A Proper Exit

Today I saw a hearse with big open windows in the back and inside was a wicker coffin - think a really nice picnic basket but much bigger. It struck me as very English, but also had such a simple elegance to it. When I asked a few colleagues about it, they also said it's very green/environmental.

This seems like the perfect way for Martha Stewart to exit this world...

Yes, they really say that! - English as a Foreign Language

One great source of intrigue living here is the language. That old quote that goes something like 'two countries separated by a common language' couldn't be more accurate. It has been really fun learning all the terms they use so I thought I'd start a list.

Our Top Ten List
Vest - tank top
Pants - underwear
Jumper - sweater
Snog - kiss
Pulled - to hook up with someone
Bespoke - means custom or tailored
Pudding - dessert
Squash - juice
Binned - to dump someone/break up with them or to throw something in the trash
More some - tasty, meaning you always want more

Dog Related
Can I stroke your dog instead of can I pet your dog?
Does she molt instead of does she shed?
Morgan is a "cross" between a poodle and a retriever not a mix or half and half.
Lead - Leash

Funny Ones You Know - Blimey, crickey, shag, cheers
Irish terms that both the English and the Irish use - malarkey, shenanigans, hooligans


Food Related

Aubergine - eggplant
Corgette - zucchini
Rocket - arugala
Chips – fries
Crisps - chips

Less Funny, but Good to Know
Clever - intelligent/smart. they would not say "she's very smart" meaning intelligent.
Smart - as in "smart dress required". we might say fancy or nice.
Fancy - to take a liking to or desire as in "fancy a snog"
Nice - they use it more like Americans would use good as in "the food there is really nice"
Spanner in the works - A wrench in the plans
Tatty - Worn out, as in tattered
You ask for the bill not the check
Am I winding you up - Am I making you mad/fooling you?
Are you having a laugh? - Are you kidding?
Taking the piss - busting chops basically (seems like kind of a crass term, but everyone uses it all the time here)
Want a top up? - re-fill
Loads – lots
Car park - parking lot
Boot - car trunk
Bonnet - car hood
Estate - station wagon
Dear me - Charlie Brown would say "good grief"
Lay in - sleep in
Zed - zee, last letter of the alphabet
Full stop - period, the punctuation mark
Chase - track down or follow up
Knackered - exhausted
Take away - to go, as in food
Corker -exciting game
Straight away - right away
Pavements/footpath - sidewalk
Posh - upscale
Diary - calendar
Gutted - devastated
Dodgy - sketchy
You alright? - How are you?
Bin - trash
Knickers - underwear
Anti clockwise - counter clockwise
Sacked, as in "that is a sackable offense" - fired
Dog's breakfast - a mess. "he made a dog's breakfast out of that one"

Cross - angry
Fortnight - Two weeks or biweekly
Oye - hey
Bloke - guy
Lad - frat boy type guy
Mingy - ugly
Wee – small
Queue - line
Useful - good for sports, as in "that was a useful shot on the 18th hole"
Alight - disembark

Lorry - Truck
Ta - Short for Thanks
Peckish -Hungry but in a snacky sort of way
I can’t be bothered – too lazy or cool to be do something
As you do - this is a tough one to explain, basically its a sarcastic way of saying "don't we all". As in, "Jane is having lunch with the Queen to day, as you do"
When you put a check in the box, it means yes, but an X in a box means no
The measure the weight of people in stone, but food in grams. There are 14lbs to stone - and 14 is an awkward nubmer to calculate quickly.
Also, the 1st floor of a building is the ground floor, so here, the 2nd floor is called the 1st floor.

Disgusto-rama

Today I saw a man get off the tube and he had a roach on his back. I swear it wasn't my imagination - a number of people on the car were smirking and pointing as he got off. This is pretty much my own personal version of hell.

A number of disgusting incidents have presented themselves over the last week the details of which will only be revealed in person and a minimum of 90 days after they have occurred and I am ready to laugh at them.

I am soooo ready to get back to bright, shiny Seattle!

