Wednesday, June 23: From Jason's Diary

...After breakfast we cleaned the house. (Philip and Jennifer, who are so graciously letting us stay in their home without even meeting us!, are coming back from their holiday).

Then we walked to the train station and caught the train to Hampton Court Palace. This is a Palace built by King Henry VIII; who is famous for his six wives (whose relationship to King Henry is summarized in this way: Divorced, Beheaded, Died, Divorced, Beheaded, Survived).

It was, again, another impressive sight, rich in glory and history...

At 2:45 I left the Palace for a nearby Pub to catch the England vs. Slovenia soccer game. I was, of course, rooting for England. It turned out that the US was playing Algeria at the same time (but that game wasn't shown on the Pub tv). So there I was rooting for England, yelling with my mates there, but, also sad that the US hadn't scored against Algeria. England wins...we all shout in gladness, then the news that the US scored with just a minute left came through (which meant that the US won their section and that England, as #2, would have to play Germany next).

So there I was, yelling and shouting about America winning. My new mates in the pub weren't as excited about that as I was.

After the game, I met back up with Jenny and the kids and we grabbed dinner before catching the train back to Farnborough.

I admit I wasn't looking forward to the walk back to our home from the station in Farnborough so it was a very pleasant surprise to be met at the train station by Philip and Jennifer to be carpooled back to their home.

We spent a delightful evening having tea and visiting with our hosts. In an act of great hospitality they slept in their living room and let us stay in our beds for our last night.

I was able to pick Phil's organizational savvy regarding the ministry back in Indy...