Happy Hour at Chez Animal Hair Can I get you a drink?

(note: this is part 8 of our trip journal. The first part is found [HERE])

Edinburgh 2008 Part 8: Friday, July 11, 2008

We had probably the best meal of the entire trip on this day.

We went to Le Petit Paris for lunch. This is the place we thought about going to for dinner on Thursday night. But it looked like a deli and not “nice” enough so we chose another place. But this time, we went in and were surprised to find that it was actually pretty big. There was the cute little deli part in the front of the place, with the counter and about 3 tables. But then there was a back room, which they whisked us right past and took us downstairs to another dining room that held probably 10 more tables. All full. They stuck us in the corner (we had to really maneuver to get back there) and we began to drool over the menu.

I chose the sausage and mashed potatoes which I know sounds more Scottish than French, but I’m telling you…it was divine and definitely had that French touch. The sausage was housemade and scrummy (one new word I learned while we were there) and the mashed potatoes were heavenly.

Greg had a steak; I think au poivre (with pepper). Was also very good.

We also had salad which we’d been craving since the Scottish version of a salad is really more of an afterthought, consisting of 4 leaves of some kind of green thrown on the side of a plate, with no dressing.

Another place that Tasha and Justin had told us to go to is Chocolate Soup.

They were apparently having the weekly meeting of the Beautiful People that afternoon. I felt like a crone.

I ordered what was called a Chocolate Mint, not sure if it was a sundae, a drink or whatnot. Give me chocolate and mint together and I’ll eat it. Or so I thought. This is what it was.

“Ma’am I think there must be some mistake…I ordered the large espresso”

So it’s basically minty flavored hot chocolate with all that goop on top: whipped cream, sprinkles and a crushed up Aero bar with chocolate sauce drizzled all over it. Probably equaling eleventy hundred grams of sugar per mouse sized sip.

The cream tasted like it had turned and I got a roll in my stomach every time I tasted it, so I took a couple of polite sips and left it there. But it sure was purty!

We just wandered around and shopped for souvenirs. We wandered into one of the street’s closes (sort of a side street). I am going to call this series, “Study of a Close”:

Photo one is from the main street (Royal Mile)

Photo twos is walking about halfway into the close

Photo three is almost at the end of it, looking out onto the city

We just relaxed at “home” for the rest of the night.

Posted under Scotland, Vacations

note: this is part 7 of our trip journal. The first part is found [HERE]

Edinburgh 2008 Part 7: Thursday July 10, 2008 – Our Anniversary!

We went down to Grassmarket again and ate lunch at the Beehive Inn.

I noticed they had a cigarette machine and I about fell over when I saw the prices. £6.50 for a pack, that’s like $13! I’d totally quit if I lived here. No wonder that zombie girl felt she needed to buy one from me.

We took a walk into the New Town and checked out the Princes Street Gardens and the Scott Monument. Here are a couple of shots of the backside of the old town, so behind the Royal Mile:

Scott Monument (you’ll get a better idea of it if you click to see larger version):

Greg likes this perspective of the Castle

Here’s a fountain in Prices Street Gardens. Click to enlarge, it looks much better that way. Castle in the background.

We went down the Royal Mile and I got the cream colored sweater I’d been dreaming of (£37). It’s gorgeous.

It was about 4pm. Not quite late enough for dinner, but barely enough time to rest much at the flat but Greg insisted we drop off the sweater. I didn’t see the logic in trudging up a billion flights of stairs just to drop off a bag that I was happy to carry, but I lost that argument. In fact, I lose that argument every time. So we rested at the flat and went out again at about 6pm.

We thought we had a plan. We were going to eat at [Petit Paris]. It got great reviews. But when we actually looked in, it looked more like a lunch/deli counter. We had in mind something sort of dark and romantic. So we walked over to our second choice, Mussels and Steak. But I didn’t really like the choices. Pretty much seafood and steak. And not a lot of creativity or variations within. I was not in a seafood mood and I’d had steak for lunch. So we wandered around some more. Then I’d agreed to find something on the Mussels and Steak menu since we seemed out of options, but then we realized it wasn’t quite open yet. So we walked around and found [Gennaro’s].

