And that was Christmas

My dad doesn't have the best of luck, for our 2nd Christmas with him in a row, he fell ill for the big day itself.

Perhaps we're just bad luck charms? More likely I suspect his love affair with eating seafood on Christmas Eve may have played a part on one or both occasions. To be fair though, the 1st time was a combination of slightly warm prawns from Whitby and the crazy proof navy rum consumed that night. The 2nd time was more bad luck, perhaps related at least a little bit with a defrosted fillet of Plaice that was consumed, but more likely being in contact with someone who recently had the winter vomiting bug could have done it. Bless his cotton socks, he was still trying to do the cooking preparations when he just couldn't keep it in any longer and spent most of Christmas day in the bathroom and looking as pale as a sheet.

The 4 of us remaining rescued the preparations and Norngirl took charge of the cooking and we still ended up with yummy feast. We went buffet style on the table so I went for a giant Yorkshire pudding pile variety of presentation. It was delicious!

As well as the unexpected which threw the day out a little, we all managed to sit around the TV to watch Dr Who which I thought was very good, well structured and heart warmingly festive. The falling from the edge of space and being dead but only bruised on the outside did seem to push the need for a plot device a little far. Multiple fractures and a bit more of a pizza appearance seemed more likely but at least it was only for a little more dialogue and to probably not scare the children watching.

The rest of the Christmas period flew by, on boxing day we went to the pub to watch the football; Leeds were thrashed by Notts Forest and it didn't make easy viewing. Hopefully the lack of fight and skill was more a hangover of the Ken Bates era.

The best moments were getting a little bit of down time here and there with Norngirl as well as tasting lots of nice beer. Other highlights were visiting people and heading to a couple of tourist attractions.

One of the places we visited was The Hepworth Wakefield.

Being able to walk over the river on a springy bridge to get to it was great fun and there is a cool junk dude hanging from a crane by the river Calder.

The gallery itself has lots of space but very little content that grabbed my attention. I liked the medical drawings though they were all rather samey samey after the first 10 or more. My favourite artwork was the collection of images showing scenes of Wakefield as it was in the past.

If you've read my views on art before you'll know I'm not a fan of a lot of modern art and the majority of the pieces displayed here didn't win me over. By the time we had walked through all of the galleries it seemed to me that a lot of modernist sculpture (where it isn't self evident as to what it is) ends up looking like a case of someone creating something and then assigning the context or label to the form after the fact.

In fairness, I thought a lot of the Barbara Hepworth sculptures were quite good as they are sculptures that appear to have some coherent idea and design behind their creation. The museum itself is free entry so you've nothing to lose (time aside) by heading down to it.

If I dare say so myself, still not as good as my 'Using 2 Dominoes to balance the rest of dominoes and the box too' that I made on the table at my dads house when I was bored.

The building the gallery is in, it's boring grey facade aside, was rather modern and well thought out, the windows were huge and the views of the river were my highlight for me.

The other place we visited was the Thackray Medical Museum in Leeds. The medical museum was more up my street. Though it's £7 admission for an adult there was plenty to see and it engaged us initially by picking a character which you then find out more about and end up seeing how long they lived and how long they ended up living for.
There was plenty of interesting things, a part about disability and people's perceptions, another about improvements made in medical science. I even got to try on a pregnancy empathy belt as well as find out lots about how medicine was in the UK before some major breakthroughs - like anesthetics.

Our time in Yorkshire was soon up and we were back on a plane and landing onto the runway at Belfast City Airport. Over the next couple of days we had a re-Christmasing in North Belfast which involved perhaps a little too much alcohol.

Time flew by and we didn't get much downtime, Norngirl only managed to get through a book or two instead of her usual libraries worth. The biggest surprise was a shock result in a game of Trivial Pursuit.

Also the news that we're going to be getting a pet cat! Norngirl okayed it with the landlord and surprised me on Christmas day with a photo of items bought for our feline to be. We’re planning to adopt a cat from an animal sanctuary so hopefully it’ll be a nice improvement in life for the cat too.

