Its summer!!!!!

This is summer in England. This rose plant is growing up through another bush in my back yard. Its been blooming like this for about three weeks. Unbelievable.

Biggest Green Roof in the middle of The City of London

Last week I went to a meeting at a new building in London. The law firm which now resides in the building in the City is justifiably proud of its Green aspects. Because my firm is a planning and design firm, they gave us a tour of their newly finished "Green Roof."

This photo shows you was a misnomer green roof is, the planting results in a green and red carpet of low growing plant material - I forgot the name of the plant. It even has some higher stems which are topped with a white flower. There are bird and bat boxes to encourage wildlife. The building manager was very funny when he said it was hard to get used to the idea that he was supposed to be attracting flora and fauna to the roof; apparently that strikes against all his previous building management experience. But he seemed very please with his expansive new territory.

But enough about the roof do you see that view? We are looking out across St.Paul's Dome and in the back you can see the London Eye. Luckily it was a lovely day - clear and hot. Up on the roof in the The City. Thanks for the tour.

Today, I helped some old people

OK they weren't that old but they were standing outside my tube station (Farringdon Road) dazed and confused pouring over a map. They kept flipping the map around and staring up at the buildings where the street signs are supposed to be. No street signs, its a typical London sign nightmare. You think they could put up some decent signs since the streets are not a grid and who can tell what direction is north (south east or west for that matter) when its a constant level of grey.

Anyway, I asked them if I could help. Not because I'm particularly helpful but because I've worked with a lot of downtown improvement districts and I always like to know where tourists are going.

Lovely couple, they held the map out for me and asked a simple question, "Is this Cow Cross Street?"

"Yes," I replied in my regular voice. I don't know who else's voice I would use but its an important part of the story, that I spoke to them in my regular voice.

"We are trying to find Hix Oyster Bar." It's clearly marked on their map but they are holding the map upside down. I point them in the right direction. They both say thank you and I say "That's fine, I spend a lot of time looking at maps in London." Thinking, how clever of me - I will put them at ease.

As I walk away, the lady says to her husband, "Isn't it funny that a foreigner stopped and helped us."

OMG, these people think I'm a foreigner. So now I have to re-evaluate my entire persona. I'm not just an American - I am a foreigner. My regular voice - which I believe to be a standard sort American perhaps vaguely southern accent - has signaled to these bastions of middle England that I am a foreigner. How exotic.

I'm a foreigner.

Our boat came in 42

We agreed to tell everyone that our boat came in 42 out of 1800. Pretty good, huh? OK, that was 42 in the Sunsail 37 division which had 58 boats finish in an overall race of 1800.

The winning boats
/ First Monohull to finish ICAP Leopard did it in 3 hours, 53 minutes and 5 seconds however their time got adjusted and they came out in the rankings below Ran - no idea why.
/ First IRC winner (no idea what that means but they got a trophy) was Ran they did it in 4 hours and 32 minutes and no seconds
/ Extreme 40 class (again no idea what that means) but they were fast and pictures of the boat are cool) winner was Team Origin, they did it in 3 hours, 23 minutes and 50 seconds
/ The first in our division Sunsail 37 did it in 7 hours 49 minutes and 35 seconds
/ The 42 in the Sunsail 37 division (ahem that's us!) did it in 9 hours, 5 minutes and 25 seconds

1875 boats registered. Only 1750 started the race, the rest were all chicken, and only 1557 finished.

We finished AND we weren't disqualified.

Photos from Round the Isle of Wight Race

Casting off on Friday night from Portsmouth to cross the Solent to get to Cowes. It was grey and very windy. We made it in around 11 pm and sacked out by midnight. Hard to sleep the night before my first race.


Saturday morning the race started for us at 6:15 is was a cold hard slog up to the Needles (western-most point of Isle of Wight) but all those boats tacking and swerving were a sight to see even in the cold foggy early morning.


By the time we got around the Needles, the sun had come out but the wind was still very strong. This picture shows the Needles at rocky outcroppings in the sea. At this point we are sailing quite fast downwind. Very large swells and not a lot of tacking. It was sort of like being on a tippy roller coaster. At least it was sunny now.


This is a great part of the race you have made it past St. Catherine's Point (the southern tip of Wight) and are zooming north and rounding the eastern tip called Bembridge. Here all the boats narrow in to take a left (! ok ok port!) around a buoy - you can see it on the left of this picture. Its incredible to look forward at all the boats ahead of you then turn around and see all the boats behind you. Quite magnificent.