What we originally thought was a pizza place, turned out to be a really good (dark and nicely decorated) Italian restaurant. It smelled really good so we went in. We were seated by a gorgeous young Italian guy. Then another gorgeous Italian guy came over and took our drink order. We guessed they were brothers and the woman at the bar was probably a sister. If not a sister, at least one lucky woman. It did look like a family run place. I remember the ad having a picture of a fatherly type.

They were very attentive. We had starters: Bruchetta. This was some of the best I’ve ever had. Very simple tomatoes in quarters, then halved, on thinly sliced toast (darkly toasted) not very garlicky. But basil leaves on the bottom, under the ‘maters. YUM.

Then we also had mussels. Sauce was white wine, garlic (again, not heavy handed). Greg loved them. I thought they were good, but not alarmingly so. For mains we had pasta. Greg had the spaghetti de mer (so seafood: mussels, clams, shrimp on sketty). I had Pasta El Forno, which was penne in a creamy tomato sauce with sausage (which was really more like pepperoni) and mushrooms and cheese, baked in a ramekin type thing, but cast iron. It was so good. The sauce was magical. Or maybe we were just starving. No, it was very good and a gorgeous wait staff never hurts.

We then went back to our favorite bar, Bannerman’s where we drank ourselves silly.

Also great bartenders. They had a cool set up where you can request any video that’s on YouTube and they’ll play it. Would be cool if Aura could do that. We requested Catherine Wheel, Replacements, Regina, Vanessa Peters…fun!

We bought t-shirts. Stumbled home.

Posted under Random Thoughts

(note: this is part 6 of our trip journal. The first part is found [HERE])

Edinburgh 2008 Part 6: Wednesday July 9, 2008

We had set aside today to be the drinking and eating day. But we still didn’t get out of the flat until after 10. We wanted to go Bar Alba for breakfast because we’d heard it was a good breakfast place and they have free wi-fi. But here’s an interesting fact…Bar Alba does in fact serve breakfast, but they don’t open until noon. Make sense? I thought so.

So we wandered around looking for breakfast anywhere. We ended up at Biddy Mulligan’s and this time it was empty Yay, no drunk, screaming young people (‘you kids get off my lawn!’). We noticed they do have wi-fi so we ordered and got online, checked email, etc.

Inside Biddy Mulligan’s, cute huh?

Our breakfast arrived and I was starving! I had ordered an omelet with bacon, sausage, tomato, cheese. It was served with toast. Sounds good, right? I mean how hard it is to make a simple meal like that? Well, it was the most disgusting meal I have had in ages. The egg was overdone (crispy, hello? Vomit!) and all the cheese was plopped in the middle in one big block. The bacon was fine, but the sausage was a colorless, tasteless, gray, mushy blob. Absolutely disgusting. The entire thing was sitting in a pool of about ¼ cup of grease. I ate about 4 bites, one corner of toast and gave up. I had even tried to soak up the grease with the toast but it didn’t help. It was beyond repair. My cranberry juice was fine!

I have decided that in an effort to lose some weight I will no longer eat something I don’t enjoy. If it means I miss a meal, then I miss a meal and I try to make up for it by making a better choice for the next meal.

Greg had the Irish Breakfast which was a regular fried egg, blood pudding, sausage, beans (what? They’re everywhere), bread, hash browns, and bacon. He liked his OK.

At about 2 we decided go start our pub crawl. I packed a peanut butter sandwich in case we got hungry along the way. We went all the way down the Royal Mile to Holyrood. We took some photos, but didn’t want to spend the money on the tour, it was £13 which we thought was too steep. So we walked back and started picking pubs to go to:

[Tolbooth Tavern]

Really cute, local hangout. Other than the other touristy looking couple upstairs, all the other patrons were male and over 80. One guy was having a pretty hard time. It took him several minutes to get up and go outside for a smoke, then getting back in the door was even harder, I thought it was going to smoosh him. The story of that place is that it was previously the police station, jail. There’s apparently a warlock that haunts the back area. I went back there to the loo, but didn’t see anything darnit. Nice older ladies behind the bar. We each had a Guinness.

