Fog, Fog, and more Fog

Starting around 4PM on Tuesday, Dec 19th, the fog rolled in. Visibility was almost nothing. You figured that perhaps it would clear in the morning...WRONG...around 2 PM on the 20th it appeared that the fog was burning off...WRONG...it got worse again....

Today, the 21st, there wasn't even an attempt of the fog to burn off...It may last until the 25th. Thursday and already announced for Friday that all domestic flights are canceled.

The frost on the morning of the 20th was very deep. Frost was everywhere and it didn't burn off until around 2PM...but came right back!

The Pogues

The Pogues, a great Irish band, haven't produced an album in years and are officially no longer together but every year they do a small ~10 date tour of England and Ireland. My birthday present this year was tickets to see them in Birmingham.

This year the Saw Doctors opened up for them. The crowd was appreciative but was waiting for the Pogues to hit the stage. I've never seen a lead singer so drunk before. He would stumble on and off stage when there were songs that he wasn't singing.

One of the songs that they did was "Streets of Sorrow / Birmingham 6" about 6 Irishmen who were wrongly accused of a devastating bombing in Birmingham in 1974 and served 16 years in prison before having their convictions overturned and released.

Weekend in London

Jennifer and I placed the kids with friends and went down to London the wknd of 8-10 Dec.

We took the train down from Bicester and then hopped on the Underground to where our hotel was (Kensington). After checking in we went to the National Gallery in Trafalgar Square. Being December in London it was almost dark went we left the gallery at 4PM. The Trafalgar Square Christmas tree lighting was the previous night.

There has been a Christmas ceremony every year since 1947. A Norway Spruce (or sometimes a fir) is given by Norway's capital Oslo and presented as London's Christmas tree, as a token of gratitude for Britain's support during World War II. (Besides the general war support, Norway's then King Haakon and his son Crown Prince Olav, as well as the country's government, lived in exile in London throughout the war.) As part of the tradition, the Lord Mayor of Westminster visits Oslo in the late autumn to take part in the chopping down of the tree, and the Mayor of Oslo then goes to London to light the tree at the Christmas ceremony.

On Saturday we got up and headed to Leicester Square to get the (almost) half-price show tickets. We decided to see the Producers. After getting the tickets we stopped off at Harrod's, which was *PACKED*.

On Sunday we just walked from our hotel, past the V&A and Natural History museums, down to Harrod's, which was alot less crowded early on Sunday.

Nothing earth-shattering but a nice weekend to relax!