Alien Spouse

Snow!

It really snowed last night!  This is a picture of our little car this morning (Sorry about the grid lines, our bedroom windows have an insect screen on them, which is what caused the cross stitch effect in the photo!)

The roads were very slippery and we actually had to pull off the road at one point, because Doc C just could not steer.  We sat by the side of the road for a while and at one point we thought we might have to abandon the car and just walk home, because that's how close we still were to the house!  The Doc persevered however and we did make it into the office.

I was almost an hour late, but actually I'm the only one here so far.  Classes have been cancelled until 10, and when I spoke to the director of my department she said that next time it'll be perfectly fine not to try and get in until the classes are up and running.  Which is good to know!

It is very pretty.  I have a large fir tree right outside my window, and that is covered in snow.  I am starting to feel quite festive already.

Number Two in an Occaisional Series: Frosty.

Otherwise known as the roof of our metallic black Mini Cooper yesterday morning.  It was cold.

I call it "Black Mini Roof on a Winter Morning"

It's getting colder now, so when we leave in the mornings the car is covered in condensation.

Which looks prettier than it sounds.

Monday. Ugh.

Today was fairly awful, for boring work related reasons for me, but I found that pretty much everyone else was having a bad day too.  It seems to me that ever since I heard that Paul Newman had died, everything has just been wrong.  For example Jason e-mailed to say that he had got home ok, but his suitcase hadn't.  Again.  What is it with Delta, and the inability to fully co-ordinate a change of flight?  I haven't heard the suitcase's full itinerary yet, but I expect you will be seeing Jason's first book "Places My Suitcase Has Been Without Me" in airport bookshops in time to catch the summer tourism trade next year.

However today I did discover what could well be the perfect alarm clock; I currently use the alarm feature on my phone, but it literally scared me awake last week (I sat bolt upright and whimpered according to Doc C.  I dispute the whimpering) and I hate it.  I've been thinking that I really needed to buy a good alarm clock as an alternative, and whilst looking for one I stumbled across the website to the Voco.  It has a voice chip in it loaded with 150 different phrases read by Stephen Fry in Jeeves mode, and that sounds to me to be the most delightful way to be awakened.  If you don't want to buy the clock itself, you can also just download the phrases and a bit of software and it will play through your iPod instead.  There are different versions for Sir and Madam, as well as a Horoscope and Bible version (Stephen Fry doesn't do the Bible one though, which I was quite glad about actually).

 

Jason's On A Jet Plane.

Before we took Jason to the airport today, we packed in a few more fun activities.  First Doc C whipped up a breakfast of pancakes with maple syrup, as well as eggs and bacon for the carnivores.  Then we went to the Humane Society to introduce Jason to the two cats we've decided to adopt, he approved of both of them; so we filled out the paperwork and we shall be picking them up on Friday (I'll wait till we've got them to post their details!).  Last thing before we hit the road was a trip along the Parkway, so Jason could enjoy some of the fantastic scenery in all it's early autumnal beauty.

I have to say dropping Jason off at the airport was a lot less fun than collecting him; but the woman who checked him in loved my "Miss Scarlet in the Hall with a Revolver" T-shirt which was gratifying.  We walked Jason to his security gate, waved him off and promptly left, because I would have got something in my eye if we'd hung out for too long.

Right now he should be in Atlanta waiting to transfer to his flight to Heathrow; let's hope his suitcase has learnt it's lesson and catches the same flight as him this time around.

Rain Day.

We were planning to go on a day trip to the next town over today, but we woke up to heavy rain that hasn't really let up all day; so Jason and I stayed at home instead. 

We had a leisurely breakfast whilst watching "Cash on the Attic" (it was a really old one because Alistair Appleton was presenting, what on earth is he doing these days?)on BBC America, followed by "You Are What You Eat" with the gnome-like Gillian McKeith.

Jason had thoughtfully brought his hairdressing tools with him, so he gave my Do a much needed tune-up.  Then I demonstrated my new method of mopping floors with the dutch rubber broom, which I think Jason was honestly interested in seeing.  Well as as a flat mate of mine for 7 years, me cleaning was probably something he didn't feel he'd seen often enough, so this was by way of a rare treat for him (Note to Mum: I am much better at cleaning than I used to be, and now I have an independent witness!)

If he's really lucky I may vacuum later.  Wild times.

Antiques, Cat Training and Petrol Shortages.

