The Adventures of Lorie and Brian Groth

Here is my video for the launch of Windows Live in Finland

I do look comfortable on stage, but I say the word “um” too often and refer to the screen too often also. Watching the entire thing might be somewhat dull to anyone watching it here online, but if you are interested in our new products then you might like it. 

Lorie and Milo as London police? I’m not sure that would work out.

Interesting side note, this was taken near Hyde Park so the van would be for the Metropolitan Police, not the City of London Police who only patrol one square mile of London commonly called “the city”.

If Lorie and Milo were cops in London, I would call both of them a Bobby, which is British slang for a police officer, which originated in the 1800s. 

When out walking Milo this morning, I discovered a building that had started falling apart over night. In this photo, you can see how the concrete facade crumbled, along with the light that was attached to it. Yes, the entire thing just fell apart after only 80 or so years (I assume). I’m sure the owner wasn’t thinking of repairing it yesterday, because it was still in place; even if it was dilapidated. But today is probably the right time to do a little repair work.

We saw the new Star Trek movie tonight at a very cool cinema called the Everyman Hampstead – we were in Screening Lounge 1. The Everyman group has a few of these cinemas in London, but this was the first time we have been to one. Lorie and I shared a red couch, Geoff and Silvia had one of the big comfy couches and Anne had her own big chair next to us.

If I didn’t have to be at work early Monday morning, I would have taken advantage of their service of bringing drinks to your seat. Maybe next time!

A bunch of friends got together for Geoff’s birthday last night … we went bowling (ten-pin, not lawn). I do best when I don’t use the finger holes in the ball, but people tell me it looks like I am just hucking the ball. Either way, it is amusing, but I struggle to get over 100 points per game.

Maybe if I could have used the ball pictured here, I would have done better.

There are still canals that run through London. Where the Paddington Arm of the Grand Union Canal meets the Regents Canal is the area called Little Venice. There was a gathering of canal boats there this weekend, so Geoff, Silvia, Lorie and I (Milo stayed at home) checked it out. It wasn’t very interesting, but hitting a pub nearby for a jug of Pimm’s (Pimm’s No. 1 Cup) must mean that summer is here. 

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What to do on a lazy Saturday when it is sunny in London? Walk! Just like when it is raining. Lorie and I had a nice walk and lunch through Camden Market (great Venezuelan pocket sandwiches), over to Primrose Hill and down through Regents Park. Nothing exciting, but nice.  

Yes, those are bags of garbage and recycling (in the orange bags) sitting in front of an Austin Martin.

Each week, there is a large garbage truck (as we call it in the US) that drives down each street as a couple of guys walk ahead of it pulling bags of garbage from in front of people’s houses. I’m not sure why people have cans (bins) to put the garbage in since these guys usually just open it and grab whatever large bag of garbage is in it – leaving whatever loose items behind for the owner to put in a bag for next week. These guys stack the bags in the street or in parking spaces so when the truck comes along, the guy on the back of the truck doesn’t have to go far before tossing it into the truck. 2/3rd of the truck holds the garbage and 1/3rd of it holds the recycling.

I think it’s time I take a holiday if I’m down to blogging about garbage! 

We often see cars from Ferrari, Lamborghini, Maserati, and many others when walking around Fulham and Chelsea. However, today we saw the old Rolls Royce pictured here and the newer Phantom version too. They certainly are nice, and very expensive (around £300,000 for the new ones). I doubt I will ever be able to afford one, or buy one if I could afford it. I’d rather spend my time/money doing something weird, like touring the world on an electric bicycle.

Tonight, for our friend Anne’s birthday, I treated her to something very London: a gin & tonic at an old London pub: the Lamb & Flag. It is most likely the oldest pub in London and probably best described by Charles Dickens (click to read). Pubs.com explains it as:  

… a small wooden fronted pub. At over 300 years, it’s the oldest in Covent Garden, and possibly one of the oldest in London…

The main reason for choosing this pub was a quest for an old gin bar, as described by Dickens. The fact that it was a warm and sunny Saturday made it all that much better. Since Charles Dickens wrote about this neighbourhood when explaining gin, I figured the oldest pub in this neighbourhood in London was an appropriate place to try.

While it does have some charm, the pub really isn’t all that. Yes, we had a G&T with Bombay Sapphire, but it was a bit crowded and with no good music to keep us entertained, we soon moved on. Still though, it was an interesting place worthy of the visit.