The View From The Other Side of the Lawn

My three regular readers may have noticed a change in the picture that tops this blog. Instead of the view from my girlfriend's house in Bozeman, Montana, looking out over the Bridger Mountains, we now have a view from the long porch at Cowley Manor in the English countryside -- more specifically, the Cotswolds, which is British for "quaint as shit."  Here's the other side of the top picture -- taken from the lawn, after turning around and facing the house.

Lovely refurbished 19th century manor -- 30BRs, 30BA, pool, pond, 

and that rarest of amenities, a 12th century chapel, on 55 acres

My daughter and son-in-law got married on a Thursday at Chelsea Town Hall. Only members of the immediate family attended that ceremony. Then about sixty of their friends arrived from the states for a three day reception. Friday was a pub party. Saturday was an afternoon at a football [soccer] game. Saturday night was a barbecue at the groom's parents' house. [London barbecue is an oxymoron in case you're wondering.] Sunday a bus arrived in the morning to transport every one to Cowley Manor for a day of swimming and relaxing before the formal reception that night. Nothing like barreling down a highway, thinking it's just like any highway in the United States, only to look out the window and suddenly see a huge castle, her nibs' digs at Windsor. We were not in Kansas anymore. The bride and groom had reserved all the rooms at Cowley Manor for the whole night, so the champagne, music, and dancing went on until the morning. Since then, they've returned every year on the weekend of their anniversary.