Doc C was teaching this afternoon, and this morning he had a meeting so Jason and I went into town with him when he went to work and I showed Jason around the local antique shops, restaurants (we covered one for breakfast, one for lunch and a bakery for a sampler selection of their finest cookies) and the university campus.

We also picked up the post from our post office box and the CitiKitty I ordered last week arrived today.  All we need now is a cat or two, and I will be able to report back on whether or not it is indeed possible to train a cat to use a toilet.  Oh, let's hope!

We were planning to go to Asheville on Saturday, but it turns out that the petrol shortages that have been effecting other towns in America has finally reached our town; so we may have to be more careful about the distances we're going to drive over the next few days before we go to Charlotte airport.  Otherwise Jason may be here for considerably longer than he had anticipated, which would honestly suit me perfectly well!

Day Three of Jason's Visit!

This evening we introduced Jason to Kim, Jill and David, "Project Runway", our shiny new grill and smores.  It was very fun!

Tomorrow I will take Jason out to my favourite breakfast place, then around campus and the antique shops in town, before we go bowling in the evening.  More fun!

Jason's Bag Arrives!

Jason's bag flew into Charlotte from New York today, and then was put on another plane to Tennessee, where it was then put onto a van and driven to our house.  So the suitcase is technically better travelled than Jason, having been to a whole extraneous state.

It took the entire day for the suitcase to get here, but it has finally arrived.  Inside it (apart from all of the stuff he puchased in New York) were a huge jar of Marmite, a large jar of Branston Pickle, the biggest box of maltesers I've ever seen and A BOTTLE OF PIMMS!!!

Jason is the best houseguest ever.

Jason Arrives!

We drove to Charlotte today to collect Jason from the airport.  We parked the car, walked through the main entrance and I immediately spotted Jason at a luggage caousel.  His suitcase, unfortunately, had not made it from New York to North Carolina, so he gave them our address and they'll deliver it to us tomorrow.

Apart from that small hiccup, I think he's had a good trip so far.

Heave-Ho Me Hearties!

Scurvy curses!  Yesterday was International Speak Like A Pirate Day, and I didn't know until it was way too late.  Why does no-one tell me these things?  I love a good "Yarrr!"

Of course if I did speak like a pirate round here people would probably just assume it was some quaint English phrase they'd not heard before.  This was something I realised the other day when I got tongue tied in the middle of a sentence, and as a result completely mangled a perfectly normal expression; later in the conversation the person I was talking to then repeated the phrase exactly as I had said it, clearly under the impression that was the British way of putting it.  I managed not to laugh, but how funny would it be to convince people that Pirate speak is in fact just the way people talk in South London?  It is SO tempting!

Rafting.

After work today Doc C took part in The Great Raft Debate with three other professors representing other academic disciplines.  The idea is that a raft with all of the audience on it is traveling to colonise a completely new environment and they find these four professors on an island on their way.  They only have one space left on the raft so who do they take to help build the new society.

It was really fun, and I thought The Doc explained the importance of Philosophy to civilisation really well.  In fact last year's winner Geology, and Literature, were left behind, leaving the debate in a tie between Philosophy and Biology/Neuroscience, which was represented by my department's Director. 

In the end this momentous choice was decided by a brisk round of rock/paper/scissors, which Biology/Neuroscience won by a sheet of paper versus Philosophy's rock.  As so often happens in a these life-and-death-of-society moments.

First Official House Guest!

Apart from Doc's brother, who was really only here to drop off furniture, we have not yet had an official house guest come to visit us.  It looked like Jason was going to earn that title with his visit from the UK in two weeks time; but just pipping him to the post is our friend Bob who drove up from Boston.

We have naturally rolled out the red carpet for him, and even purchased new sheets from the Jacqueline Smith home furnishings collection.  Clearly Jacqueline favours a sateen cotton sheet which we bought in a nice chocolate brown.  More mysteriously the insect screens that were taken off our windows by some workmen two months ago have re-appeared just in the nick of time.

We're about to go out for dinner, and we're looking forward to showing bob around town a bit too.

Zombie Slow.

As the very slow car we had been stuck behind turned off the road, Doc C said "Good.  Now we can move at the speed of the living".

Washinton 10 - (Finally) Bullet Point Number Ten

As we came out of Lush directly across the road from us was a branch of Urban Outfitters and we briefly discussed going to see if they had anything we wanted, but we agreed that really on the last couple of occasions we'd had looked round an Urban Outfitters we had been really disappointed with the selection and quality.

