Bill in China

Bill landed in China this morning sending me photographic proof that he lived through the 15 hour flight with this shot of the airport. (at least I assume this is an airport)

Bill's colleague, Sam, is making sure that Bill is well taken care of.  They went for a traditional Chinese meal in Beijing.  This is Bill eating a whole garlic clove.  He told me that shortly after this he had to excuse himself because he thought he might vomit.  But he didn't and went back to eat a chicken neck.

We were able to "Face Time" on our iPhones while Bill was in the Marriot hotel bar.  He was clearly running on adrenaline and alcohol at this point.  He introduced me to his server, Denise.  Here is Bill and Denise.  Bill looks a little sleepy, no?  He needs to rest up because they head to the Great Wall this weekend!

Eton Mess

Our shipment has arrive in Eton.  This is the living room filled with all the boxes that were packed to fit like a jigsaw into our crate.  Bill knows how to keep me happy...he told me that he has unpacked but organized nothing.  He knows how much I love to find places for everything and set up our little household systems so I was quite please to hear that the house is in shambles.

Meanwhile, check out the phrenology bust on the coffee table.  We saw it in an antique shop on the High Street and I had "want" written all over my face so he went back and bought it the first weekend he got there.  Another job well done by Will.  All our visitors will be subjected to my assessment of their intelligence and personality based on the shape of their head.  

PS Will left today for China and Australia!  It's hard for me to imagine him eating crickets on a stick in a crowded noodle market a la Blade Runner.  What will they think of the pink paisley? 

PPS I know that a joke that needs to be explained isn't funny...and yet, I want to make sure that readers know that the title of the post not only refers to the current status of our house but also a famous British dessert! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eton_mess

I have the best bookclub

Bookclub met at my house last night with Andrea hosting (New Haven pizza!).   Everyone knows I love my bookclub - just the right mix of book talk, gossip, drinking, and laughs.  They surprised me last night with a little going away celebration - an Eyewitness Guide to Great Britain (the best kind of guidebook - lots of pictures and little bite sized blurbs of information) and Amy made a delicious trifle.  I'm kicking myself now for not getting everyone to pose for a group shot but unless my work transfer process starts speeding up I will get to do it at next month's meeting.

Thank you for my lovely going away bookclub night!!

Fully immersed

My new iPhone case...

Sunset in Eton

This is what I'm missing in Eton....the sunset from our backyard and Will (not necessarily in that order).  The process to move my job is torturous with no end in sight.  Luckily I have lots of friends keeping me busy to take my mind off of being in limbo.  

Racing around England

I went for a long ride with Louise today in her Morgan.  Her classic car has the power of a jet and Louise casually zipped us around to Henley and Marlow and several other towns.  You can see by my seat belt that this is a race car.

 In fact, Louise and 14 others are driving their classic race cars down South to Portsmouth where they will take the ferry to France and then drive to Le Mans where they will race.  Her brother, who will also take part, drives a classic Ferrari.

After my drive I went to Sunday lunch with Louise and Mariam.  The Sunday roast is a tradition and they wanted to make sure I had a true English lunch.

Louise told a story about her nasty neighbors who saw poo in their yard, saw the same poo in Louise's yard and accused her of letting her dogs out in their yard.  After several rounds Louise got a camera attached to the house and it turns out the poo was from foxes that recent our field.

In fact, the 80 year old neighbor feeds the foxes every night.  He says it's his only vice.

 This is a picture of ubbsy flubsy.  He's a strange looking alien-like doll of the kid whose parents own the local Chinese restaurant.

She adorable, but that doll is a freak show.

Speaking of Portsmouth, the girls were doing a bit of shopping to help Jennie out of her depression over not being in England.  Is Diane wearing her new Red Sox hat (it's used, but new to her).  Miss you all....

greetings from Eton

The Slags were out in gaggles

The spillover from the Ascot-something-or-other brought out the finest couture.

Saw The Wildflowers perform after I had a pizza in Windsor....  The were great.  But it made me sad when they played "Wonderful Tonight" by Clapton.  A couple dance in the pub and it made me wish Jennie were here.  

Crumpet and Sausage

Crumpet, the friend formerly known as Noelle, had me over for dinner last night.  In a twist of fate, she was cooking my namesake - Sausage.   We have decided that Crumpet and Sausage is destined to be the next hit British sitcom and studied up on various British swear words (so we would know what not to say on the BBC....don't say 'hob knocker'... or 'uphill gardener'...and definitely not 'stirring the pudding'....)

We already have our theme song recorded on our iPhones about 20 times.  

"Crumpet and Sausage....hijinx and mystery..."  

Technical Difficulties

My iPhoto isn't working tonight so the fabulous post I had planned from my night at Noelle's (aka Crumpet) will have to wait.  Apologies to our 5 followers.

Hopefully tomorrow.....

Bill Hangs with the Locals

Bill went to a pub tonight to watch a football game and sent me this shot.  It doesn't look like a real pub to me - it looks more like a pizza place.   So I don't expect we will be spending much time there once I arrive but it's nice that Bill got out and about.

While he was at the pub he snapped a picture of this bloke.  That's quite a nose.  Doesn't he look exactly like what you would envision the local punters to be like?  (Are you following my british banter??  Bloke and punter and words that will be used frequently on this blog from now on.  Cheers!)

Eton, day one

I arrived in Eton today to a triathlon that diverted traffic.  There were hundreds of participants running down The High Street, being cheered on by the locals.

From our house we have the beautiful views you see below.  I think we chose a great location.  

I was shown around by the owner of our cottage's sister, Louise.  She made sure I got settled in and then took me shopping for essentials at Tesco.  I stocked up on the basics, plus added an iron, a tea kettle and an outside chair.