Christmas 2012 was busy but benign and hopefully the kick start into a great year ahead.

Somewhere in Midtown Manhattan

After a week in the US and having stayed in Washington and Manhattan, it was the day we were heading over the river to experience a bit more of Brooklyn, but as seems to always be the case in the heart of New York, there is always something else to do before you leave.

It was sad to leave a room with such an awesome view. Even the legally required tall building water tanks looked pretty from our window.

But we pulled ourselves away, checked out and left our bags to collect later then ventured out to have lunch in Grand Central Terminal. I wasn't impressed with the food at Juniors but I was with the closer look at what is a really grand building. 

We even had a go at whispering in the whispering gallery which was good fun and did our own 'printed off the internet' walking tour.

What wasn't so fun was visiting the public toilets to take a leak. I was met by what can only be described as a naked old dude. The US sure has a major homeless problem, and amongst the business men and tourists were folks who seemingly have to go through the indignity of washing in the sinks of public conveniences. 

Norngirl has a much more detailed report of this half a day if you'd like to know the ins and outs but suffice to say that we fitted plenty into a few hours.

After we'd searched for some hard to find candy for a present, we admired the Chrysler Building a bit as it's Norngirls favourite skyscraper and rather pretty.

The top of it especially as it does tend to hide behind the other buildings somewhat.

Next we had a look around the museum part of the New York Public Library which was full of all sorts of random artefacts from recent history.

After that it was the trek back to the hotel via Bryant Park and it's tall neighbours.

Though we were still to do plenty of subway riding back and fourth, with bags collected and in hand, we set off to the next hotel. Next stop, Brooklyn.

Walking around Washington DC

After an evening of the unexpected on day 1 in Washington DC, day 2 of our visit started off the same way but ended nicely.

So following a good sleep in a bed that didn't bend my spine in strange places (unlike our one at home that does), I woke up as if I'd got up at lunchtime. My body clock likes going to this time zone, it's the only time I can get up at 7.30am and feel like I assume most 'morning' people do *shakes fist at morning people*.

With me wide strangely awake and a little hyper, and Norngirl not so much so (caffeine hadn't yet kicked in), we spent the next half an hour or more stood waiting on a bus. This was getting to be an all too familiar ordeal. Eventually it came and it took us within sight of the route it had taken the night before... only to then be caught in a one way system that circumvented the place we wanted to be. Realising this, we got off at the nearest available stop - by the agricultural department - we wanted to be outside the old Post Office, ah well. So we made our way across the mall and had a look at the Washington Monument.

We knew where we were going but stopped to check the sign for later to see which of the buildings was the museum we were going to. Before we'd chance, we were approached by a guy who was trying to sell free maps (one of which we already had) to tourists. This seemed to be a big thing in Washington DC, there were an awful lot of homeless people and it seems their main source of income is anyone who looks like a tourist. As bad as it feels to say no to someone trying their best to emotionally manipulate you into buying something you don't need nor want, we did say no thanks and got the 'ah you didn't do anything wrong' guilt spiel. I tend not to give money to homeless people. It might sound harsh but in the UK I put money into official charity boxes instead where it might be spent on food and shelter and not on the cigarettes and alcohol that plenty of homeless folks seem to have on their person. At least that way the money can be used constructively to help even if it doesn't address the immediate needs or wants of a person on that individual day.

All that aside, we made our way along the path past another homeless person who was wandering the lawn who shouted something at us, the other few tourists or another homeless guy that was indecipherable that didn't sound friendly. We quickly moved on to find our way to the Old Post Office.

We had planned to go up the tower to take a look but the place was deserted and by the time we found a sign stating which entrance to use, we were already running behind schedule so gave it a miss. Afterall, we didn't want to be towed for idling... in this usually warm winter it just wasn't cold enough for us to stay there for long.

Instead we walked past the FBI building where a very enthusiastic lady from out of state sung the praises of Washington and told us how she'd been up the old post office tower before... at least someone was having a good time in this city!

