Archive for the 'Personal Entries' Category
Thanksgiving
Today is my family’s big Thanksgiving dinner, and only the second one I’ve ever missed. I sent my mom some photos to take along, and I’ve also written a letter to my family. Here is a copy of the letter, which is basically a run-down of 2010:
Dear Family,
I hope you all can forgive me for not being there for Thanksgiving, but with Mom’s visit to me in December, I felt it was silly to visit so close to her visit. I’m planning on visiting sometime in 2011 and if Tim can get time off from work, he’ll come with me.
I’m not sure where to start or what all to tell you but I will say that this past year has been amazing. I really love living in the UK and I have made some fantastic friends, as well as re-connected with a friend from high school who now lives here!
Before I arrived, Tim was talking with his Aunt Wendy about me wanting to get involved in the community. Wendy asked what my hobbies were, and Tim told her about singing. Wendy had a friend who was part of a chorus and I was invited to attend a rehearsal. I loved it, so I joined! The group is called Lincoln Sounds, and is a female barbershop chorus and part of Sweet Adeline’s International. This past May, we won the bronze medal at our regional convention!
I also found a volunteer opportunity one day while walking around in town. I now work once a week at the Cancer Research UK shop. It’s a short shift, but it gets me out of the house, meeting people, and more used to using British money. I tend to make people laugh when I use American words like “pants†or “suspenders†– in the UK, if you mention “pantsâ€, you are referring to what in the US is called underwear. “Suspenders†in the UK are what in the US are called garters! Whoops! Fortunately, most people recognize my accent and laugh.
We’re slowly working on getting the house redecorated and organized, but we can see the final vision in our heads, so hopefully in 2011 we will be able to do everything. We are planning on installing double glazing on our windows to help with keeping heat in in the winter, and looking into central heating. Our house is a farm house from the 1800s (the oldest house in the village), and the previous owner never had central heating installed and Tim didn’t have it done because he was hardly home. Now that I’m here all day and we’re thinking about starting a family, we need central heating! I also plan on learning how to cook on our Esse stove. We have a solid fuel stove that will require smokeless coal and I will have to keep it topped up daily. The fortunate thing is that the Esse (similar to an Aga Rayburn) will also help to heat the water in the house. We’ve got a long way to go before I can use it, and a few weeks back a bird flew down the chimney and was stuck in it! Fortunately, Tim rescued it.
Of course, you’ll know about Mom’s visit in April. She got stuck here due to the volcanic ash, but it wasn’t a bad thing! She came over so she could attend the wedding reception we held for Tim’s family. We had a great time, and I got to wear my dress again! 🙂
I’ve gone on a few trips this year – one with Tim, and 2 without. In August, I went with my friend Helen and her son, Mark, to Wales for a week. We stayed near the coast and spent the week going to railways (Helen and Mark have a garden railway like us) and castles. We had a lot of fun, but I missed Tim. In October, I went down to Southampton to visit a friend I knew in high school and college. She also married a Brit and lives down there, so it was nice to catch up with an old friend, and made me feel comfortable. I missed having friends around who I’ve known for years and who I could just talk to about anything. I’m planning on going back down to see her in January.
Our big trip this year was our Honeymoon Part 2. This was the original Honeymoon plan before Tim’s days off got restricted last November and we wound up going to Florida instead. Tim wanted to take me to Germany and Austria, so we headed off in September with the car loaded down with camping gear. Our first stop was Neuschwanstein Castle, which most of you know is one of my favourite castles. We then drove down into Austria and set up camp at two different sites and visited railways, castles, and historic towns. Since we were camping, we also got to experience life in Austria and buying groceries! My German came in handy, but if someone heard Tim and I talking to each other in English, they would switch into a combination of German and English that we could understand. We really enjoyed camping as well. We have a large tent that has 2 bedrooms and a large middle section as well as a camping stove and of course, lots of flashlights (called torches here!). Just about the only thing we didn’t like was that once it started to get dark, it was hard to read or do anything else other than go to bed. We also didn’t like the cold, but we were camping in the Alps, so what did we expect? We plan on going camping again this coming Summer – spending a week in Scotland with Tim’s brother, Ben, and then a week down in Wales with Helen & Mark. I do apologize for postcards not making it back to the US. I’m not sure what happened, but it appears as though every single postcard we sent to the US has been misplaced by either Austrian Post or the USPS. After asking 5 people if they got their cards, we’re writing them off. Maybe someday they will show up! I sent Mom some pictures though, so they should be somewhere with this letter.
