Day Two. London!

After a night of rest, we rose and set off to get our bearings. 

Must learn the tube.

Check!

A stroll along the Thames.

Check!

Some window shopping. I'm still trying to figure out how I can get one home!

Then we joined others for market day where I found Turkish Delight. Yum, by the way. 

And then a delicious meal.

Of course, there's a bunch more photos in the real camera that will have to wait till we return. So this is just to whet your appetite.

Vacation

So a while back I told my husband, "Hey, honey. This year for vacation I'm going to Europe. What to go with?"

I guess he got my point. Generally we are beachy kind if people, but I really wanted to explore.

"Where are you going in Europe?" he asked. 

"You decide." And he did!

So here we are! Yeah. 

Day One: leaving Phoenix. Can you believe the clouds?

We found our cozy cottage through airbnb. 

It's fabulous. And in a quirky neighborhood. How you ask?

We decide to set out for some fish and chips. We need a mini-cab. So we walk to the end of the block and push this button. 

A gentleman sticks his head out the window of the third floor. 

"Yeah?"

"Cab to village," my husband says. (As we were told to do) "How much?"

We are told.

"Too much," we say as told. The price goes down a pound and a few minutes later our driver pulls up to the curb. 

Off we go for fish and chips, and Eaton's Mess. Which was a delicious dessert of berries, whipped cream and angle food cake. 

Most vacations, it appears I stay home, as I'm always behind the camera. This time, I'm going too!

Calgary!

I've been a bit off lately.

As you know I was in Calgary, Alberta for a few days.

I had been asked to speak.

What a great opportunity.

On Friday I'd spent the day learning about nutrition and dietary allergies.

Pretty interesting stuff at a dental conference.

Since I was to speak on Saturday, 

I made the choice to head to my hotel early Friday evening and run through my presentation.

When I finished at 10:30 p.m.,

I received the "wheel of death" and 

my hard drive crashed.

Yep!

Died. 

Right then.

Sooooooo

I had a decision to make,

I could go to the convention center and see if the evening party was still going,

find someone willing to lend me their computer

find a coffee shop that was still open

download my program from the web

download my presentation

and then go to bed . . .

and hope I would be well rested

OR

I could go to bed and pray the computer fairies came to visit.

I went to bed.

I had learned all about belly breathing as a way to help with anxiety that day in my nutrition class,

so I belly breathed away

and set my sleep cycle app,

'letting it know' I was going to bed crazy STRESSED.

And that was that.

The next morning I awoke to find the computer fairies hadn't shown up.

Wouldn't you know!

I dressed,

and prepared

my new presentation,

which would include my story of why I didn't have a presentation

just in case.

I ran into the woman, who was in charge of all the speakers, in the elevator,

she seemed to hyperventilate when she learned of my computer issues.

I assured her it would be fine.

We walked to the convention center together, where she told everyone we met

how my computer had died and I had no presentation.

I assured them all,

including the person who'd gone way out of his way to get me on the program at such an illustrious conference, that it would be fine. I would be fine. 

I found a computer guru and 

he hooked me up with a computer

the internet

and 

15 minutes later

I was ready to go

with my presentation.

There I am . . .

And there's the crowd. 

They were awesome!

The presentation went off without any more challenges.

And all I did was add to my presentation,

how to white water raft.

I'll tell you about that later.