Next we found civilisation as we walked past Ford's Theatre. Norngirl was amazed that I didn't know the reference as to why it was an infamous location, ah well, I knew a matter of seconds afterwards that it was the theatre where Abe Lincoln was assassinated in 1865.

The streets were still quiet but we soon discovered the population of Washington DC appeared to be having brunch. So we joined them and had brunch.

It was a quick brunch though for our itinerary had us down to be at the Verizon Centre to watch the Boston Bruins Vs Washington Capitals. I'll be putting together a separate post on our 3 hockey games from the trip (so I'll put a link here once I post it near the end) but for now, here is the cool inside of the Verizon Centre, a cool place to watch hockey!

Finally having found something happy to do we were in better spirits and walked down the hill to the mall where we saw a few more sights along the way.

Sights like this place that I can't find the name of and that I didn't know what I was looking at at the time...

And the Capitol Building... from this angle, nestled in a construction site.

Our destination was the Smithsonian Institution National Air and Space Museum, the one with this big piece of modern art outside it that reminded me of the road system in this city.

And here is me taking a photo of the national mall through the reflection of it in the windows of the museum.

The National Air and Space Museum was awesome, I especially liked the space exhibits. I could have stayed in there the best part of the day but we only had a couple of hours until it closed. From seeing yourself through a live thermal heat camera to a simulation of a NASA moon landing there was plenty to see and do.

There seems to be something about ice hockey and museums that makes for a fun day - like our awesome day in 2010.

After leaving the museum it was getting on a bit and the sun was starting to set.

The evenings entertainment for us was a monuments by moonlight trolley bus tour but to get to Union station we had 2 buses to catch - we waited for 5 minutes before opting to walk it to just catch the 2nd of the two buses and we walked up to Chinatown. Hard to miss Chinatown in Washington DC, the start of it looks like this:

In that time, our bus didn't pass us so it was a good choice. It wasn't such a good choice to leave that bus stop after 10 minutes and walk to the station. Our bus went past us about half way. Ah well, at least we knew we'd get there on time + the place looked pretty in the twilight of a cloudy dusk and into the dark of the late evening, so walking, although bad for Norngirls hip, was a nice way to see the city a bit more.

Anyway, before too long, there we were at Union Station and in time for our tour with time to grab some food in the station's food court.

Washington had grown on me a little but there was still much to see that day, albeit in the dark... on the Monuments By Moonlight Tour...

Two days in London

Last month we were on our travels to London. The main event that led us to getting a plane to Heathrow was Fulham Vs Crusaders at Craven Cottage but we decided to make a little bit of a holiday around it. So here are some photos from the couple of days we visited the capital of England at the end of July.

After our flight to Heathrow we bought an Oyster card each and topped then up before taking the tube into the centre of London. After getting off at Covent Garden tube station, without realising it at the time (and unfortunately for me, as it was my idea - I honestly thought I could hear the street above) we took the stairs... all 193 of them. It turns out it's one of the deepest London Underground stations... and unsurprisingly, it has many stairs to climb - only really beaten by Hampstead Tube station having over 320. With bags on our backs that contained clothes for 4 days, it wasn't the easiest climb. Half way up I think I may have sold it to Norngirl as an alternative gym workout, she wasn't impressed.

Once we'd had breakfast in a cafe opposite Drury Lane Theatre and had a look around some shops we got some cupcakes and headed back on the tube to the V&A Museum of Childhood. Before we went in we sat in the park next to it and ate our goodies. Mine being a nommy chocolate number that didn't taste as much of glitter as it looked, indeed it was quite delicious.

It was then into the museum which was free and we headed to a section that had games you can play. We rewrote the rules for snakes and ladders but had fun playing anyway before looking around the rest of the various toys, games, activities and displays.