Those Batty English

Blame Greg for the groaner headline, but seriously how can this type of thing happen?? I'd like to say only in England, but I am pretty sure this could have happend in the US too.



Teenager finds baby bat in her bra

By Laura Clout Last Updated: 1:47PM BST 08 Jul 2008



A teenager was stunned to find that a baby bat had been curled up inside her bra for five hours - as she was wearing it.

Miss Hawkins said the bat looked 'very snug' inside her bra.Abbie Hawkins, a hotel receptionist, thought her mobile phone was ringing when she felt vibrations coming from her clothes.But she later discovered the tiny creature tucked away in the padded pocket of her underwear.


As staff and colleagues crowded around, Miss Hawkins, 19, produced the frightened bat, which was the size of her hand. She said: "Once I realised it was a bat I was shocked, but then I felt quite sorry for it really."It looked very snug in there and I thought how mean I was for disturbing it."Miss Hawkins said she got dressed at 7.30am and arrived for work at the Holiday Inn Norwich North, near Norwich International Airport without noticing anything unusual.
"When I was driving to work I felt a slight vibration but I thought it was just my mobile phone in my jacket pocket," she said.


It was not until her lunch break, at midday when she felt a strange movement inside her bra, which had been hanging on her washing line the previous night."I plucked up the courage to investigate and I pulled out a little baby bat. I just lost my breath when I saw it and I did not know what it was at first," she said.The teenager's general manager freed the bat in the hotel garden."I keep thinking how could I have not known it was there?" Miss Hawkins said. "I will certainly be checking my bras every morning from now on."


Jaime Eastham, of the Bat Conservation Trust, said they had never heard of a bat being found in a bra before.But she said the animals roost anywhere that appears dark and safe.

10 Years of Wedded Bliss

Neither of us can believe that we've been married for ten years. Okay, maybe not every moment has been blissful, but overall, we've had a great time in these ten years. Looking back at it, it feels like we got married very young, especially given that most of our friends have gotten married in the last 3 years or so, but after dating for 6 years it felt like the time was right. Nonetheless, we are both really thankful that we've grown together over the years instead of apart!

So as this big milestone approached and having all of Europe in our backyard, there was a lot of pressure to put together a momentous trip to mark the occasion. We discussed it and researched and researched, consulted with others, went to the book store, spent countless hours on Fodors and Tripadvisor and in the end Greg recommended we head to Puglia, Italy. This was on our list for some time, but we weren't sure if it could beat our Tuscany trips. Also, we felt that we might get bored being in one place for ten days, so we decided to start the trip in the Champagne region of France. It was a place I've been wanting to see for a while and seemed a great place to kick off a celebratory trip.

We flew from London to Paris (cheaper than a one way ticket on the Eurostar), picked up a car and were in Epernay in time for lunch. Epernay was larger than we imagined and was surprisingly empty of tourists...we actually found this to be the case most of the trip. I am not sure if this due to the weak dollar, the global recession or both, but it was a bit odd to have it so quiet.

In the afternoon, we toured the Moet Chandon house and caves, which was fascinating and highly recommended. Napoleon was a close friend of the family and would always make a run though Epernay on his way to major battles to stock up on champagne so he could celebrate with champers when he was victorious. The caves are dug out of the chalk ground that naturally occurs in the area and maintains a constant temperature and humidity making it a perfect spot to age bubbly. Their oldest bottle was from the late 1800s and they have more than 10 million bottles in stock. These caves (nearly twenty miles of them belong to Moet Chandon and several hundred all together if you include the other champagne houses of Taittinger, Veuve Clicquot, Piper, etc.) were instrumental during WWI, as entire cities moved underground to avoid the bombing. Reims (the largest city in the region and on the front throughout the war) was bombed for more than 1000 days straight and nearly every building was destroyed including most of the Cathedral of Reims - the place where kings of France were crowned.

