A Return to Life as Usual

What a whirlwind three weeks! As you can tell from the guest blogs, we had a blast! Devon was beautiful. John drove a 9-passenger people carrier all the way there and on little day trips- he was quite skilled! One day, Mike, Caitie, John and I drove to Blackpool Sands, which was an hour and a half from Torquay. It is one of the best-kept beaches in Devon and it's a bit off the beaten path. We had to take a ferry across the smallest river you've ever seen- the River Dart. The queue for the ferry was about 30 minutes each way, but the ferry ride itself was less than five! We had to take a lot of narrow streets to get there and on the way there- we were behind this caravan (camper) and a big tour bus came around the corner- straight at the caravan. The caravan moved to the side to let the bus pass and John tried to follow, but we weren't completely out of the way when the bus started coming at us! Caitie stuck her hand out the window and yelled, "STOP!" He didn't. But John moved quickly and saved the day! Then we laughed a lot! On the way home, we followed signs for the ferry queue, but when we turned the corner, the queue was backed up far behind us. We didn't know how to get to the back of the line, so John jumped the queue. Well, we got to the ferry and this woman came running down from the dock to tell the ferry master that we had jumped the queue (she wasn't a driver- just a concerned citizen apparently.) And he made us go to the end of the queue! We felt like schoolkids and laughed a lot on the way to the back of the queue.

The family went their separate ways on Saturday and we must admit we are quite sad. We had such an amazing three weeks- with Flo's Shower and Bachelorette Party, Eli's visit, the Ramsburg visit and the Ramsburg family trip to Devon- we had forgotten how lonely London could be. But have no fear- Dan and Jim will be here in exactly two weeks! And in the meantime, we've got plenty to keep us busy!

John has a big audit at work next week and I will be focusing on a serious exercise/diet for Flo's wedding, which is in less than six weeks, and finding WORK!

Hope you're all doing well- we love you!

The Devon Top 10

Caitie here…

We’ve had a very eventful week since arriving in Devon. So many things have happened…writing it all out would bore you sick. So I am going to give you the Top 10 Events. And now, when you are in our presence, you won’t feel left out of our inside jokes.

10. Mike and I got locked into our bedroom. The only possible escape was a tricky one . . .we had to scale the wall and climb into Aunt Linda’s room. Once we defied gravity and reached safety, a locksmith was called. Rumors spread that it was Tom’s nighttime playfulness and door-handle-jiggling that broke the door…it’s still a mystery.

9. Tom meets a “friend” Andy at the Clocktower (a pub) and gets directions to a secret beach. We all sit on the edge of our seats as John drives miles away from civilization only to find a beautiful and quiet beach hidden in the cliffs! And of course, there is a pub right at the top of the hill where Tom can get snookered while Jamie, John, Mike and I work on our tans.

8. Daddy, you’re making me soo sad! Quit making me sad.

7. Watching E! Entertainment’s most random 101 Amazing Hollywood Moments, and getting cut off at 21! But mostly all the English TV is random and boring.

6. John and Jamie winning Couple of the Week for winning the Cranium match and all the cheesy lovey dovey comments made by John. (For instance, Sandi says “John look at the cottage behind you.” To which John replies, “I would, but I can’t take my eyes off Jamie.” Puke!

5. Sandi blasting oldies from the CD player in the kitchen and strongly encouraging all of us to do a line dance with her. . .which we happily did. All of us clapping and bopping to the temptations, working our groove thangs from the oven to the fridge. Not awkward at all.

4. The “Carnival”. Carnivals in Devon are actually parades. We were very distraught to learn this, but then, magically, we discovered rides! Mike and John each paid 10 pounds (20 dollars) to ride “The Power Shot”, a giant slingshot-looking thing that launches its riders 200 feet into the air. Jamie and I were screaming louder than they were! Then we decided to go on a nice relaxing ride, which, unbeknownst to us, was faster, spinnier and scarier than the Power Shot, we almost all puked, but got ice cream instead.

3. Murder Mystery Dinner. We all dressed up, Mike as Clarke Crumpett the Arab; John as Johnny Come-lately the Cowboy; Jamie as Sue Spender the Stripper; me as Losta Morales the Actress; Sandi as Fanny Chaise-Lounge (blond with big boobs); Tom as Cecil Lothario, the esteemed Hollywood director; and Aunt Linda as Monica Makeover the hairdresser. I had to hold it in all day that I, Losta, was the killer, and in the end, my acting was terrible and they all knew it was me. What can I say, I cannot tell a lie. That’s the truth.

2. John goes on a weird “I will hump anything” spree, starting with Mike, then the kitchen table and then the door…he had an evil gremlin laugh while demonstrating. Again, it wasn’t awkward at all. Sandi reprimanded him and promptly put his little gremlin tail between his legs.

