This year I stayed in England for Christmas, much to my mother’s dismay. But, really, what does she care? She couldn’t even get my presents here on time. Just kidding, Mom. The poor lady will never use USPS again to ship me things. For over a week my presents were stuck somewhere between the borders of the U.S. and the U.K. surprisingly out of reach to both carriers. So, long story short, I finally got my gear, but my mother can’t get a refund because neither country is assuming responsibility. But the gifts were great. I got a cool “Liger” shirt, some Sudoku, maddening Sudoku puzzles, “March of the Penguins,” the orginal “Nutty Professor,” the first season of “Lost,” AND pretzels! Yummy pretzels. Anyway, back to the story at hand. I’ll try to keep it short, but bear with me, there is much to tell.
Christmas Eve found me on a bus to London where, upon my arrival, I found myself a pub and had a pint. Good start to the holiday. From there I met up with Derek and Kelly, my hosts for Christmas. So nice of them, though after meeting Kelly’s parents I think they wanted me there to run a little interference. Her parents are great, especially her mother, but her father can be a bit, well, headstrong. And so can Kelly so… you can see where I was going with that one.
Moving on, after getting there, the girls (Kelly and her mother) went shopping, leaving the boys to walk around town snapping photos. I got some amazing photos walking down along the Thames, across the Tower Bridge
, and into the City of London. The City of London is the financial district of London, where all the money is at, but the people aren’t. At least on the weekends they’re not, leaving us pretty much the entire area to ourselves. 
It was great. 
My favorite shot from that night, I think, is one of the “Egg” at night using my new wide angle lens.
Christmas morning was great. We slept in and then, after Kelly’s parents arrived, presents! They even got me some, which was not necessary, but much appreciated. One of the presents was “Hangover Tea.” How cool. I spent most of the morning snapping some photos for them, and then we went to THE most expensive Christmas dinner ever. Something like 50 pounds per person (that’s about $90 to you yanks). It was a good meal, though, and I’d say well worth it. 
We walked back through Trafalgar Square and caught a taxi back to Derek and Kelly's. The rest of the night was pretty much a wash spent making delicious cookies (and eating them). That evening I took a call from my family back in the States. All of them. Well, most of them anyway. Apparently I picked the year that they all had dinner at my parents. I got to talk to my mother, my step-father, my sister, 2 of her 4 kids, my granmother, my pappy, AND my Aunt and Uncle. It was a long call. But they loved my photographs, due in large part to the wonderful job Kristen did framing them. Thanks, Kristen.The following day I left the family to their devices and walked around a bit on my own, hitting places like the Marble Arch
and Regent’s Park, before heading to meet the gang on the north end of town. Derek and Kelly bought everyone tickets to see the Chronic, what, cles of Narnia at this great theater that had couches and served beer and liquor, similar to the Drafthouse but much more upscale. That night we stopped in at Derek and Kelly’s local Irish haunt for a few pints before calling it a night, since I had to meet up with Kristen in the morning. Joy! I’ll write more about that later, but I hope you enjoyed the story so far.
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