Author: David Messinger

Our friend and colleague, Jess, came for a quick visit during RIT’s Spring Break. One of the places that she wanted to visit was The Bowes Museum, so off we went! The museum is a purpose built marvel that houses the 15,000 artifacts collected by John Bowes and Joséphine Benoîte Coffin-Chevallier. Both patrons of the… Continue reading The Bowes Museum

Every year Durham hosts the Fire and Ice Festival featuring a combination of outdoor ice sculptures and torches. This year there were 14 displays located throughout the city. It was a beautiful day so we went for a walk to check them out! This year’s theme was the “Silver Screen” featuring sculptures with movie themes.… Continue reading Fire and Ice Festival, 2024

To celebrate Joan and Rich’s Anniversary and Deb’s Birthday, we went on a cruise out of Ft. Lauderdale that stopped at Princess Cays, San Juan, Puerto Rico, and St. Thomas. The weather wasn’t the best, but it was still a lot of fun and great to get away and see Deb’s folks! The view leaving… Continue reading Caribbean Cruise

In January we joined Deb’s parents on a Caribbean cruise to celebrate their 58th Wedding Anniversary! Because it was a long trip, we came a day or two early to explore Miami Beach and see the historic art deco architecture. Miami Beach is a place to see and be seen, particularly if you drive the… Continue reading Miami Beach!

County Durham is a very agricultural area in Northeast England (see our earlier post on the Wolsingham Agricultural Show). There is a tradition here to start the new agricultural year on the Sunday after Epiphany by bringing a plough (not plow) to the local church for a blessing. In Durham, they take it up the… Continue reading Plough Sunday!

What do you get when you cross musical theater, vaudeville, slapstick comedy, improv, audience participation, and family entertainment with drag? The British Holiday Tradition of Pantomime Theater! And we saw Cinderella at the Gala Theater in Durham! The British pantomime theater has a long history as a holiday tradition in England. Many of our friends… Continue reading Cinderella the Pantomime

We decided to stay in Durham over the holidays to get a feel for an English Christmas. It did not disappoint! We went to a bunch of Christmas Markets, carol services, and we even had some snow! The picture above was taken from the window of a local Turkish restaurant. There were lots of other… Continue reading Happy Holidays from England!

T’was the night before Christmas, So off to the pub. But first a quick shop, To gather some grub. Up the hill we walked, Feet shuffling below. The wind was a blast, But thankful no snow. To the Elm Tree we hurried, To get out of the cold. Hoping to see our new friends, Who… Continue reading T’was the Night Before Christmas, Durham Edition

This year the Fairfax House in York hosted “A Townmouse Christmas” where the Georgian mansion is decorated with little white mice all over the house! There are a couple hundred mice spread out in all sorts of scenes, outfits, and activities, all while celebrating the Christmas Holidays. Some mice were skiing! While some arrived by… Continue reading A Townmouse Christmas, York!

About 20 years ago Deb received a watch specifically with the intent of golfing with it – it was an Eco-Drive and powered by the sun. She has worn it 24/7 (including in the pool and shower – it’s waterproof). Rarely is it ever off her wrist. We have spent time all over the US… Continue reading Time Out…

Dave was invited to be the “Opponent” for a Ph.D. defense at NTNU, the Norwegian University of Science and Technology. So we headed to Norway……. in December…… when it’s both dark and cold, but beautiful. First stop was Gjovik for the defense. Gjovik is a nice little town about 2 hours north of Oslo, on… Continue reading Norway!

After our day in St. Andrews we headed up to Broughty Ferry where Mark’s mom lives. It is just outside the city of Dundee, Scotland and a picturesque coastal town. There is an old castle to defend the town and the entrance to the River Tay. The castle was built in 1496 and today serves… Continue reading Broughty Ferry and the Dundee Hooley!

Our good friend Mark came over from New York to visit his Mom in Scotland so we headed back up north! First, we went to St. Andrews by train. The weather was great and we were able to get some rare pictures of the Scottish coast. This is Berwick-upon-Tweed from the train. We followed a… Continue reading St. Andrews and the Scottish Coast

We celebrated Thanksgiving a little early to coincide with the Lumiere Festival. Our friends from London, Claire and her kids and her fiancee Pete, came up for the weekend. We also invited some new friends from Durham. We made the best traditional meal we could while living in the UK. Turkeys are a bit hard… Continue reading Thanksgiving in the UK

Lumiere is a Festival of Lights that moves between London and Durham every other year, and we were lucky that it was in Durham this year! There are art installations based on light technologies all over the city for a long weekend. Thousands of people come to Durham to see it. A number of the… Continue reading Lumiere 2023!