Quick visit with Eric, then over to the pub for lunch. Somehow, I don't expect a British pub to make a great Eggplant Lasagna, but this was a winner: layers of eggplant, broccoli, spinach and just enough pasta to provide structural integrity, held together with bechamel, with a thick layer of melted cheese on top, all baked golden-brown in a crock. It even went well with the ale -- yum.
Thence back to Vera's so that Kate and Ann (Kate's mother) could have some quiet time with her, while Peter and I were shooed away. He took me on an hour-long driving tour of Bristol (where he and Anne had gone to college), showing off the riverways and gorges. It was a slightly forced bonding experience for both of us, but it's a pretty town and made for a pleasant diversion.
Back on the train to London, and I finally got to meet
pir, back from a trip to Brazil. We geeked a bunch as he set up his new TV, and he showed me the insane flashlight that he got as swag when he was working at Google. It was powered by some sort of high-powered batteries, and even on the lowest setting was crazy-bright, with LEDs running so hot you could feel them. (On the highest setting, I suspect you could direct air traffic.) This was all given mainly as a demo of how powerful the batteries were, and why he was repurposing them to build a portable charger for his Mac. This was also when I discovered that he knows keshwyn and a bunch of my other friends from his time working at Tufts.A pleasant dinner of Indian delivery food (quite good, as promised), and to bed.
Next: Off to Spain
the Bristol Hotel (which the family knows as Juries, despite the fact that I don't think the hotel has had that name in decades)
Is this where the Boston tendency comes from? ("Just turn right where the Ames was, next to what used to be the Woolworths...")
At one point he snuck up on me in his motorcycle leathers and startled me badly enough that I told him he looked like a Power Ranger; he's one of two sysadmins who taught me about how to Jumpstart boxes to a spec.