The Willimers in America

Wecome to the Huggins

My bad. Again. The Huggins came to stay with us over Christmas, which was now nearly three weeks ago, and I may not be able to do justice to it here, given the state of my short-term memory.

Sally, Roger and the girls arrived on the day after Christmas Day - that's Boxing Day to you, mate - (but not here). We'd checked online, and knew their flight was running a few hours late. So as we drove south through Philadelphia along Route 95, we were scanning the skies to see if we could see their plane landing. Tom spotted a plane descending over Lincoln Financial Field (The Eagles stadium) and we wondered if they were on board. Two miles on, and much closer to the airport, a British Airways 737 glided gently towards the runway, just alongside us - so close we could almost look into the cabin windows. 'That's their plane' we said.

Sally and Roger are the first English visitors we've had for some time, so we were really looking forward to entertaining, catching up on gossip from overseas, and of course, we were looking forward to the chocolate and teabags. On Tuesday, we re-did Christmas Day with a full table of guests. Sally had packed Christmas crackers, we had a 20lb turkey which lasted us the rest of the week, and we settled down to watch 'Elf', the perfect Christmas movie.

Next day, we set out for Philadelphia again. Sally had asked us to find out whether there might be somewhere where we could all go skating, and a friend of ours had told us about the Blue Cross River Rink at Penn's Landing. This was right on the banks of the Delaware, and quite picturesque. Tom thinks he is really good at skating, but this largely because he makes up for any shortfall in technique with a absolute unshakeable determination not to fall over, and not to give up even if he does. After a few minutes of refreshing his skills, he is tearing round the ice at (almost literally) 'breakneck' speed. Of course when he falls, he almost bounces. When I tripped on the front of my skates, I fell like a sack of spuds and crashed my knees into the rock-hard ice. Even now, three weeks later, my left knee is still raw and tender. We had lunch at Dave & Busters in Franklin Mills, where Bridget systematically worked her way through every last morsel on her plate (including the lettuce leaf) and I gave the girls $10 worth of tokens to play the machines, and Martha showed a worryingly precocious talent for successfully dropping said tokens into a slot machine in return for winning coupons.

After an entire day hitting the malls for shopping, we went to New York on the day before New Year's Eve. After an abortive attempt to visit the Empire State Building, where the lines were enormous, we did some of the less obvious things, including some things that Linda and I had not done before. We jumped in a cab, and drove upto the west side of Central Park, to see the Dakota Building where John Lennon was shot, and then visited the Strawberry Fields Memorial in Central Park. After a long and slightly circular walk through the Park, we ended up at the Central Park Zoo, and spent a delightful hour or two there, trying unsuccessfully to find Alex, Marty, Melman and Gloria.

We were also unsuccessful in having lunch at the Carnegie Deli, and recreating our previous 12 inch high sandwich lunch for Roger's benefit. Instead we had lunch at Lindy's, home of the famous Lindy's Cheesecake (at least the sign said so, for the benefit of the tourists), and then made our way down to Times Square and Toys R Us, the biggest toy store in the world. Perhaps we should have been a little more far-sighted, but we were a bit taken by surprise by the huge number of people around, and it started to get a bit intimidating for the kids, who couldn't really see very much. Once we had done the business in Toys R Us, we struck out for Penn Station and the train home - at which point Martha burst into tears, and we found out that 'the one thing she wanted to do in America was see the Statue of Liberty'. By now it was late, dark and cold, and it was not going to happen that night. But I felt so bad that she was upset - and next day I promised to drive the girls upto Liberty State Park, from where we could at least see fantastic views of Liberty, as well as the lower Manhattan skyline. I also got to play with the new camera lens I had bought for Linda for Christmas.

Various photos here.

We were invited to our friends the Spragues for New Years Eve, and though it was a welcome invitation, much like previous years we felt a bit surplus to requirements, since most everyone else were close friends and neighbours. When the ancient school yearbook came out, and everyone looked for their own picture and their classmates, we knew it would soon be time to leave, and using the kids as an excuse, we left soon after watching the ball drop in Times Square. Martha was already asleep in Roger's arms, and the others were asleep soon after we got in.

