Turkey Watch 2008 - the aftermath

I think this speaks for itself:

Turkey watch 2008 - episode 4

We're all too tired from the tryptophan to write much, so I'll let the pictures speak for themselves. I will say, that after much worrying and dreams of lumpiness, the gravy was fantastic...

This Thanksgiving, we're thankful for...

...the puppy cam. Seriously, who doesn't enjoy watching puppies?

Turkey watch 2008 - episode 3

Most importantly, when cooking a turkey, you must visit the local pub for a beer break. If this step is not followed, the turkey will not taste as juicy.

Turkey watch 2008 - episode 2

After the soak, we took Mr. Turkey out and patted him dry. Matthew took care of that and did quite a thorough job (inside and out as you'll see from the picture below). Then I cooked up a little stuffing - with sausage, celery, onion, and butter - and put a good amount inside, leaving the rest for dry stuffing. After rubbing butter all over the skin, sprinkling with salt and pepper, and rubbing with a little Thyme (Matthew's idea), we officially started the cooking process. Only 4 hours now until we have a golden delicious Thanksgiving meal.

Turkey watch 2008

All the way across the pond in Hampstead - where the Americans are out and about, buying wine, pies, stuffing, and looking for turkeys high and low - we're smack in the middle of Turkey Watch 2008. After lots of coaching from moms and grandmothers, we've taken the first (kind of weird) step of pulling out all the little remaining feathers from the bird (there were lots) and soaking it in a salt bath. Ma-Maw said that when she was growing up on the farm her mom used to light newspaper on fire and singe off the feathers, but I think that might be against the Hampstead fire code, so we just pulled them out one by one. As you can see below, Mr. Turkey is now quite comfortable in a cool bath of salty water. Stay tuned for more exciting developments from Turkey Watch - 2008.

Dublin

I really love Dublin. Everyone there was so friendly, it's a great size (easy to find your way around, manageable), we had really good food, and it was of course very festive and Christmasy! All in all, a great weekend...

Matthew and I did a "Hop On Hop Off" bus tour the first day and saw all of the major sites. We then went back to the Guinness Brewery (as you'll see from about half of the photos below), were treated to dinner that night by a friend from London (who's part owner in a restaurant in Dublin), then did a mini pub tour to get a feel for Irish pubs. They were really, really crowded, but fun. Heard Irish music in one, sampled Guiness (which supposedly tastes different depending on what pub you're in) and even chatted with a few Irish people. Then on Sunday we just wandered around... feeling like we already knew the whole city. We saw Trinity College and its amazing library. In it, there's a book called The Book of Kells which was thought to have been written in 800AD. Talk about old. It was pretty amazing.

Thanks to Matthew for encouraging me to come up with him for the weekend, we had a great time!

St. Catherine's church



Museum



Busy streets



Street stalls... a really old law says that these vendors don't have to pay taxes. The licenses for the stalls get passed down through fmailies, so the people selling at these stands can trace their linage back hundreds of years based on the license.



Art from the local college



St. Patrick's Cathedral - under renovation and closed for the day due to graduation ceremonies



Where the magic happens



The electric plant that supplies power to the brewery - yes, they provide their own power in case the national energy grid goes down, Guinness will still be brewed





In the Tasting Lab where you can try Guinness that's not available outside. We had a "medium strength" version





The perfect pour takes 2 minutes exactly



It really does taste better here! From the bar at the top of the brewery








It was packed!



Great 360 degree view of Dublin



Trinity College





Festive lights on Grafton Street

Yay for visitors!

Got to see the little bro last night in London... here are a few pics from our evening of visiting very cool pubs (both Matthew and Ric were impressed with my selections... The Eagle and The Eastern), having a big hearty meal at The Quality Chop House, and just catching up. On an impulse, I decided to spend the weekend with Matthew in Dublin, which works out well since Ric leaves for NYC tomorrow. Can't wait to visit Ireland for the first time!

Yummm... jellied eels at The Quality Chop House (yes, that was actually on the menu and no, we didn't order them)



Aces! At the Eastern...



Thoughtful gaze at The Flask...



