Leaving Wisbech
Well, all that knitting content last time nearly gave poor Rachael a heart attack, so I'll tone it down this time. But I am looking forward to being able to post a photo of how much I've gotten done on the back right panel of "Margaret Tudor." I'm nearly ready to cast off and decrease for the armscye.
A traveling day today -- I'm done here in Wisbech, and slated to get to Northampton. How? Taxi to Peterborough, direct train to Northampton.
This taxi ride will be cheaper than the ride from Ely, even though it's further -- it's further as the crows fly, and I won't be taking one of those -- cause there's a highway that goes directly there. Ha! (Those of you who were concerned that the Ely taxi driver was being nefarious; nah. Ely's ten miles if you're not driving on actual roads. Fenland roads. Through the fens*. Or, rather, what used to be the fens. And is still called the fens. To get here more cheaply, I'd have needed to change trains. Ely was as close as I could get, direct from King's Cross. Anyway. I'm a backseat driver from America, and I'm not at the wheel of control. And I'm guilty, and I'm war, and I'm the root of all evil -- Lord, and I can't drive on the left side of the road. So. I take what I get.)
I will tell you many things about Northampton, if I can get on the Internet, which I do not know at the moment, when I get there. I will, at that time, discuss the former 18th C racetrack across the street from the B&B, and why it is one cannot walk from ANYWHERE to the shire record office.
But what I mostly want to use my Internet space for at the moment is whinging about my clothes. I hate my clothes. I liked them when I bought them, which I did precisely for this trip, but now I hate them. I have a set of easily washed plastic clothes which I bought from TravelSmith. I have one pair of black pants, one khaki skirt, one red t-shirt, one black t-shirt, one black longsleeved t-shirt, one black and khaki big overshirt. With these clothes I can easily get through a week of coordinated outfits. I can wash things in the sink, and wear them the next day. I am bored out of my mind.
I was fantisizing last night about some of the clothes I left behind. I miss my long blue dress with the little mirrors. I think I own some jeans. Also. Cute sandals. Oh, there's a red shirt I miss, and a green dress I miss. I think some various things in yellow. Maybe I made that part up, about the yellow. But I would wear it if I had it.
Less than two weeks of these clothes left. After that, they go in a drawer till October, when I travel to more conferences. As travel clothes, they are brilliant. As an entire wardrobe for a month, they are the pits.
********************
*Rachael wants to know about the fens, and wishes not to google them. Honey, just for you! The fens are gone now, except for some wildlife preserves where bits of them were kept so that one could go and look at them. They were vast tracts of marshland, easily flooded (in fact, even though the water's drained, the area still floods easily). There are other places in England that had tracts of fens, but the biggest area was the Wash, which ran from Boston, in Lincolnshire, through Wisbech and Ely, in Cambridgeshire, and on into Lynn (now King's Lynn) in Norfolk. The area had some roads, though they weren't always negotiable; the area had -- and still has -- an intricate system of waterways, some natural, some made by humans (starting with the Romans) -- used for transport and travel. It's very flat. If, like me, you grew up in New Mexico, it's a place that's very comfortable, cause it's one of the few places in England where you have a Big Sky. In the middle ages, and on until the fens were drained by the Dutch engineers brought in for the purpose starting at the end of the 17th century, the economy was based on fishing and fowling; sedge from the fens was used for fuel. A good novel set in the fens is Graham Swift's Waterland. I love the fens. I'm sorry to be leaving the area. Wish I could have stayed longer this trip. But now, I'm off to the Midlands. Which are also great! I'm not dissing the Midlands!
A traveling day today -- I'm done here in Wisbech, and slated to get to Northampton. How? Taxi to Peterborough, direct train to Northampton.
This taxi ride will be cheaper than the ride from Ely, even though it's further -- it's further as the crows fly, and I won't be taking one of those -- cause there's a highway that goes directly there. Ha! (Those of you who were concerned that the Ely taxi driver was being nefarious; nah. Ely's ten miles if you're not driving on actual roads. Fenland roads. Through the fens*. Or, rather, what used to be the fens. And is still called the fens. To get here more cheaply, I'd have needed to change trains. Ely was as close as I could get, direct from King's Cross. Anyway. I'm a backseat driver from America, and I'm not at the wheel of control. And I'm guilty, and I'm war, and I'm the root of all evil -- Lord, and I can't drive on the left side of the road. So. I take what I get.)
I will tell you many things about Northampton, if I can get on the Internet, which I do not know at the moment, when I get there. I will, at that time, discuss the former 18th C racetrack across the street from the B&B, and why it is one cannot walk from ANYWHERE to the shire record office.
But what I mostly want to use my Internet space for at the moment is whinging about my clothes. I hate my clothes. I liked them when I bought them, which I did precisely for this trip, but now I hate them. I have a set of easily washed plastic clothes which I bought from TravelSmith. I have one pair of black pants, one khaki skirt, one red t-shirt, one black t-shirt, one black longsleeved t-shirt, one black and khaki big overshirt. With these clothes I can easily get through a week of coordinated outfits. I can wash things in the sink, and wear them the next day. I am bored out of my mind.
I was fantisizing last night about some of the clothes I left behind. I miss my long blue dress with the little mirrors. I think I own some jeans. Also. Cute sandals. Oh, there's a red shirt I miss, and a green dress I miss. I think some various things in yellow. Maybe I made that part up, about the yellow. But I would wear it if I had it.
Less than two weeks of these clothes left. After that, they go in a drawer till October, when I travel to more conferences. As travel clothes, they are brilliant. As an entire wardrobe for a month, they are the pits.
********************
*Rachael wants to know about the fens, and wishes not to google them. Honey, just for you! The fens are gone now, except for some wildlife preserves where bits of them were kept so that one could go and look at them. They were vast tracts of marshland, easily flooded (in fact, even though the water's drained, the area still floods easily). There are other places in England that had tracts of fens, but the biggest area was the Wash, which ran from Boston, in Lincolnshire, through Wisbech and Ely, in Cambridgeshire, and on into Lynn (now King's Lynn) in Norfolk. The area had some roads, though they weren't always negotiable; the area had -- and still has -- an intricate system of waterways, some natural, some made by humans (starting with the Romans) -- used for transport and travel. It's very flat. If, like me, you grew up in New Mexico, it's a place that's very comfortable, cause it's one of the few places in England where you have a Big Sky. In the middle ages, and on until the fens were drained by the Dutch engineers brought in for the purpose starting at the end of the 17th century, the economy was based on fishing and fowling; sedge from the fens was used for fuel. A good novel set in the fens is Graham Swift's Waterland. I love the fens. I'm sorry to be leaving the area. Wish I could have stayed longer this trip. But now, I'm off to the Midlands. Which are also great! I'm not dissing the Midlands!
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