You know how I do.
Open post day!
I feel ‘meh’ and people on Twitter keep saying they agree with me so let’s all commiserate together and therefore make ourselves feel better. I’ll go first:
Wedding planning blows and there’s way too much drama surrounding finding a place and setting a date and whether or not I can actually invite more than 3 damn friends.
Your turn! Group therapy.
Ummm…what kind of “unique” jewelry does this place sell?
I’m kinda bored and since I’ve probably exhausted everyone’s desire to ask me questions on my Formspring account, I figured I’d go through some of my darling Jay’s best questions/answers and add my two cents. I’m logging some practice hours in for becoming a wife.
What is your biggest guilty pleasure tv show?
There isn’t really a show I watch that I feel guilty about. I have been watching wedding shows more though but that’s a product of the current environment haha
He lies. He loves “Glee” and tolerates “Gossip Girl.” Also, please note that I have not yet watched one wedding show at all.
How much money would it take for you to pose nude in playgirl?
Any decent offer, I could use a new car
I am okay with this. I’d rather people see him naked than have him die on 95 driving home from school because his P.O.S. car finally decided to quit life and fall apart.
I want to go to Austism speaks podcast, but have no wear to stay. do you have extra room to sleep?
Sorry no room at the Inn
Yeah, Zoe hates strangers. But you can reserve your room for a special rate of $68/night at the Wingate by Wyndham, which is right next to the Raleigh IcePlex. The number is (919) 821-0888 and all you have to do is say that you are with “Jay and Jack’s Podcast for Autism Speaks.”
what is your junk food weakness?
Cooler Ranch Doritoes, or the old Taco Supreme doritioes. Man I could eat those for days, and I have lol
I also would have accepted “Every chip or remotely unhealthy thing that Colleen brings home with the hopes of getting to even get a taste of herself.” Also, that’s what she said.
What is the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow? by kristinfinley
That’s What She Said?
Kristin, *I* got the question.
what is your favorite thing about Colleen?
Her smile, Her sense of adventure, Her love of things geek, and how much she really truly cares about the people she loves. She’s my best friend that I could spend a lifetime with.
What, are you trying to get laid or something?
What is your middle name?
Hmm lets keep it a mystery
It rhymes with “Smoseph”.
have you ever written a song for Colleen?
Yes
Yes, but then you were GOING TO LET SOMEONE ELSE USE IT!!
Toilet Paper Roll: Over or Under?
Not life or death for me, but I do find under more efficient
As the person who changes the toilet paper in this joint, over is the ONLY way to go.
Why is everybody doing formspring?
no clue
Boredom and attention with a big drop of fun mixed in.
Everyone’s probably seen this already but in case you didn’t, our wedding website is ready for viewing. So check out www.jayandcoll.com (the winner of the poll) and book mark it because we’re going to try to update it as frequently as possible.
We still have to update the “Photos” section and once we have more, we’ll add to the “Wedding Party” and the “Registry” sections.
Outtake: This photo is one that we were going to put on the top banner but it didn’t make the cut. It’s from Hawaii on Friday night, which I still need to tell the story of:
In the home stretch and then I can go back to posting boring shit like my new haircut and pictures of Zoe being adorable.
Thursday February, 18 2010:
So Thursday morning, I didn’t feel so good. I woke up with a terribly sore throat and I couldn’t swallow because my glands felt so swollen. I decided to sit out the trip to the VNA Museum and meet up with my parents and Katelyn as they were finishing it. I met up with them in time for the gift shop and we were off to visit Harrod’s, the ginormous, famous and ridiculously expensive department store. It was pouring rain and cold again that day. Harrod’s was both awesome and depressing. Awesome in the sense that it was 7 stories of shopping in every single area you could imagine, including pets & books. They had this amazing section of their food court that was just all chocolate and sweets. Depressing in the sense that 98% of the things in the store probably cost more than one month of my paychecks lol. We did a little more window shopping in the area before moving on to Piccadilly Circus, Leicester Square and did even more shopping at Convent Gardens. Convent Gardens was way more in my price range than Harrod’s.
