Hastings and The Decemberists!

I am typically much too long winded in these posts and being that I am going to try to post about two events in one blog I may have to be a little more to the point. 

A week ago I was blessed to go to Hastings, England with three lovely ladies I met through the Calvary Chapel North London bible study. Lauren, Allie and Sam are awesome and funny and the day was great! Sam scored a really good deal on the tickets so we got to travel for a very cheap price! Hooray!

We stared early but the train ride out there was forever so we didn't arrive until the early afternoon. We headed straight for the Hastings museum so we could learn a little history of the place. Being such a small town the museum was less than exciting. They had exhibits dedicated to famous people from their area, and not to be a snob, but there weren't really a lot of awesome people that came from Hastings. The most exciting person was a man who was just a regular bloke. He grew up in Hastings, went to war, came back and got married. Things get interesting about 6 months after his wedding when he disappeared. Turns out he moved to Canada and became a native American for no apparent reason. His native American name was Grey Wolf and there was a movie made about him starring Pierce Brosnan! You go Grey Wolf!

But there was still a lot of interesting things to see. There was an exhibit that showed the progression of theatre, starting with puppets. It also explained the history of music in Hastings and had newspaper clippings of how a bunch of 'hooligans' would be causing a ruckus with their rock 'n' roll music back in the late 50's. 

As usual the architecture was stunning!

Our sites were ultimately set on the Hastings Castle though. When we were researching Hastings all the sites kept saying that we should see the castle and a place called Smuggler's Adventure. All the sites made Smuggler's Adventure seem like something little kids do.  It was like Hastings' version of Boomers or something, at least that's how it sounded. As we were leaving the museum we heard that last admission for the castle and for Smuggler's adventure was at 4 and it was 2:20 at that point; we still had to walk all the way across town to get there too. We resolved that we would only get to do one of them and the castle seemed like it would prove more epic in the end. We didn't even get to the lift that takes you to both the castle and Smuggler's Adventure until 3. The lady working the lift told us that last admission for the castle was at 3! So sad! We would never make it in time. I think Lauren was most depressed at this news. But we could still make it to Smuggler's Adventure which was bittersweet because going there was kind of a joke to begin with, but now we had no choice. 

We found the entrance and we were less than impressed. It was starting to look like a poor man's version of a wax museum/ park.

Upon entering the cave doorway though we were pleasantly surprised to learn that Smugglers Adventure was a tour through caves built over 300 years ago by smuggler's, bootleggers, and warring gangs!!! How awesome! If you live on the Central Coast allow me to paint you a picture! It would be as if the Smugglers started digging the entrance to the caves in the rocks in the bluffs at MDO and dug the tunnel all the way to beneath Valencia's peak where they dug out at least a dozen different caverns! So far!

They built all of these wax statues to show scenes of what things were actually like back when these caves were still being used for smuggling. There was a sign that said the worst punishment a smuggler could receive would be to be hung by the neck on display for other smugglers as a warning. I think that's why they hung that skeleton in the middle of the caverns. There was another sign that said some of the gangs that did business in these caverns were successful enough to have employed there own book keeper and doctor in the caverns! 

Later the caves were used as bomb shelters in the second world war. After that they were used as social halls where bands would come play and dances would take place! I would love to go to a cave dance! 

Afterwards we went down by the water where they had a mini carnival. There were trampolines and go carts and some small fair rides. We went on the trampolines and the go carts. While we were on the trampolines I decided to do the splits in the air which proved to be an awful idea because I spent the rest of the day trying to strategically hid the gaping hole in my pants from the rest of the world! It turned out to be a lot of comic relief among our group so I am thankful for that. I was glad, however, to violently stuff those pants in the trash when I got home.

The Decemberists!

Just two nights ago we got to go see The Decemberists! One of my all time favorite bands! They were ASTOUNDINGLY great! A lot of fun to watch! I met a girl from Minnesota there named Cici! Adorable!

I am really jazzed about their new album! They played some songs from it and they sounded way awesome! Here are some pics from the show!

