Off to the Highlands

Last weekend was parades and this weekend, we are off to the Highlands. I'll post more about when it is over, but a brief itinerary for you to wonder about over the next several days:

• Highland Games (I hope to compete in some event)
  
• Military History reenactment & parade
  
• Distillery Tour (Glenlivet and I hope another)
  
• Some Castles and churches
  
• Some hiking in the Scottish country
  
• A decent view of the ongoing meteor shower
  
• Enjoying our cabin (ten minutes from the Glenlivet Distillery)
  
• Too much scary driving
  

I'll let you know how it all goes.

Cavalcade

The day after bagpipes and the castle was the parade we intended to attend that opening weekend of Festival, the Cavalcade. This parade has most of the bands involved in the Edinburgh Military Tattoo and floats from many of the shows in town for the festival. Due to construction of a totally unnecessary tram in Edinburgh, the Cavalcade was in Holyrood Park last year and again this year.

We went early thinking this was wise to get good vantage point. Turns out, this wasn’t so necessary. We arrived ninety minutes early to a completely empty parade route excluding roughly nine other people. Still I laid down a blanket and spread out on it for a nap while Amy and the kids went to the entertainment area (carnival?). I sort of assumed that Amy knew how far a way it was.

They made it all the way to the entrance, but not one step further. Blocking there steady advance was a few chaps on stilts dressed as though they were riding an ostrich. I’m not sure if you have met our second daughter, BC, but if so, you already know that this spelled doom for her; she simply turned around and left. No fits, minor tears, but a full force “about face” and “forward march” back to Dad and the absence of ostrich-stilt people. So, Amy and the crew had to follow due to legal obligations.

This was an all out parade, not just bagpipes. In fact, our children cheered and yelled out, “Yeah, a REAL marching band!” when a bagpipe free crew passed by. The parade started with 150 motorcycles and some sports cars. Many kids would think this was cool, but ours just covered their ears and waited for the exhaust and noise to clear. They were happiest with the bands. The very first float was the Lady Boys of Bangkok, which Mary caught on to right away. She, however, thought they were just being silly.

All was fun and games until the Chinese dragons came down the path. This put BC into full out tears and a face-down-in-the-picnic-blanket hiding spot. But, she kept coming back for more. Dancers, fine; show songs, fine; anything in a (non fairy) costume, horror!

At the end of the parade we were told by two children, “That was awesome.”

Bagpipes and Castles

Amy and I had decided we needed to take the kids downtown for a day of home town tourism. August is the month of the Edinburgh Festival and the population of the city supposedly doubles to one million. So we decided to go for it, head down to High Street with the Festival goers on opening weekend. There would certainly be no parking, so let’s take the bus. Our children absolutely love the double-decker buses.

We took the bus to High Street (although I made us get off one stop too soon and walk) and turned up hill from George IV Bridge toward the Castle. We had decided to purchase a membership in the Scottish historical society so we could get into all the castles in Scotland with no further fee, and the place to buy such a thing is the castle. As we got closer, we noticed that the steps along the sides of the streets were filled with people waiting but we couldn’t tell what they were waiting for. When we got around the bend, we saw a few bagpipers and decided to stay for the parade. We didn’t really consider when the parade would start, but found a spot on the route in the front and planted the children on the steps to eat their lunch. The parade started roughly one hour later. It was the festival bagpipe parade. Have you ever heard Scotland the Brave?



Whenever a new bagpipe band approached I’d ask the girls, “Hey, what song do you think they’ll play?” They thought this was funny twice, but there were a lot of bagpipe and drum bands.

After the parade, we headed to the castle and decided to go on in and tour the place. I think the kids thought it was pretty cool. Aaron was out cold from the jarring of the cobblestones when we got to the cannons and waited for a tour to start. Amy had the other three up on a cannon when one of those super annoying photo company asked if she could take their photo. I recognized the Aussie accent (with the previous knowledge that Kat from the Heatherlea was one of these photo people) and went and gave her a hug. This was disconcerting to my wife and children. We did however score free pictures, although we’ll have to pretend that Aaron is IN the cannon. (They look something like this, although this is not one from Kat and the photo people.)