1. And last but not least, our adventures to Black Sands beach. We had to take a ferry over the river to get it and on the way home we passed all traffic and cut the line. We are Americans! We got called out by a bloody wench who ran down and told on us!! And she wasn’t even in a car!! Don’t blame John though, I was the one peer pressuring him to cut in line!

That’s it. If you are lucky, John and Jamie (once they finally get rid of us) will enlighten you on their perspective of this trip. Oh, and also, I would like to note, I made it all two weeks hanging with these Ramsburgs. . .and I am still standing. If you are as shocked as they all were, then you too can call me Superwoman.

Thank you and good night.

Mike Blog #1

Mike here.

Even though Eli thought I was older than John, I am, in fact, the youngest member of the family. (It's okay Eli, honest mistake. Nobody can deny that I am more mature than John. Clearly it has nothing to do with the receeding hairline.)

I have been directed, by the blog administrators, to write only about one event. Otherwise I would go on and on and everyone would get bored and stop reading. The topic of the blog is John's birthday BBQ.

So. . .we have now been here for a full week. The reason for the delayed blog is simple - Jamie and John didn't like having us in their home. They give us a cursory tour of the apartment (which is loverly) and then they made us sit outside the whole time. . .away from the photo albums and the cats and the computer. In retrospect, the decision to contain us in the back porch area was a wise one. We are large people, clumsy by nature. And mostly we are self-centered and unaware of our surroundings. Had we been inside, we may have dislodged the photo of Jesus from the bookshelf, or God forbid, we may have tramped on Jovi's tail. No hard feelings, guys, you have to protect what's yours. The thing that bothered me was, they appointed their next door neighbor, a scottish dude named Andy, the guardian of the doorway. If any of us went near the door, he would scream "HAGGIS!" and then kick a soccer ball directly at our arse. It was humiliating.

More about the BBQ. . .John sucks at cooking turkey burgers, but he makes a mean polish sausage. In all honesty it was a fantastic occasion and John got to celebrate his birthday, albeit belated, with his immediate family. Jamie arranged a gorgeous a dessert tray and placed a candle in the middle of a delicious fruit-tart. We sang happy birthday and John blew out the candle in one large breath. He's a big boy now.

For those of you who had the pleasure of visiting J&J in NYC, you have no idea how much larger the London apartment is. It makes the old apartment seem almost comical. No longer do they live in a home fit for Lilliputians. No, now they have a bonafide crib. To put it in perspective, their entire NY apartment could fit in their screened porch, or "solarium".

Back to the food. The Ramsburgs can eat. And eat. And eat. We have decided to weigh ourselves like the British, in stone. There are 14 pounds to a stone. If you suck at math, that means if you weigh 14lbs, you are one 1 stone. You can see the advantage in weighing yourself in stone. If you can guess how many stone I am, I will give you 5 pounds(english currency). Pounds/Dollars is a conversion that is not so advantageous as the stone/lb conversion. Basically you double whatever you pay in pounds and the sum is what you are paying in American dollars. Caitie tipped a cabi five punds and then realized she wasted $10 on a taxi driver. I digress. . . the food at the BBQ was good, and there was lots of it. Burgers, dogs, sausages, chips, potato salad, fruit tart, lemon tart, crisps, beer, wine, pepsi light and sprite. We ate like romans and then played Cranium, girls against guys. Naturally, the women cheated and completely emasculated their counterparts. Even the scottish guy was taken aback by their blatant disregard for the rules. But whatever, we remembered that we could pee standig up. That's what matters in life.

As the evening progressed, certain members, notably John, regressed. He and Jamie got into a nasty "row" about the results of the Cranium match, and John managed his feelings of inferiority by guzzling cans of Carlsberg lager. It was classic Johnny R. He broke out the guitar and began to serenade his wife, a touching show of affection. Unfortunately Jamie wasn't wooed by this, and John wound up strumming the g-chord and singing in monotone. Here are some lyrics I can remember: "Jamie Lynn I love you, even though love is a weird thing and sometimes word are misunderstood. The sky is black and mike ramsburg is wearing a terry cloth shirt. My shoes are comfortable. Stonehenge tomorrow. Music is noise and if nobody listens then its poetry." You get the idea.

You'll be happy to know that the lovers made-up and eventually we all left and spent the night at my parents' rented flat. We woke up at 3:30am and went to Stonehenge. That's a whole other blog.

We are in Devon now, at a gorgeous home overlooking Torbay. It's heaven, really. Everyone is yelling at me to finish. Another Cranium match awaits. This time it's couple vs couple. . .

After Eli...

Hello--

Eli has left and I am sad. He didn't get to write another blog, because we were just too darn busy. BUT- I have attached the photo link to this entry. There are A LOT of photos because I combined his and mine into one folder. But they are great photos. Eli and I sat down and named them all on my computer, but that messed up my Uploading. So, I haven't had a chance to rename them. But you should be able to figure them out.