Thinking about it later Doc C said he felt that the main problem was that they sold too many t-shirts with slogans that "...Frat boys would think of as witty".

Which probably means we are not the target demographic anyway, so we carried on to Barnes and Noble instead.

Washington 10 - Bullet Point Number Nine.

Before leaving on the trip I had gone to the Lush website and found the addresses of their shops in DC.  There was one in Georgetown, and I think Doc wanted to take me there anyway, so we stopped off on the way home.

I really like Georgetown, it's like a nice English market town, if they'd had a Waterstones, a Monsoon and nice tea room (and if the traffic was on the correct side of the road), then I would have thought I was in the home counties.  sigh.

Even better the Lush was between an American Eagle Outfitters, a clothes shop which does Doc C's current favourite cut of jeans, and a Barnes and Noble bookshop.  Heaven.  Doc bought three pairs of jeans, whilst I bought three books and a pilates ball, not to mention a tidy sum of delicious smelling cosmetics.

It was a very good day of shopping and we both left very happy.  Next time we go to Washington I really want to spend much more time in Georgetown.

Washington 10 - Bullet Point Number Eight.

At the Hilton we were paying $90 a night for the room, and if we had handed over the keys to the valet there, it would have cost us another $40 a night for parking too.  So instead we checked in, put our bags in the room, and then drove round the block to a car park which cost $15 a night.  A third of the price suited us much better, thank you very much.

We parked the mini ourselves, and the spaces were double parked, so we had to leave a key so they could move cars as necessary.  However once we'd parked, we couldn't find the valet to leave our key with.  So we left it with the man in the front booth instead.  I reminded Doc that the Mini has a special plastic valet key, which is a lot smaller than the normal key and although it will open the door and start the engine, it won't open the glove compartment (which is weird, isn't it?).  More to the point, it's a lot cheaper to replace than one of the normal keys, and losing the valet key is a lot less of an inconvenience.

So, three days later, we came back to collect the car.  We got it from it's spot, and we ask the valet for our key back.  He didn't look at the key rack, but he immediately, and forcefully, said that he had no key for our car.  Umm, really?  Because we definitely did leave one.  No key, come back tomorrow and he'll ask the other guy.  Ok, well that's not terribly convenient for us really, what with living in another state, but clearly there's nothing we can say to this guy to get our key back today.

So we drove up to the front both to pay our bill, and asked if perhaps our key was there.  It wasn't.  At this point we thought, well we do live in a completely different state if necessary we can just abandon the plastic key and it won't be as bad as losing one of our main keys.  We noted down the head office address so we could chase it up later.

Fortunately the woman from the front booth was really helpful, and she literally ran down to the valet to make him look.  And what do you know?  He had our key.

Washington 10 - Bullet Point Number Seven.

I don't really think point number seven, "Why a good curry is just the best thing ever", needs much explaining. 

We haven't been out for a curry since March.  That's six months ago!  Clearly we were so due a curry, with garlic naan bread, that it wasn't even funny and so the curry we had in Washington was especially delicious.

Mmmm... Curry...

The Hope Diamond.

This is the Hope Diamond. 

It is very big and shiny.

The crowd to see this at the Smithsonian was enormous.  It's displayed in a four-sided glass display case, and the plinth it's on revolves; stopping for ten seconds at each side to accommodate photography.

Which you have to admit is very thoughtful, especially for a diamond with a curse on it.

Washington 10 - Bullet Point Number Six.

Doc C has a lot of brothers and sisters, to be precise he is the youngest of nine.  This usually doesn't have much of an effect on our day to day life, so we forget to factor it into our plans.  This can be a mistake.

On the Sunday morning we were in Washington, we'd decided to go out for brunch; so I went to have shower and get ready.  I heard Doc's phone go as I walked into the bathroom, and I guessed it was probably one of his parents.  Which it was, so in the course of the conversation Doc mentions we're in DC for the weekend and his Dad immediately said "Oh your brother's in town, I'll call him and tell him you're there too."

The first I hear of all this is when I came out of the bathroom, Doc's phone went again, and he answered it loud enough for me to hear, so that I would get a head's up. "Hey Pete! So I hear you're in Washington!".  We arranged that we would meet Pete and his family outside the Smithsonian in the afternoon, but when we got there, we couldn't get them on the phone.  So we waited for about 30 minutes, and just as we were about to get a taxi back to the hotel, Doc's phone rang and they asked us to wait there for another half hour.  Which turned into 45 minutes.  In the rain.