After a tour the three ladies went in to see the crown jewels. Upon emerging from the chambers, I excitedly asked the girls if they liked the Stone of Destiny. They looked at me and said, “What’s the Stone of Destiny?” So then I just asked if they saw a big square stone in with the crown jewels. “Um, I don’t think so, why?” Nevermind. Amy ensured me that the Stone of Destiny was still there.

We left the castle and headed to the Fringe. I’d like to explain what the Fringe is, but it is totally unclear to me (and the link won't help you either). What we experienced was a massive number of people handing out flyers to their shows and very bad street performers lining High Street. Oh yeah, and about 100,000 people irritated that I kept jamming the stroller into them when they wouldn’t move.

We decided to leave to meet some friends for lawn bowling. Seriously, we finished the day with lawn bowling at the Falcon and a picnic dinner. Very relaxing. One can best understand the day by this guy…

“Look kids, Big Ben, Parliament”

After being in Edinburgh for ten days, we took the kiddos to London. I wanted to take the kids to London of course, and I was considering driving there. I also wanted to take them on some train journeys, and then East Coast Trains offered a ridiculous deal: £9 each way. Seriously, I couldn’t drive to London for this price, so for £108 we had six table-reserved seats on the 5 hour train to London. I think the kids loved the train travel.



In London we did most of the obligatory tourist stuff, save the museums. You see, four kids don’t all agree simultaneously on when you should go inside a museum. We also didn’t go inside anything else, because in London they charge you for everything. Seriously, we went to St. Paul’s Cathedral only to see that it would cost us roughly $50 to take the family into the church. A CHURCH! I went in as far as I could. It was nice, but it was no $50 church. I’ll take der Dom for free, or Notre Dame, or St. Peter’s, or, well, any church not in London. Okay, I got sidetracked. Point is, we really saw everything from the outside due to the need to pay our mortgage.

We took the train on Saturday and found our hotel. It was interesting with incredibly uncomfortable beds but worked. Sunday, we took the tube (not handicap or stroller compliant in 2010) to St. James Park and scampered to the changing of the horse guards. Then, we walked back through the park to see the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace. Aside from the baby nearly choking to death (for real, people around us were very scared) the kids waited like champions for the festivities to begin.



I didn’t see too much of it, but the kids saw short bits when I would hold them up over the crowd. Okay, two guard changes, then we went back into the park to the playground. We had a picnic. We saw a pigeon rescued from the algae on the pond. We returned to the horse guards to catch a photo with a guard.



I wanted to go to 10 Downing Place so we headed that way. When I saw the radical Islamist protest, I thought that might be a fun experience for the kids. Then I saw police pulling some of them down and things getting thrown back and forth across the street so we turned around and headed for Trafalgar Square. No kidding, vans filled with riot police went by for about twenty minutes.

Later that day we took a boat on the Thames. It was fun and a good way to see a lot of the city in a fashion the kids found to be entertaining.



The next day, we asked the girls what they wanted to do. Without hesitation, “Ride a double decker bus and an 18 meter bus.” We were able to work that into the plan with the double decker taking us to St. Paul’s Cathedral (where one girl had a 40 minute nose bleed) and catching an 18 m bus (one of the extended flexible mid-section buses) when the boys were in bed. So that day we did the outside of Tower Bridge, Tower of London, St. Paul’s, Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, Parliament, the Eye, and Kensington Gardens. We spent the longest time at the Diana Princess of Wales Playground, the most amazing playground we have ever been to.

The baby spent most of the trip in the backpack which has carried all four kids to many interesting places. He didn’t complain too much, but he was probably still reeling from the pain of getting a granola bar ripped out of his throat by parents’ hoping to save to his life.



Oh yeah, he also had a low grade fever the entire trip. Sadly, this made him lethargic and easier to have along.

The train back was at first horrible. The car we had reserved seats in was about 100°F. Then, they announced that the AC was broken in the car and we should move to a different car. This gave us a trip home in First class as you can see on the seat back (if you are able to see past the hair).

“n I coulda blogged if it wasn’t for those meddlin’ kids!”