I didn't get any pictures of the madness that occurred going around the Fort or crossing the finish line, just this relaxing shot as we head back to port at Cowes - exhausted but happy after 9 hours of sailing. I slept really well on Saturday night

Sorry but I have even more photos at the following link.

Sailing Around the Isle of Wight

Last Saturday I was crew on a boat that did the round the Isle of Wight race. The entire experience spanned most of the sailing I think you see in the UK. It started off ignobly with a gale force wind, race day dawned bad but turned great and sunday post race sailing was better yet. I'm composing a photo essay on the event.

In the mean time this is a great picture of ME! I'm not really sailing, its totally posed. But that is my new foul weather gear (thanks, Ceri!) and that is my hugely sunburned face. Really great fun.

For an overview of the race see this you tube video

Pawley's Island, South Carolina Beach

This is what Pawley's Island looks like from the back porch of the old beach hotel were we stayed. It was very relaxing.

Best part of the trip was when another guest told me with a completely straight face that they were going down to the beach music festival, taking chars and plopping down around the dance floor to watch couples shag all night.

I've been in Britain long enough to almost fall out of my chair. When I told the retired teacher what "shag all night" implied in UK slang I thought she was going to turn into a beet. But then she had a good giggle and went anyway.

Travels since April

Wow, I've been back from vacation for almost two weeks and still running to catch up. Need to get some photos of friends I visited on my trip back to visit Atlanta. Had a great time seeing old friends and catching up. The trip to South Carolina's Pawley's Island was excellent as well. We stayed at the Sea View Inn. Which has not disappointed for the second year in a row. No phones , no TV; just the beach and a really great porch. Doesn't take much to get me happy at the beach.

A rainy bank holiday later, I'm just headed up to Shrewsbury for a work event. Don't know anything about Shrewsbury except the guide says its the County Town of Shropshire, the birthplace of Charles Darwin and features the Shrewsbury Abbey (which is the mythical home to Brother Cadfael).

As usual I am packing on the fly and cannot find my camera - where does that thing hide. Will try and get some decent pictures from someone else's camera on my walk through the town on Saturday morning.

Hope all is well with everyone - tell me about your summer plans.

Forgetting Sarah Marshall

So remember Russell Brand, a member of my grandfalloon and celebrity siting there of? Well, it turns out he's made a movie in the US, Forgetting Sarah Marshall. He plays Sarah's recovery boy a British rocker and has a new fake video. I wonder if any one in the US will get the joke?

Its a funny think British humour - plus he's wearing normal clothes and the birdnest hair seems to be under control.

I wonder if he will remain in my grandfalloon and if I'll still keep siting him in the BA lounge and Hampstead. Funny the public people you recognise.

Smithy Beats out Nessa for a BAFTA

Oh - its BAFTA time (well it was when I started this post) and Gavin and Stacy, the show I wrote about a couple of weeks ago swept the awards. While Smithy got the award, Nessa is my favorite character. The actors who play Smithy and Nessa are the writers of the show - so I'm please to see they are getting some recognition.

I think its great that Nessa has that giant Welsh dragon tattoo she has on her arm. That and the fact that she's reading the Satanic Verses and couldn't talk about it because she couldn't afford "another fatwa." I love hearing those Welsh accents and who knew that Barry Island could be so funny?

Do you know about Gavin and Stacey?

Its a comedy on BBC3, second season started here five weeks ago. I believe you can watch them online at BBC's iPlayer here.

I've had a miserable cold for days only falling into staying home when the cough got so bad others begged me to stay home - lots of time on my hand and a friend suggested I watch it, because I'm bored, and I'm terrible and grouchy when I'm bored. Anyway my friend was right it did make me happy to watch it - now if this cough would just go away...

Way too much television in the last couple of days.

Mad Men Mad Men Mad Men

Oh I really love Sunday evenings because that is when BBC is showing Mad Men. Tonight's episode ended up with our hero in a village bar listening to a folk song about the River Zion, meanwhile Mr. Sterling head of the ad agency is having it off with the head secretary at the agency. They leave the hotel separately but end up standing on the street just near each other while they are both rying to get a cab while the folk song is still in the background.

omg the symbolism is like getting hit over the head with a beautifully crafted photograph.

All brings to mind MFNY who used to work at an ad agency and looks a bit like the wife in the story - right, Nancy?!