Okay, enough of the history lesson. The area is beautiful, full of vineyards, old French chateaus, castles, and forests. We stayed at Chateau d'Etoges which was built in the 17th century and we loved its moat, swans, ducks, chickens and garden. The staff were very friendly and had a great restaurant, delicious breakfast, but they need to update their rooms to match the rest of the inn. Overall, it was a great start to the trip, but would probably recommend spending only one full day and night there (or even a day trip from Paris is pretty easy to manage) since there is only so much champagne one can taste in a day - even for me!

We didn't really have much of a plan for day three. All we knew is we needed to be at the Holiday Inn at Orly (posh, I know, but there weren't really any great options near the airport...actually, it was surprisingly new and clean) at the end of the day for our flight the next day to Napoli. Greg had never been to the beaches at Normandy and I remember going when I was a kid and thinking it was pretty cool, so we headed west. We were just outside of Paris at around lunch time and decided lunch at our favorite Bistrot Vivienne was in order. Driving in Paris was challenging, but parking in Paris was impossible! We made it, but it took much longer than we imagined. After a satisfying lunch, we hit the road and got to the beaches at around 6pm....when everything closed. We'll just have to go back one day, but we saw Omaha Beach and the drive was lovely. After dinner in Caen, we hit the road back to Paris. Despite not looking that far in the map, it was a long day in the car.

An uneventful flight got us to Napoli where we picked up the car and drove to what I like to call the stiletto heel of the boot, Puglia. Unfortunately, this meant another three hour drive (there weren't any great flights to Bari, a much closer airport) but it was more than worth it in the end. The landscape was full of farmland and olive groves. It was extremely windy and there were a few field fires - one that caused a very serious accident only a few cars in front of us and was a good reminder to both of us that life can change in an instant.

We arrived in the coastal town of Fasano and at the spectacular Massaria Torre Maizza at last. We were not disappointed, which was such a relief after all that planning. Greg is a fantastic job of finding a perfect spot to spend the rest of our trip. I can't say enough great things about this hotel. The service was impeccable, the food was amazing, the pool and bar were both relaxing and hip, and the rooms were luxurious and had a unique, un-hotel like athstetic. We were in heaven.

Our days were filled will spectacular breakfasts with nearly 40 plus options of gorgeous fruit, cheese, meat, pasties, etc and lots of much needed pool time. At night we headed into neighboring towns for dinner and would recommend Osteria La Madonnia in Ostuni for a great meal and celebrated the official day with dinner at Osteria Sotto L'Arco in Brindisi (be sure to ask for their one outside table looking over the plaza).

Puglia is actually responsible for something like 80% of Italy's pasta, olive oil and much of its produce, so you can imagine the food here is amazing. While not yet famous for their wines, the are gaining popularity. We tried a few of the Primitivos (similar to Zinfandels) and a Negroamaro which is much subtler and delicious. I also tried a delicious after dinner drink made of almonds (think a jordan almond in a glass) called latte della mandorla that I must fine a recipe for as it was amazing.

We could really only tear ourselves away from the pool for one day (the sun wasn't out in the morning) and headed into Alberobello which is famous for it's trullo style of house. It turns out that these clever Apulians knew the only home owners had to pay taxes, so they built a type of house that could be easily dismantled when the tax man came - they look like they would be pretty hard to take apart to me, but what do I know? Should you find yourself in this town, you must lunch at La Cantina towards the church off the main plaza. Here you will feel like you are at the owners home and enjoy a delicious meal.

It was an outstanding trip - our best yet!

Tottens in Tuscany

Dear friends David (aka DWT) and Treva Totten decided that buying a shower-less house on Queen Anne hill wasn’t going to use up all of Dave’s MSFT bonus so they booked a 2 week vacation to Europe while the Euro climbed to 1.6:1 versus the dollar. Well done. Dave also timed the start of a new job and their move to be the week before they left for Paris (via an 8 hour layover in Phoenix in July). As a reminder, Dave has never been known for his good judgement.

