Friday, June 13, 2008
Iowa City Flooding
Hey all, Matt and I have been following the news of the flooding closely and just want to say we're thinking about all of you and hope everything will turn out okay. It looks like the whole community is really stepping up to help with filling and laying sandbags and helping people evacuate their homes. Good luck to everyone!
Thursday, June 12, 2008
Pig in Boots
Hey, I just wanted to post this, it is the cutest thing I have ever seen, and maybe will cheer up you Midwesterners who are experiencing the Deluge right now:
Apparently, this little piggy from a farm in England didn't like rolling around in the mud with its siblings because it was afraid of the mud, so the farmers put on these teeny tiny wellington boots and now she is happily trotting about. Cutest thing ever.
Apparently, this little piggy from a farm in England didn't like rolling around in the mud with its siblings because it was afraid of the mud, so the farmers put on these teeny tiny wellington boots and now she is happily trotting about. Cutest thing ever.
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
Pygmalian
So here's a rule of thumb of mine - wherever you are, make an effort to do the things you can only do in that place (if they appeal to you at least a bit). So, in Iowa City, go to Pagliai's pizza, and the Hamburg Inn. In Ames, go to Thai kitchen and Battles' Barbeque (if you eat meat). In London, go see the art and the theatre (but don't worry too much about the restaurants).So, in that spirit, Grace and I intend to see some theatre and visit the museums this summer. Last week we went to the National portrait gallery and the Tate Britain museum. And last night, we went to see 'Pygmalian' last night at The Old Vic, a historic theatre (Kevin Spacey happens to be the artistic director). They have a special deal for people under 25 - 100 12 pound tickets each performance for the young crowd.
Grace and I studied this play in high school, but it was impossible to understand a lot of the jokes when it was being read, because so much of it depends on accents. For example, there's a scene where the entire joke depends on the juxtaposition of the character's upper class accent and her lower class topics of conversation. This joke is entirely lost on a high school class from Iowa with no idea that there are different english accents. We all thought an english accent basically meant you dropped your "h's" and said "guv'nor" at the end of every sentence. It turns out there are dozens of accents, in London alone. And it was great to see the actor's make use of all these different accents.
So it was a good play. And I hope to see more. My theory is that I'll know what's good and bad and I'll begin to enjoy things even more when I've seen a slew of plays. It has worked with art, which I am now capable of really enjoying (for about 40 minutes - then I tend to lose my attention). After the play we went to the bar below the theatre (called the pit bar) and enjoyed a pint. The cast was down there, which was cool (it's not like we talked to them though). However, there was someone else there. This guy.
He's better known as this guy.
Henry Wickham from the BBC Pride and Prejudice miniseries. Grace freaked out for about 180 seconds.
Sunday, June 08, 2008
Red Bull Flug Tug
Update: Since posting this blog entry I have been informed that the event is actually called Flug Tag, not Flug Tug. Anyway, I found some much better videos on youtube of the action. I'll put them up at the end of the post. I might just recommend starting with them.
On Saturday Grace and I, plus one of our friends, went to see the "Red Bull Flug Tug" in Hyde Park. The "Flug Tug" is basically this silly competition where teams of people - usually men - build enormous gliders and then run them off a ramp into the Serpentine (the man-made lake in the middle of Hyde Park). It's a competition and people are judged on three criteria: creativity, performance and distance.
You can get a maximum of 20 points for creativity. The gliders are not usually built by people who know anything about aeronautics. They're usually more like parade floats that are pushed off a 20 foot ramp, where they fall straight down into the water and break spectacularly apart. The performance is also out of 20 points, and is based on a 30 second performance which the team does before they push their craft into the water. You get 2 points for every meter you glide through the air, for a maximum of 30 points.
Unfortunately, we showed up a bit late (it was free) and there were no more primo seats on the water. Like the majority of the 80,000 people who attended we had to watch the event on giant TV screens. Still, it was a good crowd, and a good excuse to drink some beer, sit in the sun and eat freshly fried donuts (I love freshly fried donuts).
Anyway, I took some videos, because you really have to see it to believe it. Unfortunately, these videos are pretty terrible. When you take a video of a TV screen, it shows up very badly, as you will see. Beware of flashing lights.
ANYWAY, without further ado, here is a typical entry. This one is Star Wars themed.
And here, if you can stand more flashing TV screens, is a wildly successful glider built by real engineers.
Other highlights:
-A very good looking plane built by engineers that snapped apart in mid-air from the weight of the pilot.
-A disco themed team whose glider was literally a giant discoball with some angel wings attached to either side. That went absolutely straight down.
-There was also a team whose 'glider' was literally just a fully loaded fruit stand.
Some Better Videos:
A Nun-themed team (The Bad Habits)
A Better Video of the Star-Wars Team (The Wrong Brothers)
Don't worry, this guy from the Evel Knieval themed team was alright.
And, one more time, the successful glider.