Brothers in law!



Scenes from The Flask pub in Hampstead





Toasting a great evening



Yum, Guinness (and a Bombardier)



Ladies and Gents, brothers and sisters...

Congo fighting endangers mountain gorillas

Really sad to read how the fighting in the Congo is impacting the mountain gorillas that Ric and I visited last March. We were in Virunga National Park and can attest to its beauty. Now, all the rangers who lived there to protect the gorillas are being driven out by the militias and fighting happening on the border.

From The New York Times:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/18/world/africa/18congo.html?_r=1&partner=rss

And Oxford for the win!

Thank you very much to our single best reader, Sara, who responded right away to encourage us to visit Oxford on Saturday. Since Oxford won over the Imperial War Museum 1 to nothing, we really had no choice... we made it up there around 1pm on Saturday and had a great time visiting a bunch of pubs and wandering through small, quaint little streets. For any other potential Oxford visitors, our favorite pubs were The Bear and Old Bookbinders. Both had really low, old ceilings and were full of personality and British beer.

I'm very happy that I've now been to Oxford. It's really English and pretty, but almost everything is behind a wall or gate that you have to pay extra to see. I understand that college kids don't want tourists invading their areas every weekend, but it was a little weird to walk around the town and feel like we weren't actually seeing anything up close. The biggest, most important library in the world, for example, was only accessible by signing up in advance for an hour long tour. We peeked through a few different fences, and paid money to eat sandwiches in the botanical gardens, but I would say that Oxford is definitely best experienced with a student.

Back to watching our favorite new show which is Stephen Frye traveling across America... he's in Humboldt County tonight, so it reminds me of my last home :)

Pictures to come...

Putting it to a vote

Ric and I are trying to decide what to do with our Saturday and thought we'd let Bremer Blog readers weigh in. Here are the options:

1. Day trip to Oxford - had this planned for last weekend, but got rained out. It would involve visiting some really old pubs (circa 1200) and checking out the universities. I've never been to Oxford, so it would be a new city to visit, but it requires getting motivated relatively early and about two hours of travel time each way.

2. Visit the Imperial War Museum - we've never been to this museum and hear that it's one of the best. With this option we wouldn't have to leave London and wouldn't be rushed to leave the house in the morning. But it isn't quite as adventurous as going to a new city.

Thoughts? Comments? What is everyone else doing this weekend?

Lots of comments!

Hi loyal Bremer Blog readers. We've gotten a lot of comments on the blog lately and I wanted to thank everyone for reading and taking part!

On a cloudy Friday in London, I thought I'd share a few photos from my office so you can all visualize where I'm working (for now... we might move in the next couple months). You'll notice the lovely non-windows that actually look out into a dark shaft currently covered by construction equipment. Not lots of what you'd call "natural" light.

Hope everyone has wonderful weekends!

Congo

Ric and I are watching the developments here very closely, having just been to the Rwanda/Congo border earlier this year. Not sure how much coverage this is getting in the US, but we're hoping that a peaceful solution can be worked out sooner rather than later. These conflicts are always complicated by there not being a clear good guy versus bad guy dynamic.

Ric made an interesting point last night that he thinks Rwanda doesn't really like the UN very much, and doesn't trust them, which is why they may be getting involved in the current situation (although that hasn't been proven). After the 1994 genocide, it's hard to fault their distrust.

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5hoitt5BsM5OKJ2Mmc3g5q6iufXjwD948CLEG0

Election coverage from London papers

On this day after the election, I thought it might be interesting to share photos of the headlines from London newspapers. Needless to say, people in the UK were desperately hoping for an Obama win and, while I don't want to talk politics on the Bremer Blog, people here are thrilled about what this now means for America and its standing in the world. But you will be able to see that clearly by looking at the photos below...

The newstand at the tube





Sorry, couldn't get this one to turn the right way. It says "Momentus, spine-tingling, absurd: an election like never before." From the Guardian






From The Times





And here's a slideshow on the Guardian's website of papers from all over the world:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/gallery/2008/nov/05/pressandpublishing?picture=339365861