Why do we never think to check the location of every single one of his many siblings before we give out our geographical details?  To be clear I honestly do really like all of his family, however what always happens is that with all the apparently inevitable messing around they always take up a large chunk of time.  And that's exactly what happened.

Once we did finally meet up with them it was fun to catch up, Pete went to university in Washington so he took us to a really good pub.  Plus his oldest son (who I think is 9 or 10) thinks I'm fabulous, so naturally I find him charming.  That said I'm fully intending to give them all GPS tracking units for Christmas, so we can get a much better idea of who is where at all times.

Washington 10 - Bullet Point Number Five.

We had a difficult choice between the Museum of Crime and Punishment (which has a CSI crime scene to investigate!) or The International Spy Museum.

We went for the International Spy Museum, and it definitely has the potential to be really fun, but there were too many people in there when we went.  It's odd because to get into the museum you have to get into a lift (American translation: Elevator) in small groups, so presumeably it would be fairly simple for the museum staff to control the flow of visitors very easily,  Given that, I don't really understand why they allow it to be such a scrum. 

Somewhat ironically most of the visitors to the museum on that day would make terrible spies, because they were totally unaware of the people around them.  At one point in the museum you could crawl through a mocked up air duct that looked out over a room in the museum, so you could see other visitors through a grill.  This was made apparent by people in the air duct thumping on the sides to get the attention of the people in the room below them.  Hello?  Does the word "covert" mean nothing to you people?

It was a fun museum though, they have some really cool exhibits and they have done a really fantastic job on the displays.  The recreations of rooms, street corners, and tunnels are especially atmospheric and impressive.  I would recommend going, but perhaps mid-week when there would be a lot fewer people.

Washington 10 - Bullet Point Number Four.

On Saturday we'd had a very light breakfast and only a snack for lunch, which meant by Saturday evening we were absolutely starving.

Having learnt from that, on Sunday we decided to have a much larger breakfast to keep us fully fueled for a busy day ahead.  So The Doc suggested we go out for brunch at Old Ebbitt Grill. 

It's across the road from the White House, so it has the reputation of being the place that a lot of informal political deals have made at over a breakfast or lunch.  We didn't see any of that ourselves, or at least didn't notice it if it was happening at the next booth.

I can't really remember what Doc ordered, it was sort of like a quiche without pastry that was served in the small cast iron skillet it was cooked in.  I had eggs chesapeake which is an english muffin, with crab cakes and poached eggs on top.  It's utterly delicious.  After I'd finished that I decided to follow up with oysters, because who can resist an oyster menu with a hyper glamorous mermaid on it?  Certainly not me. 

By our usual standards it was an expensive brunch, but really worth it.

Washington 10 - Bullet Point Number Three.

So why do I believe that pavements (US translation: Sidewalks) are A Very Good Thing?  Because you can walk on them without fearing for your physical safety!  It's genius! 

We parked the car on Friday evening (and believe you me that in itself is a whole other post, I believe it's scheduled for bullet point eight) and did not feel the need for it again until Monday morning when we left.  We walked all over Washington, felt safe doing so and not once did anyone stare at us or honk their horns or yell at us.

It sounds like an odd thing to say, but since moving to NC I find that I honestly miss the excellent pavements of Great Britain.  Now there is a coffee table book waiting to happen.

Washington 10 - Bullet Point Number Two.

Whilst planning our trip to Washington we had asked our friends for any recommendations or suggestions.  Top of everyone's list was an Ethiopian restaurant called Meskerem in Adams-Morgan, and Doc had been there a couple of years ago; so naturally we went on Saturday night.

I'd never eaten Ethiopian food before, but Doc assured me there would be a good vegetarian selection and he was absolutely right.  I choose a platter which had a little bit of everything on it, and all of it was delicious.  Doc C had lamb, which I understand was really good too.

Everything was served on big plates (usually just one from which everyone shares, but Doc asked our waitress to keep our main dishes separate because he's very considerate like that) with a lot of soft floppy bread, sort of like a pancake, but with the little bubbles you get on crumpets.  You tear off bits of the bread and use it to scoop up a mouthful of food.  The platter is placed on a low wicker table, which is concave so you have to reach down into it.  That sounds so weird, but it's really nice and creates a very relaxed intimate atmosphere.

