ENGLAND WEEK ONE: While Andy slaved away at work (sometimes working well into the midnight hours) I did a solo trip to Leeds where I managed to strain my foot, spent a day with Andy’s sister exploring pretty (albeit touristy) Bronte landscapes and 4 floors of the Bradford media museum, did an overnight trip to York where I fell in love with a pub called the Priory (only to find out later on it was a chain), spent another evening in Leeds, and finally headed back to Crosby with Andy in tow.
Beautiful but touristy HayworthENGLAND WEEK TWO: Andy and I spent two days in Liverpool city centre where we ventured around Albert Dock, stalked the Go Penguins, saw his friend in a Christmas play called ‘Merry Ding Dong’, and danced and sang with the older crowd at the American Irish Pub. The rest was Christmas week in Crosby where we spent a lot of time in Stamps stealing their internet, going to pub quizzes and wearing silly but awesome Christmas hats.
Beatles Go Penguins
SuperLambanana!
Freezing our tits off in Llandudno!The weather…well, the weather was shit. I don’t suppose you can’t expect much else from England in December. I did get to see snow for the first time in 5 years. I soon realized that I didn’t miss snow one bit though we did have 15 minutes of fun throwing snowballs one evening on the walk home from the pub.
Things I love about England:
- 1 & 2 Pound coins
- The public transit system, mainly trains
- Food such as: Quavers, sausage rolls, Hob Nobs, never having to ask to mayo on your sandwich as it’s always already there, awesome chocolate, ‘irish’ bacon, meat pasties and pies, and great beer.
- Food & Beer deals – for example, most places offered a lunch meal with beer special for 4 pounds ($6.00).
- Lack of stigma for actually having a beer with your lunch!
- Friendly people (and I love when they mention that they thought they noticed an American ‘twang’ in my voice)
- British television, including the commercials – funny stuff! Also, nakedness and swear words, oh my!
- The accent of course…when I could understand them.
Things I didn’t really care for about England:
- The lack of dryers – everything is hung on the radiators to dry, including your ‘knickers’
- Trains and just about any other business that doesn’t run\isn’t open on holidays, or around a holiday, or just because they just don’t feel like it.
- Food: No ranch dressing, peas and\or carrots being the only vegetable side served with meals, and lack of decaf coffee, tea, and soda.
- Never having a good hair day because it was always damp in some shape or form.
- Bathrooms: Piss poor water pressure in showers if lucky enough to have a shower, toilets that aren’t in the same room as the shower\bath, taps that are separated out into hot and cold so either you burn your hands or freeze them to death, and general lack of paper towel dispensers in public restrooms (would be alright if the hand dryers actually blew hot air).
And that was England, and it was good. Of course, the week after we got back from England, Andy and I got married, and that was good too. We had Andy’s mum and sister staying with us for about a week before\during the wedding and all my family and friends from Wisconsin showed up the weekend of. It was busy and hectic and a wee bit stressful and I came down with a cold, but I married a wonderful man (even giggling through the entire ceremony forgetting my lines) and I’m very happy.
The bachelor and bacheloretteNext month Andy and I leave for our honeymoon. We’re doing 3 days in Vegas for the Rugby 7’s tournament, then 5 days in New Orleans to catch the end of Mardi Gras.
So that’s 2010 so far. Sheesh! I’m exhausted.
Glad to see you are writing again. I was geting withdrawls. I liked the recap of what you liked and didn't like about England.
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