We <3 English pubs!

Gotta love public transportation!

Gotta love being able to hit pubs then sober up on the long train ride home, huh babe?

We actually used the Colchester station more than Sudbury bec Sudbury was out for most of the trip due to maintenance work (you could take a bus instead, but the bus ride was incredibly long). We liked Colchester, though, bec you could get an express train with only 2 stops. When everything is working well, the regular train ride isn't that bad...but the night that Ben was snoring on the train and the English didn't realize he was my husband and were pointing and giggling at him...hehe...we were on the regular and we had to go incredibly slow due to rain...and it took a couple of hours to make it to Colchester (after waiting on a train for over an hour to arrive). Then we had a 45 minute drive home to Felsham. It was a long night.

More of the big city...

The National Gallery was amazing! Millenium Bridge was cool looking (our feet were killing us by that time, though)...should have done a tour of the Globe replica...we'll do that next trip.

Ben was creeped out by that statue in front of the Gallery...hehe.

More pics of Tour, Hyde Park, Serpentine, etc...

Before the prologue there was a parade of the vehicles - it was so much fun! French dj's on top of busses blasting french dance music with hot girls dancing, others throwing out goodies (and lots of tricksters acting as though they're going to throw you something then laughing as they fooled you), a huge hose spraying a fine mist on excited watchers, etc, etc. Then, the riders warmed up before the actual start.

There were SO MANY people - we heard over 1 million - and for perspective, there were that many people in a small park in the middle of town - it was crazy crowded - I wish I knew the acreage of the area. We finally decided to get on the tube and stop at a station where not many people were getting off to find dinner. Luckily that turned out well and we found an Italian place with little art pieces of Positano - superb meal in a quaint restaurant.

Poor Stuart O'Grady. :-(

GO GEORGE! >

Afternoon in the country...some pics from my walk....

Ben went to work for an afternoon, so I went for a good old fashioned walk in the country. Apparently, though, Tuesday afternoon when it's sunny and warm is not the best day to walk to Felsham - the store and the pub were both closed so I was parched. Thankfully, Nigel the gardener saved me with a peach orange juice drink.

My favorite pic from the whole trip is the one of that chicken - it makes me smile every time I look at it...

Sites around London

The Gherkin...I think it looks like a Faberge egg...but my opinion seems to differ from the rest of the world... :-)

Dinner by the Tower Bridge and my first official fish and chips

Fun with wax

I had so much fun at Madame Tussaud's...hehe...Ben got a little aggravated with me playing with the statues. Penelope is number 1 on Ben's list, so I had to give her a talking to. And groping a guard has always been a fantasy of mine. ;-)

Me at the TOUR de FRANCE!!!

(In London, of course....)

I had a little US flag and Ben had a little UK flag.

What a day! It was beautiful out. I did not bring any sunscreen with me to the UK, because, well, hello it's the UK and I was expecting rain the entire time. My shoulders actually had a mild sunburn at the end of the day (and I came home with more of a tan than I went with).

The riders came so close to us - there were times when I was leaning over and thought they were going to hit me. So cool.

Jet lag kept us from making it to watch the London - Canterbury stage.

What a trip! We had the best time. First vacation I've ever been on that I wasn't ready to return at the end of the trip.

We had a jolly good time...

....but it was nice to sleep in our own bed last night....especially after having been awake for approximately 22.5 hours.

Will post pics soon.

Hmmm. So, yeah, everyone who actually might still read this probably already knows that our buyers backed out. C'est la vie. (sp?)

So now we are waiting.

We found another house (the lake view house was contingent so we're out of that) so if ours would just sell we could make a move. We'll see what happens.

And...well nothing much else is going on. It's the same ole, same ole around here...but I guess that's sort of abnormal for most newlyweds, but "normal" for us.

Oh...someone came to look at our house and looked in one of my dressers. Yeah, crazy huh? How do I know that they did that? Because I'm completely anal about nothing hanging out of drawers - they are meant to be closed properly. And what was hanging out of my dresser drawer when I came home after a showing? A scarf. Ew. Someone touched my things. I should wash everything. Why in the world would someone go through my dresser? How could a realtor approve of that? It makes me feel so icky.

Oh, yeah, I was locked out of the house one night for awhile too. That was great. I had to sit on the deck in the dark until someone came flying down the road. She explained that I might have to get a hotel because those little lock boxes shut off past 9. It was right at 9 when she showed up. What a slow motion movie like moment as we both held our breath...and the box opened.

I got addicted to Dancing with the Stars this spring. It was sort of random...but it made my weird Mondays and Tuesdays bearable. I'm actually really sad that it's over - but glad Apollo won - they were just too cute. We discussed going to see a live performance, but that's just not working out. Carmina this weekend isn't either. :-( I haven't been to a live performance of anything in 3 years I don't think.

Too much sugar tonight....my thoughts are random.

So yeah. I think I might make this blog pics only and start a completely anonymous one for thoughts.

We need rain.

Our new purchase

We'll have to work on getting rid of all of that clover.

Goodbye Soddy Daisy.

Big sigh of relief....

We sold our house today (and after only 5 days on the market)...so it's a big relief.

In other news, we will finalize an agreement on a house in k-town tomorrow.

We will close june 30, if not sooner. Depends on a few things.

I am really hesitant to buy the house that we will finalize tomorrow - it is more than i think we need to spend and needs work. It's the lake view house I posted the pic of a few days ago. Ben is so ecstatic about it, but he hasn't priced all of the upgrades like I have! I have spent way too much time in home improvement stores this week.

Oh yeah...we're going back to England - we're so grateful to Mike & Maria for allowing us to use the house. I'm excited to go over again - our trip last time was a bit short as we were trying to spend most of our time in Italy. I hope to see the crown jewels this time!

Why is buying a house so hard?

This is the view from the side deck, breakfast area and dining room of the house we looked at today. The lake! Our next door neighbors have year round water frontage. If we buy it. Why do I say "if"? Well, why did they only put 2 baths in the house? And why did they only put one bathtub between the 2 baths that are in the house? We've come across some weird quirks but I do believe that this is the strangest one to date.

Cat stinch, horrible paint (which isn't that big of a deal), gold fixtures & hardware, oak, oak, and more oak on top of not very big (only about 2100 or 2200 sq ft) for a whole lot of money and I just don't know what to do. Very few closets, an insanely ugly stone fireplace and tee-iny bedrooms top it all off.

But look at that view. For lake people like us, it's beautiful - we never dreamed that our budget might possibly afford us such close proximity to the water. Ben is of course sold...but I am uncertain.

Granted, it is extremely difficult for me to make decisions over what to buy at the grocery store...so you can imagine how anxious I am over a purchase this large.

Happy Cinco de Mayo.