Tuesday

It is a late start day for me, though I have been up for a quite awhile, but it was a sleepless night--it was loud, and my mind would not shut off.  Too many thoughts about things I can't control, can't negotiate, and ultimately don't really matter.  Or so I would guess.  Certainly, none of this matters from 3300 miles away from it all.  It isn't all bad stuff--some of it is absolutely wonderful, but most of it is complicated.  Oh well.

I had a funny story already.  I stopped at the local pub (for breakfast--relax, I am not that troubled) for a full English breakfast   This consists of an oil-basted fried egg, beans (the pork and beans kind of beans) grilled tomatoes and mushrooms, and bangers, a sausage of indeterminate meat and lots of grain fillers.  And bacon, in case you weren't already worried about the fat content.  Sounds bad, but actually it is better than it would possibly seem.  And it has an American connection and is very closely tied to WWII.  The beans were a commodity that the US shipped over by the freighter-full during and after the war.  Beans were cheap protein.  The grain filled sausage were a way to stretch meat during wartime and the rationing that lasted until the early 1950s--people just grew to like them, and you can go to a grocery and choose sausage with 40, 30, or 20% filler. Yah whatever.  The the story is that the waitress, who I hoped to be some English chippy because I love to hear the accents, was from St. Paul, and her dad is from St Cloud and when to Apollo etc.  So much for a nice Cockney accent to start the day--she sounded, well, she sounded like me!  She picked me out right away from when I ordered and asked me where in Minnesota I was from.  I don't have an accent, so I wonder how she did that?

Yesterday it rained and rained, not that I really noticed.  I was in museums all day and loved every minute of it.  Well, it was only for 7 hours, but it was a start.  I wonder why I travel alone?  Could it be no one else is geeky enough to put up with that?  That is part of it, I am sure.

I am sure some are wondering about pictures, and really, so am I.  I have taken some and dutifully carried them around, but have taken few of note.  Considering the hassles that posting them seems to cause, I haven't done this yet.  Maybe today--I have three or four that might make viewers smile and give readers a break from this verbiage.

I am off to Oxford--there is a concert there tonight that wouldn't mind seeing, so I might not head back till late.  But I will try and write a bit more tonight, too.  I am sure I will have a story or two.