Anyway, we decided to meet up with the Tottens in Tuscany to show them around Radda and Chianti. We arrived early at the Relais Vignale and the Tottens met us there in time for dinner the first night. I must have been more excited to see them than I realized because I first ordered a bottle of prosecco followed and a magnum of Chianti. I will confess that I didn’t know a magnum was 2 full bottles – I thought it was more like 1 ½ . Oh well. I think I would have been fine but then we decided to retire to the bar for limoncello. Dave and I decided to get up somewhat early and go for a little jog to start off the day and then it was the usual breakfast-pool-lunch routine. We went to lunch at a new place on the way to gelato in Castellina and then some wine-tasting in Greve. I wasn’t having anything to do with wine on this day. I tried beer and Gatorade but needed a nap more than anything. After a quick nap under a shady tree we headed to the famed Da Michele for pizza and pasta. It was unusually quiet (no long queue with people leaving disappointed or any drama involving prolonged waits for orders to arrive) and Michele seemed out of sorts. Anyway, I stuck with beer and Dave ordered the “grande”.

The Magnum is bigger than Treva

Chillin at the pool

Tiff and Treva at the Vignale

Feeling much better the next morning so Dave and I repeated our little jog followed by breakfast-pool-lunch. The Tottens decided to tag along for some shopping so we looked for a place to lunch near Montevarchi. Found a place up in some tiny little village that sounded great, but they were closed for lunch. Minor panic ensued because we didn’t have a backup plan, lunch time was coming to an end and we didn’t want to waste a lunch in Italy at Autogrill or something. We basically found a major road, followed the signs to an Osteria and decided to give it a go. Turned out to be another great meal in Tuscany. Hit the D&G and Prada stores where Treva came close to buying some shoes while Dave wondered if there was an extra digit on each price tag. Wrapped up the evening at our favorite little restaurant in Radda – Al Chiasso dei Portici – where Dave and I finished off the steak for two.

The tastiest sandwich I've ever eaten

The random restaurant




Dave hadn’t run in months so he managed to hurt his back after back-to-back runs so no running on Sunday. The weather was actually rainy too so it was a good day to be travelling to the Cinque Terre. Dave needed to drop off his rental car on our way, and Tiff and I hadn’t been to Florence in 13 years so I suggested we hit Florence on the way. I must say that I was pretty disappointed. I’m sure the art museum is great, but other than that…I must be missing something. Plus, the AGIP gas station there owes us €9 of diesel so I’m boycotting AGIP and Florence from here on out.

We made it to our hotel in Santa Margherita relatively unscathed (one mirror rubbing incident aside). We stayed at the Hotel Tigullio et de Milan which was totally fine in my opinion. We ventured out to the harbour-like area for some dinner. The restaurants aren’t like those you’ll find in Tuscany, but they were fine. We came back to the hotel, grabbed some drinks from the bar and headed to the roof deck to wind down the evening where we were surprisingly treated to a fireworks show.


The hike


The hike between the five hill towns was the main activity of the next two days. We took a train to Riomaggioire and did the first 3 legs to Vernazza. I was in favour of knocking out the last leg on the first day, but was overruled as it was starting to rain and the thought of sitting down for a drink was too good to pass up. In spite of DWT’s last second loss of courage, we snuck on to the fast train back to Santa Margherita and headed to a pizza/pasta restaurant that was just off the main square of the town. As we were deciding on the place, a guy was warming up for a music act so we were treated to good people watching as most of the town converged on the square for the show as well as a pretty good one man show. Turns out he was doing some sort of recent history program so we wandered over after dinner and listened to Ants Marching with Italian subtitles. The last day we finished the last leg of the hike. The lady over-charged me for the train tickets, but I challenge anyone who doesn’t speak Italian to go back and get a refund. After training it back, we said a sad goodbye to the Tottens and headed down to Pisa to fly back to London. The trip home was not as blessed as the rest of the trip – I messed up the time zone difference and our flight was delayed so we left about two hours before we needed, I was about €9 short (damn AGIP) on filling up the car with gas and the machines wouldn’t take my card and the car ride home from Gatwick was painful but all that couldn’t damper our spirits from the trip.


Dave and Treva after the 'concert'