#england trip

[ohsilverplease]

journal entry

We had really heavy rains the other night, and a leak in my roof I thought was fixed...wasn't. And it dripped right down onto my charging roomba, which may never recover. The guy came today to check it out and said it will only be like $350 to patch, which is about half what I was prepared to shell out, and since I've made so much progress on paying off my debt I just...have that? In my checking account? (Getting a higher-paying job really did change my life.) Anyway he's gonna come fix it in the next few days.

Sunday is my birthday and I'm flying to England for a couple weeks with my parents and little brother. We have booked some really neat-looking places to stay -- an oceanfront apartment in the heart of Newquay, a garden apartment in Bath, rooms over a pub in Richmond. I think it's going to be a little more jam-packed activity-wise than I'd like, especially because we're doing a lot of repeats from Bath (Oxford, Stonehenge, Salisbury) because my dad hasn't seen all that. But it's been 8 years since we did all that, so it'll be nice anyway. And who am I kidding, I visit the same parts of London literally every time I visit (St. James's Park for example). AND last time we were in London there was scaffolding on Big Ben, so it will be nice for Dad to see it in all its glory.

I am looking forward to eating lots of fish and chips and lots of meringues and Sally Lunn's Bunns and that good bacon.

[davisexplainableart]

England Trip - Day 1 (WIP)

At long last, in honor of the 101 Dalmatian Street Twitter Trending Holiday, it’s about time I tell you guys what happened on my trip to England, starting on Day 1 (June 26)...

At the start of the day, me, Amethyst and Bloo were still on the plane to Camden Town. I was so scared of getting hurt whilst on the plane that I kept puking, which made Amethyst very uncomfortable.

Later, I had to teleport to the real world for a few activities (including lunch), so when Amethyst and Bloo arrived, they had to wait for me to come back before they went anywhere.

Eventually, I came back, and we decided to wait at the airport for a bus to get us to Camden. I believe Amethyst was the one to look over the money we needed for stuff like this.

While waiting, we decided to just talk about what we were gonna do in Camden. Soon enough, we manage to get on a bus to Camden, and decide to get off at what I believe is the center of Camden Town (according to Google Maps).

After looking around, the 3 of us decide to split up. We had booked an apartment somewhere in Camden and had used my teleportation device to get our bags over to there, so we decided that we’d meet up there later to talk about dinner.

I’m not sure what Amethyst and Bloo did, but what I did was go around looking for dogs. Why? Well because I had a summer project for art class that required us to do one half, and to have a canine partner (probably because of what dogs can do in the cartoon world) for the other half. The project was due the next day, and I’d been having no luck with finding any dogs that were willing to help work with me back in the states. I hoped that at least one dog in Camden would want to help me out.

Fortunately, Camden Town just so happened to be full of dogs, so this should’ve been easy... At least, it SHOULD’VE been.

I ran around Camden, asking dogs if they could help me, but they were either confused, or just uninterested.

Then there was that dog who was sleeping, and considering his size, I didn’t feel like bothering him. Then there was that white-furred Pomeranian, who just rudely ran away from me. At least say ‘no thanks’ or something, jeez!!

As the day goes on, I’m becoming more and more desperate for help. Eventually, I come across a trio of dogs. One of them I easily recognize as a pug. The others... not so sure. I think the one in front of them is a Corgi. But anyway, I run up to them and beg for help with this school project.

Okay, so yeah, I was talking to Clarissa. Of course she wouldn’t be interested. But listen, I’ll explain why I decided to ask them in the 1st place later.

That wasn’t all however, because the sight of a Mixel (which was something that she never knew was a thing, let alone that they existed) absolutely HORRIFIED her. As you can see, she was pretty much frozen in place as her mind was going crazy trying to process the sight of me.

It’s like she felt in that moment that absolutely nothing in her life was how she perceived it. This all causes her to uh..... this...

Okay, real talk. What the heck is Clarissa doing? Actually no, not just that. HOW is Clarissa thinking that this is a good solution?? Even in her own obnoxiously snobbish mindset, I’m pretty sure that “punch it over and over” isn’t something that she would EVER resort to.

In that case, why did she do it then? It’s certainly out of character for her. I guess her mind just snapped and she went full force or whatever on something she didn’t quite understand. I guess that would explain her loud shrieking.

Clarissa’s insane punching leads us into an alleyway, where her friends (Prunella and Arabella) desperately try to drag her away from me, both of them just as confused and horrified of Clarissa’s violence as I am.

