Happy Holidays! GUEST BLOGGERS!!!!!

The Next Chapters of our Lives Blog has been hacked by three friendly 'yanks' from across the pond.  Dee Dee, Jason and Shaun have been here for the holidays with The Robinsons, and we are ready to spill all!  Okay, you actually don't get all of the dirt, but all of the papers here are quite 'sensationalised', so we thought we would hook you with a cheeky headline!

After cancelled and delayed flights, the Yankee Threesome finally arrived at Kelvin Grove for a fantastic holiday abroad with best friends.  For starters, upon a late arrival, Dee Dee and Jason's bags were thrown into the flat and everyone went off for a surprise Christmas Eve dinner at Oriental Fusion, where the menu had been hand chosen by their gracious hosts for the occasion.

Saturday 25, December 2010 (Christmas!)

‘They never left the flat that day….’ All met the morning with a traditional English Breakfast of ‘rashers’, mushrooms, beans, eggs, and potato cakes courtesy of Chef Jon and his lovely ‘Foxy’ partner, Miss Deb.

The stockings that had been hung by the faux chimneys with care, were ravaged with peals of childless care. Followed by, what would be only the beginning of MUCH frivolity. A mystery gift of an Hour with The Bean had us strangely curious….  For dinner, none other than a traditional Dickensian Roast goose ...

...with wild rice and chestnut stuffing was served with ‘mashers’ and enough food to, well, “stuff a goose!”  Okay…no laughter there, is there?... and now….. HEEERE'sss Dee Dee!

Whoo hoo! My turn! And so off we go to Bromley on Boxing Day to go shopping!!!! Oh yeah, there were pubs and eating, too.

Monday 27th we spent with the Crown Jewels at the Tower of London after a warm-up at the Horniman pub on the Thames.

After we rescued Shaun from the dungeon for ‘goosing’ a guard, dinner was spent at… wait for it….another pub.

This one was the Dartmouth Arms, where I had baked Camembert (OMG Yummy) and the carnivores feasted on venison chili.

Tuesday revealed the mystery of The Bean… a tour of the old Capitol Theatre and its’ resident ghosts by the local expert on this art deco structure from the past! FASCINATING!

Wednesday double header – I’ll leave the first adventure to Jason, but the afternoon saw us at the Dominion Theatre in the West End seeing We Will Rock You… the Queen Musical!

 Rocked, rocked, rocked!!!! But before that (enter Jason….)

“The game was afoot!”… Mrs. Hudson, Watson, Holmes. It was amazing. This was truly something for a Sherlock aficionado or anyone interested in Victorian times…

Thursday we ventured to the Borough Market to pick up noshing items for a get-together in Camden with some associates of Jon’s, and now our new London ‘mates’. Wild Boar Pate, cheeses, breads…

 ...we are really feeling like we actually live here, shopping, partying, riding trains, Tubes, and buses like native Brits!

Well, its New Year’s Eve here, and Deb has just filled us with the most bestest spaghetti ever.  Have no idea how we will get the dessert into our bellies... or how we will ever make it until midnight! You all will be celebrating tomorrow as we travel back across The Pond. What an amazing trip we’ve had, with the best hosts ever! Can’t wait to come back when there is a potential for sun, but at least the snow melted and many, many good times were had by all.

From the Clan, we are wishing you all a happy and prosperous 2011!

Dee Dee, Jason, Shaun, Deb and Jon

What's on Page 11 This Week? - Part 2

Well, the papers have been most interesting since our last similar post.  Below are the top three more recent and most amusing factoids we’ve learned from our Daily Metro and the Evening Standard.  Though not all have appeared specifically on page 11, as we read them, we must constantly remind ourselves that these items deserve column space on some level…

Vultures in Germany have lost their Freedom of Choice.  At a zoo in Germany where the zookeepers are of free spirit and believers in equality, two gay male vultures have been sharing the same exhibit for quite some time.  Getting ahold of this information, animal rights activists concerned about the extinction of vultures took action.  They orchestrated a legal mandate that the two boys be separated and forced to live and pro-create with female vultures.  The zookeepers had no choice but to acquiesce.