It was really cool to see people of all ages there! There were so many people there that looked like they were 50 and older. I think that's really cool! The Decemberists are a traditional American folk band with some rock 'n' roll in there too. 

I suppose it makes sense though that the older generation would show up. After all, 30 years ago it was them that made the punk/ rock revolution which started in London. Great to see some old rockers supporting a new band!

The Decemberist's front man Colin Meloy is an insanely gifted lyricist. He has a natural talent for story telling, however tragic and melancholy his stories may be.

They concluded the show with A Mariner's Revenge Song!! So awesome! They all pretended to get eaten by an angry whale and they were strewn all over the stage laying down playing their instruments after faking their deaths! Awesome! They also had Sarah Watkins on tour with them. She was the fiddle player for Nickel Creek, another of my favorite folk bands! She was an amazing addition to already full bodied and enjoyable music! Bravo!

I am going to post a picture of Hastings castle from the internet just so you can see what it looks like. Sadly, I didn't get any pictures of it!

It is mostly in ruins now after WWII because of all the bombs dropped by the Nazi's. Thanks Hitler. Apparently you can still see some of the bomb shrapnel. Not that I'll even know for sure :(

Blenheim Palace

Oh boy! It has been a while since my last post! Sorry! Not that I expect any of you to be hanging on these posts or anything. Just know that any lapses in posting is most likely due to over exposure to awesomeness. A lot of really cool things happened this past week so I was overwhelmed with too much to write.


We'll start with last Tuesday! I woke up with the preconceived notion that Tuesdays would be my one day in the week dedicated to day trips to other parts of England! I was purposefully being very spontaneous about it too. I didn't look at a map or anything I just filled my backpack with a days worth of necessary items and set off. I made it to the bus terminal and peered longingly at the signs above each bus port. Most of the buses go to London and some go to Cambridge. I plan on going to London every Wednesday so I didn't want to go there and Cambridge is like a 3 1/2 hour bus ride (one way) so I am saving that for a weekend trip. Then there was a sign that said buses to Bedford!!! With me being the huge It's A Wonderful Life fan that I am I thought it would be awesome to go somewhere that must be something like Bedford Falls!!!! I went to the ticket-master and asked how long it was to get to Bedford. 2 1/2 HOURS!?!?!? I can't do that. It was already noon. So, I asked him what he might recommend for a day trip and he said I should go to Woodstock. It is only 20 minutes away and it's super adorable he was telling me. SOLD! I bought my ticket and settled into the bus letting my imagination fill with thoughts like 'I'll probably find some ancient palace, or some magical waterfalls or something amazing'. I was off! Sure enough, about 20 minutes later we were winding down the tiny, quaint, cobblestone streets of Woodstock. LOVE! I instantly fell for it's charming ancient architecture and even just the way the town was laid out.

I didn't want to get out in the middle of town because I wanted to start at one end and sweep through the city. As we rounded the last bend in town and started into some tiny neighborhood. I noticed a huge, towering structure off in the distance behind the houses.

The curiosity welled inside of me! I suddenly couldn't care less if all of the adorable houses in town spontaneously combusted, as long I saw what the heck that monument was! I didn't know if the bus was taking me towards it or not and because I only bought a ticket to Woodstock, and we were now leaving Woodstock, I thought I'd better just get off the bus. There I was standing in the middle of a mess of houses blocking me from the unknown awesome structure gleaming in the distance. There seemed to be a vast expanse of nothingness directly behind the row of houses along the road and between me and my destiny! But how was I supposed to get through them without seeming like a spazz, crawling over and through someone's yard and busting through their back gate!? Then, as if by intelligent design, I knew to walk to the left and pass about three houses. When I turned to face a driveway I noticed it had a small gate at the far edge that said footpath! Triumphantly, I ran towards it! Thank you GOD! I busted through the gate and was at the edge of the hugest field ever! It was like a dream! Rolling hills of emerald green grass with gorgeous trees intermittently sprouting up. Off to the far left was a huge pond! With a closed off boardwalk covered in ducks and geese! That would have to wait though. I could almost taste success. There was nothing between me and this monument that no longer represented anything from English history but now was a monument built for me alone. Erected to glorify the time I defeated not knowing what a thing was!!! Against my will, I had to actually follow the footpath because had I strayed from it I would have been vexed with about 30 lbs. of extra weight put onto the bottom of my shoes by the ridiculously thick English mud. The path took me in an indirect route towards the pond. I should have been excited to see all of the beauty along the way but because I am very single minded sometimes I was gently fuming that I couldn't frolic through fields to victory.

