Weekend in London

Let’s go back in time to catch up on a fun weekend from not so long ago…

On Valentine’s weekend, Candice and I decided it would be a good time to get out of town and head to London. Naturally, as per the spirit of the day, our intent was to fan the flame of our love, to rediscover the magic… and like everyone else, we were hoping to rediscover the magic over a nice, expensive dinner.

We got online to decide where we would eat, and I quickly found that of the 1700 restaurants in London, there were only about three that had an available reservation for Saturday night… this may be a bit exaggerated, but the point is that it was slim pickins (“Nothing, huh?” “No, Slim Pickins, it’s a BBQ joint.” <obligatory Friends reference>)

We really like Tapas, and when we found a place we thought would be good, they only had a 5pm or a 10:45pm reservation… reluctantly, we went with the 5pm slot.

The good news is, not only was the food awesome, wonderful, amazing, and not terribly expensive, but the 5pm slot turned out to be the perfect time because we ended up getting theater tickets to go see Les Mis at 7:30! Magic, consider yourself re.dis.cov.ered :).

So if you’re looking for a nice Tapas meal in London, might I recommend Dehesa [Matt & Tiffani pay attention, you might be going there with us].

Also, if you’re looking for a good musical to see, look no further than Les Mis… we both loved it! It’s pretty freakin’ inspirational. Plus, I managed to get a shot of the theater with some sneaky camera work so the camera-nazi-usher didn’t see me and scream at me… not so lucky was the guy sitting a couple of rows behind me, he was trying to be covert and took a picture with the flash! Dead giveaway… c’mon people, rookie mistake!

Overall, I’d say it was a perfect day in London… we were pretty happy :)

Allow me to introduce…

“Hello Blog, it’s me, Collin. I know how you don’t like it when I post people on you without properly introducing them first….”

“Thanks, Collin, I really appreciate it when you consider my feelings.”

“I know, Blog, and your welcome. I’d like you to meet a few people that I’ll be posting…”

“What kind of people?”

“Oh, well, they’re nice people that I…”

“Do they look good in pictures?”

“Umm, yeah, I think they do.”

“Good. I like those kind of people.”

“Alright… then I guess I’ll just go ahead…”

This weekend, we went to Suffolk with a really pleasant group of people from our church.

This is James enjoying his breakfast in front of the giant Corn Flakes ad that was wallpapered to the side of the dining room. It was like eating breakfast in a quaint English village at sunrise! Brilliant!

This is Candice, Abby, Laura, and Martha. We went to the sea and spent the afternoon on the beach. It was the nicest day we’d had in a while, but as you can probably tell by the clothes, no one came away with an attractive tan. (Then again, no sunburn either).

This is Tom and Ali. They went swimming because they laugh in the face of danger. They actually looked a bit sunburnt later, but I think it was just some sort of skin reaction to all the fun they were having.

And these are Candice’s new Wellies! They are shaped like cowboy boots, but with an awesome paisley design :). Your welcome, world.

And this is the gang sitting down to have a nice lunch on the beach.

Oh, and this is Alvin the Chicken. I said, “C’mon, Alvin, smile!” But he only looked at me and said, “Just take the damn picture, Collin. B’gock!” He’s just moody because everyone’s always asking him to sing.

At least it hasn't come to this...

Someone asked me today if I was thinking of adding any hair accessories, like a moustache. After pondering the prospect, I decided to put it to a Photoshop test. The resemblance is striking, don't you think?

Triggers

No, I'm not talking about a nickname for my dear friend Dr. Tiff Riggers, although I'm sure she's been called Triggers once or twice in her life.

I'm talking about how something will trigger a memory or feeling in you, out of the blue. You don't expect it but it hits you like a Cambridge winter wind that whirls around you, through your clothes, down to your bones... it's a feeling that you just can't escape. And it seems to linger a tad longer than is comfortable.

For example, I wasn't expecting to feel both contented and gloomy last night as I chopped potatoes and carrots for our stew that was simmering on the stove. No ma'am, I didn't see it coming. All of sudden, a very vivid memory popped into my head... of sitting at the bar at my grandparent's house on holidays eating beef stew, drinking too much sweet tea, all while my uncles and cousins give the girls a hard time (out of love, of course, and innate orneriness). You can understand why this triggered feelings of joy as I remembered hanging out with my family, laughing at each others jokes, and cuddling the rambunctious kiddos. And then, feelings of sadness came quickly too. I lost my grandmother this past August and I suppose that memory brought on a feeling of loss that has been lurking about since the fall. Last night I couldn't help but wonder, 'Is this the way MeMe and PaPa made their stew?' After a few moments of pondering good times and remembering MeMe, I had to shake it off and get on with the cooking. I did not see that coming. And no, of course that's not how she made the stew. All food is just better at Grandma's.