More Yorkshire Dales

The snow made the dry stone walls really stand out in the landscape. They were interesting mostly because they need to be built by hand. Can you imagine the labour required to build hundreds (or thousands) of feet of these walls which criss-cross the hills and valleys. Truly awesome

Ribblehead viaduct

Easter weekend Robert and I ventured forth for our second annual Easter road trip. This year we went to the Yorkshire Dales -- last year it was Cornwall. This year it snowed; six inches of snow on Saturday night. It was really really gorgeous. This picture is of the ribblehead viaduct which was built in 1874 and is still in use today. Doesn't it look cool in that valley.

I forgot my camera so all pictures are care of Robert's camera. I'm trying to figure our how to get direct links but best I can do is link to his source.

The family that reads together, stays together

The weather was perfect the first day in Paris so we ate a picnic lunch our side and watched Paris stroll by. This scene played out on the bench across from us, they all sat together and just read the paper. Didn't really speak to each other just reading and soaking up the sun. I liked that about Paris, it was like everyone was in their own bubble, they weren't ignoring you they were just getting on with their own thing.

As usual I must give creative credit for the photo, this is from the marcia collection. Here is a link to her Paris pictures, they are so beautiful.

just sitting out on a sunny Sunday, reading the paper on the artists bridge - ain't life grand?

Marcia and Me -Paris - from early March

This was late in the day and we were in citroen park. it was looking a bit shabby, possibly more shabby than it actually was since it was grey and the end of a touristy day. Bailey is the photographer.

The thing I like most about this photograph is that I have NO DEA what we are saying and why it was so funny. It also reminds me that I apparently only travel in the winter because all photographs of me include coats and scarves. This red one is a favorite! we had a great time.

Where does the time go?

Its March 2nd today and I feel like it was just February 2nd! How can it go by so fast - it was even a leap year so we got an extra day! Probably because I've had some friends passing through. Marcia and Bailey are visiting from San Fran. They arrived in London last Saturday and on Sunday I joined them for a short trip to Paris. I'm hoping to get some pictures to post from them because Marcia has a bitchin' new camera.

I took the usual badly focussed tourist pictures including this lovely night shot of Notre Dame. Best part was right after we took it we went in and watched a bit of mass being said (or is it performed?). There was a whole lot of incense; giant billowing clouds. Not exactly the same of the local anglican church here in leafy north London.

The weather was amazing on Sunday. We loafed around the city drinking wine from plastic cups--very bohemian. We stayed in the St. Germaine as lovely a place as you could ever hope to see. My last trip to paris was in 1999, so much had changed; for starters Notre Dame was no longer shrouded, but probably more importantly I could afford my own hotel room. Ah, the joys of aging and achieving more disposable income.

More later once I get some pics of Marcia!

Houston: Mission Control

When I was in Houston at the end of January, as a side trip from the meeting, we went to the Johnson Space Center. This picture is from the gallery at the original Mission Control. As with all pictures from the race to the moon I was struck by how amazing it was that any one actually made it to the moon let alone back. The computers in the mission control were only terminals and the guide says the computing power was something tiny and the main frame took up a whole floor underneath this control room.

Really remarkable. But the most interesting bit was the next picture.

Rocket with boosters

This is one of the two or three rockets left. There is this one laying on its side with stages slightly separated in Houston and apparently there is another one standing upright at Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The most interesting thing about the rocket, apart from the scale which no picture can really capture, is the fact that the whole thing looks like it was put together in someone's backyard. Ok a really really big back yard but still.

One of my fellow tour takers said, "Really look like it was made in shop class, doesn't it?"

That really captures the essence. Although they weren't really reused, the enormous rocket was slightly bashed in looking and when you looked at the business end, the end where the giant propulsion occurs, you really get the feeling you are looking at something smushed together slightly badly then covered in tin foil. I really wish I could have captured that in a photograph. All I could get was this shot from near the top end; this thing is huge.

Being there did give you a frisson of pride. If man can do this then surely they can figure out some other stuff. Of course that was ages ago.

Note to Mum and Dad: I still can't believe you wanted to do this Dad or that you were willing to let him, Mum.

Robert is Here fruit stand

On saturday, we went for a walk in the Everglades National Park. On our way there we stopped at "Robert is Here" fruit stand. Neither Ali nor Ules (nor the boys but they are all under five) thought it was odd that this place was called Robert is Here. I thought it sounded like a fruit stand for a guy who could use some therapy. They figured he just used to be out in the middle on nowhere, declaring his availability for fruit purchases.

I highly recommend this fruit stand; they had a key lime pie milkshake that was out standing as well as some really ugly tomatoes which, of course, tasted excellent. Just north of Homested, I believe. Make sure you visit Robert.