Canon’s Gait

We wanted to go here mostly because Tasha and Justin (Ellery) had recommended it. It was really cute. Very nicely decorated, posh. Had a great quote on the wall: “If you resolve to give up drinking, smoking and loving you don’t actually live longer, it just seems longer.” – Clement Freud.
I had a jack and coke (yes, I learned how to order so as not to upset the delicate nature of the bar staff in Scotland). Greg had a Guinness.

[Bannerman’s]

This is a cool partially underground pub and music venue. The front room is small and dark and the bartender was cool. I had a jack and coke, Greg had a McKewens.

There were two tabloids on the bar and we were reading them.


Greg catching up on his Stories.

Greg went to the loo and told me that that backroom where there’s a stage is really cool. I told him I’d go check it out when I was ready to pee. After awhile Greg asked me if I’d seen the backroom yet? I thought that was really strange because we’d both been sitting together the whole time. So I said, “Did you see me leave?” he comes back with “Yes, I know you left, but you didn’t say anything about what you saw.” This is when I realized he should not have any more to drink. It was our third drink, you’d think it would not be affecting him yet. But something was happening. I did get up and go look at the stage room. It was really cool. But no ghosties.

We stuck around for awhile then headed out. We were hungry. Not knowing where we’d end up next, we ate our sandwich while we walked.

We were walking down the street looking into a shop that sold children’s books and comic books. A zombie-like drunk girl approached me and asked if she could have a cigarette. I gave her one and she offered me money, I told her it’s OK she could have it. She could barely see straight, I wasn’t going to take money from her.

We ended up at Greyfriars Bobby’s.

We decided to eat there. Right after eating a peanut butter Sammie, I know. Stupid. I had a steak pie and mashed potatoes with some veggies that were properly cooked, but were much more fresh last week. The taters (or tatties) were really yummy, the pie was good too. Greg had fish and chips. He liked it.

We left and headed down Cowgate toward the Royal Mile and walked into Frankenstein’s briefly but only looked into the pub area. It was cool but quite gimmicky. A couple of doors down was the Elephant Room where JK Rowling wrote the first Harry Potter book. Tons of people were outside taking photos. Across the street was The Villager where I had wanted to go because I’d read that it’s filled with locals not tourists and had “amazing” food (and was haunted), but we were really tired so we went home.

Posted under Scotland, Vacations

(note: this is part 5 of our trip journal. The first part is found [HERE])

Tuesday July 8, 2008

We had wanted to go to Chatelherault (the hunting lodge in which we got married) and it was looking like this was the only day we could. Every other day this week was supposed to rain and since Chatelherault is outside mostly, we wanted to go when it was dry. Hah! Isn’t that cute that we thought we could go somewhere in Scotland and stay dry?

So we went to the train station to ask about how much it would cost, how much time it would take, etc. We sort of got awkwardly pressured into just buying tickets. The woman was so quick and helpful we had tickets before we knew it. Just as well, if we’d thought about it, or how long it would take or how much of a pain the arse it would have been we’d have never gone. We went to Marks & Spencer (really cool foodie shop) and got a sandwich, chips and water to have on the train.

I won’t bore you with the gory details of the various and numerous train rides we had to take (and missed) but let’s just say we ran around a lot. I hurt my knee in the process so I was pretty much limping the rest of the day. Not good since we probably walked several miles.

Some of the Scottish countryside, it really is pretty!

We passed a cute station in a town called Kirknewton. I noticed that the station was for sale and had a five minute fantasy about living there and running a train station. It only lasted until I remembered I couldn’t have my dogs there.

We got off the train at Chatelherault and began walking up the path (which is about a mile) to the main entrance. They have since put in a new playground for the kids and it’s really great. They have a jungle gym/monkey bar set up that any kid would have killed for. We (and by ‘we’ I mean ‘I’) limped up to the entrance, which is really hasn’t changed much We went into the banquet room (where we had all our photos taken on that day)

and it was in that room looking out the window that we realized it was raining. Not just raining, but pouring. We took some photos in the room and of the gardens. We expected the hedges to be huge, but they really weren’t. They were still under 2 feet tall, but still really pretty.