I want to post things here. It’s fun. Not fun like blowing something up or a rollercoaster, but fun nonetheless. However, I went back to Iowa a few times, and the blogging died with each trip. It shouldn’t be surprising that when I brought these wonderful people (I love them all, I really do) back with me to Scotland that the blogging would fall considerably on the priority list. Also, kids in a whisky bar attract unwanted attention. I haven’t sipped a drop since their arrival. (Well, that’s not perfectly honest; I did exploit the airline status upgrade and drink Dewar’s on the flight to Utah).

I have thought to myself that I owe it to my fan(s) to post things and I want to do so. I just need a new approach. As the priority dropped for blogging, so shall the quality! I think I will try to get ten minutes out of my fingers every day or so. I am going to try that now for a bit and hope it all works out.

Flat update: all the work inside is complete, they gave me £500 back from our deposit, and they are looking into giving us 10 days rent. I think they are getting off easy. By the way, a flat is an apartment.

So, we went to London, I went to Utah for three weeks, we went to the Beach, we got Iterative Hard Thresholding running on a GPU, and more. I’ll start with some snippets about those things, but hey, my ten minutes is up.

Happy Anniversary to my parents.

The Angry Journey, Part III

We’re finally on our flight to Edinburgh, the boys in car seats with me in the middle, the three ladies in the row in front of us. With some work, the baby falls asleep as people board the plane. The clock is ticking. We need to get off the ground to start the seven hour flight since the baby may not have seven hours of sleep in his plans. Instead, the passengers board and the door is closed. Fifteen minutes pass and the plane finally backs up. It taxis a bit and the safety briefing takes place. Then there is an announcement that we are tenth for takeoff and should be off the ground in twenty minutes. Forty five minutes later, the plane finally accelerates and lifts off. This was another highlight of the journey as the kids were fabulous, both boys sleeping for the vast majority of the flight. I even caught about ninety minutes of sleep.

We land, clear immigration, and collect our baggage. Surprisingly, all thirteen pieces of luggage arrives. This is blessing and a curse. On our own, how are Amy and I going to move this immense amount of luggage and the children? We knew this problem would arise, but I had no real plan. So the oldest pushes the baby in the stroller, while Amy and I each push an overloaded luggage cart while pulling another overloaded luggage cart. At one point, a kind Scotsman takes pity on Amy and pushes her cart all the way to the taxi queue. The six seater taxis refuse to take us with the luggage. Two five seater taxis agree to take us, fully loading one taxi with luggage and the putting some luggage in the other. I ride with the loaded cab while the rest of the family rides in the other. In the taxi, I call and text the property manager to meet us at the flat with the keys. Remember, we’re arriving roughly 23 hours later than planned.

At the flat, we unload the luggage, pay the £52 ($78) in cab fare and move the luggage into the overgrown front garden. The state of the garden lets me know that the immense amount of work that was supposed to be done before our arrival was likely not complete. Also, there is no one present with keys and the agent isn’t answering his phone. To top it all off, the kids are in summer clothes, but it is roughly 45°F. Amy unpacks some jackets, but the cold children are tired and not thrilled with the Edinburgh summer. The six year old tells me, “This is all your fault.” True enough.

A few more phone calls and keys arrive after roughly an hour. Yeah, we’re inside our temporary home. Precisely none of the promised work is completed. If I have the energy, I might comment on all that, but the fact is the flat turns into a construction zone and remains one today.

To take the family anywhere, we’ll need the van I bought us before heading home. I walk the mile to where the van is parked, but guess what? It doesn’t start. I walk to the Heatherlea, get the bike I bought, and ride back to the Blackford flat. “Good news,” I tell Amy when she answers my knocking. “My bike works.” The car was jumped later that day, I moved it to Blackford, and told the family to get ready to go to the store. When we loaded up, the van was dead again. (It would be three days before the battery was replaced.) We all get out and walk one and one half miles to the grocery store. If you are roughly three feet tall, that’s a long walk.

So that was my family’s introduction to Scotland. Not exactly what I had planned.

The Angry Journey, Part II

Now, we have reservations at Crowne Plaza and vouchers for that hotel. So we wait for the shuttle to Crowne Plaza. And we wait. And we call. And we wait, and forty minutes later the Crowne Plaza shuttle stops and opens it doors. We scamper up to board and Emmanuel, the driver blocks the doorway and asks if we have vouchers. We do. “Don’t get on the shuttle, we don’t have any rooms for vouchers,” he tells me. Again, the law against homicide gets more justification. I tell him we have reservations and to call the hotel. So he does. Guess what? They have never heard of us. So Crowne Plaza literally won’t let us come to the hotel; we’re hosed.

