Home at last

Date: 17 June 2006 20:38:09

Well, I bet you were wondering just how long that adventure was going to last, weren't you? Fear not, we are not still trapped on the London Eye, going round and round in never-decreasing circles... although sometimes it feels as though the latter part of that may well be true... but I simply haven't had time to blog.. or at least, time when I have actually had a computer close at hand.

I tried to set up a wireless connection for my laptop actually, but seem to have achieved very little other than creating a self-destruct mechanism. Thus, whenever I plug the connection in and try to get the internet, it first informs me that I am picking up an excellent signal, then says that the website I am seeking is unobtainable, and finally locks on the little egg timer symbol and will do nothing ever again, including shutting down, until I let the battery run right out. Hmmm... not good. I need a whizzkid. Why is nothing ever simple?

So, how was our big adventure? It was absolutely WONDERFUL! He knew we were going on a picnic and that Uncle Dave was taking us to Ryde, but that was the limit of his expectations. It was fun sitting in the car and listening to him guess where we were going... and to see the range of his thinking suddenly expand big-time when we were dropped at the catamaran terminal. By this time he'd decided we were going to Portsmouth... so the thinking expanded another mammoth leap when we arrived there and, instead of heading for the exit, stayed and hung about on a platform at the train station instead. The entire carriage had the pleasure of his excitement which was without bounds as we got on the train and he realised we were going to London.

He was hoping to go on the London Eye, but I told him that the queues were immense and we probably wouldn't have time to do that AND the British Museum in one day. As compensation we sat beneath it to eat our picnic and gaze in amazement at all around us. He was particularly taken with the number of different colour skins he could see as the Island has hardly become a home for many people of different ethnic backgrounds. We both decided we were country-mice at heart, mind, as we battled through the crowds and the traffic and queued for an eternity for tickets on the underground... and especially when the ticket allowed Smudgelet through the gate and then locked mummy on the other side with alarms going off left right and centre!

We arrived, footsore already, at the British Museum which I warned him was the biggest building he'd ever been in. He was doubtful... until we got there. Oh, you should have seen his face! :D

I had been a bit dubious about taking him there as he's one of those irritating children who races round museums and is hard to interest in anything except on his terms. The more interested you are, the less interested he tends to be. But the Egyptian display was, he said, the best thing ever - he so thoroughly enjoyed it and was wonderful company. He'd been doing the Egyptians at school, and as a teacher of general subjects when I started teaching it had been my favourite subject to teach, as well as being of great interest to me when learning linguistics, so we were both in our elements.

At the end of the afternoon he said "Mummy, I'm really tired, but do you think we might just have time to go on the London Eye before we go home? Could we go and look how long the queue is?"
"No, I don't think so, Smudgelet. I don't want to queue for ages, and it would be a bit of a waste of money."
"Oh".. my brave little man didn't moan - quite an achievement for him.
"Besides, Smudgelet, I don't really want to go on the London Eye this evening when it's already booked for tomorrow".

Wow - the reaction was overwhelming... and nicest of all was that his greatest source of enthusiasm was the thought that he was stopping overnight in a hotel room with me and without Tiddles... even more exciting than the prospect of the London Eye. The hotel was cheap (ish) and basic but gave us a good little room and a brilliant breakfast and the utter excitement of staying overnight in London. Wow! I was hugged and kissed and thanked and hugged some more by excitement personified. And then next morning off we went, to see the whole of London in 30 minutes. I was somewhat nervous - very happy to sit myself down on the seat in the middle and concentrate on looking out so that I couldn't see any of the massive structure as we went. It was fine as long as I only looked at the view, so you'll understand the pains I went to to get the following photo. I rather like it, though, as it's a bit different to all the birds' eye views of London that the rest of my camera's memory was filled with.

Did we have fun? You betcha!