We went around the corner and ran into the Dutchess room. This is where we had our champagne toast and teeny reception. (click for bigger photo, it’s a really pretty room)

Then upstairs and we found the room in which we were married. We took some more photos

then decided to brave the weather. We walked outside and found that cute little stairway where we had some good photos taken, but it was gated off. Plus the rain was coming down so hard I was afraid to take out my camera. We went back in and hoped that we would be able to buy an umbrella in the gift shop for our mile walk back to the train station. No dice, but we did get a teeny bottle of whiskey and a shot glass. The cashier asked if we wanted the price tag removed, “It’s a gift?” she said, we told her no, we were keeping it. She said, “Oh just a little memento?” and I explained that we were married here ten years ago and we were back to celebrate. She smiled and said she was giving us a 15% discount. She was sweet.

We then bundled up and headed out for the train station. In the short time we were in Chatelherault the streets had flooded and it made it very hard to walk without being ankle deep in water. We got to the station and waiting for the train. We took the first one to Hamilton that we could find.

Unfortunately, there was a school trip of about 30 irritatingly sugared up children waiting with us. We were trying to keep out of the rain in a little bus shelter along with them. Joy. At one point the teacher just screamed at them to shut up because she was trying to get instructions from someone on a loud speaker and couldn’t hear. That was great. But it lasted 3 minutes and she ended up having to go across to the other platform and call from there. There were three other adults/teachers who were completely useless. Two stood outside smoking and the other one just sat there, staring at her feet, beaten. God I was not looking forward to riding the train with them.

After some clusterf*ck directions and misunderstandings (the trains run at really weird times) we finally got on the train taking us to Edinburgh. It was a long ride, over an hour. Once we got there I was quite relieved and tired, and my knee was killing me.

We were very hungry so we went to a place that looked like it had good food, it was called the Filling Station. It’s a slick Friday’s sort of place but with a biker theme. We ordered Guinness then picked out something we wanted from the menu. Not that it mattered. One of the two bartenders went on break and the one left was too busy to ever come near us again, even though we tipped her. So we left and decided to go to Subway. I know, but we were starving and didn’t want to spend a lot of money.

We then went to a cute bar in the Grassmarket area called The Last Drop (think noose, not liquid). They were playing old Wham! music. (Young Guns, Go For It) and we laughed again at how the 80s music is following us around. We only stayed for one beer and then left.

The next stop was The Bow Bar. It was a cute place, but I felt I was getting attitude from the bartender. I tried to order a whiskey seven and I got a weird look and he agreed to give me lemonade. I got it and it was weird, tasted like tequila. I realized it was scotch. I guess if I want whiskey I have to say bourbon.

Then he lipped to Greg about how he’d not seen a one pound note in a long time. I took this as him commenting on how we gave him exact change and not a tip. We would have tipped him once we had paid, if he wasn’t such a douche. It was obvious that we were American and I can’t believe I’m the first American who has ever set foot in that bar. It would have been nice of him to say something like, “I see you’re American, perhaps you mean bourbon, not scotch”, but no, he was just rude instead. I didn’t like him and hence didn’t feel comfortable there and in fact started to feel nauseated after being there for only a little while. Greg finished his beer and we left. There was no music there at all, and no good people watching. We were tired anyway.

…but there’s more….tomorrow!

Posted under Scotland, Vacations

(note: this is part 4 of our trip journal. The first part is found [HERE])

Monday, July 7, 2008

This was a busy day. We started out at [Camera Obscura] across the street from the flat. It’s 5 floors high (6, if you count the main floor, which they don’t) and there’s no elevator. So we started on the main floor at the gift shop. They have lots of fun funky things like optical illusion books, puzzles, posters, hologram pictures and other toys as well as candies and stuff like that. Gifty trinkets. We paid our £8 each and entered the museum. It’s basically a fun house, each floor having its own theme…sort of. It’s kind of schizophrenic, but cool. Like that strange friend you keep around for entertainment purposes.

We had arrived just as a show was scheduled on the roof top so we headed straight there so as not to be late. We wandered around the roof taking photos and getting good views of the city. It’s really quite beautiful up there.

(click on the photos to enlarge, you’ll get a better idea of how cool)

At show time (2:40pm) we were ushered into a very small, very dark circular room that was built around a big white disk. The disc had a pipe hanging over it which leads all the way to the top of the building. At the top of the pipe is a mirror, all creating this camera obscura (which means dark box). Our guide turned off all the lights and we were able to see the city projected onto this disc which was a concave wooden table painted white. We pointed out spots in the city and with a piece of paper “picked up” people walking down the street and created bridges with paper which made it look like the people were walking over it.