Robert has Purple Martins, too

In addition to excellent key lime milkshakes and tomatoes; Robert also claims to have the southern most purple martin house in the continental United States of America. Which reminded me that in all my travels across the world, I have RARELY, nay, NEVER seen another country have such bizarre roadside attractions as you do in my home country.

Why do we do this kind of thing? The best you can get here in the UK is a stand which will sell you cornish ice cream or silly stuff with pictures of royalty on it. But even here in the land of the truly eccentric; you never see anything like a claim to have the southern most purple martin house in the continental USA. Which make me think is Hawaii more southern than Homested? That must be the reason for the "continental" modifier. I wonder if they even have purple martins...

Of course, there were alligators

Who cares about the purple martins anyway. There were alligators to be seen. Here is a view of a few wallowing in the swamp, just feet away from our board walk. very very similar to last year's alligator picture. But this year I was with intrepid boys under the age of five. Who were kitted-out with binoculars. Well, at lest in the begining they were...

Binoculars floating away

Unfortunately for my intrepid fellow alligator hunters. One set of binoculars had to be sacrificed to the alligator gods. After a rather thrilling siting (see previous picture) we clambered up on the railing to get a better look and one pair of binoculars fell off.

Sadly, Ules didn't feel up to wrestling the alligators that saturday afternoon; so, we had to watch the bright yellow and orange, grandma-purchased, best-est of all binoculars float away.

I slept with Superman, Spidey and Captain Jack Sparrow...

After a meeting in Houston, I flew through Miami to spend some time with my friend Ali and her family in Coral Gables. Ali and her husband have three lovely little boys.

Got kicked out of their room so I could sleep in amongst the most fabulous collection of super hero's I've ever seen. This is the view from my twin bed. Superman has certainly got better looking than what I remember of him. The pirates of the Caribbean sheets were also fun. Please not that the planets in front of superman actually glow in the dark, but Ules had some trouble with getting th eorder right so I think they are all revolving around saturn. Ali says that because he didn't go to catholic school. I took umbrage at that, being a public school girl myself...

Back in the UK and more on Thor

I wrote this last week and never posted it.
---------------
I'm back in London and feeling slightly more grounded. As I mentioned in my last posts Tripoli was a surprise; picturesque and pleasant.

Getting back to the UK was a bit of a strain. As we entered the gate at Tripoli International Airport (TIP, for those of you collecting airport call letters) my British seatmate - flying back from six months at an oil field-- informed me that "we had no idea where we were going." After a perplexing moment I replied that I was going to London and hoped the plane we just boarded was headed that way as well. He then told me there had been an 'incident" at Heathrow and runways were closed.

Now, when a British person uses the word "incident" I try to remain calm. They are a remarkably understated group and it could mean anything from a neutron bomb detonation to a taxi cab run amok. Turned out to be an amazing save by a pilot who landed an 777 with no power by gliding (!!) it down. Virtually no injuries -- an amazing story.

Lots of emails flying back and forth between my friends from college; spurred by the death of our friend Thor. Since he was peripatetic, his friends from around the world have built a memorial site. I found this very strange in the beginning, slightly unseemly, which is odd if you think about it since I write to all my friends through an open blog. Ultimately, I have found the site quite comforting because it allows me to remember with a lot of others the hysterical life and death of Thor, the God of Thunder. Best of all there is a collection of his yearly letters which show you how funny and witty he really was.

I spent Sunday rooting around in my flat looking for photos from the mid 1980s when most of the Emory crew were still in Atlanta and found an great set of negatives from when I was taking black and white photos. The picture above is Thor posing for me. I don't remember subjecting my friends to this but apparently I did because there were a ton of black and white negatives from then.

I'm headed to Paris...

At the end February, I'm finally taking the super duper fast and speedy train to Paris from the snazzy newly renovated St. Pancras Train terminalwith some friends. We are staying for a couple of days; I'm just telling you so you can get all set up for great pictures. Maybe we will run into Sarkozy and his squeeze who are being endlessly written about in the British press. Who knows - it could happen. Chances are what you really have to look forward to is the usual funny signs and possibly a picturesque cafe scene...

Sportswear for modest women

Becasue all the signs are in arabic I cam only take pictures of scenery. This display shows a remarkable adaptation of the "mall suit" or sweatsuit. I suppose its sportswear for modest women.

BY the way headscarves are very prominent here in Triploi along with generally demure women's clothing. But chadors or other full body covering has been a very rare sight.