It was a perfect atmosphere for a second or third date, and I had a whale of a time eavesdropping on nervous young couples.  In my opinion the guy in the blue shirt was completely wasting his time, because the young lady he was with barely spoke and was wearing a scruffy beige cardigan which would indicate to me that she wasn't keen, but he seemed to really enjoy the sound of his own voice so perhaps he won't be too upset.

Another thing I really liked about being out and about in Adams-Morgan on a Saturday night was that everyone had really dressed up to go out.  Women were wearing beautiful dresses and jewelry, or well cut jeans and tops with really good hair-dos, so they looked great.  The students round here seem to believe that dressing up is putting on their least filthy pair of jeans and a t-shirt, so it was just refreshingly fabulous to see all the glamour

Skeletons on Display at the Smithsonian.

Clockwise from top left we have the skeletons of a domestic cat, a tarsier (look at those orbital sockets!), a hedgehog and a platypus.

Fascinating!

Washington 10 - Bullet Point Number One.

I only packed one book (not counting my crochet book) for our trip to DC.  This was the new Diana Wynne Jones book, "House of Many Ways".  It's a sequel to "Howl's Moving Castle" and it's a really enjoyable, witty, fantasy novel (ok, technically it's a children's book.  Let's not get bogged down in labels though).  I've read pretty much everything that Wynne Jones has written, and I would say this is one of her strongest books.  I would love to read another story about the characters she's introduced here, and I feel like there is still a lot to learn about Sophie, Howl and Calcifer.

I started reading it in the car after we' been driving for a couple of hours, and had finished it before we'd even arrived in Washington.  So it took me roughly 5 hours to read in a single sitting, and I wanted to start it all over again when I got to the end.

I would definitely recommend it to a friend (Specifically Esther, she would LOVE this).

Office Space.

This was the first picture I took in Washington.  I took it at about midnight of the office building that was opposite our hotel and it was all dark except for one guy still at his desk.

Mate!  It's midnight on a Friday!  Close the spreadsheet and move away from the computer.

Which segues neatly into my first day in my new job, don't you think?  It all went well I think, everyone was very nice but it was so much information to take in that I had to have a recuperative nap when I got home.

Home Again, Home Again, Jiggity-Jog.

We are safely back in NC, enjoying the deafening sound of crickets and their insect friends.  The 24 hour traffic of Capital Hill was distinctly quieter.

Remind me to tell you about:

1. How brilliant the new Diana Wynne Jones book, "House of Many Ways" is.
2. The Ethiopian restaurant we went to on Saturday night.
3. Why pavements (US translation: Sidewalks) are A Very Good Thing.
4. The amazing brunch we had on Sunday that involved both crab cakes and oysters.  Yum!
5. The International Spy Museum.
6. How we came to realise that Doc C really does have far too many siblings.
7. Why a good curry is just the best thing ever.
8. The foresight of BMW to provide little plastic valet keys.
9. Georgetown, and how nice it was to find a Lush, an American Eagle Outfitters and a Barnes and Noble within walking distance of one another.
10. Which shop Doc C describes as have the type of clothing that "...Frat boys would think of as witty".

There is other stuff as well, but those ten will do to be going on with.  It was a very fun trip!

A Saturday in Washington.

My feet are aching.  It was such a fun day, if a little too blazing hot for me.

We left the hotel at about 10.30, and we haven't stopped since.  We've been walking everywhere, past the White House, past the Treasury, through the Smithsonian Natural History Museum, through two art galleries and a sculpture garden, before finally investigating every square inch of H&M (We needed new clothes for work, we now have them).

I took the most photos at the Smithsonian, because they allowed photography and they had so many interesting things.  The moment we walked in I was immediately impressed by the Easter Island Figure they have just sitting in the Constitution Avenue entrance lobby.  I have always been fascinated by those statues, and this is the only one in America.  Inevitably I have a new Facebook profile picture with my stone-faced buddy.

I also fought through crowds to take a few shots in the Harry Winstone gem gallery, why hello there Star of India and Hope Diamond!  

Surprisingly it wasn't the gem room that I got completely snap happy in, mainly because there were just too many people in the way; in fact I took the most pictues in the skeleton exhibition.  I mean, who doesn't love skeletons?  Right?

