Hello from 40,000 feet above the Atlantic! We're on our way home for a quick visit to the good ole USA! We hope you are all having a great summer! Summer has finally gotten here too. It's hot, and I mean HOT - it's only in the 80s, but with no AC, it feels hotter than back home. Our flat doesn't have an air conditioner, and neither do most other places around here. It's nice to get to finally wear shorts and a t-shirt for more than just a day, but we miss the AC! The good thing is that turning on our fan is enough to keep us sane, so it's not too bad - and we better enjoy it while we can - it will be getting cold soon enough. And the days are already starting to get shorter - gets dark at 9:15pm now.

We recently took a weekend trip to Brussels, Belgium - we took the high-speed Eurostar train and it only took about 2 1/2 hours. Brussels is a cool place - pretty small city, so we could get everywhere we needed to go pretty easily. We know you've heard of Belgium chocolate - we had our share - good stuff - and don't forget about the delicious Belgium waffles - they pile those things high with chocolate, fruit, and all kinds of stuff! Belgium also has over 800 different kinds of beers. We didn't quite try them all, but we tried Hoegaarden, Duvel, Lambic, Juliper, and Stella. Hoegaarden is a while cloudy beer, and it was our least favorite of them. Duvel and Juliper were our favorites (besides Stella, but we've had that in London before). The Lambic was extremely sweet - I could only handle one!

We arrived late on Friday night, and we started the next day with a bus tour of the city. We went to Parc du Cinquantenaire saw the Arcade du Cinquantenaire (this is Brussels' version of the Arc de Triumph in Paris) and the Military Museum. Next, we went and saw the Atomium. This is Brussels' most famous landmark - it's a huge molecule - very strange, but neat - we got to go up inside to the top. We also got to see the Royal Residence Palace where the kings and queens live.

Grand Place was by far the coolest part of Brussels. It's a huge square surrounded by big buildings with beautiful architecture. The buildings include the Hotel de Ville (now the Town Hall), the King's House (now a museum), and lots of guildhouses. We took tours of the Chocolate Museum and brewery. Of course Jill found the shopping - St. Hubert Gallery and Avenue Louise are the two main hot spots. Cathedrale des Sts Michel is a beautiful gothic church - the baroque pulpit depicts Adam and Eve's hurried exit from Eden, the Last Judgment is in stained glass over the doors, the organ contains over 4300 pipes, and the Miracle Chapel is used as the treasury.

We took a quick trip through the Centre Belge de la Bande Dessinee - Brussels' famous comic area. St. Catherine and St. Gery are a couple of really nice areas for eating and nightlife activities. I'm not a huge fan of mussels, but I hear that Brussels has the best mussels. Jill can attest that since she had over 65 for dinner at Aux Deux Couleurs in St. Catherine. And the next day for lunch she had about 65 more - I tried one and have to admit that they are really good. If you haven't tried mussels before, you should!

Two other sites we saw were the Palace de Justice (huge courthouse) and Manneken Pis. The Manneken Pis is a statue of - well - a little boy taking a leak. There are a couple of legends about why this was created. One is something about how a little boy peed on a fuse before anything exploded, and doing this saved Brussels. The other is something about a building blowing up and when the walls came down a little boy was standing there relieving himself. Anyway, he's been there for over 100 years or so. I forgot to mention that there's a light show in Grand Place each weekend night - the picture to the left is of the Hotel de Ville lit up in blue.

One month out of the year (August), Buckingham Palace is open to the public for touring. We did that tour last weekend. That place is HUGE - and beautiful - everything is so extravagant. We also met our neighbors that live in the basement of our house - we all went down to the river and had a few pints. I got to play golf again the other day. I played better than I have been, but that doesn't say much - I just didn't slice as much - still can't seem to break 100.

I'm starting to hurt - I heard "Yea Alabama" the other day when we used our bottle opener that plays the song. The season is here - I still find myself flipping through the channels looking for Sports Center and some news on the Tide. All I find over here is soccer and cricket. It's gonna be tough - there's supposedly a channel over here that plays college football games, but they won't be the ones I choose - and they will be in the middle of the night too. The good news is that we are coming back for the first Bama game, so we're fired up about that! I'm hoping that my good buddies back home will be so kind as to tape the games for us so we can at least watch them later - but that will be weird to see the game after the fact. I've yet to find live video broadcast on the internet (I have found audio, but I want more) - if you know of a site, PLEASE let me know. I hope the first installation of ROSE is out soon!!! Kiker, you there? Is Caitlin yelling "Roll Tide" yet?

Don't forget to check out our new Belgium pictures. Bham folks - we look forward to seeing you soon! We'll land in about 1.5 hours. We're going to my 10 year High School Reunion tomorrow - can't wait to see all of you guys! Carter and Kim - looking forward to seeing you in London - have a very safe flight! Everyone else - please come visit soon! We love and miss you all! Take care and God bless!