Libyan plumbing

I have a long standing beef with British plumbing specifically the ridiculous habit they have of two taps in the bathroom - so that washing your hands is a freezing or scalding experince.

This picture shows Libyan plumbing is much better. Who knew a country coming out of exile could learn so much quickly that the world's seventh largest economy.

This is Tripoli in January

I'm in the Libyan capital on business. I was gentily approaching this trip for a variety of reasons, mostly it took sooooo long to get a visa and it was difficult to arrange a hotel. But things opened up considerably overthe lastcouple of months or my companies in-country group got better at figuring out how to book rooms. Regardless, I have been pleasantly surprised by Tripoli.

As usual most of my trip is spent in conference rooms and hotels so there's little time to explore. Yesterday, I did get out for a walk for lunch. This is the view in the regular neighborhood. Not bad, eh? Well the weather is much better than in London at this moment, so that's a plus. The infrastructure is really hurting for a variety of reasons: lack of cash from embargo, insufficent planning and god knows what else. The people I've met have been really great, eager to help sort me out and very friendly. So I guess the jury is out but I encourage a visit. Did I mention the whole country is dry? no alcohol, none, nada.

Terrible news

An old Emory friend was killed yesterday in Afghanistan. Thor Hesler was killed when Taliban rushed into an expat heavy hotel with grenades and guns. Its very odd to think he's gone. I got an email from a friend in the US yesterday while they were still saying "an American" had been killed. I wrote back to my friend asking if it could possibly be a mistake. The answer is no, Thor was that American.

Thor had been in hot spots all around the world and spinning tales of his travels in yearly letters to his friends. December's missive was as usual great reading.

Not much you can say when someone dies like this; but its on my mind and I'm far away from home so I wrote it down.

New Haven as an example

First, let me say that I love having this new Mac. It means that I can finally get some speed out of my home Internet pipe, so there's lots more surfing going on. Now if I could just figure out how to get all my old files transferred I would be golden but that requires that I sit down and RTFM since the easy way has had a hiccup.

Any way that's not why I'm writing I'm writing this post because I've been thinking about infrastructure (can you imagine how dull my life must be?) and then today I read this marvelous article in NYT on Public vs. Private infrastructure. It sure isn't pretty but basic infrastructure is what makes cities great and every city I have lived in has a crumbling infrastructure. Atlanta's water system, San Francisco's schools and roads, when I left Tampa it was so busy growing that the infrastructure hadn't caught up yet. Sort of makes you long for early to mid 20th century when civil engineering was kind and social infrastructure got nothing...

Here in London, I'm still having trouble understanding how these things are funded. They don't have bonding as I know it from the US - central government shares our revenue to local authorities who get work done (or not). They have privatised everything so its a very strange quagmire. As fully realised in this week's cock-up concerning net work rails in ability to get the line work finished on time to re-open Liverpool Street Station. They seem to have split up the companies which maintain and deliver the rail lines from the companies which run the trains. No overhead wire engineers available over the holidays so no line from Rugby to Liverpool Street. Good thing no body was at work last week!

Anyway back to infrastructure, I suppose it was always this - before it was privatised the service was crap, now its privatised the service is slightly better than crap but the infrastructure is weak and failing.

As and aside, despite all the great papers here I miss my Sunday morning coffee and NYT ritual, either in the sunny spot in front of my place in Dogpatch with my neighbour's or in Henry's back yard.

Oh, and Happy Birthday, Mum!

So badly out of date

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to the blogosphere (note trendy verbiage). I'm woefully behind in posting, my old mac was actually wheezing so I took advantage of the ridiculous exchange rate to buy a new MacBook (thank you, Santa) whilst (note silly Brit word) in Florida visiting family over Christmas. Yay. Its so lovely and white and spanking-ly great. Has a big-ish screen and the battery lasts for ages and any minute now I'm going to transfer all th egoop from my old machine to my new machine but for the moment its all just so shiny and new.

I flew back in town today -- arrived at a stellar London airport on Sunday. It was sunny and warm the entire week in Mad Beach, family is all doing fine, thank you for asking. London is cold dark and dank. Not sure why I live here; oh yes, its a great job. Hmmm, may need to rethink my priorities and chuck it all in buy a boat and float around a la Travis Magee. Bonus points to anyone who remembers the name of his boat and sends in a comment!

Really was a great and relaxing visit, will dig up some photos and post at some point. Had a great catch up with My Friend Nancy Last-name-starts-with-a-Y-or-did-until-she-married-but-its-too-late-to-change-a-nickname--also known as MFNY. I have decided I can talk about my friends but only if I don't use a real name. Anyway, she brought me up to date with all the friends who didn't know I had moved: Cat Mag, Manker, Elise, etc. etc. Great to here all about every one's life and especailly see MFNY's giant wall O' Christmas card pictures. So many children!