On Saturday Grace and I, plus one of our friends, went to see the "Red Bull Flug Tug" in Hyde Park. The "Flug Tug" is basically this silly competition where teams of people - usually men - build enormous gliders and then run them off a ramp into the Serpentine (the man-made lake in the middle of Hyde Park). It's a competition and people are judged on three criteria: creativity, performance and distance.
You can get a maximum of 20 points for creativity. The gliders are not usually built by people who know anything about aeronautics. They're usually more like parade floats that are pushed off a 20 foot ramp, where they fall straight down into the water and break spectacularly apart. The performance is also out of 20 points, and is based on a 30 second performance which the team does before they push their craft into the water. You get 2 points for every meter you glide through the air, for a maximum of 30 points.
Unfortunately, we showed up a bit late (it was free) and there were no more primo seats on the water. Like the majority of the 80,000 people who attended we had to watch the event on giant TV screens. Still, it was a good crowd, and a good excuse to drink some beer, sit in the sun and eat freshly fried donuts (I love freshly fried donuts).
Anyway, I took some videos, because you really have to see it to believe it. Unfortunately, these videos are pretty terrible. When you take a video of a TV screen, it shows up very badly, as you will see. Beware of flashing lights.
ANYWAY, without further ado, here is a typical entry. This one is Star Wars themed.
And here, if you can stand more flashing TV screens, is a wildly successful glider built by real engineers.
Other highlights:
-A very good looking plane built by engineers that snapped apart in mid-air from the weight of the pilot.
-A disco themed team whose glider was literally a giant discoball with some angel wings attached to either side. That went absolutely straight down.
-There was also a team whose 'glider' was literally just a fully loaded fruit stand.
Some Better Videos:
A Nun-themed team (The Bad Habits)
A Better Video of the Star-Wars Team (The Wrong Brothers)
Don't worry, this guy from the Evel Knieval themed team was alright.
And, one more time, the successful glider.
Monday, June 02, 2008
Scotland
We got back to London yesterday afternoon after a week in Scotland. Here's a brief photo tour of the trip.
First we - Mike, Rob and Me - took a train up to Edinburgh. You may have read about it earlier, on this very blog. We stayed in a hostel, 12 bunk beds. I thought it was an all male room, so when I changed that night, I treated it like a locker room. The next morning I saw lots of the people sleeping in the bunks were women.
We stayed at a hostel right under Edinburgh castle.
We stayed out each night, enjoying the live music scene. It's pretty amazing, a set of free live bands for the choosing.
The next day we hiked around town, seeing the castle, going to the top of Arthur's seat, an extinct volcano.
The hike up the mountain was about 45 minutes and pretty exhausting. Really windy.
The next day we headed off to Stirling on the train, to see another castle and the William Wallace Memorial.
Please enjoy the above, blurry photo of me by William Wallace (Mel Gibson)'s sword.
The next day we rented a car and drove off, into the highlands, to the town of Oban.
It was good times. Great to get behind the (passenger side) wheel of a car and drive on the (left hand side of the) open road. Once we got about 30 miles outside of Edinburgh it was just a two lane road, speed limit 60 miles per hour. We had lochs and little wooded mountains all around and the road was really, really windy. We got into Oban, went to take a whiskey distillery tour, and were shocked to discover it was totally booked up. We took a ferry ride out to the island of Mull.
The entire island has a population of about 2500. We only had two hours on the island before the last ferry of the night left, so we stayed in a pub for the whole time. We did not want to miss that ferry.
Like an idiot I thought it was warm enough for a T-shirt. The ferry ride was not so pleasant.
That night my glasses broke, and the only cool pub in town was having a concert which was sold out. We gave up and went to get some food from the local Tescos. It was closed. Oban sucks! That's not entirely true. It had a good sunset. In Scotland, we were so far North we had light until 11:15. This photo was taken around 11 at night maybe.
We left early the next morning (we had to get out of stupid Oban!). We had our first taste of one lane roads - first over a bridge.
Then we got up to Loch Ness, home of the monster.
Nothing to report on that front. We also did some hiking that day. We felt the rain added to the atmosphere.
We got into Inverness that night, the capital of the highlands. However, despite the existence of a three story pub called 'Hootenany' we decided to stay in that night and watch the football - America versus England! America lost 0-2 and the commentators made fun of our team a lot.
That afternoon Grace had finished her last exam and she took an 8 hour train ride up to meet us in Inverness. She got in at 11:05 and the next day we left bright and early for the far North, to the town of Ullapool (pop. 1300).
The landscape changed quite dramatically up North. It became really remote, barren and desolate, but I actually liked it even more.
We got into Ullapool, a really nice fishing village that mostly a jumping off point for hiking and then spent the afternoon hiking to the top of a 500m mountain called Stac Pollaid (Stack Polly). Mike thought, just for kicks, he would go for a little run on the mountain trail.
That night we had some drinks on the harbor.
