Happy Birthday Song

I overheard some girls today singing this in the locker room. What a classic...

"Happy Birthday to me, I'm 103, I still go to pre-school and I miss my mommy, my mommy's at work, she fired a jerk, she hired a monkey to do my homework"

Fire Rainbow

A Fire Rainbow

The rarest of all naturally occurring atmospheric phenomena.

The picture was captured on the Idaho/Washington border, the event lasted about one hour.

Clouds have to be cirrus, at least 20 thousand feet in altitude, with just the right amount of ice crystals and the sun has to hit the clouds at precisely 58 degrees.

Stunning!

I checked this out and it turns out that it is true!

Golden Brown by the Stranglers

This is one of Ben's favorite songs that he introduced to me tonight. I thought it was a really groovy song that has a neat harpsichord part. Neither of us can figure out what the words mean, but hey... it's probably written by a drugged up crazed lunatic in the 60's. Anyway, it's one of those songs you could just listen to over and over and go into a daze. Hope you like it!

Hillary Humor

I am making no political statements in this blog (besides that I'm not voting for Hillary), I just thought these were so funny.


Tired Hillary













Surprised Hillary

Scarey Hillary

Military Hillary

Approving Hillary

Vader Cheney

Cooking in April

For those of you who like fish, this is a wonderful glaze! I got the recipe from my father-in-law's wife, Ilana. She is a wonderful cook. On the plate is some salmon, and then on the right is some tilapia that I did. I prefer the salmon, Ben prefers the tilapia.


Teriaki Fish Glaze

sesame oil- a little bit
1/4 Cup of teriaki sauce (I used "southern tsunami" brand of teriaki sauce)
2 T brown sugar
2 T sesame seeds
2 T lemon juice (I used lime juice)
rosemary leaves and chives (fresh is better, but I used dried rosemary, and didn't use chives cause I didnt' have any)

Put some tin foil on baking sheet and then put the fish on the tin foil. Put the glaze over fish and then bake in a 350 degree oven for 20 minutes.

London

After a few more days in Cardiff, we drove to London for our last few days. London reminded me of New York City a bit, but even bigger.

Here we are in Wales before going to London hiking in the Brecon Beacons.







This is fish and chips and mushy peas.








This is how the beach is in Wales. I think it's very beautiful. The tides come in a long way.








On our first night in London we went to Harrod's department store. They had a whole huge room devoted just to hosiery. It was HUGE!











Our second day there we went to the tower of London. Basically, many people were beheaded here. It's kind of spooky.










This is Big Ben and little Ben.

Chatsworth House

On our way back down to Cardiff, we stopped in England to see a stately home. Apparently wealthy people built these back in the day and it has since been inherited by people after that. To keep up with the upkeep and taxes of such large estates most of them are open for the public to see. I cannot even imagine living in one of these houses. The one we went to, Chatsworth house, was built with all of these rooms in hopes that the king would visit. It was customary to have all these rooms as a processional thing to enter a royal person's presence. The king never did visit Chatsworth House.

This is a church we saw on the way. The steeple is all warped... I liked it.








This is Chatsworth House. Can you imagine living there?








The dining room









They had a whole room devoted to sculpture. This sculpture was my favorite. The second picture is of a painted ceiling.








Here we are!

Scotland

On from England we drove up into Scotland. I wasn't sure what to expect really. The only thoughts of Scotland always go back to Braveheart. So... Ben and I joked that if you make a Scot mad that they would just head butt you. The Welsh are known for their hospitality and choral singing, the English for their wonderful manners and high tea, and the Scots? What we found was that the Scottish people are very friendly and appreciate a good joke. They also like to party a bit as well. We stayed in the city of Edinburgh (pronounced Ed-in-buruh) where we visited the Holyrood Palace, an official residence of the queen in the summer months, and also the
Edinburgh castle. It was an exciting city. Then we took a day trip into the Scottish highlands and to a Loch (lake).


Scottish highlands... the pictures don't even do it justice. It was breathtaking.








Ben and I at Loch Lomond








Both of our moms in front of Holyrood Palace in Edinburgh








Beautiful! This was up in the highlands as well up near Ben Nevis (the tallest mountain in the UK)








Ben's mom and her Scottish boyfriend. Actually, it was just some man at the Edinburgh castle taking up tickets. When she asked if she could have a picture he growled, "it'd had better be quick." What a dreamboat ay? We're just thankful he didn't headbutt us.






Edinburgh castle

England

After the wedding the four of us (Ben's mom Pam, my mom Sue, Ben and I) traveled on into England. On the way we stopped at a ruined abbey called Tintern Abbey. Then we traveled on to a town called Keighly (pronounced Keithly) where we stayed with some Barreth family friends. While we were there we visited the city of York, where Ben went to college. I was very impressed with this town. It has so much history (it dates back to the Romans), and it is also very beautiful. We drove through a part of the country called the Dales to get there. It is full of rolling hills and grazing sheep. There are also plenty of stone walls. These are built without any mortar...the stones are just stacked. There is a certain art to this and not many people know how to do it. Some of the stone walls have been up for hundreds of years. I have to say... this area of the country is beautiful and like looking at a postcard. I loved it!

We also went to London at the end of the trip... and although it is technically in England, I will have to devote a whole other section of the story to it later.


Tintern Abbey









The Shambles. This is a street in York that the buildings almost touch. I'm not sure how they've stayed up for hundreds of years.









York Minster... beautiful! We climbed to the top of it.












One of my favorite pictures from our vacation. This is at a church we stopped at in a town called Linton Falls. Notice the stone walls... no mortar.










The Dales... like a postcard!

Wales

When we arrived in London, we got in our rental car and drove to Cardiff- the capital of Wales. Functioning on no sleep I thought for sure we were in for the ride of our lives, considering Ben had to drive on the other side and the steering wheel is on the other side as well. Ben did great with the driving though, and somehow we stayed awake. Nothing like driving on the opposite side of the road for a wake up call! Cardiff is a city with many sides. It's got peaceful spots where you can't hear any sound at all, and also busy streets. Our first day we experienced three hail storms. Definitely different from Miami. Ben's friend, James, got married at a beautiful castle called Caerphilly Castle near Cardiff. Ben was pretty busy helping and preparing for that during the first bit of our stay. Ben and I stayed in James and Katie's new flat. It was great! Here are some pics from our stay in Wales!
Caerphilly Castle- by the way, the daffodil is the Welsh national flower, and it happens to be my favorite! Also, my name is Welsh and it means "guardian of the sea."





The handsome groom, James, and MY handsome groom Ben.








The lovely couple cutting their wedding cake. Wedding cake is different in the UK. It is a fruit cake with marzipan type icing.







This was on a walk in a section of town called the "Wennalt". I thought it was beautiful and very peaceful.







The UK is filled with all kinds of quaint pubs. This is one of them and it's called Maen Llwyd. I'm not sure what that means in Welsh, but my mom and I tried our first Yorkshire puddings here. It's like a waffle with gravy. The other picture is the view from the pub- stunning!



Many people in Cardiff live in these type of houses. They are called terraced houses. (not to be confused with terrorist house) It makes it easier to walk about town and meet up with friends. Something Ben and I both noticed is that friendships in the UK seem much stronger.

Our Holiday

Well... we have now returned from our whirlwind visit to the UK. We have seen so much that it is going to be a challenge to recap! Let me begin by giving you some slight differences I noticed.

British people are much quieter than Americans (big surprise huh?)
they spell tire "tyre"
instead of whole wheat bread, it's whole meal
chips are french fries, and crisps are chips
they have very amusing signs (at least they were to me) Here are a few samples: