Not quite the Thames, but...

... a walk along the side of Austin's Town Lake a few days ago did bring back some memories.

The lake is a reservoir on the Colorado River that flows through town. Believe me, no Texas rivers are this wide in their natural state!

The photo above is of the Lamar Street bridge, taken from the brand-new pedestrian bridge that was the object of our walk. It's a very nice, wide, structure, that was being used by lots of Austinites on the pleasant, sunny day. And it doesn't "wobble" a bit!

Here's a look down its solid structure, facing north:


And here are some more photos taken from it:

looking over the elegant spiral ramp leading from the riverside to the bridge, you get a great view of downtown Austin from the west...

I doubt you'd ever see graffiti, or even street art, like this on a Thames bridge, but, folks are a little wacky in Austin (click on the image to see it large enough to read)...

There's a series of bridges across the lake that I, for some reason, neglected to photograph in a row from the pedestrian crossing. But on the right is the underside of one of the most famous: the Congress Avenue "bat" bridge. We saw the bats emerge from here on a trip many years ago, and it's an amazing experience.

Unfortunately, it was the wrong time of day (and the wrong season) for us to see them on this outing. But we think we heard some peeping as we walked under the bridge...

I expect that you wouldn't be able to see anything like the blooming tree (a pear, perhaps?) on the left anywhere near the Thames right now.

But even given all the differences between this jaunt and the many I took along the Thames while I was in London, it did bring back pleasant memories.

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To read about the main reason for my trip to Austin, check my Hometown Tourist blog.

An English Christmas

It's been two years, and three Christmases, since I left London. But I still pine for it, and for almost all things English.

Santa was listening this year, and I got three English-themed gifts:


I've been enjoying my new:

• puzzle, showing the Tower Bridge then and now, along with a bit of the Thames embankment on the far shore
• electric tea kettle...why did I wait so long to get one of these?! the tea it makes is amazing!
• England calendar, whose lovely scenes I'm looking forward displaying for the rest of the year in my office
  

I hope you all had as nice a Christmas, and that 2011 is off to a good start for you.

The Elephant Explained

On the way to Austin Saturday [to attend their satellite Rally to Restore Sanity—I'll be blogging about it later this week] I happened to hear this delightful interview with Sir Michael Caine on NPR.

I would have enjoyed the interview anyway, but what really caught my ear was Sir Michael's explanation of the curious name used to describe the neighborhood where he grew up. I recently had occasion to recall it when I ate at a Washington, D.C. pub that cribbed the name.

It's the Elephant and Castle, and I'd always wondered where the name came from, how two such disparate nouns got combined in the name of a pub, tube station, and neighborhood.

Of course, I could have googled it before, as I did this morning, and found different explanations. (Here's one that refutes Caine's.) But it was much more fun hearing him discuss it. He even plays on this great name in the title of his new memoir, which he was plugging on the radio: The Elephant to Hollywood. Clever, eh?

This looks familiar...

On a recent business trip to Washington, D.C., I visited a new (to me) museum: the National Portrait Gallery. It's a neat museum and I got to see almost all of the exhibits before my legs—and brain—gave out.

The tour reminded me of our rather brief visit to the British NPG, but the sight that really got my London reminiscence juices flowing was the sight of the covered central court (see above). Doesn't it look like the Great Court at the British Museum? (You can see pictures that I took there at the bottom of this page.)

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And that wasn't my only London-themed memory on the trip.

The next evening I had dinner at this DC eatery, the first time I'd seen the phrase "Elephant and Castle" outside of London.

Apparently it's a chain of pubs with locations all over the country (none in Texas, however, which accounts for my surprise). I didn't have fish and chips there, although I was tempted. I went instead with a local specialty, crab cakes.

But I did tip my cap, or mug, or whatever, to my London days by having a Magners cider, which I was happy to find on the menu.

This became my standard pub order when we would head down to the local O'Neill's to watch a soccer game or just have dinner. Of course, there at the corner of Redcliffe Gardens and Old Brompton Road, the Magners was on draft. But I must make do with what's available on this side of the pond. Unfortunately.

Pints and pub food

Something reminds me of my time in London almost every day, but we really had a London-type experience last evening. The only difference was the football they were playing with on the TV in the "pub" was the wrong shape.

Well, maybe not everything else was the same. We were actually at a brewery, that has a pub on the side, and I don't remember visiting any of those in London. Specifically, Blue Star brewery, one of our kids' favorite places to visit when they come home.

We weren't watching the aforementioned football, either, as we opted to eat outside on the patio (another non-London touch). And we were on the banks of the San Antonio River, not the Thames.

But Henry and I shared a delicious plate of fish-and-chips! As good as any I had in London. (Although I missed the mushy peas, the cole slaw on the plate instead was excellent. I know I should have taken a photo of the food, JaPRA, but I didn't think of it until it was gone!)

And we had pints of beer. I know I drank more beer in London than I usually do at home, simply because it's what one does in pubs. Although I would often substitute cider, one of the many culinary discoveries I made while in England. But I do occasionally indulge here, especially when we have guests, like Hal and Carey, spending a few days with us while their Austin house's bathroom gets re-tiled.

Along with the beer and food, we had an enjoyable, relaxing evening of conversation. And, given the high bsq [beer snob quotient] of the younger generation, a good bit of the conversation revolved around the beer we were drinking. The aspect that most interested me, however, was the size of our servings.

I thought my glass held more than the ½ pints I usually ordered in London, which led us into a long discussion of the relative sizes of British and American pints. H&C have had beer all over the world and so there was a lot of experience to draw upon, if not actual evidence. But I was practically convinced that either 1) my memory was faulty, or 2) that I was misled by the size/shape of the glasses.

However, internet research has proved me right! According to this well-researched and referenced Wikipedia article, British pints contain 568 milliliters, while American pints have 473. I also found this historical account, which includes the same figures, plus several others.

A pint, by any other name, or size, would still taste as good. But I was glad to find some hard figures to quantify yet another difference between my life here and now and how I lived during my "Dream Season."

A good result

I got to watch England play soccer in a pub again today!

Now, it was a slightly different experience than the last time. That was in September, 2008, in the Gloucester Arms, in the Gloucester Road. For the duration of that match, I was standing in a crowd of English supporters (supplemented by myself and some of my sports class students)—and I mean a crowd, dense enough to make it hard to hang on to your beer.

Today, it was a much less hectic scene, and arriving at the establishment 45 minutes before game time got us a front row seat. (Unlike at the Gloucester Arms, when all the seats must have been taken long before then!)


However, the fact that an American food and beverage establishment, here in the heart of gridiron football territory, advertised World Cup broadcasts, offered game-drink-specials, and—eventually—drew a nice crowd, means that real football is a lot more popular here than it was even just a few years ago.

This wasn't just any England game, either, but the first time in 60 years that they'd played us—as in USA-us—in a World Cup match. (Readers of this blog might remember my report on the draw that set up this epic encounter.) An exciting, but also somewhat disorienting, situation for Anglophile soccer fans such as myself.

How to behave at such a match? I've never rooted against either of these teams! Normally, though, I do like to root for underdogs, which made it easier for me to acceptably patriotic and shout USA! USA! USA! with gusto. I want it recorded, however, that I did stand for both national anthems.

As it turned out, the game ended with a great result, from my point of view, at least. It was a draw. Both teams got a point to aid in qualifying for the knock-out stages, and hopefully both of them will get to keep playing far into the tournament. And then, who knows?! We might not have to wait 60 years for another re-match!

Flashback

I have good London flashbacks all the time, like any time the Tower Bridge is in a commercial, or when I hear the "news music" on BBC America (which I watch more than I used to!).

But going to and from Buffalo, New York, for a librarians' conference this week, I had flashbacks of another kind, triggered by many hours spent in the Newark airport. Some of my faithful readers might remember our somewhat nightmarish return to the states in December, 2008, which involved an uncomfortable overnight in good ol' EWR.

This year I wasn't there any longer than I was supposed to be, but just happened to have long layovers there both coming and going. No food vouchers this time around, though, and I swear the recurring security announcement that I came to loathe when trying to sleep is broadcast in the same voice! If I ever meet that woman, I won't be responsible for my actions!

In addition to the familiarity of the security voice, an uncanny thing happened when my Houston-Newark flight unloaded, and I stepped into the terminal for the first time. For just a split second, the smell of the place triggered a rather sharp Proustian response. It didn't last, and, I hasten to add, the smell isn't unpleasant, but it was a very strange and unexpected little jolt from the primitive wiring 'way down in the reptilian brain.

There's no avoiding airport layovers, I guess, especially when traveling somewhere as out-of-the-way as Buffalo, but next time I might try to find a flight with layovers somewhere else. I've had enough of Newark.