Anyway, it's been a very exciting day.  I think I need a nap.

Sushi, Unexpected Fountains and an Early Morning Alarm.

Well.

It's already been quite an interesting trip, and I've only just woken up.

Last night we went out for dinner and Doc C remembered a sushi restaurant not far from our hotel.  I ordered the dinner box and I really should have taken a photo of it, because it arrived on one of those lacquered trays with little compartments for the different types of food.  It had miso soup, teryaki salmon, seaweed salad, steamed rice, vegetable dumplings, and California rolls.  Plus I'd ordered some crispy salmon skin rolls, my favourite sushi!  I can't resist crispy salmon, so I was already half way through it all before I even thought of taking a picture.  Yum!  Also there was some great music playing which I must look up, I first noticed it when I heard a bossa nova version of "Fame", but then came the bossa nova version of "Ring My Bell" and now I must own that CD.  It was brilliant.

By this time we were tired so we got a cab back to the hotel, and watched TV in bed.  Doc C went to sleep fairly quickly, but I'd slept a lot in the car (huge shock there, eh Mum?)  so I blogged, crocheted and watched "The Dog Whisperer".

I'd noticed that the toilet kept running by itself, which wasn't loud but was slightly annoying.  When I went to get washed, I thought I'd just check the cistern.   Because, you know, I am such a skilled amateur plumber these days.  So I lifted the lid off, and the water pipe that was filling up the cistern turned out to be rubber, so when I lifted off the lid the hose shot straight up into the air and started writhing around.  Suddenly there was water everywhere!  I was frozen for a moment of two, but as soon as my hair and nightdress started getting wet, I stuffed the thing back in the tank and set about mopping up.  There was water on the walls, the floor, the marble counter top (I cannot think what the British word for this would be.  Someone help me!) and the ceiling.  It was quite impressive.  It was also exactly like a scene from a Frank Capra film (as I believe you predicted Mik), which makes me Jean Arthur or Claudette Colbert and Doc C would be Jimmy Stewart or Alan Ladd.

Somehow Doc slept through all off this.  He did not, however, sleep through the fire alarm that went off at 3.30am.  Oh my.  It started off as just this annoying bell like noise, which just got louder and more persistent.  We were staggering around the room getting dressed, and then I went to the door only to hear a member of staff rushing around reassuring everyone that it was only a malfunction.  Great.  We went back to bed.

They just set the thing off again, but used the system as a PA this time.  The announcement said "May I have your attention please.  The reason for the alarm has been determined as a false alarm.  Please resume normal activities."  Thanks for that reassurance.  I've been on tenterhooks panicking about it for the last six hours.

Oh yes.  Already the Hilton is ensuring that this is going to be an interesting weekend.

Hotel.

 If you should need to contact us we are in room 880:

 

Something tells me there is a "Star Trek: Next Generation" fan in charge of the labelling around here.

Privacy engaged Captain Picard.

And remember how we are paying $90 a night for this room?  Well this is the room information sign which I immediately noticed when we brought our bags up:

 

Ha-ha-ha!  It's usually $750 a night for two people?  Good grief!

Doc C rocks at finding a good deal!

Preliminary to Our City Break.

We are all packed and the bags are in the back of the mini ready for us to go to Washington DC.  I've packed the laptop, the Skype headset, the camera leads and every single recharger cable I could lay my hands on.  I have the technology and I will be blogging whilst we are away, but I can't commit to my usual two posts a day because I may well be having too much fun!

At the moment I'm blogging from Doc's office while I wait for The Doc to finish teaching his last class and then we will leave town for the weekend.  In the meantime I nipped back to my old desk to do one or two things that I had forgotten about that I felt needed to be taken care of.  You see?  I am a very responsible employee!

I was planning to leave you with a nice picture to look at whilst we are on the road. Unfortunately the pictures I was going to post were all out of focus, which is annoying.  You will just have to see pictures of the fabulous, framed, Day-of-the-Dead wedding diorama (which includes an adorable skeleton dog) that Randy and Laura brought back from Mexico for us.  I think it was the reflections on the glass that confused my poor little point and shoot, so I'm confident that I can get a good picture once I fiddle around with some lighting.

