All change in the 'hood

The past week has seen visible migration at long last....and this time, we're not talking about birds (although we may stretch the metaphor a little further...)
Our mid-western friend (and pseudo-niece), Lisa finally had enough of DC and moved back home - actually, she successfully completed her three month clinical at the National Rehab hospital and is off to Iowa City for the next 12 weeks - congratulations Lisa. Trust us, it will be better doing all that hard work when you receive a salary as well! (and BTW your excess luggage is 'in the mail'...).
As (we expect) those back home in Iowa did, we threw her a sumptuous farewell evening including having Japanese food thrown at her (at the local Hibachi restaurant) and then - surely the highlight of any visit - topped it off with a visit to the 'Pizza Box', our local drinking establishment. (Pictures of Lisa dancing with 'Uncle Jack' available on request....)



Other transient visitors to the neighborhood included former residents Bill & Sylvi and their family, Silke, William, Kristin and Laure. Also joining a riotous (!) Sunday lunch were Kim, Chip and Olivia (with sassy pink cowboy boots no less).

It was great to see everyone and we look forward to many more get-togethers (here in DC, in Pennsylvania or even perhaps Washington state).








Which bring us to April and our annual royal visitor. April Fools Day saw Rhiannon's 15th birthday and today she arrived, courtesy of Virgin Atlantic (and, more impressively, Elliott drove his sister to the airport). The weather is FANTASTIC today - warm and sunny. However it looks like that will break tonight :( and Rhiannon will struggle to get that suntan she wants. Nevertheless we got a bunch of things planned that hopefully won't be spoiled by the weather. Watch this space.....

15 Minutes of fame - with Subtitles (名声の15 分 and 15 Minuten Ruhm)

So this is going to sound JUST a touch geeky.... but as we were (sort of..) in the area and it was the first visit from the new A380 to Dulles, we thought a quick trip to the airport would be in order.

Dulles (and Airbus and Lufthansa) didn't exactly make it easy - not publishing the arrival time ("sometime after 9" was the best we could find). Eventually I found that the plane would be arriving just after EIGHT (55 minutes away and 50 minutes drive away).

Anyway, long story short - drove to Airport, went up to the top of the car parking (with stories to Lisa about "this is where the Snowy Owl was.."), park, got out, one BIG plane immediately landed right on the runway next to us.

It's certainly an impressive machine and there was a small crowd had gathered to take a look.

Which brings me to our subtitles.... There were a couple of Television crews there.

First we were approached by the Japanese crew (TV 乗組員) which Lisa neatly sidestepped and directed them to me (:O - my only previous experience of "being on the telly" was the ultimately edited-out Blue Peter session in 1967).

So we were laughing about that and returning to the car when the German TV crew invited me ("and zee whole family!") to be interviewed.


After all those nice words I think we're owed a tour (I wish!)




For our fellow travellers who like big planes here's an impressive Airbus video - ahhhhh one day :)

St Patrick's Day at our house

The first two pictures kind of sum up the gathering on Saturday (and yes that IS Jameson, Harp, Murphy's AND Guinness behind the sobering Irish Coffee).

The food table had a stock of traditional Irish Brie and Swiss Cheese (!) but the Corned Beef (yet to arrive, in the picture...) lent authenticity to the fare.




With Celtic Music on the stereo and Irish flags on the flag pole (and elsewhere!) the party was underway.

Jerilyn and Allie easily won the prize for most enthusiastic personal adornment





A house full of victims (aka friends,old and new) joined the celebrations including Derek and Levi - in town from Iowa for the weekend and seen here with Deanna - and Pat 'Chickie' Boylan - posing with Lisa and Rob.

Despite the implications from top photograph, on Sunday morning the flag wearing young ladies were off to the airport at dawn, the Iowa contingent were out impressively early to do the tourist rounds of DC and Chrystal & Rob were off birding in a bracing (damn cold!) wind

UK Trip - part 3

The final leg of our UK trip was a long talked about weekend in Norfolk with Jack and Paula. Being the tourists, we arrived back from Dublin at 10 and took a leisurely drive up to the cottage at Burnham Overy.
Poor Jack and Paula had to work and so left Watford for the 3-4 hour drive around 5. By this time of course the weather had deteriorated to hard driving rain for their journey. Not only that but Jack then enthusiastically cooked a pasta Dinner....


Here's the mill just outside Burnham Overy on the coast road that most of the best birding sites are nearby and up and down we drove for much of the weekend.
Pre-Breakfast on Saturday Jack and I headed for Titchwell (in the rain...), but the weather cleared and after bacon and eggs we had rendezvous with some more old friends.