Get your free AK47s here.  A truck dealership in Florida held a promotion where any patron buying a new truck would receive a free semi-automatic weapon.  The proprietor assured that the proper waiting period and paperwork were involved with each weapon; he also reported that his sales increased 600% during the promotion…

Emma Thompson’s mother might be a witch!  How do we know this?  There are gargoyles and gnomes to prove it.  A couple of years ago, someone stole her two gargoyles from her front garden.  To deal with her loss and frustration, she posted a sign in the garden: “To the thief who took my cute little gargoyles – a curse on your house!”  Just recently, the two gargoyles magically returned to the front garden and were delivered with a note attached: “Please lift the curse, my life has been a living hell for the last two years.”  Grateful to have her “babies” back, she posted a new sign: “All curses lifted and garden order restored.”  Well, no one knows what exactly befell the thief over the 24 month period, but the rumors of bona fide witchcraft were afoot.  We learned about this only because one day last week, her garden made the news again when someone came in and smashed one of her garden gnomes, leaving small piles of colored ceramics where the gnome once stood.   The papers are now concerned for the well-being of the gnome smasher…

Our First Christmas Market – a Day Trip to France

A German tradition at Christmastime is to have a Christmas Market in the town square, where local artisans, restaurants, and pubs put up booths to display, cook, and/or serve their wares.  Over time, this tradition has made its way through most of Europe.  The closest such market to us in London is in Lille, France.  Fortunately, Lille is just “across the channel.”  So, we decided to make the journey.  We booked a Coach to pick us up in London, cross the channel, and drive us to Lille.  You can take Eurostar and get there in less than 90 minutes, but it is cost-prohibitive if you don’t book way in advance; we booked 4 days ahead of travel day.

So Friday night arrives and we know we need to turn in early because our Coach is to pick us up at 6:11 a.m.  Then about 7:00 p.m. Friday night we get a call from the tour company to tell us they don’t have enough bookings for a full coach (we assumed everyone is wealthy and took Eurostar) – they asked if it was OK to go in a passenger van instead of a coach.  We thought, “Why not? So long as we get there.”  No problem, but the pickup time now has to be 5:40 a.m.  Our first bus from the flat to get to the pickup point is at 5:06, so all will work out perfectly.  Which it did.  We got to the pickup point at 5:30 a.m. and we were off to France at 5:40.  One more stop at Maidstone on the way to Dover and then to Dover to catch the ferry.  Ferry is a bit of a misnomer – it is indeed a ferry, because it holds cars and trucks and such, but inside it is like a mini-cruise ship.  It has multiple restaurants and bars, two sets of on-board shops (duty free of course), a host of lounges, and a bank.

The crossing is 90 minutes from port to port (Dover to Calais). The departure was beautiful and we sang The White Cliffs of Dover (actually, no singing since we don’t know the lyrics, but we pretended).  The cliffs were beautiful. 

On board, we had coffees and some crisps (potato chips) and we exchanged our money into Euros at the bank.  We roamed about the ship and before we knew it we were in France!  We stopped just after the port at the city of Calais to go to the Pidou Superstore – the BevMo of France, but with unbelievable prices.  We bought a half-case of French Red Wine (which we have since sampled – it is delicious!).  Back into the passenger van to head to Lille.  At this point, we were getting pretty cold through and through as the van had minimal heat other than the body heat from the 14 passengers (which was ok for the first 2 hours, but not so much any more).