After I get up and dust myself off, I leave the alleyway, feeling rather upset. I decide to find a place to lie down, preferably a park or something.

So that’s what I did. I go out and find the nearest park (don’t ask me which one, Camden Town has tons of parks).

I find a random blanket lying on the ground and I, still very upset, just put my head under it and start mumbling to myself about my situation.

As this is going on, and certain dog shows up on a skateboard and rides over to me, asking for me to hand the blanket over.

I assume that Amethyst is talking to me because it sounds like her voice, so I complain to her, my head still under the blanket, about how dire my situation is.

Yes, you heard that right... I literally just called myself a “slacky baby”...

It’s... something I refer to myself as when I’m mad at myself for being lazy, probably because I can’t think of anything better to angrily call myself.

But anyway, when this dog hears me call them “Amethyst,” that dog, who’s seemingly aware of Amethyst, eventually begins laughing, after almost having an existential crisis over what I was saying to them.

I’m confused as to what they’re talking about, they take the blanket off of my head and turn me around to face them.

I’m confronted with the face of a Dalmatian. Not just any Dalmatian, but a Dalmatian that seems... oddly familiar.

When I ask if I recognize her, she stops laughing and starts thinking to herself.

The dog, realizing that she doesn’t recognize me (at least she thinks that until a bit later), seems to have a conclusion as to how I know her. She says that her family’s stories were published in a local magazine, but now those stories no longer get published at all.

I try to remember their name.... I think... “Sarah”

She giggles at my mistake, I was thinking of Sarah from the Amazing World of Gumball. Afterwards, I try to remember Sarah’s original placeholder name from the Gumball wiki, since it’s the same name as this dog.

Then, it hits me...

It’s Dolly from 101 Dalmatian Street.

By this point in the summer, my attention had been drifting away from 101DS, and I had almost completely forgotten about it. This was why I didn’t recognize Dolly upon 1st glance, and ALSO why I asked Clarissa for help, completely forgetting that she’s really snobby to “commoners.”

Anyway, Dolly tells me that her younger sister, Dorothy, had left her blanket here, and she had decided to head back to the park to get it.

Just before Dolly’s about to leave, I decide to take this as an opportunity to ask Dolly for help with the project.

I can’t quite remember the order that this conversation went in, but this is my best speculation:

Not quite sure how she didn’t recognize me at 1st, but whatever.

Then our conversation goes into questions about the concert itself.

I don’t think Dolly actually asked if I was playing in a stadium. Maybe she actually said something like a ‘shopping center’ or something. Again, I don’t remember.

Looking back, I don’t think Finsbury is really that expensive, but I mean, Dolly DID say it was in terms of what she’s aware of, so there’s that...

Yeah, I usually don’t grab as much attention by myself than when other Mixels are around. I have no idea why.  Maybe it’s because I’m so small.

But anyway, Dolly and I see a nearby clock and notice what the time is.

Concerned about what her parents might think of this, I ask Dolly, as she’s putting her helmet back on, if I can come along so that I can talk to her parents about the project directly. She tells me I can follow her, but she’ll need to talk to her parents before I can come in.

She then points me in the direction of 101 Dalmatian Street, and I proceed to head in that direction.

When Dolly sees me walking fast, she probably assumes I want to race her or something (I’ve never been sure), so she decides to do a trick up into the air to catch up with me.

However, in doing so, she completely loses control of her skateboard and lands on the concrete, scraping her elbow.

She is upset that this is the 2nd time this had happened, and that it happened with her other elbow, which is why the elbow is bandaged up.

Once she gets back on her board, she decides to go much slower whilst holding onto her injured elbow, continuing to tell me the way to her house.

I still end up going too fast, and almost get run over by a vehicle, so I also decide to go slower.

Eventually, we make it to her house, and she tells me to wait outside while she talks to her parents and gets her elbow bandaged up.

While outside, I sit down in front of the steps and look around the neighborhood. Upon seeing Clarissa’s house, I get a bit irritated, due to what had happened between me and her earlier.

Eventually, she lets me in, but not before being confronted by her parents, Delilah and Doug. They are understandably suspicious of me.

I tell them about the project, and Delilah angrily asks to see it.

So I get out that device in my bag, and show the incomplete artwork to them.

As you can see, they decide to head to the living room to think about what to do.

It makes sense, they don’t completely trust me and aren’t sure if Dolly will be safe if she goes with me.

Oh yeah, I also notice Da Vinci in the living room as well, hard at work on a painting. As a result, she likely won’t be able to help me with the project like Dolly had previously suggested to me.

I decide to go upstairs and to the medical room because that’s probably where Dolly is and I have no idea where else to go right now.

When I come in, I think Dolly knows full well that I’ve settled on her to help me with the project. That’s because I had gone through so much trouble trying to find a dog for a project that’s due tomorrow that I don’t have time to keep searching at this point.

When I go in, I see that Dolly’s eldest stepbrother Dylan is also there. He seems a bit suspicious of me too, just not as much as Delilah.

Dolly and I explain everything that we talked about to Dylan, which also makes him a bit more trustworthy of me. Since he’s the only other one in the room, I specifically show him the art, and promise him that I’m not trying to put his stepsister in danger.

A few minutes later, Delilah heads into the medical room and angrily confronts me. She tells me to get Dolly home by 10:00pm or there would be consequences.

Even though she wasn’t my mother, I still took what she said very seriously and promised her that Dolly would be okay.

Just as Dolly is about to head downstairs, I get an idea.

Despite Dylan telling me not to, I open the closet door, and get bombarded with piles of toys.

Fortunately, the closet houses what I’m looking for: elbow pads for Dolly. I jump out of the pile and hand over the elbow pads to Dolly so she can put them on.

She doesn’t comment on either of my responses and just heads down the stairs after putting the elbow pads on.

Once we head out the door, I help direct Dolly to the building that I’m staying in.

As I start walking faster, Dolly once again decides to catch up using her skateboard, of course being more careful so as to not injure herself again.

She ends up reaching the door 1st, but only because I accidentally run into a lamp post.

After I brush myself off, I explain a problem to Dolly. The problem is that the hotel doesn’t allow pets at all.

Fortunately for us, the guy at the front desk seems to be asleep, so me and Dolly try to stay quiet as we get to the elevator (since my room is on the 2nd floor).

When we get there, Dolly notices our bags on the beds, implicating that my friends and I only just got here (which is true).

I then get my bag, pull out my computer, and set it on a nearby desk. After setting everything up, Dolly seems unimpressed with the artwork.

The next few hours are just me helping Dolly with making artwork on her own. I start to get a bit lazy and unfocused at one point, but she gets me back on track.

Around dinnertime, Dolly is understandably getting hungry, as am I. I decide to teleport to a local store and buy her a few bags of kibble. One for dinner tonight, and two for lunch and dinner tomorrow.

Due to my small size, I have trouble carrying the bags. Luckily, I simply teleport back to the apartment building so that I don’t have to walk all the way there.

After some more time, we eventually both get distracted. And I end up talking to her about dalmatian-related stuff. One of the things I bring up was the beginning of her family’s troublesome history, and that it occurred 60 years ago.

The reason this surprises her is because her family’s main rival, Cruella, has been said rival since the beginning. She wasn’t sure how long she’s been around.

When Dolly brings this to my attention, I, feeling that her family’s stories might remain undocumented, decide to show her some footage of a 101 Dalmatians DVD trailer to let her see how it looked from our perspective.

Why that trailer? Well, for a while, that was the only 101 Dalmatians related thing that I’d seen. Until I came across 101DS, I didn’t really have much interest in the franchise. Not that I dislike it in any way, it’s just a lack of interest.

As I showed her the trailer, when Dolly 1st saw Cruella in the video, she suddenly began to feel a little uneasy.

When I noticed this, I paused it and asked if this was all making her feel queasy. She said that it was just a result of dinner. I then tell her that she didn’t even eat much for dinner other than her usual amount of kibble, but then she interrupts me by continuing the video.

After a couple more seconds of watching the video, I overhear Dolly mumbling to herself about the time period and Cruella’s presence in the video. Eventually, she thinks too into it all, and proceeds to run over to the toilet and throw up.

I stop the video upon seeing her run to the bathroom, and worriedly walk towards her.

(WIP)

[wombywoo]

detour 🚘

[anotherfandomtrash]

That's how that conversation went in my head

[vintagecamping]

Camping beside an idyllic stream in the village of Llanfair Waterdine.

Shropshire, England

1987

[literatureaesthetic]

summer diaries 002

[kral-adams]

London, United Kingdom 🇬🇧

[calamityskies]

(1/2) Over the weekend I visited the 100th Bomb Group Memorial Museum at Thorpe Abbotts and IWM Duxford so thought I’d share some pics in case it’s of interest to anyone!