As the expressions here show, the wind whipping off the North Sea was cold but we spend the morning with Gary Elton (ex of South Oxhey, Jack's partner in Birding London, and the serious birder here actually LOOKING at the sea) and David Russell (Jack and my co-author on the Tring Book, and without gloves). Both Gary and David are resident in Norfolk so we had plenty of good local information about the whereabouts of local specialities (some of which cooperated and some of which didn't....)

One species that wasan't where it 'should' have been the first few times was the local Little Owl. Revisiting the tree on Sunday, Jack picked out a very obscured bird. We were looking at the top of the birds head (all that was visible initially) when a second bird perched in the tree giving wonderful views, Chrystal's first Little Owl.


Norfolk has a healthy Barn Owl population and we saw three of this increasingly rare species in the south of England.
We walked in Holkham Park, had a pleasant pub lunch (from a somewhat bizarre 'lunch menu') and visited Cley.
As often the case, we overspent our birding time budget and only just managed to find some meat for Sunday lunch in a rapidly 'closing for the evening' Holt. In the event Sunday lunch was a wonderful Pork roast. Before lunch Jack, Chrystal and I birded locally, finding the owls and some other species including a field of Pink-footed Geese.
Jack and Paula left in (again!) deteriorating weather for their journey south on Sunday.
On Monday Chrystal and I had another calm drive down to Heathrow ready for our flight home on Tuesday
It had been 'spring' in the UK. Birds were singing and displaying (including bizarrely Great-crested Grebe displaying on the sea).
The flight captain announced a temperature beneath freezing point back at Dulles. Overnight it snowed a couple of inches. During the following week the temperature here was 81 degrees and now its back down to 29 degrees (and ice/snow/freezing rain or something / everything in between...)


Still spring birds have arrived here too although goodness knows what the insect eaters will find to eat for a few weeks

Catching up, Part 2 - Dublin

Here are some of our Dublin pictures from our week in the Irish Capital.

Highlights included Chrystal's first (and many subsequent) Guinness, our Ulysses walk around the streets of Dublin, the highly recommended Guinness tour and many historical sites around the city (The Gaol, Croke Park [DESPITE the Rugby result a few days previous], Ha'penny Bridge, the Post Office etc).
Walking is always the best way to see a new city although we cheated with taxi when we ran out of stream or the weather threatened. However we did spend most of Tuesday following a walk that Chrystal had downloaded to her iPod, following the route of Leopold Bloom around the city.

It rained a bit (actually quite a lot, one day in particular!!) but but we had a BLAST! of a time.

Our traditional Irish fare consisted of Curry, home-made chicken pie (thanks to our friends Dervela and James), Indonesian and finally some (Irish traditional) Boxty, and of course many Guinness.

We never did make it out of the city - the suggested trip to the mountains started too early (for this is a town where breakfast is served until 11! :) ) and we were taking it easy this week. Maybe we'll do the grand tour next time...

SLAINTE!

Playing catch up.... Part 1

Having been away for the best part of two weeks we've slipped a little behind and have a bit to catch up on.
So here's the first instalment of our trip.
The first leg of our UK trip was the big surprise 18th birthday party that had been planned and arranged by June, Rhiannon and Robyn for months and somehow kept largely concealed from a puzzled Elliott. So Family and Friends gathered at Selsey Village hall ready to greet the victim as we drove, supposedly to a celebration dinner. The first picture is of Elliott 'in the spotlight'.




We'll post many more pictures soon but here are a couple of shots, firstly of the 'Coconut Princesses ' (Rhiannon and her friends Emily, Kiera and Sarah) after watching too many movies and secondly some of the 'catering'

Wayyyyy out west

OK maybe not WAY out west but on Sunday we headed out to the panhandle of West Virgina and up into the mountains.

We were visiting Dee and Ray in their splendid self-build Log-cabin house a couple of hours west of DC (including this amazing fire pit in the center of the lounge).














This visit included some neighborly assist to Brian from whose kitchen Lisa can be seen admiring the view down to the valley to the South

Two of life's inevitables....

Firstly ... if you wait long enough the Washington winter will eventually
arrive. Despite all the talk of the mild winter, the icy weather finally arrived.
It's now been below freezing point since last Sunday. Our home thermometer has registered a low of 11F (c.-12C), wind chill made it feel well below. Here's a picture of the largely frozen Potomac river with a light covering of snow that fell earlier in the week.
We've still had it relatively easy though, upstate New York has had 100 inches of snow this past week and much of the Midwest has been much colder.

The other inevitable, age.... Rob's eye finally succumbing to the need for reading glasses. Still getting use to them!!!

The Robyns Young

The Treasure Hunt is on, identify the real bona fide Robyn (Michelle Eleanor) Young from the following rogues gallery.....
All those depicted are indeed called Robyn Young (including the country & western dude - what WERE his parents thinking, I suppose he has something to write songs about though...)




