Josh and Rachel Take a Trip

Our flight from Philly took off at 10:45 pm EST, and arrived at 10:45 am London Time. It was a long, sleepless night in the absolute tiniest of quarters, but we made the best of it:

From Heathrow airport we rode the Underground for an hour into the heart of London. I booked a hotel close to St. Pancras, so that our train ride to Paris tomorrow can be easily managed. After depositing our bags at the hotel, we wandered around in search of a meal. Josh tried a breakfast of fried eggs, sausage, bacon, toast, and beans, of which he ate everything but the beans(!). Color me impressed. I had a tasty lasagna with “chips”.

Invigorated by sustenance and coffee (so good!), we went exploring. We discovered a community garden that was founded in 1984 to save the space from city development. There were a dozen kids working on it when we were there, pulling weeds and wheelbarrowing things around, and sneering at the interested Americans.

And the light sprinkle didn’t spoil our mood at all.

In fact, I daresay we found a little magic when we wandered into King’s Cross Station…

There was some napping back at the hotel, along with some British “Deal or No Deal”, which is way more dramatic than the American version (although I don’t really care for either). When we emerged for dinner, we went to a place that we’d spied earlier. I had some Speckled Hen Beer, Josh had Guinness, and oh-my-whaddya-spy?

That’s right - a little Heinz ketchup. It’s like they knew we were coming.

Also, my current impression of “chips” is that they are the bomb. At least, we’re 2/2. Regular french fries may be lackluster to me from now on.

The time difference has got us all turned upside down. Josh was feeling neglected that he wasn’t in the know about a big Apple announcement today, but once we realized that we are 6 hours ahead, and that it was happening in accordance with all previous announcements, all was well. It’s like we’re existing a little bit in the future. I hope it doesn’t destroy the space-time continuum to mention that the economy doesn’t look that much better from this side of Time. Sorry, kids.

At the moment (in your near future), it’s 9pm British time and I’ve had maybe three hours of sleep in almost 36 hours. I am a bloody champion. Take that, jetlag. Boo-yow. And now: ZZZzzz…