When the show was over we walked down the stairs and took in each floor in sort of reverse order (not that it mattered). There were fun house mirrors that made us look like midgets or tall and skinny (I wanted to take that one home with me). They had a whole room (maybe more) of 3-D hologram pictures. Those were really cool. When you looked at them one way they looked like one thing and then when you turn or look from another angle it changes. Some were downright creepy. Bulging eyeballs, hands reaching out through the picture at you, that sort of thing.

Here’s an optical illusion with lights

There were paintings with hidden things in them, a room of electric thingies like the Eye of the Storm toy, a bunch of pictures that when you looked at them close up they turned into something else. I have trouble with those sometimes, and turns out I’m not the only one. I heard several people say “Those things never work for me!”

It was a fun thing to do and while expensive, at about $16 a person, I think it was worth it.

Our next stop was the Edinburgh Castle. This was £12 (that’s like $24…per person!) to get in and to be honest, I don’t think it was worth it. Maybe just because I’d been there before, but to me it’s just a big cool area with balconies to go on and look out at the city. There really isn’t much else there except a war museum which is unappealing to me (so we didn’t go past the gift shop). I guess I was just tired, but there really wasn’t anything at the castle to see. You can’t actually see any rooms, like bedrooms, or kitchens or anything. There is a ballroom sort of place that’s gorgeous and I overheard the guide telling a tourist that it’s still used for special parties.

other than that….eh. I like castles where I can walk around the rooms and fantasize that I live there. This one is not like that.

Self-portrait on top of the castle:

Next stop was Ensign Ewart’s, a cute pub close to the flat (right by Camera Obscura). We stopped in for a pint and tried to pay for it using some old pound notes that Dad had given us from his last trip to the UK. Turns out they were “fake”. At least that’s what the bartender said. I think they were actually just out of date, not fake. But it sure made us feel stupid.

Here the bartender (who was American, by the way) looks none too pleased, and this was before we tried to pass off the funny money!

One thing I liked about that pub is that the menu consisted of baked potatoes with stuff on them. I even took a photo of the menu:

We headed back to the flat to rest, and if we’re being honest…nap. We made dinner at home that night. We made a really yummy pasta dish and had garlic bread. We had some store-bought pesto on the bread too and ate it with olives. Nice meal. Yummy. I wish I’d taken a photo because it was really good.

We had to be at the Mercat Cross at 9:15 for a ghost tour (£8.50). This was the [Ghosthunters Trail] tour. We checked in and waited for start time. A bunch of loud (drunk?) younger folks showed up and we thought it was going to be awful but they were really well behaved.

Our guide was Kenny and he talked really loud and tried to scare us by talking really soft then screaming. The tour was basically taking us to semi-creepy places and then telling ghost stories. Kind of lame, but I’m glad we went just to say we’d been. It was a cool way to see the city. Much of the tour took place under the Mercat Tours store front in some “vaults” that were supposedly haunted. The stories he told were supposedly true, but they were pretty stupid, to be honest.

He was explaining things that people supposedly saw when there’s no way to know if it’s true because the person in the story died (usually of fright) right at the climactic moment. It’s like that old urban legend: a motorcycle driver riding on a dark highway, saw two lights coming at him and he thought it was two motorcycles and decided to drive in between them to scare them and it turns out it was a semi. I mean, come on, how does anyone know what he thought? The story says right there that he didn’t live to tell about it. Stupid. But I love that ghosty shit, so it was worth it for me. I was genuinely scared at one point, but that’s mostly because I thought someone was going to sneak up behind me and go “gah!”.

I think the script could have been better since much of the time it did not apply to our situation. But we played along. The tour ended in the Cannon Gate graveyard at the end of the Royal Mile. That is a really cool cemetery. I took some photos and even though it was about 10:30pm they came out really bright, looking like it was about 4 in the afternoon. The light is weird here. The sun goes down around 9, but it’s twilight for another two hours at least. How cool is that? Since twilight is my favorite time of day, this was very nice for me.

This photo was more what it looked like to the naked eye:

It was late by the time we got back home so we just went to bed.

Visit again tomorrow for more!

