April 28, 2013 flying to London

Photos

Saturday & Sunday, April 27 & 28, 2013

Today we used Triangle Transit bus for the 1^st time to RDU. It worked out fine. It was busier than I expected for a Saturday afternoon, but it only runs once an hour then. We had never been able to use it before because it doesn’t run at all nights and Sundays. Anyway, for $2 each per trip, it is cheaper and just as reliable as any other method. Clay drove me and the luggage down to Moore Square Station to the purple columned Rte. 100 shelter and then he took the car home and parked it in our own driveway and walked back to meet me about 10 minutes before the bus arrived. We will look forward to using the bus on the way home on our return.

AA’s direct flight to Heathrow was problem free. It was a fairly full flight apparently because last night’s flight was canceled. There were a lot of disgruntled people sitting around us complaining about how AA handled things last night. But, we have no complaints. Luck of the draw, I guess. We were pleased with the Economy Plus seats that we paid extra for, that made the trip easier. We paid an extra $98pp for these seats coming over and $88pp for the return flight. So, it was definitely worth the extra money. We have seats 13 J & H both ways. But, frankly it is just under 7 hours and it was fine. Of course, any red eye flight is stressful, but it was alright. They showed Rise of the Guardians, a weird little animated film about Santa, Easter Bunny, Sandman, Tooth Fairy, Jack Frost and the Bogeyman in a battle between good and evil for the hearts and minds of children. I watched it and Clay watched his tablet with Pride & Prejudice again. I was looking forward to The Big Year, a comedy with Jack Black and Steve Martin, but they waited until about 3 am London time to start it and I couldn’t stay awake. Of course, then I couldn’t really sleep either! About the time I was getting comfortable with sleeping, they were delivering orange juice to wake everyone. Oh, for dinner last night we had chicken with rice for Clay and I had cheese tortellini in pesto. Both came with salad and white or red wine. Really awful wine, but they were not charging extra for it either. This was served after sodas (or whatever) and a small snack sack of pretzels, nuts and crunchy things. It was all good. For breakfast, they served a croissant with butter and strawberry jam and a raspberry yogurt. Coffee and juice, etc. Again, all good and no complaints. We must have arrived early because we spent about an hour making 2 big loops over southern England before approaching London. Then the most amazing thing happened, we flew directly over central London and then hooked a turn right by the London Eye and flew down the Thames by all the major landmarks! We spotted the Millenium Bridge, Big Ben, Parliament, Westminster, Buckingham Palace, St. James, Hyde Park, Royal Albert Hall, Kensington Palace, I saw Kew Gardens after Clay quit looking and about 5 minutes before we descended to land, I swear I saw Downton Abbey or Highclere Castle. We saw lots more, but that hits the highlights.  The only hitch came as we tried to exit the plane. The jet bridge was not working and it took about 30 minutes to get the door open after the Captain turned off the seat belt sign. Then it was a very long walk to immigration and customs and a very, very long line to be cleared to enter the UK. I guess this is true everywhere anymore, but there were a lot of people queued for entry!

It was over an hour and a half after our luggage was removed from the plane before we got cleared to go claim it. We were concerned that they would leave it on the carousel that long, but I guess the luggage people knew we were delayed a ½ hour getting off the plane and then had long lines in immigration. We all just walked right through customs though.

Leaving  Heathrow, we bought an Oyster Card for me and put money on Clay’s and took the Piccadilly Line of the Tube into London.  It is about an hour ride. You can get in faster on the Heathrow Express, but it is much more expensive and we were in no rush since you usually can’t check in that early anyway and you’re too tired to sightsee! As we neared Green Park station and the Victoria Line we had intended to get off and switch to, the conductor announced that Victoria Line was experiencing severe delays. We stayed on 2 more stops and took the Northern Line to Euston and our home station for the next 2 days. We failed to get a map from the station to the ibis Hotel and wandered unnecessarily for a bit, but we got here alright. It is really convenient now that we know the way. The room is typically small as one expects in Europe. But, it is clean and quiet. Internet is not included. One bad thing is that it has a very high tub with a shower in it. The tub floor must be 8 to 10 inches above the bathroom floor and while it is difficult to get in, it is nearly impossible to get out of it and you are wet then. There are no grab bars anywhere in there. Something for short or mobility challenged people to consider. We both also dislike no tissues and only one trash can which is in the bathroom. The other weird thing is there is no soap or shampoo. Just a tiny bar by the sink and then a dispenser on the shower wall that is to be used as both shower gel/shampoo. Yuck!  Incredibly, this no soap for the bath/shower held true for almost every hotel on this trip. I mean how much money are they saving withholding that little bar of soap? We had booked online and prepaid £148.75 for 2 nights at the ibis London Euston St. Pancras at 3 Cardington Street. 

