Jetlagged Musings

The travels have begun again in earnest.  I was in Argentina, Chile and the UK all in the span of the last ten days.  Can you say jetlagged?  What the heck is jet lag anyway?  I looked this term up in the Urban Dictionary as I figured since I liked this phrase so much it must be used by the cool hipster underground.  They say it is a euphemism for a hangover.  Ok, so they don’t actually use the word euphemism.  Instead they say “Dude, that stuff we smoked last night was tight but now I’ve got some serious jet lag.”  You can always count on the Urban Dictionary folks to clear things up.

That picture above?  That is the Tower of London.  I took this shot Wednesday night of this week when we brought a bunch of our biggest UK customers on a guided tour.  I’m sure many of you have hit this same tourist destination on your visits to London.  It doesn’t get old;  what an awesome place!  And to top it off this week we saw all the crown jewels without the masses and a Beefeater guy explaining how big each of the diamonds are and such.  But the best part of the jewel tour was to see the very same crown the Queen wore earlier that day as she opened Parliament.

This Wednesday, May 8th, was a big day at the tower.  Besides the Queen stopping by to pick up her crown, they were holding the Tower of London Run.  It is a 1k up to 10K run in the Tower’s moat.  It is the oldest running event in London and looked awesome.  I wanted to get out of my monkey suit and into a red Tower of London Run t-shirt and jump the fence!  Maybe next year.

A little trivia for you blog followers – did you know that if the ravens that live at the Tower were to leave one day the entire country would fall apart?  I guess that is why they have one in a cage now to protect against this?   The last time I was here I completely missed the ravens for some reason.  There is even one named “Jubilee” who was given to Queen Elizabeth this past year to mark the event.  And once a week they enjoy an egg and an occasional rabbit.  Who’d have thought, right?

Running Update:  I have really fallen off the wagon when it comes to running (other than a recent Nashville Country Music Half Marathon) but I do have a new Google Drive training plan that takes me through November 9th where I’ll run the Savannah Marathon again.  I guess given the travels I have an excuse including my complete annoyance with treadmills and having to convert kilometers to miles in my head since that is all they have in these other countries.  My best run of the year so far was in Chile as I was able to run four miles in a park that sits at the base of the Andes.  It was a holiday there so the park was full of families and food vendors and dogs and normal Chilean life.  They live in a very beautiful part of the world.  If I ever get a chance to go back I’ll be blogging about my time running in Patagonia.  Bucket list.  Oh, and I have no idea who that cowgirl is in our picture from the Nashville Country Music Half Marathon expo.  She worked for Women’s Running and was promoting for subscriptions I suppose.  If it works for their magazine I figured it can’t hurt with the blog.

Only 23 months and 26.2 miles to go…

Advertisement

Queen’s Diamond Jubilee

I was fortunate enough to be in London for one of this past weekend’s parties celebrating the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee.  I figured I’d write a bit about it for posterity.  All Hail the Queen!

I arrived on Tuesday, June 5th.  This was the final day of the weekend’s four-day Diamond Jubilee celebration and the grand finale “Thanksgiving” celebration.  I was completely zonked from flying across the pond all night but decided I had to at least see a bit of the pomp and circumstance.  So I made my way to Hyde Park figuring there had to be something going on.  I was right.

The park was filled with local vendors selling “Happy Sausage”. Strawberries and Cream and Back Bacon Sticks among other things.  There was a big stage and four monster big screens showing the concert that was underway.  All of the acts were local UK stars and were awesome.  I made my way to the middle of the park and had the thought that since I’m so close to Buckingham Palace why don’t I just walk on over and wave to Elizabeth.  As I’m walking out of one of the pathways there were hundreds coming in the opposite direction.  They obviously knew something I didn’t know.  There were many dressed from head to toe in the Union Jack flag and others just carrying commemorative flags and others with fake Kate or William or Harry faces on the backside of their heads.  I asked someone why they weren’t headed to the palace.  After a long pause and a few odd looks at their friends I’m told “Mate, there is no possible way to get anywhere near the palace.”  Ok, I’m a stupid American.  I’m naive.  There were literally millions in the “mall” which is like London’s version of Magnolia Lane at Augusta.  I turn around.

When I get back to the park I find that they are going to show the entire procession and views of all the horses, military, fly overs with WWII planes and such on the screens.  If they were looking at this as a practice session for the Olympics they are ready.  Everything seemed to go without a hitch.   I got a kick out of all the ceremonial carriages accompanied by all the horses and guards.  I really wish we had Royals.  I guess we’ll just adopt William and Kate since they are from Cambridge and go with that.

I walked around and took some pictures of the crowd (below) including many who had a full-blown picnic going on with Champagne, cheese, crackers, sausage and flags.

Walking back from the event to the hotel I find a couple of guys that look like true Londoners and force them to let me take a picture with me.  You can see they are very happy to do so from the look on their faces.  I think one is thinking “Bloody Hell, why did I wear this outfit today.  Americans can spot me from blocks away.”   And the other is thinking “Bugger.  I need a nap.”.  I’m thinking “Why is the guy on my right grabbing my arse? Stop it!”

Running Update:  So sad.  No running to speak of.  I’m in week 3 of recovery from Sports Hernia surgery.  It really does stink to be over here in London and not being able to run around and see some sights while doing so.  Instead, I walk.  And walk.  Today I walked more than two hours through the fancy shmancy neighborhoods near Regents Park.  It is actually amazing what you see when you slow down and walk.  Goats in some school’s yard taking care of the grass.  Figaro old school cars along with the Maseratis, BMWs and Mercedes in virtually everyone’s drive.  Kids playing cricket in the park in their matching white pants and white sweaters.   And dogs.  Lots of people with dogs.  And no leashes.  What is amazing is not one dog seemed out of control or came over trying to maul me.  They just marched right along with their owners.  I literally saw 20+ different dogs like that.  Running begins again in earnest later this month and I’ll write again after my family joins me to bounce around London and Paris for a week.  Cheers!

Still Only 34 Months and 26.2 Miles to go…

P.S.  Here are a few more shots I took from the Jubilee and one I love that I just found on the Internet that shows the Queen really does have a sense of humor.  I should send her my blog.