Next day was departure day, but there was one last ritual to perform. Diner Breakfast. After four years here, we now have a very refined methodology of choosing the right one for our visitors. The Metro on the way to Flemington is great, but not for breakfast, because the pancakes are floury. Amwell Diner is all authentic chrome and leather (not quite as authentic as the Americana in West Windsor) but the food is not that good and the service is worse. For quirky, we go to Jimmy's on Route 29 south of Lambertville to look at the circus pictures. But most times, the quality of the food takes it, and we end up at the Red Oak Diner on Route 206. We watched as all three kids intelligently and politely ordered their food, and studiously polished off everything while we were able to look back over the week. I dropped the Huggins and their many new purchases at Philadelphia Airport ready for the flight home, and all was quiet, back at the ranch.

In the nicest possible way, it was almost a relief to get back to work for a break - the whole Christmas period (especially the run-up) had been hardwork and full of stress. But we do so enjoy having people to stay, and we talked several times about how we missed the sense of awe and wonder that visitors get from all sorts of sources - different kinds of roadsigns, eating in diners, the trip on the train (and explaining to Roger how the conductors do their job). We miss that, but we do get vicarious enjoyment from sharing it with others. So - do us a favour and think about a visit, eh ?

My New Snowblower

Being a homeowner now, I feel my resistance to the acquisition of the trappings of the American Dream slowly slipping away. And if you're a regular reader here, you'll know that there was very little doubt that the first step was going to be the purchase of a seriously serious snowblower. It took one simple forecast of a four inch snowfall to galvanise me into action. I am now the proud owner of a Craftsman 6.5 HP Briggs & Stratton OHP powered snowblower with a 24 inch path and two-stage action. And very nice it is, too.

The trouble with Thanksgiving...

The Thanksgiving Holiday has a very...unique quality to it. I'm avoiding the word 'strange' because I'm certain it's just strange to us - both as outsiders, but also because Thanksgiving is about families, and ours are 4000 miles away.

There is no huge build-up to Thanksgiving, like there is to Christmas. It just rolls up, and everyone returns to their families, often travelling huge distances to do so. There is always a full program of American Football on TV, probably so that all those families who see each other rarely and don't know what to say have something to talk about.

I don't think Thanksgiving is strange or indeed that these family reunions are insincere. But for us they present a problem. We have had a number of invitations over the years, but we've often felt like cuckoos in the heart of someone else's holiday. One year we took ourselves off to New York to watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade. This year we are at Niagara Falls, crossing another US landmark off our list. Expect lots of pictures here in the next few days...

Thomas the Soccer Star

After two years of non-competitive soccer, this fall Thomas signed up for 'Rec Soccer' a proper regular season competition followed by play-offs. In the early days, the coach was conscientious about giving all the boys a turn in all the positions on the field, and the rate at which the kids took up the lessons of position and tactics was frustrating.

However as the season progressed, without exception they have all developed, learnt to play as a team, and most have grown comfortable in one position or other on the field. Tom is a striker. Out and out centre forward, and has been scoring goals regularly. After the regular season he has averaged better than one goal every other game, and has scored in 4 of the last 5. Last week he scored the winner in the first play-off game, and we're looking forward to this weekend, when his team take on the semi-final and, hopefully, the final (or 'championship game' as they call it here).

For a brief glimpse of his undoubted talent (says his proud Dad) check out this clip  - hopefully it won't take too long to download.

Autumn Leaves

Since we've been here, we've often commented on doing 'New England in the fall' - that is, touring round Messachusetts, or Rhode Island or even Vermont while the leaves on the trees turn multiple shades of red and gold. Actually, New Jersey (known as the Garden State) is very rural and doesn't do badly for spectacular autumn vistas. All around us there are hillsides covered with an infinite variety of autumn colours, and occasionally one or two stand-out vibrant red trees. Just down the road, on the site of a deserted ramshackle farm, there's an avenue of tall trees, and right in the centre is a ball of autumn fire. And our garden is quite impressive too !

Through the fall, Linda and I have been waking up to see this (see left) fantastic display of flaming red leaves outside our window. It's been both and inspiration and a measure of the passing of the seasons. Then this week, literally within 36 hours, almost every leaf dropped. Winter is upon us, and I really, really need to go and buy that snowblower...