Posted under Scotland, Vacations

(note: this is part 3 of our trip journal. The first part is found [HERE])

Sunday July 6, 2008
We got up and made breakfast sandwiches with what we got at the Farmer’s Market (egg, cheese, bacon). Very good, but salty. Here is Greg in the kitchen eating.

Then we watched TV and I started writing this. I learned that instead of closed captions, they have a signer signing the dialog at the bottom of the screen. I don’t have any idea what the show was, but I watched it for like an hour because I was so interested in the signer. She was funny. She even made faces that mimicked the actors and when there was no dialog, she’d look over her shoulder as if she were watching the action.

We decided to go walking a little. We went down the Royal Mile, We stopped at a gift shop called James Pringle Weavers, a cute shop with lots of cashmere and stuff. Greg got a cap because it was raining pretty badly and our raincoat hoods are not meant to stay on (what’s up with that?).

We went to the Wollen Mill where last time Greg got his kilt. It was just as I remembered it. Small and high priced.

We just sort of meandered around town with no real plan. Just turned down a street we liked here and there. We ran into the Greyfriar’s Bobby pub, but I was convinced that the statue I took a photo of was not near the pub and it was much larger. We’d planned to go to Greyfrair’s Kirk to see if there is a larger one.

As we were walking I started getting tired (I know what you’re thinking…’you? but you’re in such good shape!!’, I know, I know). Anyway as I started dragging I happened to look up and I saw this:

…and I thought “Thank god, vodka and food!’, but we didn’t stop in. I just thought it was funny.

We took a right and headed up George IV Bridge to Royal Mile where we ran into Deacon Brodie’s and realized where we were.

Went home and dropped off groceries and relaxed, made coffee and had shortbread biscuits. Nice combo.

Then we went on our second walk of the day:
We walked the Grassmarket this time, and realized that the Castle Wynd steps were smaller than we originally thought because we were only looking at half of them. Doh! The second half, leading to the Grassmarket is even longer and more stroke inducing.

We took a right at the end of the long staircase and wandered around there looking at the cute shops. We stopped at Biddy Mulligan’s but it was overrun with students watching a sort of weird game that even Greg couldn’t identify. Looked like Rugby but had a goal (as in a place in which to score, not an ambition). There was no place to sit so we went next door to Maggie Dickson’s. We had a Guinness and watched part of the Tennis match. Much quieter group.

I would have been happy to stay there all day but we had plans to go to dinner with one of Greg’s colleagues.

We left the pub and wandered and saw a shop called Costume Haha. It had a great window display.

Then we turned a corner and found a good food store. This one had a better selection, including garlic. So we got some stuff so we could make a nice pasta dinner at home.

We went up the next street and were back at the Castle Wynd steps. I really wanted a smoke so I lit one and started walking. Not a good idea. I got about 10 steps up and could barely breathe and my heart was beating out of my chest. So when we reached Johnson Street I put it out. Then climbed the other staircase to our door. It took about 10 minutes for my heart to return to normal. But we relaxed and read until it was time to get ready for dinner. Sure is a good thing I brought three packs of smokes with me on the trip (I ended up smoking a grand total of 9 cigarettes the whole time, and most of those were put out half way through).

We met Greg’s colleague, Peter and his wife, and some of their friends. A really nice couple and a woman who was visiting from Belgium. She had a very thick gorgeous French accent which made it hard for me to understand everything she said but she was great. They were all really nice. We took quite a drive to the restaurant and ended up in Queensferry on the Firth of Forth.

We saw the famous Two Bridges.
As one of them came into view one of the women said that when she was younger she was told that trains used to go over the top part and when I looked at it, my heart did a flip flop and I worried that if we were going to go over that bridge I’d have to wait on this side of it and skip dinner. There was no way in hell I was getting on that bridge, over or under.

The restaurant was called [Orocco Pier] and it was really nice. We had a great meal. One of the best of the whole trip.

For Starters: I had Ginger beef tips which were served cold and one a bed of spring greens with a bit of sweet sauce that was sort of like a marmalade (£4.95). Greg had mussels in a creamy garlic sauce (£5.25). Both great.

