Nott What You'd Expected...

Gramps and Gran hit London

This past weekend was a call back. A nostalgic trip down memory lane, a time when (if circumstances allowed) an otherwise normal trip to Sams Club or running errands in middle school turned into.... wait for it...... An Only Child experience.

Maybe this isn't exciting for people who were born (I almost said 'blessed', but let's face it, my siblings kick ass) with no brothers or sisters, but when family Christmas card photos look more like awkward 1950s class pictures (sans lame glasses), a torrent of attention is sometimes hard to come by...

Enter G-rents. Three/Four days of solid Kevin Love. Solid Britsperience. Solid Tube riding, Neapolitan Ice Cream eating, SkyNews watching, Hilton Breakfast Buffet gorging, Times reading fun.

Making a mad dash from British Novel at 12:15 on Friday (keeping in mind Grandpa's cryptic 'oh wow, have we got a story for you' cliffhanger from a phone conversation the night before), I met up with them and showed them Nottingham's favorite out of town tourist pub/dining attraction.....(you could guess it by now)..... Pitcher and Piano.

Over an overly expensive Authentic British Meal, I was regaled with the story of Grandma's phantom blood clot, Grandpa's suitcase amnesia, a few mad dashes to and from the airport, and a sleepless flight over the Atlantic- all alleviated by a Hilton upgrade and a first class train ride up to Notts...

A tea with the flatmates (courtesy of Anna and her amazing homemade scones), a nice chat with Mark and Carol, and we were on our way..... It was hilarious to sit back and let them go- just fly with old stories, recapping Grandpa's leaving Grandma's luggage in the snow an hour from O'Hare, etc- I could look at them and my flatmates/directors and see where this tangent-filled, exaggeration-filled brain comes from.

Exaggeration hit new heights during our late train back to London. I'm not sure, perhaps it's a universal craving for attention and acceptance, but something about British people and one-line introductions seems to act as a catalyst for hour long conversations. Cab drivers, confused Miami Dolphin fans on the tram, and in this case, weird guys on the train- all seem to react to normal pleasantries with the same fervor that one might respond to the statement "Tell me your life story or I will slit your throat.....you have two hours... the clock starts now..."

To simplify (that is, to reduce 2 hours into 4 sentences...) His name was Joe or John. He was, as we could tell, either the most intelligent and qualified human being on the planet or one of the most mentally deranged people I've ever had the pleasure of speaking to.
Think Leonardo DiCaprio in Catch Me if you Can meets Kevin Spacey in Usual Suspects meets Danny Devito in real life.....

His attributes/accomplishments (as described by him) included: Cancer Survivor (5 years), Exec in Research and Development at Pilsbury, Locomotive conductor/researcher/designer/instructor, researcher, doctoral thesis writer (that is, almost done with his doctorate), Engineer, etc. Not to be outdone, his 2 year old granddaugher could disassemble a bicycle, and he once drove across the United States. Needless to say, we were enraptured.

An early bedtime with promises of Harrods and a show lulled us to a peaceful slumber. That and my introduction of Sufjan Stevens to Gramps and Gram- the song about John Wayne Gacey was a little unnerving, but no nightmares could match with the chainsawlike snoring that kept us up all night.
We discovered a statue of Lincoln, visited travel centres, took countless pictures, and visited the London Eye. The views were amazing, and aside from two young photographers carting 8 thousand dollar cameras around the capsule, it was relatively obstruction-free...

At night we braved our heavily Lebanese neighborhood (complete with Hookah bars at every turn) to find a pub, coincidentally owned by a British ExPat who was at one time a Chicago real estate agent for Century 21. Go figure.

We hit up Food City, turned on the tube (Top Gear, a show about cars) and Gramps crashed, emitting his buzzsawlike snores within seconds. He awoke for a 9/11 Conspiracy show, then crashed again while Grandma and I took in some Gladiator.
Last Day in London (for me, G&G still have 7 more....)- After calling in sick for my now week-old job, we hit the streets of London for a fact-filled Bus Tour.
Carletta as our host, we were whisked away to St. Paul's Cathedral and the Changing of the Guard, while passing through Kensington Gardens, Hyde Park, past St James Park, countless Prince Albert memorials, a few dozen Victoria statues, and Big Ben a few times....

As stereotypically lame as bus tours (most often loaded with (Old Pensioners or Asians) are supposed to be, it's the best way to learn quirky facts and see a ton of the city that might go unseen. For as many times as I've been to London (not to brag, but 5 or 6 sounds about right)... I've always found it easy to navigate on the tubes.. Driving around above ground, it's crazy how connected things are, not to mention how frigging huge the city is. Wow. I wasn't overwhelmed at all until taking the tour today..... London is massive.

The Changing of the guards illustrated the pomp and circumstance that still surrounds this nation- steeped (tea pun?) in tradition...


It was great to see G&G, and so strange to pause every once in a while and think 'We are in London. These are my grandparents. This is cool'... sometimes things seem so surreal that it's hard to sit back and get some perspective.

It was amazing having them here, especially touristing it up in London and really getting a feel for what Nottingham is like- as unglamorous in comparison, but a huge part of my experience here-

________
Work tomorrow, Charles Dickens to read, Plane tickets home to buy, Spring break to plan, iTunes to fix, flat meetings to attend. Life doesn't slow down just because two sweet G-rents come to town...

posted by Kevin @ 4:49 PM