London

This was a tough trip to make. Sunday morning, my wife's uncle Kevin passed away after a battle with cancer. Kevin was one of the best people I've ever met who I already miss so much. I don't have it in me to blog about him any further as I can't handle thinking he's gone still...even now just this is making me tear up.

My flight left Sunday night at 6pm and I had wrestled with the decision for many days asking the opinions of several people. In the end I made the decision to go. So off I went. I spent the entire flight with Kevin on my mind and wondering just how aunt Lisa was going to do it with two kids. It made my 10.5 hour trip seem endless. Upon landing I went straight to the office and worked Monday and Tuesday. All I could do was immerse myself in work and not think about it.

After work on Tuesday, I had the opportunity to go to Stonehenge. I've made it a small mission to call my Dad whenever I happen upon one of the 7 Wonders of the world. This is my 2nd. The other was the Great Wall in 2006. Well when I called him and told him where I was, he immediately asked what time it was. Guess you have to know my Dad's humor.

I had originally planned to go home on Thursday and spend Wednesday touring London as this my first trip there. Given our family circumstances I found an afternoon flight home on Wednesday. But I still go to see a few highlights in downtown London.

I enjoyed seeing Big Ben. Funny story though. As I left the subway or tube as they call it in London, it was raining like crazy. Conveniently I didn't have an umbrella and everyone around me did. As it was raining so hard I left the subway and was just looking at the ground. I asked a passerby where Big Ben was. He just looked at me and with smug look said "look up" and kept walking. I was literally 45 feet from Big Ben and hadn't noticed it. That guy must have thought I was the dumbest tourist and I can't say I blame him.

Tower Bridge

Tower Hill

Buckingham Palace

I was able to see the changing of the guard while there. Pretty cool. It was still raining and I don't really know what the changing of the guards means, but nonetheless I saw the guards and they appeared to change.

On the way home a first happened for me. We were all sitting on the plane waiting to take off but for 30 minutes we didn't. We just sat there. This is not an uncommon tale in the airline industry but up in the front of the plane we were beginning to wonder what was going on. Just then two security guards walked on the plane and went to the back. Moments later they were peacefully escorting a man off the plane. Apparently this man wanted the seat of another man who would not give it up. So he decided to take his forearm and shove the other guy. Not a smart move. So off he went and so did we. On the way home we flew over Greenland and I took a picture of the "Davis Straight". I thought it was pretty cool. Without my Deadliest Catch survival suit I don't think the cushion you use as a flotation device would have done much good in the event of a water landing...that is all ice.

Next up...who knows. Perhaps South America first but if not then Florida and NY in the same week.

Monday

Sunday night I packed my little travel bag and prepared for my trip to NY...again. I've been to NY 10 times now and have only seen the city once. I made a promise to Jenny that I wouldn't tour the city because she has not been able to go once. So far the promise has been easy to keep because my offices there are in White Plains about an hour from the city. Not easy to get there.

Anyhonk, so there I was Monday morning taking Bobby to pre-school. the teacher was late coming back to her house to let all the kids in so her front yard had about 10 kids all playing there. When the teacher arrived I got into my car to leave and the car wouldn't start. I began to panic because a car service was picking me up in 20 minutes to go to the airport. A friend had jumper cables and offered to help out. He brought his car up, I connected the cables when smoke started filling up everywhere. Imagine 10 kids running around stopping dead in their tracks and starting to "ooooh" and "awwww'. Then imagine all of their mothers starting to panic and ask them to move back and stay away. As the smoke got progressively worse, the tone of the mothers voices got more serious and worried. At this point the cables were starting to melt and combined with the smoke it looked as though a fire was quickly about to happen. I tried to remove the cables from my car's battery but they were so hot I couldn't touch them. One of the mothers brought me a towel so I wrapped it around the cables and pulled them off. I let the towel and cables fall to the ground. At that exact moment, the towel flared up and a small fire started. Remember this is all in the driveway of Bobby's teacher. Nice. I quickly stomped the tiny flames out and the matter was over...well I thought it was. I looked at my car and realized the plastic that was on the cables had melted black streaks into my front bumper. Take a look. I'm thrilled with the result. My car has battle wounds now.



I now had worse problems. The battery was fried. Apparently in my rush to get home I connected the cables backwards which is why that happened. I know I know. Not smart. I called AAA and they arrive about 2 hours later with a battery.

As a quick tangent, we drove a boy home from the pre-school every day. His mom saw the smoke and small fire and promptly arranged a carpool with another mom which we found out about before she called to tell us. This was probably the best thing that came out of this ordeal. No more carpooling.

However as I mentioned earlier, the car service showed up at my house as I was battling the smoke and flames and they still charged me the $118 bucks even though I couldn't go. And even better, the flight I was rushing to get to, was cancelled. Then the second flight I re booked on was cancelled. Then, the last flight to NY was a 4pm flight from LAX to JFK. With the new battery, the car was fine and looked mean with its new found battle scars so Jenny loaded the kids and drove me out there only to find the flight was delayed 4 hours. During this whole ordeal Jenny had made it very clear this was a sign that I should not go to NY. I still went. The two have NOTHING to do with each other. I finally made it to my hotel room in NY at 5:15am. My first meeting started at 8:30am. You do the math.

Good times. I go to London next.....