We spent a while at Convent Gardens. We decided to visit The Admiral Coddington’s Pub (aka The “Cod” I guess?) for dinner. The Cod is famous for being where Princess Diana had hung out before she was Princess Diana. Sadly, we discovered that they didn’t serve dinner until 6:30pm and it was only 4:30pm at the time. So we had a drink and left Pub #1 and headed to Pub #2, which was some place by the South Kensington Tube Station. I don’t remember the name but I was underwhelmed by the food (not that pub food is supposed to be great but the other places we ate at all had good food). I had the biggest pint of Hoegarden at Pub #2. Mmmm. We went back to the hotel to rest up for a little while and then headed back out to Pub #3, which was right down the street from our hotel on Queens Gate and a recommendation from my mom’s cousin who used to live in South Kensington. As you can imagine, we were definitely exhausted after our third pub visit of the day and only stayed for an hour before going back to bed.
Friday, February 19, 2010:
Friday was a more laid back day. We said goodbye to Christie in the morning, who was leaving for Wales that afternoon. We went back to the Big Ben/Parliament area to take more pictures and cross over the bridge to the other side, where the London Eye is. The line for the Eye was too long at that point and since I was the only one who really wanted to go on it, we decided to move on. We walked down along the Thames River, went in some tourist shops, and crossed another bridge to go back the other side. From here, we walked up to some big book store that I cannot for the life of me remember what it was called. It was across the street from a closed-down Borders Books. After that, we headed back to South Kensington for dinner at another Italian restaurant right near the Tube station. I think it was a chain (Bella…something) but it was really good.
Saturday February 20, 2010:
On our final day in London, it was sunny and “warm” (aka like 40 degrees) in the morning so we walked around Kensington Park and up to Speaker’s Corner in Hyde Park. Here’s where I have to gush about Kensington Park and that whole area. I’m so happy we went back there in the sunlight instead of the pouring rain we walked around it in previously. If I lived in that area, I’d be at that park all the time.
After that, we went back to the very first place we ate when we got to London: Gourmet Burgers. DELICIOUS. Go to there if you’re ever in London. It’s a chain of awesome. Then we went back to the hotel, gathered our luggage, got on the Tube and headed back to the airport. I have to say that I was very surprised with the security at Heathrow. I was wearing tall boots and didn’t have to take my shoes off. My dad accidentally left his Swiss Army Knife in his carry-on bag (instead of packing it) and they didn’t pick up on it. We got there very early because we anticipated possibly having to do one of those full body scans and never encountered one. I will say this, however: Heathrow has awesome Duty Free shopping there as well as plenty of expensive stores (Harrods, Tiffany’s, Burberry, etc.). It’s a way more fun airport to hang out in than LaGuardia or JFK.
On the plane ride home is where I started to feel sick. My head hurt, I had a lot of aches and pains and it was just impossible for me to even think about closing my eyes to sleep. I did however finish reading “Dead Until Dark,” the first book in the True Blood series and I watched the pilot of “The Good Wife,” which was pretty good. It took us 30 minutes to get through customs upon arriving back at JFK & an additional 40 minutes to get our luggage. I was dying at this point & my ears were all clogged up. Finally, around 12:30am we stumbled into the house on Long Island. I left for Raleigh at 8am the next morning.
Trip: Over.
I’ll interrupt all these London posts to announce that I got my hair cut again on Wednesday night. I really like it so far. I want to have longer hair for the wedding so I can have an up-do, so I wanted to cut it shorter now and start fresh with the growing out process. It makes sense in my head…
I’m going to try my best not to make this one as freaking long as the last two have been, mainly because I want people to still want to read my blog lol. So here goes:
Wednesday, February 17, 2010:
I didn’t sleep well Monday night and Tuesday night wasn’t much better. After going to bed at 12:30am, I woke up at 1:50am to make sure that everything was working out smoothly with the YuBlog.org Lost post. I didn’t fall asleep again until like 2:30am-ish. Then I woke up at 7am to pee & figured that I’d download the episode. It ended up taking 40 minutes. I feel back asleep until 8:45am when Kate’s alarm went off. So I definitely was setting myself up to get sick earlier in the week with the lack of sleep.
