Update from Stratford

Stratford is known for its theatre, and for its swans. Beautiful birds but don't screw with them. They can be nasty. This year the swans all went 'PC'; signs are up telling tourists not to feed them buns and things but greens and corn pellets. Apparently old bread is not good for them. Like people though, they want the junk food and are not taking kindly to old spinach leaves.

The left hand photo above is Distinctly Tea of Stratford. They have 350 types of teas. I went on a shopping frenzy and bought a year's worth of oolongs, black, red, white and green teas. It cost me a couple of 100 dollars.

This morning got an email that I won 3rd place in their tea/food contest. My green tea custard recipe gets me a 25$ gift certificate there - for tea. Talk about poor timing!

The 2 plays were Ghosts, and The Dutchess of Malfi. Ghosts was fantastic. If you don't know about this Ibsen play, it is about how we go about shaking off the 'ghosts' of a lives; personal past matters, family matters, and even old society values that are long dead but still very much influencing our lives. It is a pessmistic play. Although the characters are trying so hard to create new selves and values and worlds; their pasts haunt them and won't let them escape.

The Dutchess was very long and done all in black. It is a story about a woman with two brothers, a Duke and a Cardinal who don't want her to marry. She secretly does, and to a commoner. The tragedy is watching them slowly torture her to insanity for her indepedence. Very long and very disturbing. Stratford throws in some nudity to keep every one awake.

Our friends Martin and Dale arrived, and we will spend the day shopping.