Great London/England Reads

I picked up my first Edward Rutherfurd read in the gift shop at Sarum. It was, appropriately, entitled Sarum and tells the history of Sarum [Old Salisbury] and the region from the Stone Age on thru five families. If you like your history fed to you fictionalized, you'll love Rutherfurd.

These books really remind how big a role religion played in everything--including internal and external wars--in Western history. It really drives home what an important [and Enlightened] decision the Founding Fathers made to separate church and state.



City of London



Russia!



I see he's got a new one out on New York I'll have to pick up.

Prince Albert Memorial

So Anne [Bennedson, one of my friends and co-workers at CyberArts] and I are walking thru Kensington Park, and off in the distance we see a gleam of gold. Gold...must see gold...


We realize as we get closer it must be the in/famous Albert Memorial. It's seriously over the top, but it does work, the way Vegas does.


Each exterior corner has a sculpture depicting four regions of the world; Europe, Asia, Africa, Americas. This one is the Americas. The sculptures on the interior corners are Agriculture, Commerce, Engineering and Manufactures.


The Europe group.



Asia group, and following, Africa.



Looking back at Anne and Royal Albert Hall. It was really pretty cool.

How Did I Get Here?

[View from my window at the Royal Garden Hotel]

How did I end up traveling to London? And the other places soon to be posted?

After I got laid off in 2002 I never did find a 'real' job again. So I became a consultant, naturally. I taught myself web design. I did writing and desktop publishing and research for various people. You can see the early years here--site has not been updated since oh, maybe 2006? I eventually got this great gig with CyberArts providing marketing support. It's about 3/4 time. Doing the drafts for manuals, press releases and other collateral [text and layout]. Trying to manage SalesForce. Managing ad buys. A large part of what I do is trade show support. I do all the pre-show arranging, budgeting and attend as part of the tradeshow staff. So I get to travel. How cool is that?

Kensington Park

[Kensington Palace. It looked cold.]

I didn't have much time for sightseeing this trip, but I did manage to get in a bitterly cold walk through Kensington Park. [Srsly, like 30 degrees and blowing 30 knots. I actually got wind burn.]

[Still Kensington Palace. Still looking cold.]

The natives were more colorful dressers than I remembered.

Contemplating goose down on the hoof.

Swan down should be as warm as goose down, yes???

Actually it was fun seeing the birds. We don't see many swans or geese in this part of Florida. I also saw magpies, some type of common moorhen and a grebe, but failed to get any good pictures.

London in Blue and Gray

London in blue and gray.

Moira, smokes and friend.

Princess Diana Memorial, Kensington Park.

Night approacheth at Kew Gardens.

Wife Out Of Town?

No problem! Just keep buying socks until she returns.

Where No Pigeon Has Gone Before

Unsuccessful pigeon control measures, Royal Garden Hotel, Kensington, London 2009.
The doorman and I were really cracking up over this.