Oh, I think I forgot to mention where we will be staying.  Doc C is great at finding on-line deals on travel and accommodation, so he was clicking around and found a four star hotel for $90 a night.  Bargain.  So we will be in the Hilton, which is two blocks away from the White House!  We looked at their website and it looks really nice; the only thing I was slightly confused by was why they had a Presidential Suite when they are only two blocks away from the White House.  Is that where the President goes when he has a row with the First Lady and is sent to sleep in the spare room?

Good Morning!

This morning is so much better than yesterday morning.�

When I woke up my neck was definitely on it's way to being uncricked. �I still don't have what you would call a full range of motion, but it's�considerably better than yesterday when all I could really do was to go back to bed, position two firm pillows under my head, press my mini hot-water bottle (it has a knitted skull-and-crossbones cover) to my neck and watch almost the whole season of "Tori and Dean: Home Sweet Hollywood".� In the evening I changed things up a bit by lying on the sofa and watched "I Love You Again";�a Myrna Loy/William Powell movie that was not part of the "Thin Man" series but would definitely do until one came along.

On the jobs front I've now�spoken to both my current manager and my future manager to work out the time-frame for my switching jobs.� Everyone has been very kind to me in this office and, fortunately for all concerned, the timing on this is perfect; the temporary job would have been finishing within the next fortnight anyway,�which means they were happy�to let�me�move over very quickly.� In fact my last day in this office will be tomorrow, and then I start my new job on Tuesday.

Eagle eyed readers will no doubt note that means I am not working on Friday or Monday, and that discrepancy�accommodates a mini city break in Washington D.C.� Doc suggested ages ago that we should go away�this weekend, as it fits neatly between the end of the summer class session and the beginning of the fall semester;�my changing jobs�means we can go for an extra couple of days and really chill out.� Again with the perfect timing!

Naturally�I am knocking on wood as I type this.� There will be no jinxing of anything around here, thank you very much.

Beep-Beep Beep-Beep Yeah!

I took this picture on our way home when we were stopped at the lights.  I took it to record that humongous Beatles bumper sticker, mainly because I find it a bit odd that The Beatles are still so freaking huge over here.

In the UK you can easily go for months without hearing a Beatles song; here I think my record is about a week.  It's a Fab Four fixation, and just walking down the street today we were subjected to "When I'm 64" played far too slowly by a school band busking on the high street.  I never had particularly strong feelings bout the mop-tops, but now, frankly, I am getting really quite sick of them.

There I've said it.

Anyway, Doc C pointed out that there was in fact another bumper sticker on the left hand side of the (here blacked out) number plate.

Those would be metallic relief bumper stickers depicting Uzi machine guns.

How weird is that?  "All We Need is Love" and some serious firearms?

The Demise of My Pseudo-Tough Travel Mug.

One really good thing about our old flat was that the guy we were subletting from had roughly a dozen travel mugs.  I had never used a travel mug before, but I soon discovered that they are invaluable on those occasions when we need to leave the house early.  I can just brew a cup of green earl grey, pour it into a travel mug and bring my breakfast with me when we leave.  The Doc is much happier with this arrangement too, because I'm ready to go that bit sooner.

When we moved I decided to buy a travel mug of my own, and I eventually plumped for one that was on sale at our favourite local kitchen place.  Perhaps because I felt this was a slightly extravagant thing to buy I didn't chose the one I really liked (which was pink enamel), instead I choose the cheapest one with the largest capacity.  It had a raised pattern reminiscent of that textured metal flooring you find on building sites; which suggested to me that it was designed to appeal to the type of man who likes things to be industrial-looking, right down to the travel mug keeping his latte warm.  So not me.

One of the things I specifically checked when choosing my travel mug was if it was dishwasher safe, and this one had a label stuck to the bottom saying precisely that.  However when I got home and peeled the sticker off, the base of the mug had "Hand wash Only" embossed into it.  Grrr.  So I have been dutifully hand washing it, but last night I was tired and I thought, well, the sticker did say I could. So I put in the dishwasher with everything else for the first time. 

This morning I put my tea in my travel mug, but it wasn't until we were already in the car that I noticed that the base was coming off, and I could see the insulating foam.  I tried pushing it back together, but no luck.  Even worse when I got to work this morning and took my first sip, I got a lap full of tea as well, so I had to abandon it completely.  Naturally I decanted the tea first into a mug, and then did an autopsy on the mug with my bare hands before throwing in the bin.

Does it strike you as strange that something that has been designed to look like a monster truck part is too delicate to machine wash, even once?  What's the point in making something look like it could stop a tank if a mere run through a domestic dishwasher is enough to completely destroy it?