This happened another time yesterday too... at lunch. (I guess meal times yesterday were a little intense!) I was at a staff lunch at the Associate Vicar's house and he and his wife have the two most adorable little guys. Somehow the youngest, who is ten months old, got passed to me. (This is where my sisters are thinking 'surprise, surprise' and calling me a baby hog.) I thought for a minute 'yeah, he's cute, whatev'. And then... well, I wanted to take him home with me. Not really though. Actually, I was overcome with this feeling of 'I want my own little guy (and girl).' Sigh. I was not prepared for THAT to happen while I was having my tea and chocolate biscuit.

Triggers. Do they plague you too?

An Experiment

Sooooo…. things are starting to get out of control. I really didn’t intend for things to go this far. At first, it started out as a little bit of laziness.

“I’ll cut it next week,” I would say. But after the laziness phase wore off… I started to think that maybe it was really cool. Maybe if I let it go a little longer, I could make some sort of cool fashion statement like Patrick Jane in the Mentalist.

And then I started to think that maybe I couldn’t be fashionable, but perhaps if it got longer still, I could really express something about who I was.

You know, something like, “I’m not just your average Ph.D. student… I’m street… a low-down gangsta set trippin’ bangah.”

And now I think I’ve just hit the worst stage… sheer morbid curiosity. I really don’t want to cut it… not because I like it so much… but because I’m really curious about what might possibly happen if my hair continues to get bigger and bigger. I mean, think about it like this… I have already stopped sleeping on a pillow at night because of the sheer bulk of the fro. I don’t need to wear a hat outside to keep warm anymore. Aren’t you the least bit curious? I mean, the day may come when carrying an umbrella becomes totally unnecessary.

What is rockabilly?

We went to a birthday party on Friday night, and our instructions were to dress ‘rockabilly’. These instructions included a link to a ‘how to’ website in case we weren’t familiar with the style :) - http://www.wikihow.com/Dress-Rockabilly [I love it when people write how to’s about the most random things, like this one on how to become a civil war drummer… awesome - http://www.wikihow.com/Become-a-Civil-War-Drummer-(Reenacting)].

Here’s our attempt at Rockabilly complete with awesome fifties hairdo’s… and yes, my name tag says ‘Pony Boy’ :).

Also interesting... Candice's name at the party was Dottie. Can anyone guess the movie? (Hint: it's practically Candice's favorite movie of all time).

Well that's all folks. I’ll catch all you crazy cats on flippity flop… until then: Stay gold, blog readers… stay gold.

7 Feb 2010

Dear diary,

Today was a pretty good day. Candice and I got up this morning to go to church, and I made us some English Muffins (except, of course, over here they simply call them muffins). Candice had a little bit of blackberry jam and lots of peanut butter on hers, while I like to mix peanut butter and lots of honey together before smearing the concoction onto my muffin. We were both sad that we had no orange juice.

You know how you sometimes find a sweater that you really like but had forgotten about because it's been at the bottom of the pile for so long. Well that's what happened to me this morning. I really like my green, argyle, merino wool sweater, but I'd forgotten about it, and I wore it to church today. It felt good. I felt good.

I would have looked nicer in my argyle sweater had it not been for the birds' nest that is currently perched atop my head. My hair is longer that it's been since probably the mid 90's, when all the cool kids were wearing it long like Nirvana.

I like the guy who preached at church this morning. He's a bishop and he is very relaxed in his manner and has a voice that's very easy to listen to. He preached on Nehemiah. I asked Candice if she thought Nehemiah and I would have gotten along very well together, she said, "I don't know, honey... probably... yeah." She could see that I wanted her to say yes. She's very sweet.

We had a chat with some new friends after church today. They came to dinner on Friday night with another couple and we had a great time. Candice and I cooked ricotta and sage stuffed chicken breasts wrapped in prosciutto... yum. Then we made blueberry crisp with double cream ice cream, and my life will never be the same.

Next, Candice and I had lunch with our good friend Sarah at her new flat... it was nice to have lunch with friends... I vented to Candice and Sarah about my bad mood and generally gray outlook on life this morning. The weather might be affecting me a little... I could use some sunshine.

Speaking of sunshine... Candice has officially begun her full-time position at the church, and her picture was in the bulletin this morning, complete with a shout out to Oklahoma and a list of things that Candice likes: travelling, cooking, and sunshine... she's very funny.

After lunch, we came home, watched a friends episode, and fell right to sleep. After the nap, my outlook on life was a little brighter... probably because Candice made me a really good grilled cheese with tomato soup. Also, tonight we get to do one of my favorite things: order groceries online! It's very fun... and we're very fun.

If anyone's keeping track of our days with giant columns labeled "good" and "bad"... first of all, thank you for doing that, it's very helpful... and secondly, be sure to put 7 Feb 2010 in the "good" column.