November 1, 2008

George in the V&A Museum, looking through a sandstone carved window.

So we now have working heat in our house! Praise the Ld! It has felt so good to come home to a warm house- it turns out there must be some crap in the line because the pump had stopped running properly. The guy said he thought something must be in it, and although he got it working the guy who usually fixes our plumbing will need to flush all the radiators out. That pump is a fairly new one- we got it last spring when the heat stopped working. I've learned a lot about radiators as a form of central heating, and I've bled all the radiators in the house to remove any air, so our heat is working properly for the first time ever. So you can imagine me with a little bucket and a wrench turning the nut on the top of the radiators to drain the air out- rank that up there with brick laying I suppose. :) Life is so much more fun when you learn new skills all the time! :)

We had an interesting time at the Victoria and Albert Museum. Basically it's a huge museum containing all the stuff that the British Empire stole from all over the world. There are some more modern pieces, but I was just struck by how many things they had that were "acquired" through some means or other. Some governments such as Greece have been requesting the return of their stolen artifacts, but to date the British government has turned a deaf ear. Apparently finders keepers is still in effect. :) The museum is enormous, and I unfortunately left my camera at home so I took these photos with my cell phone. I want to go back with my good camera and a tripod to photograph some of the more interesting subjects. The lighting is very low so the tripod is necessary.

Here are a few of the things we saw at the museum:

This is an automaton, a sort of robot, of a tiger killing a British soldier. It was owned by a sultan who hated the British. :) It even roars, and
the head moves!

An ancient floor covering that was hand embroidered in India. Absolutely amazing.

You can see the quilting on this one, which was a tent covering for someone in India, a sultan or something. The leaves were all hand embroidered. Although I have to say that their quilting isn't nearly so good as my Living Proof friends (who taught me how to quilt) :D

As you are probably aware there are many gods and goddesses
that are worshipped all over the world. I forget where this one was from,
but he is depicted eating the brains of an enemy. Yuck.

A middle eastern sultan's drinking cup

Today I went with 2 other girls out to Anglesey Abbey, one of the local manor houses that you can tour and see the grounds and gardens. It was not a nice day for it- cold, rainy, and very wet (which means very muddy pant legs and shoes) but we had a good time. Since I've been there so many times I was their tour guide. :) I'm thinking of volunteering out there in the spring to help with the planting of flowers and things.

Tomorrow we're having lunch with a family that we'e been trying to get to know for awhile- they are in our home group from StAG. She's American and he's British, so they make for an interesting couple. They have 2 cute little boys. We also have an International Team meeting tomorrow. It's raining here again, and cold, but at least we're nice and warm inside! :D

As a side note, you would not believe how many of our friends either just had a baby, or are going to have one soon. We counted at least 5 who have had babies in the past 6 months, and coming up this month 2 of G's cousins are having babies, we have 3 friends having babies before March, another cousin of G's is due in May, and my sister in law (my brother's wife) is due in June. We're feeling a bit overwhelmed by everyone's babies, and I've heard more details about child birth including all about shows, water breaking, natural childbirth, cradle cap, nursing problems, and you can imagine what else in the past 3 months than most people without children have ever heard. :) Someday I'm sure all this information will be useful.:)