Anyway, have a safe and Happy New Years celebration.

And Note to Ali - be nice to my English friend doing a tour of Florida; I think she needs Cuban coffee and perhaps some roast pork while she's in your fair city.

Politically incorrect signage

Really not much I can say about this sign except to note that I may not have found it as incorrect if I hadn't been raised in the southeast United States post-Jim Crow. I think its aimed at Japanese residents in my neighborhood--of which I have seen very few, but there you have it.

Meant to post this earlier

In early December the leaves are almost all gone, reminds me of how desparate I was in the spring to see green and flowers. So I took this picture walking to work one morning just to remind myself that Fall (or early winter) is also lovely in leafy north London

New St Pancras

Snuck this one in by back dating it. When the female parental unit was visiting last month, we made a pilgrimage to the newly renovated St. Pancras station in London. It was really great; beautiful HUGE train shed. It is still getting finishing touches, but that was OK because you got to see things like the picture above. Its working crawling all over the enormous glass ceiling getting some last minute Windex-ing done.

The trip including some champagne at the champagne bar that watches over the trains to France. Best part of that was the fact that the seats in the banquet tables are heated. Reminded me of putting the top down on my old car and driving around with the heated seats on. Very luxurious. Well worth the visit and tipple.

Mum visits

Hmm, I don't think this worked right. The picture is a CLASSIC tourist photo of me and my Mum at City Hall in London. Note the fabulous weather. When she returned home she told me the AC was on. Oh well, there is no tower bridge in Florida so we do have some good things here.

Lovely visit. If I can figure out a better picture I'll refresh this link.

Another Cheese Post

I can't help myself, signs here are worth taking pictures of. This shop is very close Borough Market. As you walk up to it you see its called Gastronomica - then you read the shops subtitle (tag line? what would you call that?) which is "Cheese Never Sleeps".

What does that mean?

Looked like a good shop though

Happy Thanksgiving in the USA

I love this picture I took it when I was in a meeting in New York in October. It was for a conference of the International Downtown Association, which is an organiz(s)ation of people who run Business Improvement Districts. So they care about tourism and development as it applies in an inner city/town centre/downtown setting.

This picture encapsulates the group fully. Here we are on a boat tour around Manhattan on a beautiful fall day. Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island and Manhattan all beautifully framed and there they are both pointing to the new dock in Brooklyn. That dock means that BIG cruise ships can stop over in Brooklyn and therefore more tourists can come to the city. That's why my friends are pointing AWAY from the Statue of Liberty and toward Brooklyn.

More New York in Fall

I did spend time in Manhattan but apparently took pictures only off that island. This is a view of a party venue in DUMBO (down under Manhattan bridge overpass). I'm always looking for good uses for the dead areas under over passes. This one is an old building fronting the park that runs along the river. The view in the other direction is Manhattan lovely.

It was a great party!

High Line goes through a building

The High Line is an old abandonded elevated freight rail line in Manhattan in the southwest of the island. It survived into the 21 century becasue the neighborhood was always so crappy (sorry) that no one paid attention to it. Then Chelsea/the meat packing district became cool and rich dentists from Newark started moving in and suddenly folks wanted to tear it down. So Friends of the Highline got together and saved it and now its an elevated park running through the neighborhood.

This building is actually just outside of the historic district that has been established so the high line is allowed to go through the building - like it would have done when it was delivery and removing goods to the industry that used to reside there. Its a big deal deigner building--can't remember the architect-- so th eunits will be EXPENSIVE. I wonder what it will look like when the apartments (condos?) are overlooking it? Will you be able to walk through the building when you stroll along the park?

Can't wait to hear someone tell me what its like around that building but more importantly I think I will really love walking through the park. There is another elevated park; it is in Paris and called the Promenade Plantée which looks pretty cool, too.

Isn't she cute?

I am trying to write more blog entries. So I'm scraping the bottom of the picture barrel. Rather than google pictures, I found this great picture of me! Look on the phone even at this young age. Well, no reason to really write in this entry, I can just gaze at how cute I was.

BBC Radio 4

Have I mentioned how much I love the BBC? Probably not for a while now so I'll say it again, I love the BBC. In fact my TV license will be coming up for renewal and I will gladly pay the 150 GBPs. Not only do I love the BBC for the TV but I ADORE the radio.