Mains: Me: Wild mushrooms in a creamy sherry sauce with onion, tarragon, eggplant (which they call Aubergine), and other yummies on slices of roasted butternut squash that was perfectly (not overly) sweet. It said it was on parsnips but I didn’t see any of that. Must have been mixed in with the other veggies. Super good. (no longer on menu so I don’t know the cost) Greg had a filet. Had a wine sauce with fresh mushrooms and a potato gratin that was to die for. (£19.95)

For desert Greg and I shared a crème brulee that was made with Drambuie and raspberry. Very nice. (also not on the menu anymore). We had a couple of bottles of wine (between 7 people, I had one glass). Wonderful meal, beautiful place, good service. A very nice time.

On the drive back, we passed the Inn where Robert Lewis Stevenson was staying when he wrote “Kidnapped” and where the kidnapping took place in the story.

We went back to Peter’s house. We stuck around for a little while and watched the end of the tennis match. Then they drove us back to the flat.

We stayed up til about 2am reading and then slept until noon on Monday morning.

Posted under Scotland, Vacations

(note: this is part 2 of our trip journal. The first part is found [HERE])
Saturday, July 5, 2008

Arrived in Edinburgh early by about 20 minutes. So we had to sit on the tarmac for awhile waiting for a gate. In customs there was a Mexican family in front of us and the travel was too much for the little boy of about 2. He threw himself on the floor and went through a full repertoire of tantrums. Loudly. A customs agent came over and signaled for them to go to the front of the line. I suggested that Greg start crying too, but as I looked around I saw everyone in line behind us was joking about the same thing, including one woman who was pretending to pinch her child who was sitting nicely in his stroller. We got trough customs in about 20 minutes and found our ride to the apartment. We had pre-arranged for a shuttle to take us to and from the airport for about £17 total.

Now I had been reading up on the Castle Wynd steps and I was expecting them to be really really long. I think I read somewhere that they were 187 steps and I pictured myself stroking out day one before even getting to the door of the flat. We had planned to work out, go on long walks leading up to this trip, but you know…good intentions, paths and all that jazz. I was relieved to see that they were about half the length I thought they’d be. And it was downhill from the castle area.

We met the flat owner Olive. She let us put our luggage down and showed us around. She was not quite ready for us (we were early) so she gave us the keys and we went on looking for lunch and groceries.

We walked down the Royal Mile and settled on Deacon Brodie’s Tavern for lunch, It’s a cute pub with a restaurant upstairs and is apparently where the law community hangs out. But I only saw touristy looking people (unless the Scottish lawyers wear stretch pants, bring their kids to lunch and speak with a Texas accent).

Greg had a venison steak and potatoes with peas and carrots. Of all the veggies in the world these are probably his least favorite and they were mushy looking too. But he liked the venison and potatoes. I had a brie and bacon sandwich. Both were good, but not fabulous, and it cost over $50. It’s amazing how expensive things are here. Even at a bar, you see that the price of a cheeseburger is about £8. You think, well, I guess 8 bucks isn’t that bad for a cheeseburger, until you realize that you have to convert it to pounds and now a cheeseburger is about $16. At a bar. (Note: this is just an example; we never once had a cheeseburger).

We then walked to the Farmer’s Market. It’s down Johnson street around behind the castle. We got some good looking photos of the castle from that angle, which we missed last time.

The market was smallish for being a pretty large city. They had cheeses, bread, lots of meat but only one little stand with veggies (and all things like onion and turnip) one stand with tomatoes and one of berries. Everything else was meat and more meat. But we got a nice loaf of bread, some organic eggs, a hunk of smoked cheddar and some bacon so that we could have breakfast in. Turns out, probably not the most fiscally responsible way to buy food. Seeing as the carton of 6 eggs was about £2 (or $4).

On our way there Olive came speeding by in her cute convertible. She pulled over and hollered out to let us know the flat was ready for us. So once we’d bought our stuff we headed home and unpacked.

We relaxed at the flat for awhile, We decided to go have dinner at a Thai place around the corner, called [Thai Orchid].

It was really expensive so we did take out instead because it was 10% cheaper. The servings were really little and you had to pay extra for rice. But the food was really tasty. I had Gaeng Massaman Gai and Greg had Moo Aroy. The dishes were about £9 each. And then we also got spring rolls which we hoped would be fresh, but they were fried and teeny tiny, but super tasty. We made a point to only eat half so we’d have lunch leftovers. If I’m going to pay $18 for a cup and a half of curry I’m gonna make it last two meals!

