Suffolk

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Colonial Williamsburg, Part Two: The Governor’s Palace and Patrick Henry

First stop in Colonial Williamsburg is the governor’s palace. A popular activity there is to listen to a speech by one of the founding fathers, Thomas Jefferson or Patrick Henry. The fellow who plays Jefferson apparently looks like him… because he is a direct descendent of him!

On the crisp morning of my visit, the talk was by Patrick Henry. Other than his “give me liberty or give me death” speech, I didn’t know much about him. With the talk being 45 minutes, I didn’t expect to stay through the whole thing. The reenactor was so good, that I hung onto every word! I really would suggest not missing this if you go to Williamsburg.

(As point of reference, by this point, it was 11:30 and I had already been in Colonial Williamsburg two and a half hours!)

All the open buildings in Colonial Williamsburg have an English flag outside the entrance. The governor’s palace did not. It was just open for private school tours. But we could wander around the grounds.

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Colonial Williamsburg, Part One: Introduction and the Hopes Plantation

It is a very weary and happy time travel who posts tonight! My day in Colonial Williamsburg was much too full to do it justice in just one post, so I will be breaking it up into several.

Williamsburg is known as the Revolutionary City. It was the first capital of Virginia and the centre of political activity that would lead to the United States declaring its independence from England.

The historical part of the city, Colonial Williamsburg, is a huge living history museum set circa 1774, just before the American Revolution and the ratification of the Declaration of Independence. I’ll get a little more into some of the history as I work my way through the exhibits.

While Colonial Williamsburg is a living history museum, it is not like so many others I have visited where the costumed interpreters play a part and pretend they are actually living in that era. While they may take on the persona of an 18th-century whatever, they are still their 21st century selves and can answer questions as such.

In order to visit all the exhibits, you must purchase a ticket, which is $39.95 for one day. I got lucky and was able to buy my ticket through Groupon for $19.95. But, spoiler, $39.95 is a bargain!

My tips for Colonial Williamsburg: wear comfortable shoes, bring your own water and a picnic, don’t think you’ll find one-of-a-kind souvenirs, and if you absolutely want to pay huge prices for dinner, reserve very early to eat at one of the taverns. Yes, much of Colonial Williamsburg is a giant tourist trap, but one that is still well worth doing!

Plan a lot of time to visit Colonial Williamsburg properly. I arrived at 9AM and by noon I hadn’t even set foot in the core of the city yet! Many visitable buildings include tours of 20 to 45 minutes in duration and you can easily spend 10 to 15 minutes in each of the other ones watching demonstrations. I decided to work my way through the city, devote myself wholly to the activity in which I was engaged, and not bemoan missing anything when the day ended.

One interpreter gave me a valuable tip. While the town buildings and tours close at 5PM, the museum closes at 7PM. A good way to organize you day is to travel clockwise around the city, finish with the museum, and then hop on the free shuttle to get back to the Visitors’ Centre.

I don’t take notes, so the following pictures provide information I remember, but in no way encompass the whole of what I learned during my visit. You’ll just have to come to Colonial Williamsburg one day!

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Glad the Sun Has Come Out Again

The last few days have been a little wet and miserable, but the sun is coming out today and should be in full force tomorrow. Thank goodness! I badly need a day off and away from the computer so I will be heading to Colonial Williamsburg. Thanks to Groupon, I got my ticket for $19.95 instead of $39.95!!!!

I know that one day there won’t be nearly enough, but I plan to make it a very full one and will take off at first light tomorrow, have breakfast en route, and be waiting at the Visitors’ Centre at 9AM when they open. I want to be there until at least past the ghost walk tour in the early evening. Williamsburg is only about an hour’s drive each way from where I am, so staying late won’t be a problem.

Have any of my readers been to Colonial Williamsburg? I’m finding it hard to get a really good grasp of the place and all the things I could do. I’d love suggestions for places to grab a good meal, too.

Now, where did I put my pair of good walking shoes?

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I Found Good Hummus!!!

I don’t think it’s a secret that I love hummus. I can go through three, four, even five containers of the stuff a week.

I’m too lazy to make my own and commercial hummus generally isn’t great. There are a few Canadian brands I like, but I have never been able to find good hummus in the States. As for pita, forget it! Here, like in western Canada, I eat my hummus with Triscuit crackers or homemade pita.

Until today. Today, I found the best commercial hummus I have EVER tasted. Really, it’s a game changer. It’s so good I will never again be tempted to make my own!