Keeping in mind that I'm basically a latte-drinking, democratic-voting, New York Times- reading, NPR-listening type of American; this love of BBC Radio should not be surprising. But Radio 4 is really quite good. Every morning I wake up to the shipping report which is incomprehensible if you are half asleep and have no clue about the geography of the place. Followed by a news briefing, prayer for the day(!), then Farming Today. How is it possible that I actually listen to all this before 6am? I don't know but I do and I love it. Then at 6am (after those weird six pips which signal the top of every hour)the Today show starts with With Edward Stourton, Carolyn Quinn and this bellicose guy named John Humphreys - who is sort of like your crabbiest uncle. Yet some how they let him interview heads of state, captains of industry and other assorted high falutin' types - today it was the head of the Bank of England for god's sake. He gets in fights with them, cuts them off, talks over them. It's amazing.

Anyway the point of this blog is the fact that every week they announce some horrible piece of news. The country is obese, it drinks too much, has the worst children, the schools are crap, they lost the ashes to OZ, horror horror horror. This used to worry me, I thought I had made a bad decision moving to this land, but it turns out its just some collective moaning session. Its all over by 9am and we are all at work and its all forgotten until 6am tomorrow morning.

I think its because its such a small place, they all listen to the same news and its cathartic.

Tonight - its the Queen's Speech. Wonder how that will go...

Friday and back in London

Just reviewing my posts from AD and realising that I gave the place a very short shrift (what does shrift mean anyway?) The truth is I arrived after 10 at night and only went from hotel to client's place, back to hotel - twice. So my whole experience was airport, cab, hotel, cab, conference room, cab, airport. Which is of course what most business travel is.

What I saw from the cab was an interesting urban form. Blocks which had obviously been sold and built on by separate parties with little connections considered. The roads were enormous, really along the scale of Beijing: four plus lanes in each direction. Being a pedestrian was tougher than I thought possible, of course I was a) jet lagged; b) confused because the traffic was coming from the wrong direction; and c) stunned because I spent the day in a fiercely air conditioned conference room.

The place was not as dry as I had expected. There was a LOT of irrigation, which was probably not great. There was a really lovely waters edge promenade, which was empty during the day but seemed to have picnicking families and couples under the shelters once the sun went down. This reminded me of the causeways in Florida.

All in all, I should go back with out my snarky attitude and look at it again. Its an area of the world where there is a tremendous amount of growth and it deserves a longer look. Or at least a look that doesn't include a cab.

Its 1 am and this airport is packed!

This is the view from duty free at the Abu Dhabi airport up to the concourse level.

Unbelievable, right? Then factor in the fact that it is after 1am on Thursday morning. The tile work, kind of makes your head spin a bit. I was sooo disoriented I bought a liter of Jack Daniels at duty free. If any one had ever suggested to me that I would buy a liter of Jack Daniels at 1 am in the morning in the Abu Dhabi airport at ANY time in my life I would have fallen over laughing. And yet I did that very thing.

Just as a side note, a guy in my office describes this air port as being reminiscent of the bar scene in Star Wars. (OK warning I got way laid on th einformation super highway attempting to find an image of the star wars bar scene and discovered this one which is even better because its that scene done in Lego.

Ever wonder what ever happened to Tang?

Don't worry I've found an outlet - yes its the duty free shop in Abu Dhabi. Oddly they had a rather large display of Tang branded goods.

And it looks like they have branched out from the orange flavour of my youth to embrace other fruit flavours, if their sign is to be believed.

Traveling again...

I'm in Abu Dhabi. the thing about Abu DHabi, is that if you are an American chances are unless you are in the military or are a new commentator or vaguely clued-in politician. You couldn't find it on a map, except by gesturing east of Africa and possibly south of the western bit of Russia. I found it right away, it a city-state in teh United Arab Emirates smack to the left (west-ish) of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

I got here by taking the national airline of the UAE, Etihad; which is a rockin' good airline. Perhpas I flew Delta too long so my standards are really low but it was grand to be treated like a person on a plane and not chattel.

I do have my camera and I'm hoping to take some more pictures, buttonight its late so I'll just show you around the hotel room. Basically, its like every other nice hotel room I've staid in since I gave up on motels. Its got beds and a big armour with a tv and clean towels and little soaps and shampoos. Butthen in the corner up above the standard issue wall of curtains is the above little green sign.