Arriving in Lille, we alight at the entrance to the Christmas Market

and we have 4 hours to play.  At the market, we went through all of the booths, bought some gifts and even selected our special Europe Stockings for Christmas at the flat (Debbie’s is in French even, Jon’s has Santas on Skis…).  We partook in one of our favourite things to do in France, eating Crepes while roaming about.  Debbie had her traditional Crepe avec sucre and Jon his Crepe avec chocolat.  They were made, as usual, right in front of us:

And they were delicious!

The Market turned out to be smaller than we anticipated but it was still very cool.  The whole town of Lille was decorated beautifully, complete with Ferris Wheel, giant tree, and a little Christmas Village.

We wandered all over Lille, and stopped for an amazing lunch at a local French restaurant.  Debbie’s Mussels were particularly good:

BEFORE

AFTER

All of the passengers made it back to the van right on time, so we had about 30 minutes to spare in our journey back to the ferry.  So, get this, we went to Belgium! Our third country in one day.  We stopped for only about 20 minutes, but it was long enough to put our feet to the ground in a new country and, of course, to buy Belgian Chocolates.

In the line waiting for the ferry, cold again (argh), we hear the fan belt starting to make that squealing noise that fan belts make when they are about to snap.  It is snowing like crazy and we are unsure whether the van will make it back to London.  Things were looking grim.

Our driver called to two coaches from the same tour company (that were returning from Bruges and Paris and were scheduled for the same ferry we were) – his goal to find out if they had extra room.  Wahoo – they had room for all 14 of us!  So we switched to the Bruges Coach and immediately we knew why they had called the night before to ask if a Passenger Van was ok (note to selves: when asked this question the next time, the answer is “no, that is not alright”).  The Bruges coach was fully heated, had very comfy seats (close to plush but not quite) and television screens and leg room.  We watched half of Avatar  on our return to London.  The Coach is definitely how the other half lives.

The Ferry crossing back in the snow was unreal – weird to see it snowing on what feels like the open sea, it was almost Titanicesque…

Arriving at our bus stop (the originating pickup point) at 11:00 p.m. we were grateful for a wonderful day and that we can be in three countries in the same day – amazing.  We stopped for hot chocolate at the local mart and almost missed our last bus home, but we made it.  It was a great start to the holiday season.

Hoping your holidays are enriching and more importantly, warm,
--Deb and Jon in South London

Christmas Adventure

Today I went Christmas shopping at a new venue.  I've tried alot of the shopping areas close to the flat but I set out on an adventure today.  I wasn't disappointed.  It only took one train from Sydenham to London Bridge, a tube ride on the Northern Line to Bank, a change to the Central Line of about 10 or so stops and then 3 blocks of walking in the freezing cold.  In Los Angeles we have a beautiful mall called Westfield Topanga.  In London I found out they have a Westfield mall also.  It is the biggest mall in Europe.  Whoopee.  Anyway, back to my trek.  I arrived at my tube stop.  Here is a picture of it.

Seriously, that is the name of the stop.
Anyway, the mall was beautiful and very high end, glitzy and pricey.  I could'nt even afford to window shop in some areas.  However, I managed to find some fun Christmas gifts for our friends that are coming here for the holidays.  Be afraid, be very afraid.  Just kidding, you'll love them.  Anyway here is a picture of the dining area on the top floor.

So, after a successful shopping trip I decided to retrace my route back to Sydenham.  I went back to White City......hee hee.....anyway.....got on what I thought was the right train and waited, and waited and waited.
Come to find out that the train I was on had terminated at White City.  I got back out on the platform and two German tourists asked me if this was the right platform for Shephard's Bush.  I told them I thought that it was but that the train wasn't going anywhere.  Another gentleman overheard us and pointed us to the correct platform.  The Germans and I get on and the train starts moving.  All is well........then the train stops in total darkness......I said to the Germans...."Well, I don't think this is your stop!"......Train starts moving and ends up in Shephards Bush.  Yeah.  Finally retraced my route and made it back to the flat.  Another adventure ends. Hope you are having many Christmas adventures.....much love.......Deb and Jon