We watched a little TV and found Deal or No Deal, but theirs is quite different. The host had long Richard Branson-type hair and the suitcases are red square boxes that sort of look like toolboxes, but made out of cardboard (or it looked like it anyway). They are held not by models but by family members. Very strange. [here’s the website] but his hair is shorter there.

Luckily there were some DVDs left for us. We chose a Ricky Gervais live show. He’s raunchy! I stayed awake for about 5 minutes then dozed through most of it. So we gave in and went to bed at about 8:30pm. I kept waking up thinking it would be 4am, the first time it was 10:20pm.

Posted under Random Thoughts

OK we’re gonna do this in bursts…so here’s Friday.This is Part 1

Friday July 4, 2008

We first had to fly to Newark, then from there to Edinburgh. This first flight was a small plane and there was only one flight attendant. Her name was Cindy and she was very attentive. You know how when they’re ready to take off the captain says ‘attention flight staff, prepare for takeoff’, or whatever it is they say but it means ‘sit down and buckle up’. Well, we got a kick out of it when our captain (a female! My first female pilot!) would say “Cindy sit down” in prep for takeoff. Now that’s a small plane!

We got on the second flight around 10:15pm (NY time) and settled in to sleep. There was a teenage kid in front of us who was pretty sure the rules did not apply to him and talked on his cell phone while the flight attendant was doing her safety stuff. Even after she told him to turn it off. Another attendant asked him to turn it off along with his iPod and he pretended to, then just pulled a blanket over himself so that he could have his iPod on. But it must not have interfered with the planes stuff as we took off just fine. The flight was fine, a little bumpy at times, but otherwise non eventful.
Stay Tuned…

Posted under Scotland, Vacations

Posted under Random Thoughts

I am terrible, I know I’m sorry I haven’t written. Frankly, not that much interesting has happened. Just work and happy hour, that’s pretty much it!

But we spent the better half of today at the emergency vet. Yesterday afternoon I had come home from work early to find that the dogs had gotten into the garbage. Not as bad as [this time]. But still, a mess. I blame Bear.

Murphy had been acting kind of funny for the rest of the afternoon, but it really didn’t look like he’d gotten into anything in particular. Just paper scattered about, there wasn’t anything much in the garbage and it wasn’t even open, just tipped over (though I suppose they could have opened it, taken something out and then slammed the lid again…not likely but not completely out of the question). But while I was trying to do some work on The Other Site I kept being interrupted by him barking. I’d go downstairs and he’d want to go out. I’d let him out and he’d just eat grass. Not barf, just eat it. Lazlo eats the grass too, it must be tasty. So when we got home from Happy Hour last night he was acting really weird and wouldn’t eat. This is a big red flag. That dog will eat anything. I mean it, anything. He favors things that aren’t even food. Wrappers, remote controls, you know…

So we knew something was up, but we weren’t really in any state to bring him to the emergency vet and we thought it might pass (heh, literally) by morning.

Morning came and he was still acting really weird, refusing oatmeal, ice cubes, but wanting to drink a TON of water. So we brought him in. The regular vet was too busy so it was off to Doggie Urgent Care.

The doc felt all around his tummy and said he found a few hard spots but nothing alarming (remember, this is the dog who had to opened up and they found a plastic gravestone in his gut ([here].

So he looked at his previous blood work and saw that his pancreatic levels were a little high. So he wanted to x-ray him. We agreed ($$ cha-ching!).

X-Rays normal, he’s full of shit (literally) but we knew that. So Doc is thinking he may have pancreatitis. Egad, this scared me. This is fatal. Quickly fatal. So he ordered more tests on his blood levels.

Luckily the blood work cam back normal. So they decided to call it gastroenteritis. Yes, folks, gas.

But he was also dehydrated so he went on a IV for a few hours (in which time we went and had a yummy lunch at Barbette and did a little shopping) and was sent home with some special bland diet food.

Total: $465.00 (vet bill, not including lunch, that was another $30)

We were going to go out to dinner tonight, but we may be re-thinking that.

Posted under Random Thoughts