We watched the Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace on Wednesday morning. My mom & I didn’t have the best angle to see it from so to me, it was kinda anticlimatic. Maybe it was because I was freezing (we got there an hour early) or because I couldn’t see very well or because I was just plain tired. Basically, they march a band in (which was neato) & then the band stands in front of the people on the ‘house right’ side so they can’t see the guards being changed. My dad had a good spot though & thought it was cool though so if you’re the type of person who likes the shit my dad thinks is cool then the Changing of the Guard is for you!
We left Buckingham Palace & walked along some park that was right there. It was a nice little park that I enjoyed looking at. Next stop: Westminster Abbey! Westminster Abbey was amazing. Go to there if you go to London. Even though it’s essentially a fancy tomb filled with corpses up to like a thousand years old, it’s absolutely incredible. Look up at the details in everything - walls, vaults, cellings, floor, statues, etc. So that’s what people did before TV, Internet and video games. Definitely, definitely, definitely check it out.
Westminster Abbey is right across the street from Big Ben & Parliament. We did some photo ops there. From there, we ate lunch & went to find some museum with a Winston Churchill exhibit that my dad wanted to see. None of the rest of us had any interest in another museum that day so sadly, Dad didn’t get to go. I felt bad. However, our next adventure took us to King’s Cross train station and Platform 9 3/4!
We finished up the day by going to see a Shakespeares’s “The Tempest” on the West End. I kinda (shhh don’t tell on me) fell asleep for like 30 minutes during the Act I. I actually really like “The Tempest” but it was about 90 degrees in that theatre & we had just eaten dinner/drank ale so it really wasn’t something I had control over…
Thursday, Friday, and Saturday weren’t as active, so they’ll follow tomorrow. Peace out.
I’m sorry that I didn’t get a chance to come back and talk more about London while I was in London. I started to get a cold the last few days we were there: sore throat, swollen glands, headache but then on Saturday, it exploded into an awful sinus infection and I had aches & pains and a slight fever to go along with it. Let’s just say the plane ride back from Heathrow to JFK was not fun, nor was Sunday or Monday. I’m feeling better now thanks to a steady diet of Advil Cold & Sinus, Mucinex and NyQuil. My ears are almost unclogged!
But I digress. Back to London:
Monday, February 15, 2010:
I think Monday was probably my favorite day of sightseeing. We started out at the Tower of London where we got a tour from a Yeomen Warders aka Beefeater. Despite being freezing cold, it was sunny for a little while & glorious. While there, we saw all the famous towers and locations where people were held prisoner and beheaded (including Anne Boleyn) as well as the Tower Bridge. We also saw the crowned jewels which were pretty freaking blingin’, let me tell you. I think the biggest one was 500-something carats. However, my ring is still prettier 
We were absolutely freezing after we left the Tower of London, so we headed up to the area where St. Paul’s Cathedral and the Millenium Bridge were. After a much needed lunch, we went to St. Paul’s Cathedral. This place is awesome. We decided to climb up to the top of it, where there was a peephole that you could look all the way down at a center tile. We trekked up a winding staircase of 200+ stairs to the first tier, which was still inside the church. You could see all these beautiful statues and adornments from that level, as you circled around the inside perimeters of the church. Then we kept going. The winding staircase got a bit tighter but it was still walled in, so all was well. This lead to a viewing point that went around half of the outside of the cathedral. Great view; I could see the Globe Theatre on the other side of the Thames River. It was really cool to see London from above.