Can you read it? It shows you the direction to face when you are praying to make sure you are facing Mecca. They had it on the plane too, which was kinda confusing until I figured out that the arrow rotating around the plane on the little map (you know the one in back of the seat in front of you which tells you in many languages that you only have 5 hours until you can FINALLY get out of the flying tin can and its -500 degrees outside and the plane is going a zillion kilometers per hour?) as we departed London was pointing towards mecca. Just as a side note (I do realise that this whole blog is nothing but a side note but really that's why you read it, right?) the sign was pointing to a wword written in arabic which is why I didn't immediately click on the wole Mecca-thing.

Anyway,since I'm an infadel I don't really need to know where mecca is but I thought that was very friendly for them to keep me informed.

Free slippers

You know you are in a quality establishment when in addition to pointing the correct direction for prayers, they also give you a snazzy pair of slipper inscribed with the name of the hotel -- it says in tiny type, under "le Royal Meridian" logo, "Abu Dhabi."

These are keepers.

Day After the Halloween Party

So, I had a Halloween party on the Saturday before Halloween, or really I should say that I was talked into a Halloween party by some friends from work. It goes like this, Brits think that Americans have all these weird giant Halloween parties and they don't really get them. BUT they love to dress up and drink beer - so acouple of American friends said "Let's throw a Halloween party<" and I said "OK, we can use me flat." All agreed it would be agreat idea. However, we didn't take into account that a) it was half-term, which is this strange British time when schools go on break so ALL families of means flee the country, so all teh grownups we know (aka those with kids) had left town, b) evite is way to scary/complicated to for Brits to use and they are afraid to admit they cannot use it so they don't come and/or c) no one wanted to come to a party (that couldn't be!).

It turned out to be fine and fun. We had the usual assortment of priests, medusas, cats, french maids, school girls, men and dogs in matching bathrobes with hats (!?), ghosts, an Indian Chief and at least three folks who didn't comprehend "costume."

We carved pumpkins, drank beer and wine, and listend to the top 100 hits of 1972. The above picture was taken the following day to show off the pumpkin carving skills of my British, South African, Swiss, Australian, Jamaican and American friends.

I still have beer.

He walks

This is Henry! For recollection sake -- check out my last picture of Henry, a couple of weeks before I moved to London! This just shows you how much time has passed and how children grow so quickly and I swear they live in dog years or something -- your remember they get seven years for your every one? I've been grappling with London (its actually been good) he's bee rappling with learning to walk and recognise faces, and learning to laugh and clap. Wow, I guess we've BOTH come a long way in the last 12 months!

Another Brompton Post

In the UK, there is new legislation which allows participating companies to set up bicycle purchase schemes, so that people can buy bicycles for commuting tax free. That doesn't sound like much but its net of VAT (basically 17% sales tax embedded in most purchases) and paid with pre-tax dollars (tax rates run from 20-40%). This scheme (program) mean that there has been a rash of new bike purchases at my firm since July.

This is ANOTHER Brompton photograph. This is my friend Chris, cycling away on his new bike scheme Brompton. Now Chris is a major-major cyclist. The kind of guy who has lots of bike gear - and he stooped to a brompton, "just because it was nerdy." But now I've discovered an even more nerdy bike - the Pashley Princess. I don't think its possible to pass this one up: chain guard, skirt guard, basket. Its the Miss Marple of bicycles.

As much as I have admired Bromptons; my heart may have been won over by Pashleys. meanwhile my trusty trek just keeps on moving along. Perhaps I'll post a picture of her next time.

Milton Keynes New Town

There is a new town outside of London called Milton Keynes. It was established in 1960s but mostly built since the 1970s. Its now sort of a distant London bedroom community.

Anyway, when it was built they put up these concrete cows as a sort of a joke (they may even originally have been paper mache)on themselves. To this day one of the things people mention, when you speak of Milton Keynes is the cows. I have a friend who lives there and this summer I went to his home for dinner. I insisted that I get to see the cows - and here they are for you.

Snout House Brit Style

Milton Keynes was 40 this year. So it was born in the car-crazy sixties. Lots of big roads and single family homes sprawling out. It would make an American homesick. This house has with its garage right out in front, is sometimes called a snout house because its wearing its garage like a rather ugly nose. I had to laugh because I come all the way to the UK and go for fun out to look at suburban houses.

The rest of the day involed checking out the old town that MK was built around. Which was interestingly a coach stop on the way from London to parts north. Becasue it was a coach stop there were several competeing pubs including The Cock and The Bull. The two competeing pubs used to have competitions to tell the tallest tales - so is it theorigin of teh cock and bull story - or just another fairy tell they tell Americans?