We had two big garden projects this year. The first one was trying our hand at growing our own vegetables. We dug a small plot and planted some potatoes, carrots, and parsnips. The carrots and parsnips are just now finally getting large enough to use, and I harvested over 300 potatoes in August! We also tried growing cucumbers and tomatoes, but the weather here isn’t suited for them and we will need to build a greenhouse if we want to really grow them. Fruit-wise, we have our large apple tree, which I managed to get nearly 14KG (so that’s about 30lbs) of apples off of, not counting the apples friends would pick when they visited. We gave some away, I made some apple butter, and the rest are in the freezer for the Winter. We also have 2 wild blackberry bushes (called brambles) and I harvested about a gallon-sized ziplock bag from it. Those too, went into the freezer. Our raspberry canes did not do well at all. We might try again next year. We also planted three blueberry bushes. Two of the bushes died but came back to life after some serious pruning mid-summer, and the other bush just grew lots of leaves. I read that it can take 3 years for blueberry bushes to grow, so hopefully we will one day have blueberries! We also planted 3 strawberry plants and managed enough strawberries for snacking. I’ll probably plant more next year. My herb garden suddenly took off in September after hardly having anything. I have Mint talking over along with Parsley. Oregano, Marjoram, and Basil were harder to coax, but I wound up with enough to use. I also have a Thyme bush that doesn’t seem to quit! Unfortunately, I can’t move the plants inside for the winter, as my kitchen hardly gets any light, but I’ll plant herbs again in the Spring! (BTW, here they pronounce the h in herbs, Basil is pronounced “Baa-zilâ€, and Oregano is “Ore-gahn-noâ€.)
Our second project was Tim’s railway. He had wanted to build the upper circuit by his 40th birthday, which was in August, so he had a lot of work to do! Tim, his brother Ben, Ben’s friend, and Mark (Helen’s son) spent many days outside digging, laying bricks, and concreting. But we did it! Tim pinned in the last bit of track about 45 minutes before people arrived, though we had had the full circuit complete for several weeks before then. Tim even built two “level crossings†across our front walkway where the railway crosses it. We had steam-ups once a month over the Spring and Summer where friends would bring their trains over to have a go, and it was fun seeing their reaction to the progress. Tim even managed to build a snowplow in January, and so we’re hoping for enough snow to get it out this year!
Tim’s cat, Prudence, is starting to finally get used to me. I miss Will, though. Plans are to move him over eventually, but who knew it was so expensive to move a pet overseas? In the meantime, he keeps Mom company. Prudence recently stopped liking us, though. I noticed she was acting funny and we took her to the vet. Not once, not twice, but three times. Poor thing had to have 4 teeth removed and then we had to feed her antibiotics for a week. I am not very popular right now, but she is starting to go to Tim again.
I am settling into life as a British-American housewife. Learning how to cook with Metric has been interesting, and there was one mishap at the beginning where I shrank our clothing by forgetting the temperature gauge on the washer was in Celsius! I think since January, I’ve only made a few mistakes and we only had to go for takeaway (carry-out) a handful of times because dinner wasn’t edible. Ask Mom to tell you about my red velvet cake that turned black (it wasn’t burned!). If you have internet access and read my blog, I occasionally post recipes. I’m learning how to make a lot of traditional British dishes alongside my American cooking, so we have a nice mixture of meals. Betty Crocker is still my go-to book for recipes, but I also really like Jamie Oliver’s books.
I haven’ t sorted out driving here, yet. Mostly because of the expense of it and because I have no experience driving a manual car. Tim’s car is manual, and that seems to be the trend here. I also have to send off my passport to get my permit (called a provisional license here), and I haven’t been willing to part with it yet! I’ve been relying on public transportation to get me into town. While Lincoln isn’t a big city like London, it’s a decent size and we have 3 busses an hour that run from our village into town.
My health needs are taken care of by the NHS. It’s really nice to just call and have an appointment and not have to worry about paying for it. All prescriptions are £7.20, regardless of what you need, but if you have a chronic condition, you can receive prescriptions for free. My infected armpit issue has FINALLY cleared up! It had been bothering me for nearly a year, but it’s finally been cleared up and I am infection free. I’ve been to an after hours doctor twice for it, and even saw a dermatologist, all without any additional fees. I am definitely in favour of Universal Healthcare!
In December 2011, we will have to apply for my permanent residency. It’s going to be expensive (about £1000!), but it’s the next step we have to take. I have to pass a “Life in the UK†test before I can get my residency, so I’ll be studying for that in January! There also is an English requirement, but since the US speaks English, that test is waived.
