Saturday, September 12, 2009

Jet lag

This morning (9-12) at 8am we arrived safely at Heathrow airport. I was a bit stressed out about the flight since I haven't flown in a while. Gabrielle on the other-hand was in her element and even said "I really miss being in airports."

Getting through security was a breeze--the TSA was actually helpful and good humored, unfortunately I can't say so much about the United flight attendants. The cabin in economy was pretty gross. A passenger behind us had a broken chair. The metal arm that held up my video display was broken (a previous passenger had tried to fix it with a rolled up M&M wrapper to no avail), and the movie was stop and go. Southwest is such a better airline, I really wish they flew international.

Anyway, when we arrived my brother-in-law, Joel, was there to pick us. The whole driving on the left hand side is pretty freaky. I'm not sure if I'll ever get used to it. The drive was very nice, this area is very green with lots of rolling meadows and trees.

When we got to the house, we immediately took a nap. Joel and Tonya, my sister-in-law, said that we would not want to get up but it was important to do so to get through the jet lag. Boy was she right, after a two hour nap I had no desire to get up! However after a very warm shower and breakfast I was feeling pretty good.

We then went into Oxford and got a walking tour of the campus. Oxford is beautiful and it felt really good to walk around and breath in the fresh air--especially after 8 hours in a plane! I bought 2 post cards and took a lot of pictures.

We are now back at home making gluten free pizza. I'm drinking a Carlsberg ("Probably the best beer in the world" - their slogan) and relaxing. I think we will sleep very well tonight.

4 comments:

Dad Greg said...

Hello Nick and Gabrielle, good to read that you made it ok. Nothing much new here, I'll let Mom do the blog thing. Just remember, Germany is the place for beer :) Cheers, Dad Greg

Mom said...

I'm so glad you got to London safely. Sounds like you are really enjoying yourselves! We're having a beautiful, gorgeous, slightly overcast day in the 70's. Gas is down to $2.50 a gallon, so we gassed up the car this morning. So good to hear from you. :) Love, Mom

Dad Greg said...

Hello Nick, just got done working on the smoker discovered I was not hand tightening the black connector to the propane gas tank
tight enough, doh! At least it is really clean for next time :)
Also, fixed my lawn mower. After re-building the carburator I discovered that the reason why it died after I ran it into a bush was the little metal structure that holds the spring for the choke was bent back causing the choke to be closed cutting off too much air to the carb, so the lawn mower is running like new, DOH!
ILY Dad Greg

Dad Greg said...

Hello Nick!
Sox win in 10 4 to 3 over Angels,
back in second place down by 5 with about 21 games to go.
Illini beat Illinois State 45 to 17
Cheers, Dad Greg