It’s midnight and we are waiting with roughly one hundred fifty people for hotel shuttles, but we don’t have a reservation. There is much crying amongst the children and little bit inside Amy and I. Amy goes inside to work the phones while I held the baby and went up to every shuttle driver, forcing them to call their hotel to see if they have a room. Twenty more minutes and Hampton’s driver says there are no rooms anywhere. I tell her to make the call a few times and she does. Then, to both of our surprise, she says get in. She takes us to the Hampton at roughly one in the morning. The clerk is happy that just before we called, someone who had reserved two rooms only checked in to one so there is one last room. We check in. Guess what? They won’t honor the vouchers since they are made out to Crowne Plaza. So that’ll be $179.00. Fine, give us the room.

We get our key and he writes down 318. We go to 318 and the card won’t open the door. In fact, the light it shows is yellow. That seems bad. I return to the desk where the clerk verifies that we should be in room 318 and re-codes the key card. So I try again, squeezing past a balling oldest child who is so tired all she can do is cry. As I aggressively yank on the door handle, the door opens and the lady says, “This isn’t your room.” I can’t really argue with her homesteading, so I return to the desk. Confused the clerk decides that they were sent to the wrong room and should really be in 319. So we got keys to 319. It worked.

With the oldest unable to stop crying, no one seemed excited about six people sharing two queen beds, but everyone finally got in bed, everyone except the baby. He was apparently unimpressed with the room and his parents, so he and I went for a nice walk inside the security gates of this Newark hotel, with the armed security guard patrolling the tiny parking lot in a SUV. We walked around for about fifteen minutes and he finally fell asleep (the baby, not the security guard). We returned to the room and I left him to sleep in the stroller. Essentially, everyone got to sleep just after 2am.

The late night meant we slept through the free breakfast. The children blamed me for this, with one little girl saying, “Dad, next time don’t sleep so much so we can eat breakfast.” There is no restaurant we can walk to as Newark is not so pedestrian friendly near the airport. We have about ten hours until our flight. After much debating and a fair amount of PBS Kids, we decide that the airport and our good vouchers is the best way to spend the rest of the day.

We return the airport, take the circus through security again, and attempt to get reimbursed for our hotel stay. Continental shows off its customer service climate by simply telling us they can’t do anything about it so we have to file a complaint online. The number of people who would shut us down immediately rather than discuss this us was incredible. At one point I told a customer service agent that it was a shame United would be polluting its excellent customer service with Continental employees. Her response was something about being a good airline, to which I explained that absolutely no one was attempting to demonstrate this to us. She stopped talking to me. Here again, if homicide were legal…

At least we have food vouchers. We go to an airport restaurant and order some drinks. “Do you have cups with lids?” They don’t but we order apple juice anyway for all three cup drinking children. They bring 32oz bar cups to the table. Before I can tell the three-year-old not touch his juice, he’s wet, crying, and has no more apple juice.

Anyway, we spend hours in the airport with two highlights. The first was watching Amy’s animation when on the phone with Continental Headquarters customer service regarding our hotel. They told her to file a complaint online. Boneheads! The second was the ridiculous stroke of luck regarding the six-year-old and a certain book. She had read every single Junie B Jones book except one because we couldn’t get it at home. Amy bought it for her in St. Louis. This being her first flight, the poor kid had left it in the seatback pocket of the aircraft. Why would I let her do such a thing? Because I didn’t take the time to help them get ready to de-plane, as we were supposed to rapidly get off and catch the cart supplied by the concierge. Instead, I just told them to stuff all of their things into their backpacks and get off quickly. We went to a bookstore in the airport and they of course did not have the book. But, I had time to kill, so I made the poor girl behind the counter call every other bookstore in the airport. On call number three, we found this book and I took the kids on a walk across the terminal to go buy it. This was my one shining moment on the trip where my children weren’t also considering the legality of offing me.

As it approaches 8 pm, it’s time to spend some more voucher money and eat a bit before boarding our overnight flight.