I got the traditional type and except for the usual additives for freshness, these are the ingredients:

-dried, not canned, chickpeas for an authentic taste

-tahini

-canola oil

-sea salt

-garlic

And it comes topped with what you’d expect hummus to be topped with, including sumac and zaatar!

I’ve had hummus prepared by a Lebanese chef and this hummus is at least as good as that one was.

What brand is this miracle spread? Marketfresh, which is a Walmart brand!

Walmart houses me and clothes me and now feeds me. I guess that makes it home! 😀

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Ordering Glasses Online From Zenni Optical, Part One

After much hemming and hawing, I finally placed an order for glasses from Zenni Optical.

This post is going to talk about the ordering process. I have no idea yet if the time and money I spent on Zenni’s website will pay off or not. However, testimonials tell me that I am about to get my money’s worth and then some. We shall see!

Ordering glasses on Zenni started with a fresh prescription. I created an account and entered my prescription details into it so that I wouldn’t have to reenter the information several times and possibly get it wrong.

One measurement that is needed but is not on the prescription is pupillary distance, or PD. My friend had the ruler and know-how to measure that for me. This number ensures that your lenses are correctly centred.

The next thing I did was measure my current pair to give myself an idea of the size I would need my new glasses to be. Important measurements are the width of the nose bridge, the width of the frames, the width of the lenses, the length of the temple, and the height of the lenses.

Finally, I took the time to get a good portrait of myself to upload to the site so that I could virtually try on the glasses.

Then, I started shopping! There are several parameters for narrowing down the search, such as price, PD, gender, type of glasses, and type of prescription. The one I wish was a little more precise is the frame size. After a bit of trial and error, I determined that I needed to look at medium to just slightly larger than medium frames, but it would have been nice to be able to input a range.

I’ve been wearing glasses for 23 years and have an idea of the types of shapes, materials, and colours that look best on me. So I started looking for two sensible pairs with metal frames, spring hinges, and oval or rectangular lenses. I started off with a $24.95 pair until I found a couple of $6.95 pairs that looked just as good. In fact, one of the cheaper pairs looks exactly like the pair I currently have on (which I paid several hundred dollars for, and that’s just for the frame).

The processing and shipping time can be anywhere from a few days to a few weeks. I don’t know when I’ll next be in an area where I can hang out for a bit waiting on glasses. So I decided that I might as well make this order count, especially since shipping is a flat fee of $4.95 regardless of the size of the order, and there is currently a 10% off coupon! Therefore, I kept shopping!

Once I had some classic (read: boring) frames, I decided that I wanted to try some novelty ones. I finally settled on a pair of pink frames and a similar one in green.

Finally, my current prescription sunglasses are horribly scarred. I’ve always wanted a pair of tortoiseshell sunglasses, so I found a frame I liked and, following my friend’s instructions, looked for the tinting option on the order form.

For each pair, I added the anti-reflective (A/R) coating at $4.95 per pair. I was tempted to try the premium oleophobic coating (A/R, water repellent, smudge resistant), but reviews were not good for that option.

When all the frames, options, and shipping were added up and my 10% discount was calculated, my order came to a whopping $71.05. That’s for five pairs of glasses including prescription sunglasses! Walmart wanted to charge me that for lenses set in a truly crappy frame! Do note that I have single vision lenses, not bifocals or progressives.

Two things irked me about the order process. The first is that you cannot edit your order. So when I wanted to remove the fancy coating from one pair, I had to redo the entire order for that one. That wasn’t too painful because you can import your saved prescription, but it would still be nice to be able to change settings.

The second thing that I do not like is that they are not set up to take PayPal. I know the site is reputable, so I was okay with paying with a credit card, but I prefer to use PayPal for online purchases.

I placed my order yesterday, Sunday. First thing this morning (literally, it was 1:28AM my time), I got an email from them saying there was a problem with my order. It appeared to be for one person, but there was a pair out of the five that had a different PD. Which number was correct?

Well, I had started shopping with an estimated PD, updated my prescription with the correct number, but had forgotten to redo one of my orders! I’m so glad that they caught that! This tells me that whomever is processing orders at Zenni is not an automaton.

I was asked to reply to the email, so I did, and I got an email later today confirming that all five pairs will have the correct PD number I gave them and that they had started work on my order!

Now, to see if glasses from Zenni live up to all the hype…