The next day, Mike drove us part of the way out to another hike, this one to a waterfall. He was really excited to be on the wrong side of the road.
The cool thing about this hike was it started at a bookshop/cafe which was in the middle of the highlands, only accessible by a single lane road (you have to pull or back into a passing spot when another car is coming).
So we hiked out to see a waterfall. It was really bright and none of us had thought to bring sunscreen. I mean, c'mon, it was Scotland. Anyway, Robt was in danger of being sunburned, so he had to put on a 'cape.'
After the hike, we drove back, and got stuck behind sheep wandering around in the road. It happens on the backroads. Anyway, that night we all went out for a last round of pints. Some of us stayed longer and some of us stayed shorter. Me? I found I had a tick in my shoulder, his head all the way in. Grace and I had a good time getting it out that night.
The next day we drove due south, all the way back to Edinburgh. We did stop for lunch.
That night we had pizza hut and went to Indiana Jones (we were tired of learning about foreign cultures I guess). And the next morning, before we knew it, we were on the train and off to London.
First we - Mike, Rob and Me - took a train up to Edinburgh. You may have read about it earlier, on this very blog. We stayed in a hostel, 12 bunk beds. I thought it was an all male room, so when I changed that night, I treated it like a locker room. The next morning I saw lots of the people sleeping in the bunks were women.
We stayed at a hostel right under Edinburgh castle.
We stayed out each night, enjoying the live music scene. It's pretty amazing, a set of free live bands for the choosing.
The next day we hiked around town, seeing the castle, going to the top of Arthur's seat, an extinct volcano.
The hike up the mountain was about 45 minutes and pretty exhausting. Really windy.
The next day we headed off to Stirling on the train, to see another castle and the William Wallace Memorial.
Please enjoy the above, blurry photo of me by William Wallace (Mel Gibson)'s sword.
The next day we rented a car and drove off, into the highlands, to the town of Oban.
It was good times. Great to get behind the (passenger side) wheel of a car and drive on the (left hand side of the) open road. Once we got about 30 miles outside of Edinburgh it was just a two lane road, speed limit 60 miles per hour. We had lochs and little wooded mountains all around and the road was really, really windy. We got into Oban, went to take a whiskey distillery tour, and were shocked to discover it was totally booked up. We took a ferry ride out to the island of Mull.
The entire island has a population of about 2500. We only had two hours on the island before the last ferry of the night left, so we stayed in a pub for the whole time. We did not want to miss that ferry.
Like an idiot I thought it was warm enough for a T-shirt. The ferry ride was not so pleasant.
That night my glasses broke, and the only cool pub in town was having a concert which was sold out. We gave up and went to get some food from the local Tescos. It was closed. Oban sucks! That's not entirely true. It had a good sunset. In Scotland, we were so far North we had light until 11:15. This photo was taken around 11 at night maybe.
We left early the next morning (we had to get out of stupid Oban!). We had our first taste of one lane roads - first over a bridge.
Then we got up to Loch Ness, home of the monster.
Nothing to report on that front. We also did some hiking that day. We felt the rain added to the atmosphere.
We got into Inverness that night, the capital of the highlands. However, despite the existence of a three story pub called 'Hootenany' we decided to stay in that night and watch the football - America versus England! America lost 0-2 and the commentators made fun of our team a lot.
That afternoon Grace had finished her last exam and she took an 8 hour train ride up to meet us in Inverness. She got in at 11:05 and the next day we left bright and early for the far North, to the town of Ullapool (pop. 1300).
The landscape changed quite dramatically up North. It became really remote, barren and desolate, but I actually liked it even more.
We got into Ullapool, a really nice fishing village that mostly a jumping off point for hiking and then spent the afternoon hiking to the top of a 500m mountain called Stac Pollaid (Stack Polly). Mike thought, just for kicks, he would go for a little run on the mountain trail.
That night we had some drinks on the harbor.
The next day, Mike drove us part of the way out to another hike, this one to a waterfall. He was really excited to be on the wrong side of the road.
The cool thing about this hike was it started at a bookshop/cafe which was in the middle of the highlands, only accessible by a single lane road (you have to pull or back into a passing spot when another car is coming).
So we hiked out to see a waterfall. It was really bright and none of us had thought to bring sunscreen. I mean, c'mon, it was Scotland. Anyway, Robt was in danger of being sunburned, so he had to put on a 'cape.'
After the hike, we drove back, and got stuck behind sheep wandering around in the road. It happens on the backroads. Anyway, that night we all went out for a last round of pints. Some of us stayed longer and some of us stayed shorter. Me? I found I had a tick in my shoulder, his head all the way in. Grace and I had a good time getting it out that night.
The next day we drove due south, all the way back to Edinburgh. We did stop for lunch.
That night we had pizza hut and went to Indiana Jones (we were tired of learning about foreign cultures I guess). And the next morning, before we knew it, we were on the train and off to London.
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