SSS BLOG

A Little Bit about a Lot of Things

Category: Uncategorized

2 Comments

“The Great Escape” — Our Evening with the IRA

For two people who are basically fairly conservative (personally, not necessarily politically), cautious, risk-averse, middle-of-the-road folks, Suzie and I often find ourselves in unusually odd, slightly dangerous-seeming places during our travels sometimes.   Last night was one of those, when we found ourselves in a hot, packed gymnasium in West Belfast with 300 or 400 highly partisan supporters of what was (and maybe is, I’m still learning this) the Irish […]

Continue Reading →

2 Comments

Hunkering Down on a Cold Rainy Day

Our streak of no-rain days since we came to the U.K. ended today at nine — an amazing run, I think. But today is not just rain, it’s a full-fledged storm — cold, windy, and raw. Fortunately, the worst of it didn’t hit until about 3 this afternoon, so we were able to get out a bit this morning, and it’s kind of nice being forced into some down-time, sitting […]

Continue Reading →

Leave a comment

Why We are Up until Midnight

We have routinely been going to bed well after 11 p.m., which is unusual for us (we are usually early-to-bed and early-to-rise). The reason … we are way, way north, so the days here are incredibly long, particularly since today is the summer equinox, the longest day of the year. The map below shows how far north we are in relation to Santa Rosa (the latitude of this point is […]

Continue Reading →

Leave a comment

Half Dead

We are finally in Belfast. I am feeling half dead. I got Suzie’s cold or flu or whatever and there’s nothing worse than traveling while very sick. Plus, even though we had planned to take a bus and cab from Dublin to Belfast, we got a deal on a rental car that made the trip cheaper, so I had to have my first experience driving on the left side of […]

Continue Reading →

Leave a comment

London Odds and Ends No. 1 — Stockwell Station Shooting Memorial

Shortly after the subway and bus bombings in London in the summer of 2005, the police shot and killed an unarmed Brazilian named Jean Charles de Menezes, a 24-year-old electrician, at the Stockwell underground station.  Although original press reports said the victim was killed in a terrorist operation, it soon became apparent that the dead man was innocent, and that his death was the result of mistaken identity. Stockwell is […]

Continue Reading →

1 Comment

British Museum Pictures and Comments

As promised, here are some pictures from the British Museum, to give you a sense of its scale. If you are ever in London, the museum is a must. One of the more extraordinary rooms contained enormous Assyrian rock carvings depicting a lion hunt. The realism and detail of the work stand out. The sheer age of some of the artifacts is amazing. Here’s one that’s 6,000 years old. It […]

Continue Reading →

3 Comments

Our Day in Warwick was … Mint

Fun day Sundayt, took the train from the Marylebone Station (love that name, Marylebone) this morning and traveled to the small town of Warwick, to meet the family who will be renting our house in Santa Rosa this fall. They suggested the kids would like to visit Warwick Castle, which dates from 1068 (history and more information about the castle is here). We got up very early and were out […]

Continue Reading →

Leave a comment

Hey Cordel, I Found a New Sustainable Hand Dryer for You

At the London Science Museum, in the bathrooms, there are hand dryers that operate on the same principle as the drying element at the end of an automatic car wash. You push your wet hands all the way down, and then a very thin “blade” of hot air “strips” your hands of water as you pull them up and out. Not only cool in design, but unlike any other hand […]

Continue Reading →

7 Comments

Random Walks and Rides through London

Jet lag was the theme of the day. We all awoke much too early, a little after 5, thinking it was later because it was so light, all of us groggy and grumpy. Suzie and I managed to convince the boys that we all needed a little more sleep, which worked well, since when we woke up about 3 hours later, we all felt much better, at least for a […]

Continue Reading →

1 Comment

In London Tired but Happy

We had a long but uneventful trip, and I’m about to collapse into bed after being up for 32 hours straight, minus the fitful sleep (if you can call it that) on the airplane.  Highlights and comments in brief. 1.  The SFO International Terminal is wonderful.  We are always way too punctual, so we had 4 hours to kill, and it was a treat to walk around a space so […]

Continue Reading →