We were able to check in at our 10 am arrival instead of the published noon. So that was good. We were both so exhausted that we couldn’t formulate a plan. I had hit a wall earlier after the change of Tube line caused us to have to haul our bags up a bunch of stairs and I really just wanted to go to bed for a while. Clay and I both knew if we did though the day would be completely lost. It was a sunny busy Sunday in Central London and we both were freezing! After a false start or 2 we headed out with a plan. Clay removed the sim card from his phone and our 1^st order of business after unloading our luggage was buying a prepaid data sim card.

We returned to Euston Station and used the Fast Ticket machines to collect all the train tickets we had purchased from multiple sources over the Internet. It was amazingly easy. I still claim it would be even easier, if you just got on your train with your booking number and credit card and that sufficed without all the nonsense of tickets at all.

Clay had found an O2 store that he thought was nearer than it was. For me, we would go to King’s Cross Station where I had read they put a Platform 9 ¾ from Harry Potter. Getting the sim card and getting it to access the Internet took over 2 hours. It was not easy. But it is done and hopefully worth the trouble. I think after a dozen or so attempts that we finally got an email off to Mom to let her know we arrived safely. Clay wanted to walk to the British Museum. We have both been before and he didn’t have anything in particular he wanted to see. I argued it was too far and too big to cover territory we already remembered seeing. I was for the British Library which we had done in 1984. It was on our way and Clay did not remember it at all, plus it would be a quick visit. Then Clay could get his fish and chips and we could go to bed! We have an early start tomorrow to visit the Warner Brothers Harry Potter film studios in Leavesden. We will use our Oyster Cards to get there and back too. Watford Junction is where you catch the bus to the studios and that is the last stop allowed on the Oyster Card. So, that is convenient.

Speaking about Oyster Cards, it turns out that when you pay with an Oyster Card that you get about a 50% discount on your fare on average. We did not realize this and used the Underground website to get fares for the trips we knew we would take on the system to estimate the amount to put on the Oysters. So we wound up with about twice the money loaded as we needed. I mention this because you can’t get your money back. If we had loaded less than we needed, we could have added more, but you can’t subtract from the amount except by using the card. The turnstile shows how much they deduct from your balance when you swipe your card as you exit the station at your destination. You have to look quickly though!

The Platform 9 ¾ had turned into a genuine tourist attraction with a zigzag queue and a professional photographer and aide. It was very busy and a long wait, so just Bob and I posed and Clay took pictures. We did not buy the professional’s photo from the Harry Potter 9 ¾ gift shop that was about 20 feet away. I don’t think they probably had anything that you couldn’t get at the HP theme park at Universal Orlando or at the studio tour tomorrow, except that Platform 9 ¾ photo. But they had some nice stuff. Clay would have gotten a t-shirt if they had run a bit larger. Too bad. I kind of didn’t like that it wasn’t just in the station but had become a sales tool. On the other hand, they were providing school scarves as props and the aide was holding the end and flipping it up to give motion to the photos as well they were letting you take your own photos and there was not pressure to buy theirs, so I can’t complain about it too much. I just expected a half luggage cart sticking from the wall and a sign though.

 Oh, I used my annual Starbucks $10 gift card from Stuart Jones (our homebuilder) to buy a London mug. Now I have to carry it for 24 days! They told me they didn’t have a box for it after I coughed up the remaining 50 pence I needed to complete the sale. I have bought a bunch of these mugs in my travels and never have they not boxed it. It was priced at £6.75 and they took my whole $10 plus some change. I meant to ask Clay if that was a fair exchange because it is one of the features of US Starbucks cards that they are generally accepted at any store almost anywhere without exchange fees.(I just checked online and £6.75  should have been worth $10.19 and should have paid in full for that mug!) Anyway, we have learned the hard way in the past that when you see something you want to buy because later you won’t find it again. So we have the mug checked off our list, even if it is prematurely. Thank you again Stuart Jones!

The British Library was amazing. We both think the building is a new one since we last visited in 1984. It was very plain, modern and incongruous next to the Victorian pile of St. Pancras/Kings Cross but not unpleasant. The renovations of Kings Cross offer a free standing example of old and new mixing dramatically. Anyway, we saw the Magna Carta again, some illustrated manuscripts, some DaVinci manuscripts and a notebook of Jane Austen’s as well as her portable wooden writing desk, which was a surprise and just exquisite! They had a wonderful Pride & Prejudice t-shirt in women’s v-neck style and I really wanted one, but the XL (the largest) seemed that it would fit me more snuggly than I would like, so we only bought a postcard there. Now to find a stamp… hmmm.

