Mom's Trip to London

I love this picture by St. Paul's
Mom by the Sovereign's Entrance.  This is of course where she belongs.  
Me inside of the London Eye.  
Our two flat tires :(  very sad.

So here is one last commemorating post about London. I know it has been a week since I got home, but it is hard to let such experiences fade into memories so fast, so here is a little bit about my last week when Mom flew over.  

Saturday was excitement beyond compare.  Seriously.  3 Friends and I all went to the airport to meet Mom to pick up a rental car and go to Bath.  Seems pretty easy, right?  Um... Well we get to the Enterprise, and we wait for about 40 minutes.  No Mom.  So finally I go ask the desk clerk if this was the only location in the Airport, ect.  He tells me yes, and then proceeds to tell me that she had already gotten the car over an hour before, and at the North Terminal Enterprise.  So there was another location.  Lame.  Anyway, so we run over to the other location, and the guy at the desk told us that she had just left to go get something to eat, but had not taken the car yet.  So we wait and finally she shows back up and we leave for Bath.  I forgot to mention that previously, I had the assignment of getting a map, one which I had though about often over the last few days, however in the rush, I had neglected to get one also because Mom had printed out some Google maps of how to get there.  We jump on the freeway no problem, and Mom does great with the whole 'driving on the left side' thing.  Well, we had been driving for maybe 30 minutes and we got talking about something and Mom missed the turn off we were supposed to take.  So we just assumed that we could turn around at the next overpass sort of thing like the states.   Too bad that is not at all how England works.  It has the most complex freeway system I have ever seen.  The next exit was not for about 25 miles and it was this little town.  So we go to look for a map and gas (petrol in the UK)  and we find a tavern to ask them where a gas station is.  The nice bartender told us where to get both of these items.  Well as we are driving down this road in the little town of Hemel Hempstead, mom got too close to the left side of the road and hit a monster curb, popping both, not one of the left side tires.  Yes, both.  It was a sad event. Anyway, so we try to decide to what to do after pulling up onto the sidewalk (which was not uncommon on this particular street), and finally call the emergency number on the rental car sheet at a pay phone.  They tell us that a 'lorry' (or tow truck)  will come and fetch us and that we should wait.  We wait for over an hour, and finally the lorry shows up.  Well, the driver didn't realize that there would be 5 of us, and he didn't have room, so he told us he would call and have them send a larger one and he promptly left.  Great... so we wait for another hour before Mom finally went and called the number again and they told us to wait another 45 minutes.  We did (of course.  where else were we going to go?)  and another lorry pulls up with a very nice driver, Mark.  Mark didn't know Hemel Hempstead very well (who does?)  and he called around until he found  a place that was open, and that had the tires that we needed.  He dropped the 3 other girls at the train station and Mom and I went with the rental car.  The rental car got fixed ( although the guy who fixed it accidentally replaced the two front tires, much to our, and the other members of staff's amusement)  and finally we were on our way... sort of.  Back to Gatwick Airport anyway,  so we drove back, without any mishaps (amazingly!)  and got Mom to bed.  

Well that is a post all on its own, but I will quickly mention a few other highlights of Mom's trip.  We did the London Eye (super awesome, and pretty much a must-do in London cause it is so famous),  saw 4 shows, including All's Well that Ends Well,  Peter Pan, Les Mis, and Wicked.  All were fantastic, and I think Mom got the theater buzz (although she loves theater almost as much as I do)  and she commented several times how she would have loved to see a few more things.  We also went and saw St. Paul's, the National Gallery, the National Portrait Gallery,the crown jewels at the Tower of London and many, many more things (especially considering the tubes were on strike so it was tough to get around on the buses because everyone and their mother, including me and mine, was using the buses).  Anyway, it was so great to have her come and party a little with me.  There were of course plenty of things we didn't get to, but like she said, it only gives her an excuse to come back.