Day 2 (Aug 5, 2017)

[Dan] Worry not, gentle reader, I'm not going to write about every day that we're here in excruciating detail.

Everyone slept pretty well that first night, mostly just from the exhaustion of the previous days and weeks.  We were staying at the Loews hotel in Annapolis for the six days prior to our departure.  We slept OK but not great.  Generally speaking for a while before leaving, once Victoria or myself woke up in the middle of the night, we were just awake for hours.  The list of things to be done, what am I forgetting, what do I still need to do before we leave, the wheels turning....sleep was elusive for a while.  Once we got here, it was a bit of a relief.  What had been done was what would be done.  It was over, we had arrived.  There was a lull between what needed doing before we arrived and what needs doing now that we're here.  We really rested easy that first weekend and just recuperated.

Everyone slept around 14 hours and then we woke up to a beautiful day in Cheltenham just before lunch time.  We went to a nearby cafe for tea.  The boys have really been into the tea and it started here at this cafe.  I think they enjoy the ceremonial nature of the tea.  Letting it steep, the sugar cubes, stirring it, adding just enough milk to make it a little cloudy and stirring again, letting it cool a little and then drinking it.  Victoria and Lincoln have been enjoying tea often though only in the morning so far.  Haven't gotten to afternoon tea yet.  I enjoyed toast with avocado and poached eggs with a drizzle of olive oil and shelled pumpkin seeds.  Lincoln got a delicious blueberry cupcake but he didn't like it because they use granulated sugar instead of powdered sugar for the frosting (I guess) and the texture was off.  The struggle is real, people.  Dempsey didn't want anything.  We walked around the city center, getting our bearings.  I tried getting a cell phone working to no avail.  (I won't go into the Saga of the Cell Phones.)  We hung at the park a lot and walked to where the boys are going to be going to school this year.  Mostly we just existed, fed and watered ourselves.  Sunday was Lincoln's 7th birthday.  I'll leave that tale for Victoria to post.