Struck down by a head cold.

I started coming down with something Tuesday and now, Saturday, am only starting to feel a bit better. But I'm afraid Anna may be getting it next! And if not that, then both kids have a sickness of another kind: homesickness. They are homesick for their friends, their beds, and all things familiar.

I am not at all homesick, however! That's the bonus of having all your dear ones travel with you. I wish we had more time, especially with the lost days from being sick. I spent nearly my whole birthday in bed -- didn't get up until 1:00 p.m. Of course, we hadn't gotten to bed until 1:00 a.m. the night before. We went into London to see Warhorse, and the long train ride back to Shepperton got us in late. But we all loved it! I sucked on throat lozenges and restricted nose blowing to the loud moments on stage, so hopefully I did not disturb my fellow audience members too much. Alex, in particular, loved it, but who wouldn't love a story about a boy and his horse and war.

We wondered if, going into London on Wednesday night, we might notice the increased police presence promised by David Cameron and Boris Johnson. (Have you ever seen the mayor of London, usually just called Boris? He's quite a character.) Arthur and the kids had gone to Thorpe Park (big amusement park near Shepperton) on Tuesday, and I stayed home to work and nurse the beginnings of my cold. Since the worst of the riots had taken place Monday night, I kept BBC and Sky News on all day and listened to all the outraged shopkeepers and all the pontificating about disaffected youth, but mostly I heard about the need for a more "robust" police response. I thought "robust" was usually used to describe red wine. Over, and over, and over again: the need for a more robust police response. So, 16,000 police on the streets Tuesday and Wednesday night. But in the center of London, in the theater district, with tons of pubs and shops and restaurants and tourists, we didn't really notice any police, nor on the train ride in or out of London, even though we pass through one of the neighborhoods where there was rioting, Clapham. No police that we could see. Of course, Wednesday night was when the rioting had broken out in Manchester, a city that had contributed extra police to London.

So, our own disaffected youth, ages 10 and 14, have just stayed home and moped and skyped and chatted with their friends, and watched bad television -- hey, just like back home! I insisted on going sightseeing Friday, despite this lingering cold, because we're running out of time! There a couple towns in southeast England I wanted to see: cute villages with important historical significance. I got the family up Friday morning, but the kids wouldn't budge. So, we agreed to leave them at home. We left them with the key to the flat and 20 pounds, and Arthur and I set off. We discovered for the first time that the car we've been driving has GPS navigation, which greatly helped with navigating the motorways and roundabouts, and we visited Rye and Battle (pics below). We arrived back home by 6:30, thinking the kids might be worried, but they were exactly as we had left them: watching TV and on the computers.

Today I'm hoping to get Anna up and go to the last day of the National English Sheepdog Trials: you know, just like in the movie Babe? The dogs have to round up the sheep and be rated on their performance? I thought Anna would love it, but I'll have to see how she's feeling and how the weather holds up. Then maybe one more day in London, then we have to clean the flat, pack, and head home. I could easily stay another week!

The village of Rye. Actually, the official name is "The Ancient Town of Rye." Parts of it date from about 900 years ago.

The view from the Church tower.

The Church tower.

The ancient steps up to the tower. As Arthur said, these are so ancient and unsafe, there's no way the public would be allowed on them in the states: risk of lawsuits.

The clockworks in the tower: a turret clock, dating from 1561, the oldest of its kind in England.

More cobblestone streets in Rye.

The 14th-century entrance gates to Rye.

Part of the abbey in Battle, a village named for the infamous Battle of Hastings, the only successful invasion of England, in 1066, by William of Normandy, ever after known as William the Conqueror. He ordered the abbey built on the site.

The battlefield, preserved for posterity.

Inside part of the abbey buildings. This section dates from only about 500 years ago.

Older sections were started in 1070, and parts were destroyed during the Reformation, when Henry VIII ordered the dissolution of the monasteries in 1539.

The ice house: This is the entrance to a deep, insulated cavern. Ice was harvested in winter and then stored over the summer.