Happy New Year!!

We flew home from our Christmas in LA, landing in Manchester, England at 6:30am on the last day of the 2013. We got home a few hours later and set an alarm to wake us up in four hours. The alarm rang, I turned it off, and two hours later we finally woke up. Oopsies! 

We had tickets to meet our friends at a local village hall for their New Year's Eve celebration. Unbeknownst to us, the event was black tie (tuxedos!), so we were rather underdressed. Oh well, what are you gonna do?!

We had a three-course meal in the nicely decorated village hall. After dessert, we had a rousing game of trivia, which I am proud to say our table won! 

Darley Memorial Hall

We had an unfair advantage during the trivia, though. Our table of ten had equal amounts of Brits, Americans, and one Aussie. The trivia consisted of television theme songs, which were fairly American-heavy. As the Brits at our table (and around the entire hall) shrugged their shoulders in bewilderment, us Americans sang along to one of the songs... Just sit right back and we'll tell a tale, a tale of a fateful ship.... Another song that stumped the Brits was the original 90210 song; Bill proudly got after just a few notes. That said, there were a few theme songs that the Brits at our table were dumbfounded that we didn't know.

Our table won a big box of fancy chocolates. We unwrapped the package and opened them up; low and behold, each chocolate was grey with age. We checked the expiration date on the bottom and it had expired a year earlier. I am sure it was some nice villager's donation, but... ewwww! 

Big Ben Clock Tower - 40 seconds of 2013 remaining

After trivia, the DJ started pumping out the jams! Bill and I did our typical dance in our chairs, and had a lot of fun. And we learned at midnight, instead of watching the ball drop in Times Square, everyone watches the Big Ben clock tower strike midnight. Bill told me next year he wanted to be in London to watch it with our own eyes, so I'm going to hold him to it! :-)

Happy New Year!! (with our friend, Brian, photo-bombing)

Since we slept until almost 3PM, we were in rare form at midnight. Usually we're sound asleep at that time of night, but not when we're jet lagged! 

We kept trying to do a New Year's Eve "selfie," and our friend, Brian, kept photo-bombing our efforts. 

Another attempt at a selfie (with Brian photo-bombing yet again)

And finally, a selfie with no photo-bomber. It's not nearly as fun, though!

Last selfie is best, but not nearly as fun as the first two

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! 

(I know, this post is going up almost a week into February, but oh well!)