Clay saw a very busy place called O’Neill’s across the street and wanted to go have dinner. We did. He had fish and chips. We shared a pair of mini pasties as starters. We order one pulled beef and red wine and one mint with ground lamb. We could not tell any difference in the taste even though they had very different appearances and textures. Creepy. I am probably off meat pies, though Clay has plans for me to have lots of them as he has fish & chips everywhere! I had BBQ chicken breast with bacon and cheese, peas and a flat mushroom and chips. (Chips are fat cut French Fries over here.)  It was edible, but weird. Clay said the mushroom was very woodsy. Gross.  As we were sitting there waiting, a table of women near us was getting ready to leave and one of the women brought over an extra coupon they had printed off the Internet for a free Strawberry Bailey’s Sundae. That was very nice and thoughtful. Neither of us like alcohol in desserts, but Clay ate most of it since it was free ice cream.  Our waitress at that point told us that she had spent 10 years of her childhood in the RDU area and that almost everyone in her family was a Carolina alum. It is a small world. Tourism is really rampant here and everyone we met here was actively making anyone they thought could be a tourist feel welcome and helped. It is really amazing.

I am going to call it a day now. More tomorrow!

Photos

Tremor Update

Well, I had a pretty thorough exam and interview this morning with Dr. Robottom. He thinks it is classic Parkinson's Disease, but the fact that I haven't responded normally to any of the 3 most commonly prescribed treatments troubles him. He had 3 things. One is to test for Wilson's Disease. He says it can present like PD but is treated differently because it is caused by a buildup of copper in the brain. He says if it is WD, it should have shown up on the MRI, but that they can also rule it out with blood and urine tests. So, they drew a vial of blood and I start a 24 hour collection of urine in the morning. Two is to learn some physical therapy exercises to work on muscle tone and battling rigidity. I go tomorrow afternoon and he says I might be asked to return once or twice, but it will be up to me. Three is a prescription for 2mg of Artane or trihexyphenidyl with a 21 day chart for going from a 1/2 pill daily to 3 pills daily. He says if I feel the positive effects at any point in the process I can stop increasing before I get to 3. He also says this is the drug he has the most patients refuse to stay on because of bad side effects like dry mouth, constipation and what he calls fog, mental slowing, trouble thinking or finding words. We'll see. He sent it to Kmart and I probably won't get anything from them before next week if they hold true to form.

We did cover the big picture of the fact that I will not actually ever get better, that whatever it actually is doesn't matter to the fact that it is a progressive disease and the overall goal is just to slow down the progression and help manage the symptoms to maintain my normal lifestyle for as long as possible. We did not discuss what happens when we've gone beyond that. I go back to Dr. Carnes in about a month for follow-up.

 

Tremor Update

Sorry, I had forgotten about coming back with this. I did see Dr. Carnes on 4/23 and he did not want to try another drug and neither did I. He did refer me to Dr. Robottom within Raleigh Neurology. He is their movement disorder specialist. That means he did extra post-doc work in the field of Parkinson's Disease. The hope is that he will have some new direction or insight for us. I see Dr. Robottom tomorrow. I follow up again with Dr. Carnes on 6/25/2013. I will be back with more information as I have it.

Downtown Raleigh and BOB

I keep forgetting to write about St. Patrick's Day. I had won 2 free tickets to the Titanic Exhibit from the N&O. The Titanic Exhibit ends at the end of April, so we'd been looking for a good weather day to walk down to the NC Museum of Natural Sciences. We hadn't been since they built the additional building with the globe out front. We enjoyed the Titanic exhibit and got to touch a piece of the hull that was recovered. That was cool because in a month or so, we'll be at the Titanic Museum in Belfast where it was built. Anyway, we went to the new section of the building by walking through the pedestrian bridge over the street and that was weird. But, here is the special part. We didn't take Bob! He is still holding a grudge because he missed a great photo op. And because, you know, Bob. Here goes. There is a whale skeleton in there called Stumpy. Underneath her is a zodiac carrying a black dog wearing a life vest. The dog's name is Bob! He is a "whale scat sniffing dog". Can you believe it? The sign said he could "smell floating whale scat for a mile". Clay's comment was, "It floats?" I know! But, seriously, a mile?! What I was really thinking was, BOB? I mean they named a floating scat smelling dog, BOB? Is that a joke, like did they mean it to be a pun? I think I snorted. It was a busy day in the museum. It was Reptile Day. Way too busy in there and not in any good way. I was a little overwhelmed and failed to notice if there was any reproduction scat in the display. Since it wasn't real water, it couldn't have bobbed! Anyway, our Bob was not amused when he heard about it. I snickered every time I said Good Morning, Bob for at least a week. Then we all got over it. Still, though... Funny right?