There was still one more set of stairs to get to the top level. This winding staircase didn’t exactly offer the same security that the previous two did. The higher we went, the more I started to freak out (and I don’t generally have height phobias). I believe I used the word “Mommy” a few times, haha. The first problem I had was that the staircase was one of those black metal ones that didn’t have great protection on the sides other than the railing and the little bars that came down to attach the railing to the stairs. In addition to this, the staircase was right in the middle of the tower we were climbing up - not next to a wall that you could reach out to grab. If you needed to grab a wall, you were going to fall down first. Oh - and you could also see all the way down to the previously level.
But, I made it to the top and it was worth it. Absolutely gorgeous view and it was snowing lightly! If you think you can handle the climb up, this is something that I definitely recommend you do.
We left St. Paul’s and walked over the Millenium Bridge to get to the Globe Theatre. Although we didn’t get to take the tour inside of it (it was almost 4:30pm at this point, I think), we did explore the front area a bit and of course, hit up the gift shop. We went out to dinner with Christie and her friend (also named Colleen) at Sticky Fingers, a restaurant owed by Bill Wyman of the Rolling Stone. Decent burgers.
Tuesday, February 16, 2010:
On Tuesday, Christie took Katelyn & I to Primark, which is basically a giant British version of Forever 21 that’s always crowded no matter what time of day. After Primark, Christie left us to go to class while Kate and I met up with my parents at Kensington Palace. It was pouring rain that day. We did a tour of the palace. What a huge place. It was cool to see some of Princess Diana’s dresses up close and how similar some of the dresses from some of the old debutante balls were to dresses people still wear to proms and formal events now. The upstairs of Kensington Palace showcased rooms of former royals such as Queen Victoria or King William & Queen Mary. If you like history and fancy things, you’ll like Kensington Palace. We walked around Kensington Garden in that awful pouring rain after we were done. It looked gorgeous but wet lol. Still, it was cute to see dogs running around and playing despite the rain. Since Strider got sick in early February last year and these weeks a year ago were filled with trips to the doggie cardiologist and many overnight doggie hospital visits, we were all feeling a little bit sad to remember. Next, we went to a pub for lunch, made a quick stop at TopShop (I assessed it to be a more expensive version of H&M) then went back to Primark because we were pressed for time there that morning.
Here’s where the fun starts! I decided to buy something I had discarded that morning, so I went up to pay by check card. This wasn’t working. Thinking that maybe this store didn’t take Bank of America check cards, I give them my credit card. Credit card doesn’t work either. The woman at the register takes my card to run it herself. Still doesn’t work. She checks the back and of course, I never signed it. So this raises a red flag for her, I guess. I show her my driver’s license to prove the names match but she still calls someone else over. While she’s explaining the situation to a superior, the woman at the register next to her informs her that it’s not my credit card, it’s the credit card machine at her register. She’ll have to input my card manually. Guess what?! She doesn’t know how to do this! Joy! After a long process, she gets it to go through. I sign my receipt and she seems to forget that we’ve been over the whole “back of credit card isn’t signed” thing already. I pull out my license again and show her the signature on it (thank you, DMV for your foresight). Finally, I was free to go.
And with that, I’ll free you from having to read any more of my drabble for today. Thanks for popping by!
So we were going to use ewedding.com to create a website for our wedding but then Jay got some grand ideas of creating a real site where we could not only update with posts and all that fun stuff, but put in media, like brief podcasts and vidcasts. Then we could also use it for beyond.
We wanted to use www.jayandcolleen.com but someone already has it 
so now we’ve got to choose and since we can’t decide, I figured I’d ask for some friendly advice in the form of a poll. Here are the choices:
We’re going to create it ASAP, so let us know and then we’ll let you know!
Guess where I went today?
Squeeeeee! Platform 9 3/4 from Harry Potter! After the changing of the Guard (kinda interesting but kinda boring, I don’t know) and Westminster Abbey (really, really awesome), we went up to King’s Cross Station and tried to go to Hogwarts, ha. Yay!
P.S. Ignore my sneakers; after the first two days of walking around in boots, my feed, legs and knees rebelled so now it’s sneakers for this girl lol
Copyright © 2010 Coll Writes All rights reserved. Theme by Laptop Geek.