That's when it happened! The monument had been standing about 400 yards directly in front of me over some hills and suddenly seemed to fade away when my eyes caught sight of the most amazing palace I had ever seen! It was far away but nothing could disguise it's magnificence. 

The thought of wasting any more time trekking towards that silly monument was now laughable. I had a greater purpose now! I had no choice in the matter either. It drew me nearer and nearer to it. I was passing people on the trail with a vengeance! It was growing more and more gorgeous the closer I got to it! I knew nothing about this place except the fact that I couldn't take my eyes off of it and there were now dozens of other people surrounding me in the same silly stupor that I was in, walking like zombies towards this, for lack of a better word, castle. If someone came out of the front door looking like Quasimoto and told us to drink some Kool-aid I am convinced that we all not only would have drunk it but would have fought to be the first in line!

I reached the palace gates and that's when I learned that it was just that, a palace. More specifically it was Blenheim Palace. I still knew nothing about it. It was without question though that I would be going inside of this place and learning everything there was to know about it whether it meant selling my first born or not! There were signs with arrows leading around to left side of the palace. There I found a gift shop and an ice cream parlor. Which totally makes sense. Because when I think of ancient palace I think "As I tour the gardens that were designed before my great grandmother was even born I'd really like to be enjoying my 'love it' size Strawberry Blonde from Cold Stone's"

I spent the next 5 hours touring the palace and grounds. It was incredible! I ended up finding a palace and waterfalls!!! There are over 200 rooms in the palace, an organ that is over 300 years old and is the size of my old house (not kidding). We weren't allowed to take pictures inside but here are a few of the grounds and the chapel.

The grounds were equally as impressive with rose gardens throughout, a gorgeous boathouse, and waterfalls. The most impressive part is that it was mostly all man-made. That's slightly sad but when you think about it at the time they hired a landscaper to do it things like a back hoe and tractors and all that jazz didn't exist so they had to dam up the creek and dig out ponds the old fashioned way....... slaves. Which is also not cool but way more impressive because it looks so beautiful and natural.

So, a little history of Blenheim palace. It was built as a monument/gift to the First Duke of Marlboro by Queen Anne. He led the Allied forces against the French during the wars of the  Spanish Succession. In 1704 The Duke led the army in the Battle at Blindheim (Blenheim) and received the surrender of Marshall Talland, leader of the French forces. The First Duke of Marlboro was named John Churchill. So, as you can imagine, many years later the Seventh Duke of Marlboro's grandson was named Winston. Winston was born in the Palace and spent most of his early life there. He was also very good friends with the Ninth Duke of Marlboro and his wife. Winston was the great wartime leader! And is probably the most recognized and celebrated Prime Minister. His grave is about ten minutes away from Blenheim Palace in the family lot at St. Martin's Church in Bladon.

All in all, it was an incredible day! I loved every bit of it! I hung out in Woodstock that evening and ate at one of the local pubs. It was delicious!

Check out pictures online of Blenheim Palace. You can see some of the rooms inside. It's so amazing!

"I can't tell if the Anakin is finished cooking or not."

 

 So, things were looking rather bleak for Thursday around 3 in the afternoon. I'd done virtually nothing productive then showered and got back into my pajamas.