Only two of them live on the south coast of England (the rest are doctors and librarians and students (and c&w singers!) in the US or Austalia).

One of those two has THE web site and has just published a book and the other has 3 fish and dogs called Polly and Logan (NOT 'Logie Logie' apparently).

One of them is good at scrabble, throws fabulous Christmas parties and is her Dad's favourite youngest daughter


And the answer is (as if you couldn't guess!).....


Stay tuned for more on RMEY, her people, her dogs, her cats, her fishes and her adventures......

Things You Didn't Need To Know - #1 - Lessons in Korean

Reflecting the catchment area (if not the common sense!) of the North Virginia Community College, this tri-lingual sign caught my eye.....


PS Apparently in American English a 'Catchment area' would an 'area of outreach', you learn something new every day ....

Work-at-Home dayzzzzzz

Chrystal here. I must say that these work-at-home days are fantastic. Currently I take advantage of the offer once a week, but according to my wonderful boss, Karen, apparently I can have the option for 2 days a week if I want it... IF I want it?! Duh! So, as long as I can stay focused on work this is a great option! :)

Rob's in a training course this week, a tough one that had him studying through dinner last night, and he kept at it until nearly midnight, dedicated student that he is! Hopefully this will be worth it at the end of the week, as he should attain a new project management certification. Fingers crossed!

Lisa continues to work hard each day helping her patients with their occupational therapy, loving the experience of it all. Those 40 hour weeks are tough, though, aren't they, Sunshine?! lol We're all having a great time together and she's learned to make damn fine cup of tea. We'll get her to England, yet!

Two Parrots Sitting On A...????? - By Lisa

I must say that even after a few weeks here it has still been a mystery as to what the bloody parrots will be doing!! Will they be sitting on a perch, bison, or a can of blue paint?? Or...will they sound like a carrot?? One will never know...but for an evening the mystery was solved...the parrots were on the bar. Now from my college experience (mind you I have grown out of now) I have found that one should not spend too much time at the bar, or they will look like this....



AHHHHHH....frightening, I know :) Oh just kidding! But in all seriousness, my stay here has been wonderful!! NRH is a great place to learn and Chrys and Rob have really made me feel at home. As you can see below...we're just one happy family!






Bobby and Mr. Bear

'Royal visit' from England

This week's big news is the planning of the now annual April birthday trip from Rhiannon. She'll be with us from the 3rd until the 9th to celebrate the big day and 15 years :) .

We are all planning for the trip but first ideas include:

Fudruckers, Mango Mikes , Chinese Food from little boxes, Barrel of Cheese Balls, Diet Cherry Vanilla Dr Pepper, Sheppard's Pie (made by Rhiannon), Definitely NO visit to the Dolphins at the Baltimore Aquarium, BLT Pizza, bring supplies of English chocolate, tea and
Marmite from the homeland

Streets of steam

I guess the novelty will wear off eventually but I still think its cool the way the streets spew such dramatic plumes of steam during the winter time.

(also I hope this works - I am emailing our blog from my phone, we'll see .....)

footnote - OK I cheated a little bit - the text comes through ok but not the picture :(

A week late, but timeless

With apologies for only just finding this.

Here is a link to Martin Luther King's 'I have a dream' speech.

Winter arrives (finally...)

Winter finally arrived in the way of snow while Rob was out at a now-bleak-looking Huntley Meadows. The new winter hat's inaugural trip - a huge success!

(34 N. Shoveler, 11 N. Pintail, an American Wigeon and an Eastern Phoebe were the highlights for anyone interested :) )

Following George's footsteps (....continued)

After our recent trip to Mount Vernon, last night we continued our George Washington theme and went to Gadsby's Tavern in Old Town Alexandria - terrific food and interesting loot player....

New York, NY

A sample of our weekend in New York - *Here* is a link to some pictures from the city

Adrian and Family on an all-too-brief stop at BWI on their way to Turkey for 2 years - let's hope all this hi-tech helps keeps us all in touch !!

Its that time of year again when, due to the generosity of various friends and family an assortment of furry, squeezy or just plain strange creatures join the family. Here we have the English Bulldog "Tony" (safely sitting on the back shelf of our Honda Accord,'Green') and our assortment of ducks (sitting on our bedroom TV along with their canine friend who seems to have borrowed something from Space Duck...)
Talking of furry, squeezy or strange (take your pick) - Lisa arrived to stay with us for 3 months while she does something very complicated sounding at the National Rehab Hospital (?) as an intern.
So we'll be out partying if you can't find us at home ! :)

go here
for the Blue Men Group's view on Global warming