London (Day 3)

**I'm not sure I made note of this earlier but I am not suffering from font difficulties. Just trying to keep the voices separated for you guys. The "Times text" is from Danny's trip journal and this text is my added commentary and photo descriptions.

Friday we slept late again after another long night with both kids not wanting to sleep

Fin has wanted to nurse steadily thru the night we have sort of a one hour on one hour off kind of a thing – and Maya is just having a hard time adjusting to the time zone waking up in the early am hours ready to eat and play – and very frustrated…

Anyway – we had a late start – munged around the flat eating bathing and so on –

Fin had a nice long mid-morning nap on the couch (the most comfortable place to sleep...the beds were awful!).

Meanwhile, Maya had an "English" bath. I'm not sure what I mean by that other than we were in England and she took a bath! Although it was a challenge to figure out how to rinse her hair when there are separate hot and cold taps. I tried to convince her that a blast of cold water is good for you; she didn't really buy that answer. Please note the saucepan bath toy!

then met up wit Jack (a UO professor) for lunch in a nearby pub – he treated – for Jens birthday present –

Weirdly, we ended up staying less than 2 blocks from where 20 or so theatre students from UO were staying while they studied there this term. It was a very strange coincidence but it was fun to periodically pass them on the road.

then a folly of a mission to find a carousel – watchacallit (Covent) garden – where we saw fabulous buskers – a dancing string quartet in particular –

Fin and I stayed up on top to watch. Maya had been collecting pence all morning and decided that the quartet was deserving of some of her money. She was definitely entranced by their performance.

and a an ice cream cone –

but no carousel

I still haven't figured out where the carousel I remember from my Concordia trip nearly 15 years ago. All I remember is that it was around the corner from my favorite jacket potato diner and just around the corner from a tube stop. I was positive it was Covent Garden...clearly I was wrong. Thankfully an ice cream cone was a big enough distraction from a much loved merry-go-round.

so we made our way on foot to Picadilly Circus and then Leicester Square hitting some of the major London points of interest – we were moving quick as it was misty/raining…

This is an area of many of the West End shows and we just happened to pass by...MAMMA MIA!! I don't think Maya really understood why we took her picture here...but it was a fun and perfect coincidence on such a meandering / lost afternoon.


Fin got wrapped up in my coat to keep warm on our wet journey home and promptly fell asleep.


So she was ready and raring to eat and converse during dinner.


Conversely, we made Maya walk most of the way and, like the previous night,

Maya fell asleep at the dinner table for the second night in a row – we tried to keep her a wake – and managed to keep her up until just past nine with the hopes that she would sleep thru the night – and – had better luck Friday night than any night previously…

Unlike the previous night we were watching for signs of her falling asleep and kept prodding her to stay awake. (We had predicted it happening and thus put her in her jammies before supper.) When we realized it was a lost cause we pulled out the camera.

The still shot which captures her with her eyes at half-mast and toast still raised.


And even better...a movie. Holy hell were we laughing. Repeated viewings of this video are suggested!




Finally, a Maya Thomas original picture of the four of us on vacation.



it was a good if not exactly fulfilling adventure in the evening we ate burgers and made our plans for Tuesday –