Most of the toys were in glass cases but it was fun to see some toys we'd forgotten existed from our childhoods though I was disappointed after seeing things like the Turtles and Sooty that there were no Manta Force toys, I used to love those! The mechanical toys section was pretty cool though and I finally got to see the boxes/put names to some of the toys and bits of plastic we used to get given to play with at primary school.

Once we'd relived some of our childhood it was then back on the tube to go take a look at the already famous construction site of the Shard, one of the new skyscrapers to have popped up around London.

From the bus station at the base of the Shard, we went for a walk down past the Scoop at MoreLondon. Personally I thought it seemed like quite a depressingly corporate part of town given the cultural highlights of a performance going on in the Scoop and the River with HMS Belfast floating not so far away from Tower Bridge.

The buildings, as shiny as they are, each looked quite dark and cold, reflecting the overcast day above them. It was also hard to miss the depressed looking office workers walking out of them with sullen looks on their faces trying to find a spot to sit to eat their lunch.

To be honest the Tower of London looked more inviting.

We were soon at Tower Bridge and I was competing with the other tourists in taking some pictures of the Bridge and the skyline.

Lunch was a trip to a Mexican fast food place for Burritos and Tacos. It was then on to Fulham to the hotel before heading out to sample what the Fulham and Putney Bridge areas had to offer. After a drink on Fulham's North End Road, we headed down to Putney Bridge itself.

A meal south of the river in a Weatherspoons, we headed on to the football match.

The next day we woke up to a brighter Friday morning. First port of call was a tour of BBC television centre.

There we got a great insight into how things like the news and weather are produced, the layout of the building and where the guest stars of BBC shows get to stay. The best bit for me was seeing one of Kryton's heads from Red Dwarf and a Tardis from Dr Who.

After the tour we headed down to St Paul's Cathedral where we had a walk around the building.

It was then time to head to One New Change a relatively new shopping centre that opened in October 2010.

The thing that took us there, other than it appearing on 'The Apprentice' TV show, was the roof terrace that is open to the public which gives a great view of the surrounding area.

We had some nice pies from the fast food place 'Eat' and sat in the sun eating them and trying to find on our phones a new plan for the afternoon.

We didn't really have one when we headed to get some essentials like a razor (the problem of only having hand luggage on a plane), after that little bit of shopping we just headed west, the plan was to find a pub and work from there. Instead I found a sign for the Museum of London. Wires slightly crossed, I ended up leading us towards the Museum. Norngirl realised this before me and so we stood debating what the heck we were doing next. As it became clear a pub indeed was a priority I got rather lucky in that when we turned around we'd been stood right outside a bar - the Lord Raglan. We went inside and I bought Norngirl a London Pride as a peace offering.

In the end we decided to give the Museum of London a try, after all it was free. It turned out to be an enjoyable visit and I learnt a lot about London, especially how the settlement developed and how the various parts of London merged to be the megacity it is.

Another tube ride and we were back in Fulham getting dolled up for the night. We'd booked some tickets to go to see the musical Wicked as Norngirl really wanted to see it and I was curious as to what the hype was all about. We headed to the theatre and picked up our tickets before a quick visit to a supermarket to pick up some snacks and sandwiches to eat before we headed to the show. A pint of ale in a nearby pub later and we headed back to find our seats.

Little mini binoculars purchased we watched the show, and you know what, quite a show it was! There aren't as many individually great stand alone songs as you'd get in something like Les Misérables but in terms of a spectacle it was brilliant. It had a great use of the stage and stage effects and some really strong voices. Oddly the peak of the show came with 'Defying Gravity' which is sung as the pre interval crescendo. It was a great plot and show and if you get chance to see it, I have to warn you that you'll never watch The Wizard of Oz in the same way again... in a good way though!

A slight mishap with tube stops resolved by a short walk and we'd got back to Fulham a little late for a meal in a restaurant so we headed out for what turned out to be a Subway and Dominos.

We had a great time in London but it was bedtime and we got some rest to be ready to travel to Cardiff the next day... though we didn't set off the next day until we took a slight detour to take a look at Stamford Bridge.