Honestly though, I'm secretly glad this travel mug died so ignobly.  Now I can buy that nice girly pink one!

Welcome Home Dr A!

We went out to dinner with friends tonight, mainly to welcome back one of Doc C's colleagues from a trip to China.  He'd taken a party of students there to study for a couple of weeks, and the group was touring a temple about sixty miles away from the earthquake's epicenter when it hit.

Fortunately no one in his group was injured, but they still had to deal with quite a lot of completely unforeseen problems before they could get home.  It sounds like a total nightmare, but again everyone survived it all and got back to the USA in one piece.

Of course once back in the country of their birth the students decided this was an excellent time to re-assert their independence and simply scattered.  This subsequently caused two of the kids to somehow miss the internal connecting flight from Georgia to North Carolina, but I'd still call that a 99.9% success rate for the trip over all.

The Story of Our Bedroom Furniture.

We spent most of yesterday waiting for The Doc's brother Rich, and his buddy Kev, to arrive with some furniture that Rich was giving to us.  He was driving it down from Boston, and we were told to expect him on Sunday morning.  At about mid-day we got a phone call to say they were in Pennsylvania, so we knew it was going to be awhile.

Through out the afternoon we were anxiously watching the weather, because the furniture was being moved in an open-bed truck, with a tarp tied over the top of it.  When it started to rain, we were concerned. When it started to rain really hard, we made detailed plans for how best to protect the brand-new cream carpets from the wet furniture.  We were particularly worried about the sofa.  How would we save a water logged sofa?  Would there be any point in trying?  How much Febreeze would it require to really get rid of that mildew smell?  Which local thrift shops did furniture collection?

We got a couple of progress reports through out the afternoon that did nothing to assuage our concerns; the tarp had been ripped to shreds by the storm and they were stopping to buy a new one; they'd been the front car in a triple rear-ending, but it was ok and they were back on the road now.

In the end they arrived at about midnight, and immediately unloaded all of the furniture, which was surprisingly dry.  Rich and Kev even lugged a chest of drawers, a dressing table and various bits of bed frame upstairs to our bedroom.  Clearly to Bostonians driving for 17 hours is no obstacle to completing a job properly.

We needn't have worried about the sofa; it hadn't fitted on the truck, so they brought a small desk instead.

Boston: Celeb Spotting and a Word About Mashed Potato.

Whilst in Boston we were walking through Harvard Square, heading towards the bookshop I think, and as we crossed the road I saw two men walking the other way deep in conversation.

I immediately said quietly to the Doc "Those two are actors." and then promptly shushed him so I could leaf through my mental Rolodex of actors' faces.

It's always satisfying when I work out who exactly it is that I've just walked passed, and on this occasion it was Judge Phelan from "The Wire" and the FBI-Agent-who-was-on-the-ground in "Snakes on a Plane".  Otherwise known as Peter Gerety and Bobby Cannavale (Those links take you to IMDB, which at the moment has loads of those annoying ads that animatedly sprawl across the page whilst you are trying to read.  I really hate those.)

I have no clue why they were in Boston together.

In totally unrelated news that I kept meaning to mention, we ate our last Boston meal at the S&S.  It's an old-school family-run restaurant, which was originally opened by European immigrants and therefore they know a thing or two about carbs.  For my dinner I had a strong and spicy Bloody Mary; which washed down delicious pan-seared salmon in a white wine and caper sauce, with a great side salad and mashed potato.

Mum, I really have to take you to Boston sometime.  I think the S&S kitchen staff are trained to make the mashed potato from equal parts real butter to potato, with maybe some cream too.  You would definitely approve.

Giant Coffee Pot

Here is a photo of a giant coffee pot:

I took this shot on our first visit to Winston-Salem, but I didn't post it then. 

This morning I thought you looked like the kind of audience who would appreciate some outsize kitchenware, and besides I didn't take any interesting photos yesterday, so I was trawling the archives for visuals.

If you would like to know more about the giant coffee pot of Winston-Salem, here is a photo of the explanatory plaque.  If you click on it, the image will become big enough for you to read. 

Boston: A Fine City

Actually that title is nicked from my home town of Norwich, where the city signs when you arrive proclaim "Welcome to Norwich.  A Fine City.  Twinned with Rouen Koblenz".  I like that.

Of course when that wording