing since none of the Brits had heard of that. Guiness is Guiness and that's all you need I suppose.), having a flat dance party with our favorite 80's artists Madonna and (Wacko) Jacko, and staying up to watch Bush's Iraq speach. Our guest speaker in class last night was Phillip Knightly, renowned war correspondant. Quite the appropriate and timely guest you might say.

today
Work. Class (we're learning about the British class system tonight). Then I head to the hotel to say good-bye to the fam (and try to convince them that I need some more money). They leave tomorrow at noon.

what you can look forward to hearing about...
My friends from high school arrived this weekend. Tarin, Casey and Lisa are doing a K-State finance department trip here during KSU's spring break. Tarin called last night and hopefully tomorrow or late tonight I'll actually get in contact with them.
Tomorrow, our excursion is to Oxford and Blenheim Palace! Why am I excited? Because Oxford's great hall was used in the filming of the Harry Potter movies as Hogwarts' great hall. Very excited.
My friends from MU arrive Saturday. Sarah Hood and Felicity Pino are going to be staying with Emily, but we're going to spend the weekend doing touristy things. Cassie Garnas is also visitng London. She's staying with some family outside the city, so she's going to come in one night and we're going to go out.

funny story
Last week's excursion was a tour of Parliament. Our guide showed us a clock that belonged to Queen Victoria. Before it was hers, it was made especially for Marie Antionette. There is none other like it in the world and no figure is placed on it. Our guide gave a tour to Michael Jackson a few years ago and MJ pointed at the clock and said he'd like to buy it (just like in the interview!). He also wanted to buy the throne. I tell you, he's wacko, that Jacko.

thanks
...to Dan for the beautiful postcard of Jesse Hall. You crack me up!

observations
-Baby carriages are everywhere and the men take their children for walks just as much as women do. Also, the buggies have a plastic covering that can shield the baby from the rain. (maybe I 'observed' that in a previous posting...at least, I've been meaning to post it for a while.)
-My mom has always been loud. She's even louder in London where people are really quiet.
-I've said this on Dan's blog comments, but I thought I'd mention it here (especially with my birthday coming up, wink wink): There are no Reese Peanutbutter cups or 3 Muskateers bars here.
-There is a serious lack of public rubbish bins.