The museum exhibits are mostly housed in the (original!) control tower pictured, the displays are a little scattershot so better if you’re already familiar with the history (i.e. watched mota) but it’s very personable with lots of personal collections & items!! Some of my fave things:

Detailed displays about the Bremen/Munster missions

I was really charmed by this map/diary- the missions the author flew are drawn on in the red lines & the simplicity of the handwritten notes is so stark and heartbreaking

THE FEZ!!!! (Actually belonging to Frank Murphy, but there you go)

(They had a whole display dedicated to Rosie as well which I didn’t take a picture of for some reason 😭 I think because it was mostly photos/info that weren’t necessarily ‘new’ to me esp having read the book but it was really sweet!)

[octaviasdread]

(don’t repost photos)

Branwell Brontë’s Studio, The Brontë Parsonage Museum in Haworth, England X

[tangerine-dream-machine]

do you wanna see the west with me?

Notes below!

This is not a realistic road trip at all, but here are the places/activities shown:

Yorktown Battlefield, Virginia: the site where General Cornwallis surrendered in 1781, bringing the end of the Revolutionary War

Liberty Bell, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: the famous bell with the message "Proclaim Liberty Throughout All the Land Unto All the Inhabitants thereof", and later a symbol of liberty for abolitionists and suffragists

Drive-in theater: outdoor cinemas that reached their peak in popularity in the 1950s to 60s; the film is The Searchers (1956)

Kayaking: a fun lake/ocean activity

Trail of Tears National Historic Trail: this trail crosses nine states and follows the forced displacement of Cherokees, Chickasaws, Choctaws, Muscogees, and Seminoles due to the Indian Removal Act in 1830

Traffic (and billboards): a bane to many and common in car-dependent cities

Cedar Hill Cemetery, Vicksburg, Mississippi: one of the oldest cemeteries in the US still being used; predates the Civil War and includes a Confederate burial site

Devil's Tower, Wyoming: a majestic (and sacred) butte and the first US national monument

Bonneville Salt Flats, Utah: a flat, empty salt pan estimated to hold 147 million tons of salt and a popular racing site

Old Faithful, Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming: a geyser in the world's first national park known for its reliable eruptions

Gas station, Nowhere, USA

Horseback riding, Montana: no comment, just a fun time

Las Vegas, Nevada: the world renowned Sin City, a place that caters to many vices

Stanley R. Mickelsen Safeguard Complex, North Dakota: group of missile defense facilities including missile silos and the pyramid-shaped radar system; built in 1975 and decommissioned after one day of operation, a "monument to man's fear and ignorance"

Hoover Dam, Nevada and Arizona: hydroelectric power plant on the Colorado River; the highest dam in the world at the time of its completion in 1935

Space Needle, Seattle, Washington: an observation tower with a revolving restaurant built for the 1962 World Fair "Living in the Space Age", a theme chosen to show the US was not lagging behind the USSR in the Space Race

Sequoia National Park, California: home of the world's largest tree by volume (General Sherman) and the highest point in the contiguous US (Mount Whitney)

Muir Beach Overlook, California: a former base station overlook with dugouts that gained importance immediately after the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941 as a means to watch for attacks on nearby San Francisco

@usukweek

[davisexplainableart]

That Tears It

Alright, that’s it! I’m sick and tired of slacking off and having to postpone this!

I have decided to release Day 1 of my England Trip (this Saturday) as a WIP. I’ll be adding more in the coming weeks.

I swear I can’t stand my incompetence any more than I already have! Even when I have all the time in the world to work on this, all I do is slack off by binging Youtube and nothing else, before falling asleep!

Sorry about my venting, I’m just upset with myself...

[iamabigbox]

Love how the most deadly place Arthur has been to is in fact England. Bros been there for like 4 hours and everything has already gone to shit

[tea-tuesday]

travel tales: london, uk

[niuniente]

I have found a new favorite thing to eat in England: Welsch cake! Found a lovely cafe selling these, also to go, so I bought some to eat and some to go with me.

[vintagecamping]

Roadtrip to do some camping in Glastonbury.

England

1993

[punsbulletsandpointythings]

Ok ok but I've seen someone else point out that in the Temeraire universe, Waterloo by Abba could never exist. And if I may add to that list:

● A Drop of Nelson's Blood