These were our sorry attempts to look epic

I thought that having lazy days aren't the worse thing that could ever happen so I tried to enjoy it. I listened to a sermon podcast, wrote out some postcards, listened to music, read my bible, did my nails and then showered. Well, after all of that I realized that I had just worked all the way through my lazy day list of things to do. I now had nothing else to do :(

I knew that there would be some hope in making dinner. After all, some of the best times so far had been closely related to dinner. I found Linda and told her the plan! Dinner would make up for our seemingly sad and unproductive day! We were trying to get inspired as to what we would make when I asked, "Well what theme should we do?" And what I meant by that was, 'What type of food should we have; Mexican, Creole, Chinese, Indian, etc.' Linda immediately answered, "Theme? like Star Wars theme?" That was enough to get us inspired. We would pick a completely unrelated word and build an awesome dinner around it! 

We didn't originally want to go with Star Wars so I threw Rainbow Brite out. We toyed with that for a bit and then decided we would look through the dictionary for a suitable dinner theme. We chose words at random by blindly pointing on random pages and we came up with 'snow job', 'financier' and 'gasket'. All of which proved much harder than you would think to build a meal around. So, Star Wars it was!

We began with the salad. We wanted to represent each course with an appropriate character or symbol from Star Wars. And if we are being honest, most of the time the salad is the annoying part of the meal. Especially if it's not a good salad. It's the less tasty thing that stands in the way of the delicious looking entree but you have to eat it because it has really important stuff. We decided on the 'Gungan Salad'; named of course after the Gungan race, represented in the movies mostly by Jar Jar Binks. Now, when you think about our salad choice it's so appropriate because everyone hates Jar Jar. He's so annoying, but without him they would have never gotten to Otoh Gunga! Alas, Jar Jar, while being the object of hate throughout the movies, was necessary.

Gungan Salad

The main course was tricky. There were so many pivotal points in the movie that it was hard to choose just one. One thing was clear, it had to symbolize one or both of the Skywalkers. We decided that the most emotional point is when Anakin fights Obi Wan Kenobi and really shows that he has in fact switched to the dark side. So we decided on breaded chicken breast. We thought it had to be a bird since they are called Skywalker. We realize that chickens don't actually fly but just go with it. We covered the breaded chicken with a homemade Marinara sauce that is supposed to signify the lava that burned Anakin. Then topped that with Mozzarella and baked it again so the cheese would look a bit like melting flesh. The asparagus is meant to represent the light sabors.

Anakin

Light Sab-asparagus

                                
                                                                            
       

The last course was our favorite! I am always partial to dessert as it is. At first, the idea for Death Star brownies was a joke but it really made sense after we put some thought into it. A huge part of defeating the Alliance was blowing up the Death Star. To serve as the last course we wanted something that resounded with finality and defeat. Something you could eat (destroy) and walk away feeling like there was still hope. Like even though it had all the chocolate (power) and sugar (money) and ultimate control of the fat you would gain (galaxy) you had the ability (force) to bring it to your mouth (justice)! We decided on little abstract versions of X-wings made out of aluminum foil and toothpicks just to add a touch of realism. 

    

Death Star, with Blue Milk and X-Wing

When it came to what we would be drinking we were really out of ideas. I couldn't really think of anything significant that related to beverages in the movies. So we scoured the internet in desperation. Surely, our plans for a galactically (not a word) important meal couldn't be vexed by the lack of Star Wars drinks! That's when we discovered wookiepedia.org. If you don't know it..... Well, I'm not even sure if I could recommend it. I thought as we were making the meal that maybe we would fall under the category of lame, lifeless, nerds but all that went away after discovering that site. The saddest part is that it was updated two days prior to us using it. WHAT NEW INFORMATION COULD THEY POSSIBLY HAVE FOUND!?!?!?!?!? It was quite sad. Anyway, Wookiepedia told us of a couple (probably a hundred!!!!) of different drinks straight out of Star Wars. Blue milk being one of them, which you will see featured with our Death Star Brownies, and another called Tihaar. Tihaar is a spirit that comes from distilled fruit. We used apple cider! Which was a bit of a disappointment.

Tihaar

 All in all, it was a very successful meal! Jon enjoyed it and probably thought that Linda and I should be spending less time at home alone together.

Linda destroying the Death Star