Time to sit

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Hey guys,

yes i know i wasnt in Atiu, Australia last post (though I'm sure its very nice) but i only had 5 seconds before i got logged out, and it wouldnt post it without a location.

the black marked had some huge lime kims made of stone and it was interesting how big they were (similar ones were used to make iron). Also I bought one of those little styrofoam airplanes that come on a flat peice of styrofoam that you build yourself for 39p. It was a brand/model i hadnt seen before and flew very well (yes im a child at heart).

Also, on the canalboat tour the water was brown and gross, and though it may have been due to the recent flooding it didnt seem to bother the people who were fishing in it. Also at points you have to go under bridges with 2feet clearance on either side and it can be hard with such bad steering, lots of fun though, seing how fast you can do it. We got stuck behind the group that had left before us when we were getting witing 30 mins of the pub but they were going a little slow. The guy at the tiller was oversteering and zig zagging up the canal, which made him impossible to pass (somebody needs "easy does it" written on his boom). Also the guy on the boat had turned 21 and this was his frinds/familys bday present to him, so i felt bad saying anything rude.

Good food at the pub and on the way back there was a lady walking her dog on the bank beside us at a brisk pace. As she reached us she turned around and started walking beside us. She informed us that our wake is too big and we should be going 4mph (as fast as she was walking) and after calibrating us turned around and walked off. After watching a couple of these canal boaters walkaing i think they must have walking practices or something where they all walk at 4mph. It looks really awkward because they all walk at the same speed and its pretty fast.... But we were thinknig that if we did it again we should bring a water gun, and when people infront of us get in our way, or the walkers on shore try to calibrate us, we can spray them with the gross brown water, shouting that "were amercian, we do what we want". lol, mean but funny

Burmingham has lots of indian residents and is famous for its curries, Simon and Zoe took us for curries and we went again before we saw twelth night. Its good though I havent ventured into anything too spicy yet, though i bet jer will love it.

Went for food and a dinnery snack with my Aunt, Uncle, cousing and her two newborn kids. The kids were really cute and fun to play with, but it made me really not want to have childrens.

Had dinner with my much older cousin Kevin and his girlfriend Maxine. They seem really nice but I didnt get much chance to chat with them. Also the girl that was serving us was the first attractive girl I have seen all trip (though i have seen a couple after that), hmm....

One day we went to Iron bridge, which is the first place they use chert? to make iron that was strong enough for industrial use. They have a bridge made out of iron (surprise), and its actually very artistic, and is probably the first bridge made out of iron. Its interesting that the valley had all the right resources to push the industrial revolution into using iron, and so close together. In all the museums here they like to use actors to pretend to be the real people and they talk in first person (usually done in movies). Its a bit cheezy and they almost all follow the format "I'm _____ and in the year ____ i ___ _____, later in the year _____ i ____" and sometimes they even say something like "after my death _____" or "little did i know but my discovery/company let/led to/set up for _____". But still better than having to read everything.

Dropped Claire off at the airport in the morning (though please not i do not guarentee that any of this is in cronological order due to my bad memory, i wrote down all i could remember on a drive yesterday).

Went to stratford-upon-avon, which is where shakespear was born, i stood in the room that he was "probably" born in. We went to see Shakespears Twelth Night in one of the theaters. I rather enjoyed it, and I had been worried it would be hard to understand but it really wasnt that bad. And one of the main actors was played by the bald guy from "third rock from the sun", played Marcavio? or something, and did an excelent job of it.

We have a GPS in our car that somebody nicknamed Charley, and it finally made some mistakes on the way to my dads old uni pup "trip to jerusalem". It told us to go right when we could not, and took us to a dead end, i was very dissapointed in it as up to this point it had done very well, oh it also told us to go the wrong way down a one way (it has a bit of a personality and could have been mad at us).

We got up early for a day trip to london (2 hour train), and when we got there found out we were going to have to wait 40 mins for the first train because we had come to early. Once on the train we found out that they were repaing the lines so we were using disel engines and not the electic ones, which means adding 2 or 3 fifteen min stops to change engines over. Not so bad yet, get fast the first engine switch and come to a halt, we are informed that the repair vehicle has become derailed, and we spend the next hour waiting for it to get out of our way. After the next engine change we come to another unexpected halt and are informed that the train infront of us has hit a sheep. Thirty mins later we are informed that the engineer is going to help heard the sheep off the track..... (no, not a joke as we first hoped), gets back on thirty mins later and we got to London at the early hour of 2:30. :p

In london we went some market, where most of it was womens clothes so me and dad had a pint at the nearby pub. Walked around some of the realy old large buildings that make up central london. Then went to conventry gardens and watched the street preformers, had dinner, and came back (thank god uneventfully) on the train. I'm just happy that i get to go back at the end of the trip and avoid the trains.

I'm now only one day behind on my blog, but its a really good one (though fairly uneventfull). You will get to read about it later (if you havent already read so much your eyes are falling out).

Cheers and Love,
Ian

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