Friday Fragments

Mrs. 4444 hosts this weekly gathering of fragments. Go give her a shoutout!

Lots happening around here. So here goes.

Good news is Whitney has a phone interview next Friday for a dream job. And she may have another interview get set up today. Fingers crossed that something great works out for her.

A lot of excitement at work yesterday and not the good kind. Somebody drove through the security gate at the loading dock and we think committed suicide in his burning car. Sad day. Praying for his family and also for our loading dock guy and the security guard that had to deal with it. We don't know a lot about what happened. But it was on national news because of our building.

We got our refund finally from our missed tour while in London last month. It took a month but I'm so happy to get that refund when it was the company's fault. I have written a review of them on Tripadvisor.

I'm off to San Diego next week for a two day workshop. I'm looking forward to eating at another Top Chef restaurant which just happens to be less than a mile from my hotel. Score a win for me!

We had a tree guy trim back our horribly overgrown bushes. He thinks they will all come back but for the first year they are going to look pretty sparse. It was much cheaper to pay him to cut them back than it would have been to dig them up and start from scratch. I'll live with scruffy looking.

Also time to plant some flower seeds. Last year's experiment with my seeds worked out so well that I'm trying again. I picked a shorter flower so hopefully they won't fall over into the sidewalk this year. 

And with that, I'm done with fragments.

Hodgepodge

Kickstarting blogging this week.

1. Have you ever had to wear a uniform? If yes, tell us more. Did you love it or hate it?
I had to wear an orange apron over my clothes when I worked at Builders Square. That's the closest I came to a uniform.

2. April 22nd is Earth Day. What is one thing you do personally to be a good steward of planet Earth?
I recycle with our city. They come every two weeks to collect paper, cans, glass, cardboard. It is amazing how much less we have in our normal trash.

3. Brown rice, quinoa, or couscous...your healthy grain of choice? How often are one of the three on your menu at home? Given a choice between white rice, brown rice, wild rice, and fried rice which would you go for?
I like couscous but I don't make it very often. I'm not sure why since it is super easy. Not a big fan of brown rice although some of my frozen lunches now have it. The one time I tried to make quinoa I burned it.

4. In your opinion, who has the best job ever?
Grandmothers.

5. What's a situation in your life currently requiring patience?
The search for a new boss. I have a feeling it is going to take another year but there isn't anything I can do to make it go faster.

6. Do you live your life around days of the week? Explain.
I think when you work you do. Everything revolves around those days and trying to cram in everything else when you are off.

7. In a nod to the A to Z challenge happening around town this month, what 'R word' best describes your April?
Reflective. My baby is graduating college in three weeks. Oh my.

8. Insert your own random thought here.
I thought I had strep throat last week but it turned out to be allergies. I have never had spring allergies. And when I occassionally get them in the fall I never am congested...I just lose my voice. So this time when my throat hurt so bad I thought it was strep. Nope, just those pesky allergies everyone in Oklahoma suffers from.

London Part Two

We went to the Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace on Tuesday. They were only doing them on odd days in March so we knew the crowds would be bigger. We thought we were getting there early enough but at first it didn't seem so. We went to the Victoria statue in the circle outside of the gates. That gave us a view of the approaching bands and troops. Then they all go behind a gate. The people crushed against the fence may have seen some things but they really wouldn't have a good view. It is a 45 minute ceremony so people started getting bored and left. That opened up the steps right in front of the statue and a perfect view of the gate.

It was diplomatic introduction day so this is the carriage carrying the Venezualan ambassador.

Great view right?

We toured the Royal Mews after the changing of the guard. This is where they have all the carriages and horses. This is the coronation carriage that has been used for hundreds of years. They have to take a wall down to get it out.

We took a boat ride since it was a warmer day and got a great picture of the London Eye. We never made it into there but I'm sure it gives great views of the city.

Of course no trip to London would be complete without a trip to Harrods. I got some cookies for my mom and chocolate for me. Whitney went to the Laduree store and got macarons.

We went to St. Paul's Cathedral. It was huge inside (no pictures allowed). We climbed up to the top of the inside of the dome. That is not for the unhealthy (257 spiral stairs up). 

Other places we visited were the National Gallery (loved the huge Monet Water Lillies), Courtald Gallery, Trafalgar Square, Kensington Palace, Victoria & Albert Museum, Selfridge's and lots of rides on the tube.

We also tried lots of different foods while there. Among my favorites was baconaise (bacon flavored mayonaise for fries), prawn salad sandwiches, and these prawn cocktail flavored chips.

London - Part One

We spent a week in London in March for spring break. There was so much to see and do that a week isn't enough time.

The weather overall was pretty good. It only rained twice. A lot of the places we visited you couldn't take photos inside so I didn't get as many pictures as I normally take.

We started our first day of touring at the British Museum. It is free to visit (what a bonus for locals).

The Rosetta Stone

They have a huge ancient Egypt collection

Actual pieces from the Parthenon in Greece

My favorite part of this museum was the Asyrian collection but I didn't take any photos. I hadn't really seen pieces from that time period and it was a great collection.

The second day we went to the Tower of London.

They were setting up for the Game of Thrones premiere so had to avoid the tents

What a great tour guide (they hate being called that)

Collection of armor

This was for a child or a dwarf - stories vary on that

We also saw the crown jewels right when they opened but no photos. 

The Tower Bridge

After that we went to the Globe Theater which isn't Shakespeare's original one (that burned down) but a recreation. It had a great museum inside.

I'll have more later.

Alton Brown Live

Last Thursday Dan and I went to see one of my favorite Food Network personalities, Alton Brown, on his Edible Inevitable tour. I bought my tickets as soon as they went on sale and we had great seats. If you don't know who he is, just watch Good Eats, Cuthroat Kitchen or Iron Chef America and you'll know who it is. It was quite a fun evening.

He put together a 2 1/2 hour show. It was a combination of songs, stories, cooking demonstrations. His only requirement it was stuff that no one would let him do on tv. His two cooking demonstrations was making ice cream in 10 seconds using fire extinguishers and cooking a pizza in 3 minutes using a massive pizza oven made from concert lights. Both were highly entertaining.

The evening ended with questions from the audience. I couldn't believe that he had filled the Civic Center so much but all the balconies were full (if you've ever been here you'll know that's a lot of people). Alton has always been a big one for using twitter so all questions were submitted that way. You had to include a selfie.  At intermission is submitted one and it was one of the ones picked! So my selfie shows up on the big screen and I stand up waving my arms like a crazy woman. I asked him what his favorite sabotage was on Cuthroat Kitchen and he said the ones that really make the chefs think like the warped crepe pan or using a wok for stir fry but only upside down. After the show everyone around me loved my question and then someone from work was just two rows ahead of us.

It was a fun evening. Unfortunately you won't be able to catch him since his tour just ended. But if you get the chance I highly recommend it. He was really funny and it was a clean show for all ages.