a few photos

OK. this sorting pictures thing is hard. I have sorted exactly 202 of my 658 photos. But I'm getting there. I am feeling very achy today, which I am hoping is jet lag and not the bug that sent half my extended family into an intimate relationship with the toilet at some point while abroad. Although I know I'd rather be sick at home than while in a foreign country. But to tide you over while I continue to sort through this huge mass of photographic evidence (and repeatedly asking my husband "what is this lovely building?" He is so good at remembering!) I will share with you this first photo, taken our first day in London. We arrived around 11am and took the taxi to our hotel. My parents, brother, SIL and their kids arrived shortly after. We grabbed lunch at a local pub (our worst meal the whole time we were there, I think) and then dragged the tired kids (OK, the tired adults, too) off for some prime photo opportunities. See, the next day my parents were taking their 3 grandkids off to the relatives homes so we gen Xers could do some sightseeing without whining children. However, you can't go to London without a photo of your family at Big Ben, can you? No, you cannot.

So there we are, looking rather windblown on this blustery day that kept threatening rain. The May Queen is wearing a shirt my mother made for her out of material that says "London" and shows several key London sights. My mom made them for not only her own grandkids, but my cousin's kids as well. Because she is crafty and thoughtful like that. It is not the best photo, but rather iconic, so there you go.

Oh, OK, and a few more photos, because I am feeling generous.

My husband drove brilliantly in England, never once driving on the right (which is wrong, in England) side of the road, and navigating roundabouts with a fearlessness that did make me grip the dashboard a few times, I confess. We found that some of the ways that England does things are rather helpful, but certainly not their habit of allowing trees and brush to grow up over all their signs so that you cannot read them. This made navigating quite difficult. There was one sign we kept guessing meant "don't drive on my crops," but later learned that it meant "No parking or standing." Actually, as my aunt tried to explain it to me, she started by saying "It means that the road is a straight-away, well, as straight as anything is here in England..." We liked our original definition better. We did take a picture of this sign, because we were so impressed that the British care so much about their senior citizens.

This sign was literally in the middle of nowhere. Where were these elderly people supposed to be coming from, we wondered. The first time we saw the sign we laughed at it, then immediately got stuck behind a slow driver. We then thought the sign was wrong, and should have shown a balding man driving a car. At least some things are the same in every country.

My husband's favorite sign, however, was one we never saw again, unfortunately. The sign read like this:

Dead

Slow

Children

Playing

Need I say more?

And, because I HAD to take this touristy photo, I will share it with you:

No, I was not actually making a phone call. I did make phone calls from phone booths in London, but not one of these old fashioned ones. Consider it a call to all of you. I just called, to say, I love you...