To sum up Eli's trip- we had a blast and I am so grateful to Mom, Dad and Dan for sending him here and to Sandi and Tom for including him in all of the family events. The only thing that would have made it better would have been if he could have stayed longer. Next time- at least two weeks!

Now the Ramsburg family is off to Devon for a week. I'm sure you'll hear from Mike and Caitie while we're there!


Click Here to See Photos of Eli's Visit

And for those of you who were wondering- Flo's Shower went perfectly (except for Keith ruining the surprise in the 11th hour!) And the Bachelorette Party was tons of fun! If you want to see pictures, email me and I'll send you the link!

Guest Post 2!

Hey, it's Eli again. Here's an update on the last couple days.

So far we've gone to many of the places we saw on the bus/boat tour. Parliament & Big Ben, where I took plenty of pictures. The Tate Modern Art Gallery, where Jamie and I saw plenty of art that requires tilting your head to understand. The Millennium Bridge, alternately known as the wibbley wobbley bridge, which thankfully did not wibble and wobble as we crossed :P. The new location of the Globe Theatre, where we got free tickets to the tour and exhibits. There was a whole big exhibit for The Gunpowder Plot, since it involved William Shakespeare. We ended up also going to the book store so that I could buy a book about The Gunpowder Plot. I bet you couldn't guess that it's titled The Gunpowder Plot =-O! We also went to the location of the old Globe Theatre no longer standing. Thanks to some punk, there's a Georgian building over its foundation, resulting in its relocation. Apparently this Georgian building takes priority over the Globe Theatre, which has 10,000 times its historical value.


But that's not all! John's family has come into London for a nice visit. They've rented this crazy Mansion Flat in Kensington. It's really nice. We all went to eat dinner at a restaurant down the street yesterday. I had Salmon and Artichoke cakes with bits of tomatoes and chips. Oh, and deep fried Brie, which I shared with Jamie. After dinner we went to listen to Mozart at the Royal Albert Hall. It was really great, I loved the orchestra.


Today, I went with Jamie, John, Mike and Caitie to the London Eye. It's this gigantic Ferris-wheel for those who have no idea what I'm referring to. When you get to the top, you can pretty much see the entire city, it's really great. There was this group of really hot Spanish chicks in the line next to us. Hehehehehehe.


Right now, we're all waiting around to start a BBQ. We've actually got a lot of extra time since we finished off Jamie's wonderful schedule in great time. Stone Henge tomorrow, LIKE OMG! Haha. I can't wait.

Guest post!

Hiya, it's Eli (Jamie's brother). I'm guest posting because that's what you do when you stay with them in London. Sooooo, first off I'd like to mention that Virgin airlines is wonderful. I had an English breakfast on the flight. I have to say it beats the Bagel McMuffin I had prior- and it was complimentary, so beat that McDonald's =-P! I watched two movies with Jamie: V for Vendetta and Firewall. V for Vendetta was a terribly great movie, which I plan to buy in the near future. Firewall was pretty exciting, but the character of Bill Cox was really confusing. He never really established power because he was pretty lax for a criminal, yet he had no problem with killing like 4 people during the film. I don't know. Anyway, the flight was comfortable and quick. We got back to the flat at about 11 I think and we watched some TV and ate Indian food that John cooked for us :D.


The next day we didn't do TOO much. It was basically the prep work for my stay- currency exchange, oyster card, etc. etc. I got a feel for the tube and workings of the city. It's a lot more laid back than New York, although I find that people try to cram themselves into the tube trains even though they can't really fit. It's funny to watch them think they fit and then get hit by the door. Maybe that's a bit mean? Meh.


So today was a big day. I went on a tour of London on a double decker bus. We sat at the top. Got some nice sun :). We drove through the city and took a look at some historical landmarks. I kinda favored the Globe Theater and the Parliament building. Jamie suggested we take a walking tour, but I wasn't sure. There was a Beatles walk and a Haunted something or other, which was basically a pub crawl. Now I would have enjoyed the pub crawl, however "me mum" doesn't want me to drink. Jamie and I had our debates about this, haha.


So after our tour we went to the National Portrait Gallery. I have to say there must have been like 2000 paintings there. We started at the Beatles gallery where I learned there were actually two band members replaced. It didn't explain in detail, but apparently Ringo Starr took over for somebody who died of a brain hemorrhage :(. Also, somebody played Bass prior to Paul, which makes me wonder what Paul was doing during that. We then moved on to look at portraits of the royal family and some other rich people back in the day. We skipped the Victorian period because our feet were beat, but we did check out the current family portraits. Pretty interesting stuffs. Afterwards we waited on some steps outside. It was nice out and I took a nap while Jamie read. Really we were just waiting for John.


This is where the wonderful cell phone journey begins. John showed up and we went down the street to get Jamie a new phone/plan. It took quite a while but when it was over with Jamie and John mentioned how fast the service was. Okay..? That was our epic phone journey. Then we came home and here I am. I'll probably post one or two more times, I've still got about a week ahead of me :D.