Louise then took me on a gorgeous walk around the grounds of Eton College with her two dogs, AK and Uzi.

Tonight she's having me over for dinner with her brother and his wife.  What a fantastic way to start off my new home.  I may fall asleep at the table since I only had an hour of sleep on the plane.

Bill Update and Laura Turns....49 again!

12 hours after I dropped him off at Logan I talked to Bill who was sitting on our new lawn chair in our new back yard of our new house in Eton.  The landlord's sister, Louise,  met him early this morning at the house and took him under her wing.  They went shopping for essentials, they went for a dog walk and then they went to dinner at our realtor's sister's house near by.  I was so happy and relived to hear that everything was working out, that Bill wasn't alone, and that he had someone to show I'm the ropes.  They promised to bring me into the fold when I finally get there.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Laura and I went out to dinner to celebrate her birthday.  We had the most delicious fiddlehead bruschetta and I enjoyed a fantastic rhubarb cobbler with home made vanilla ice cream.  Luckily I did a long walk with Christin and Denise this morning to pre-empt those calories.  Tomorrow it's back to spinach salad.

The first day of the rest of our lives

The day is finally here when Bill heads to the UK for the start of our two year adventure.  We've been looking forward to this with excitement and dread.  It feels like Bill's been on a goodbye tour longer than Cher with all the accolades, parties, phone calls and gifts he's been getting.  And yet, his whole departure was hanging by a thread unless his passport arrived before the flight.  It was such a relief, we took a picture of it.

 Trudi, Bret, Joey, Wyatte and Malikai all come over to say their last good byes today but it still didn't feel real till I had to leave him at Logan security.   I purposely didn't wear much mascara.  (Of course, even in tears I can't not put on the picture face.) 

      

Hate to see him go.  I miss you already, Will!  Love, Sausage

Blues Traveler

I played some blues last night on my harp... deep, sad, I'm going to miss you blues....

See you soon, everyone.

Andy had a whale of a time!

So much to report today.  Andy and family went on a whale watch.  Despite a dose of dramamine, Andy was violently ill and in bed for the rest of the afternoon while Tisha took the kids to the beach.

The shippers finally arrived at 4:00 to pack our belongings for the trip to Eton.  All our winter clothes, coats, boots, some of Bill's paintings, a few dishes, our colorful forks, some family photos and our mini ironing board are currently packed in cardboard heading for Logan.

We ended the day with a bbq.  Friends, family and neighbors all gathered for a cook out, a fire,  drinks, laughter and tears (with 6 six kids in the yard, tears were inevitable).  Andy even made it out of bed with a appetite.  We dipped into Bret's cord of wood to get a roaring fire going for smores. 

Grampa Bill can't get enough of these little guys.

Neither can "Cousin Zoe"

Eva won't be missed....

The most difficult part of this move to the UK is the goodbyes.  The boys and I went to Mom's for dinner tonight.  My goal, as it always is when I'm with Mom, is to make her laugh.  It was a little harder tonight with the impending move staring us in the face.

 

But we had a few giggles .... Here Joey shows Mom some basics on how to use her camera.  Old people trying to figure out technology is always a hoot.

 Bret and Joey wrestling is fun, too.  Until they kicked Mom's table and got yelled at.  It brought back memories....

And finally, we laughed at Eva, Mom's downstairs senile neighbor.  She accused my Mother of knocking over the wreath outside her door.  My Mom denied it and Eva told her "you wouldn't tell me if you did anyway".

I decided to toy with Mom by stealing the wreath and putting it her living room.... Mom made me put it back exactly as I found it and told me Eva better not catch me.  Bret had the idea to swap Eva's two wreaths but Mom would have none of it.  We figured if Eva was always going to accuse Mom of being a bully she may as well act the part.

Last minute parenting

I'm trying to squeeze in some life lessons for the boys before I go to the UK.  

"Hey, let's see if we can reach Barbara...... oh, shoot... Sorry Barbara...."

 Giving the boys a Miyagi lesson....

Using Bret's head as an ashtray...

 And a favorite of ours... vomiting on a family member...

I'm so glad we had this time together....

Bill joined the girls dinner at Paparazzi this week to see Stacey and Di before he leaves on Saturday.  It's starting to get closer and realer now.  We made sure that the conversation was as rude and inappropriate as ever so that Stacey and Di will fully realize what they will be missing.    Don't worry, we'll only be a blog post away!!

Orange you glad you read the blog?

These pictures make it look like we had a relaxing weekend but we did not.  We packed, we planned, we cleaned, we organized, we made lists, we checked things off.  But yes, amidst all the adventure prep I did stop for a cup of tea and a bit of a read.  This is my new orange dress that Bill brought home for me after an early spring business trip.  I think he bought me something to make up for the fact that he was clothes shopping for himself but that seems churlish as the dress is quite nice.  How many husbands can bring home a dress in the right size and style for their Sausage (see yesterday's post)?

Will and Sausage, wood and grass

We crammed a lot into our last Saturday together for a while.

Randy dropped off a cord of wood which Bret will get the benefit of while we are in the UK.

I loved the family assembly line as we stacked it all.  Mom, with her bad back and all, wouldn't listen to us to slow down.  She kept loading wood until we finally gave her camera to occupy her.

Randy is the best....

Later we thought we'd split up our sea grass because it is taking over the front walk way again and the mailman gets angry at us.  I thought the project would take an hour but our sea grass has a root ball made of concrete and we're still not done with the project, despite my stellar supervision.

Finally, Stacey and Dave came over for dinner and the Celtics game.

Except for the Celtics finally fading and losing game seven the night was perfect.  

We decided that Jen and my new names while in the UK will be Will and Sausage.  I'm Will.