Clay took some photos, but he never shared them. We also went to the St. Patrick's Day parade. It was a good day except for leaving Bob at home.

Here is a link. At the photo sequence, scroll down to Investigating Right Whales and then click the photo labeled to enlarge it. You can see Bob the scat sniffing dog under there. Enjoy!

Tremor update

Yeah, no this has nothing to do with road trips! I plan to post here about our trip to England, Scotland and Ireland too later and I guess it is a stretch to call that a road trip either. So much for my sticking to the theme...

First off, I should update by saying that about a week after stopping carbidopa/levodopa that the left leg kicking had stopped. So, that was good news. Clearly, it was a side effect of the drug and not a progression of my disease. It wasn't as bad as the first drug, generic Mirapex or Pramipexole. That one made me exhausted, headachy, gave me extreme sweats, visual hallucinations of fire at night and dangerously constipated. It did though the most to relax my right toes. Dr. Carnes pulled the plug on that one though.

I saw Dr. Carnes on 3/11 and he prescribed Ropinirole or generic Requip as the next drug to try. He said he has dozens more! I am not sure I am up for all that! I stopped taking Ropinirole today with permission from Dr. Carnes' nurse. I had been taking it for just over 3 weeks. It made me really tired at first, but the Pramipexole did too at first. So, I just kept taking it and by the middle of week 2 I had muscle burning. I felt like if you've been running and your leg muscles start to burn and you cannot get enough oxygen to them. Except this was all over my body, literally every muscle in my body, not just the muscles affected by the tremor but my entire body. By this week, I started thinking I was going to die from this. I mean I could not exercise for 3 weeks. I could barely get up the stairs or through the house, etc. Clearly, this wasn't going to be a long term solution and like the other drugs Ropinirole wasn't reducing the tremor.

I will go drug free at least until my next appointment on 4/23. Until then I have to say that the knitting I have taken up stops the hand tremor. I just wish something could stop my right foot from fisting under. It is the most painful part of the symptoms. Dr. Carnes' nurse today asked if I'd like to be referred to a movement specialist. I declined. Unless there is some holding still specialist... Anyway, she said I should be journaling to keep up with my medications and reactions and symptoms. I have loosely done that here and I will continue. I can use any good wishes. Thanks.

We'll miss this year's spring NC Rail excursion

We got our email this week from the NC Transportation Museum about their spring railroad excursions. Notice that "s" at the end! They are doing 2 trips this spring. Unfortunately, both of them conflict with our big spring trip that we've already got booked! Unbelievable.

In other news, I have stopped taking the carbidopa/levodopa medication early. It was causing my left leg (previously unaffected by the tremor!) to kick violently between about 9pm and 2am for hours at a time when we were trying to rest. I also did not think it was helping with the tremor that much, though it did make my handwriting big again. I am less than 48 hours off and I don't know how long it takes to clear the body, but the night time kicking has not stopped yet. I really was hoping and sure that the pills caused it and that when I stopped the pills the kicking would stop too. The left leg kicking seemed to have started within days of starting the pills and I hoped it was them and not some progression of my disease. We'll have to wait and see. Cross your fingers for me, please. I return to Dr. Carnes on March 11 and will be medication free until then. I am wondering about his Parkinson's Disease diagnosis. If I don't respond to the Parkinson's standard medications, then maybe it isn't PD?

We'll be posting here probably about our big spring trip after we return. I know it should probably have its own blog, but since the longest segment of it will be a bus trip, I think it can be categorized as a road trip. I expect to post the trip journal here later. Stay tuned.

Clay is still in India for a few more days and he may wind up having some more travel news to post online somewhere as well. Today some of his coworkers took him in a van on a road trip to Pondicherry. So, do check back.

Jim Corbett National Park in India

Clay is on his farewell, pre-retirement trip to Chennai, India for work. He finally got to go on a side trip to look for tigers in the wild at Jim Corbett National Park in the north of India. He was lucky enough to get to glimpse a tiger! Click on the link to his solo trips on the right. Or click here for his photos.