Whitby

On my last day in England, Jan and I went to Whitby on the North Sea. Whitby is a charming (I know, I know, everything in England is charming) village nestled in the hills. A river runs through it (hee hee - that was actually totally unintentional) and empties into the ocean. The weather this day was WINDY. I mean windy like I've never seen before. I've been in a hurricane and the wind wasn't as bad as it was in Whitby last Friday.

Notice how far it is to Malton.

Homes like the ones in BBCs Pride and Prejudice.

Wait, which side should I be on?

North Yorkshire Moors National Park

There are quaint towns and villages scattered all throughout the English countryside.

If I could, I would move to the English countryside.

Obviously, I was loving the view out of the bus window on our way to Whitby.

Heather in bloom. This is what grows wild on the moors.

Jan and I walked around the art museum in Whitby. Stones like this one were arranged in a circle on the grounds of the museum. There were different designs carved in the stones.

This is the view of Whitby on the Abbey side of the river.

The North Sea. The wind was so strong we could lean back in it and it would hold us up. When Jan and I walked out toward the tip of the headland up by the Abbey, the wind started blowing us toward the edge of the cliff. At first it was funny, but then I started getting scared when I realized the wind was stronger than I was. Jan caught me and we huddled together and made our way back to the Abbey. That might be why the sea frightened me.

This is St. Mary's church, I think. I'm not entirely certain that's the name of the church. But aren't the flowers pretty? Too bad they were hailed on a few minutes after I took this picture!

The Abbey ruins

The Abbey ruins and Jan taking a picture.

The Abbey ruins

The Abbey ruins

These fine little fellows were just lounging about as though it were a hot, sunny summers day. They're brave little souls. Sounded like, from listening to the museum guides, that these little ducks are quite famous. They sell little duck statues in the gift shop. I didn't buy one because I had this great picture.

England

WOW!!!!!!! That's really all I can say. Wow. England was amazing. Seriously. I hated leaving. I loved it there. The country was beautiful, the people were friendly, and the food was delicious. The history was overwhelming. I'm going to post some pictures I took. There will be a lot. I took 500. But don't worry. I'm not going to post them all. I've also posted some on my Facebook account so you can check some out there as well. In fact, I'm going to break up posting my pictures so that they're posted by city or by experience. Anyway, so I'm going to post about 12 times but at least there will be some organization to these pictures instead of posting them willy-nilly. Cheers!

Life isn't fair

I'm sure you've probably all seen this because it's circulated around the internet I don't know how many times. I have no idea if Bill Gates ever actually said this or even gave a speech at a high school and quite honestly, I don't know that it really matters. The advice is great and I wish we implemented it more in schools. If we really are trying to prepare kids for life, we should be teaching them these principles. Oh, I agree with all the advice and I also agree with the idea of the feel-good, politically correct teachings statement. Kids are such whiny babies these days. They have no idea what life is really about. At the same time, they have to grow up way too fast.

"Love him or hate him, he sure hit the nail on the head with this! To anyone with kids of any age, here's some good advice.
Bill Gates recently gave a speech at a high school about 11 things they did not, and will not learn in school. He talks about how feel-good, politically correct teachings created a generation of kids with no concept of reality and how this concept set them up for failure in the real world.

Rule 1 : Life is not fair... Get used to it!

Rule 2: The world doesn't care about your self esteem. The world expects you to accomplish something BEFORE you feel good about yourself! .

Rule 3 : You will NOT make $60,000 a year right out of high school, and you won't be a vice-president with a company car until you earn both.

Rule 4: If you think your teacher is tough, wait till you get a boss.

Rule 5 : Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity. Your grandparents had a different word for burger flipping ... they called it opportunity.

Rule 6 : If you mess up, it's not your parents' fault. So don't whine about your mistakes ... Learn from them.

Rule 7 : Before you were born, your parents weren't as boring as they are now. They got that way from paying your bills, cleaning your clothes and listening to you talk about how cool you thought you were. So before you save the rain forest from the parasites of your parent's generation, try delousing the closet in your own room.

Rule 8 : Your school may have done away with winners and losers, but life HAS NOT. In some schools, they have abolished failing grades and they'll give you as MANY TIMES as you want to get the right answer. This doesn't bear the slightest resemblance to ANYTHING in real life.

Rule 9 : Life is not divided into semesters. You don't get summers off and very few emp loyers are interested in helping you FIND YOURSELF. Do that on your own time.

Rule 10 : Television is NOT real life. In real life people actually have to leave the coffee shop and go to work.

Rule 11 : Be nice to nerds. Chances are you'll be working for one someday.

If you can read this - Thank a teacher!"

Spring break

I'm officially excited. I go to England next week! Next week!! I can't believe it! I have been reading "The National Geographic Traveler: Great Britain" (thank you Mike!) and learning about the area, the culture, the history, the places to eat, and other important bits of information. I don't want to get there and be clueless about the history of the area. I don't want to walk by something and by chance snap a picture and have someone say "What!? You didn't stop there?! But that's Buckingham Palace!" And when I go to Buckingham Palace or London Bridge or the Tower of London or any other myriad of places I can visit while I'm there, I want to know what happened and why it's important. So I've been doing some research, which is pretty amazing since I don't like to read anything that I'm not just reading for fun. I love to learn - but I love to learn by going somewhere and seeing or doing something, not by just reading about it. So, I've been breaking out of the mold and reading for information and not just for fun. And I'm learning a lot. For instance, I've decided to take everyone's advice and eat at the pubs. Okay, so I was planning on doing that before I read about them, but now I'm even more convinced. I want to try something very "British" while I'm there. I'll definitely have fish and chips with salt and vinegar. For me, the fun of visiting someplace is trying the native foods. *Side note: Why oh why does the girl that gives the afternoon announcements have to SHOUT them and make us all go deaf?* Thank goodness, she's done. Anyway, I must get back to my research but I'm so excited that I had to blog about it! :-)

Audio problems

For some reason the audio won't play on the video. I have absolutely no idea why. If anyone has suggestions that might help me figure this out, I'd appreciate it.

Sweaty Hands Syndrome

Okay, so finally (after how many months?!) we finally have the Sweaty Hands Syndrome video up on You Tube and here on my blog. I hope it works!