I think that’s about it! I sent Mom some photos to share, and she has printed out a few of my blog entries for anyone who wants to read them. If you have internet access, you can read my blog at http://blog.beccajanestclair.com. I try to update it as much as possible. I’m also on facebook – http://ww.facebook.com/beccajanestclair for those of you who don’t have me added. You also can email me – [removed for privacy]. You can IM, video call, or call me on Skype. My account there can be found under [removed for privacy]. For those of you who don’t have internet access, our address is:
[removed for privacy]
I still have my US-based phone number, too. If you want to call me, you can call [removed for privacy]. The number is based in Michigan, so all you pay is long distance to Michigan, instead of the UK. Alternately, you can call my google voice number to leave me a message at [removed for privacy]. This is a Lancaster number, but it only goes to a voicemail account and I would have to call you back (which I can do through Skype for free). My UK number is [removed for privacy]. You would drop off the initial 0 when dialling from the US.
I look forward to hearing from you! Happy Thanksgiving, Merry Christmas, and Happy New Year
With Love,
Rebecca & Tim
Wildlife in Our House
I seem to have a knack for attracting wildlife into our house.
Remember the frog in the house when I was a visitor? Back in August, we had another frog in the entry way. That one I accidentally shut the front door on! But don’t worry, he was okay. I just opened the door, and he hopped away.
Then, there are the slugs. I think we’ve had 3 or 4 slugs wander in through the crack under the front door this Autumn. Again, no harm done. Just scoop them up into a bin and toss them back outside.
But recently, I had two different wildlife visitors….
It was towards the end of September, and we started closing some of the windows. I was headed up the stairs with a load full of clean clothing when I saw something red flapping in the guest room. Our guest room is right at the top of the steps, and you can see out of the guest room window as you get closer to the top, so I just thought I saw a bird fly too close to the window. I put the laundry in our bedroom and went to go back downstairs, when I saw the flap again. On further inspection, it turned out to be a butterfly!
Getting the butterfly out was pretty easy, I just reached around it and opened the window and watched it fly away.
Our most recent visitor….well, it took a little bit of effort.
A few days ago I heard flapping coming from inside the wall. I told Tim, and he said that sometimes a bird will put it’s nest in the chimney or fly down and not to worry about it, because it would get itself out eventually.
We have an Esse stove (currently not in use). It’s a solid-fuel stove from the 1950s and I know I’ll have more to say about it after I start using it, but it has it’s own chimney and a little flue box on the top of the stove. Yesterday, I swore I saw a wing in there, but when Tim looked, he didn’t see anything.
This morning, the flapping became worse and I heard a metallic sound. I’m not sure how to describe it, only that I thought the neighbour was out cleaning his gutters because it sort of sounded like a ladder. Again, we ignored it….until I walked into the kitchen to make Lunch.
What did I see?
Yes, that’s a bird, and he’s inside my stove. My stove looks a little like this:
*
only it’s not blue and has the boxy thing all the way over on the right. Inside that boxy thing? Was where the bird was!
Fortunately, Tim was able to open it up and catch the bird to release it outside, and we watched it fly up to the top of our apple tree.
[*Stove photo from Kernow Coal Fires]
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Why Are You Here?
Michelle from A Mid-Atlantic English (as well as The American Resident) asks, “Why are you here?” and asks her readers to post their stories on their blogs.
“Why are you here?” is a question I get asked countless times…at least once/week when I’m at my volunteer job, sometimes in the shops as well, but since I tend to frequent the same shops, people are getting used to me.
I suppose my story goes something like this….
-Visits the UK as part of a whirlwind European tour senior year of HS (1997)
-Decides then and there that she wants to live in the UK someday
-Goes to Penn State, puts dream aside for a few years while she dates and studies
-Breaks up with boyfriend, considers International Business
-Gives up on International Business
-Starts working in a day care, UK dream having been given up
-Gets laid off, gets job at bank. Starts thinking about the UK again and sets a 10-year move to UK goal
-Dates some more
-Goes to Seattle for a convention of webcomic fans. Meets English bloke.
-They hit it off well and stay in touch via email and IMs. They exchange Christmas presents, etc.
-English bloke upgrades his internet to broadband, starts talking on Skype.
-Tells English bloke about dream of living in UK, English bloke suggests an extended visit to see if the UK is really what she wants
-Agrees, and schedules visit for October 2008.
-Decides she likes English bloke as more than a friend, and surprisingly, he likes her too.
-Start dating English bloke
-visit English bloke. Decided after 2 months that they don’t want to be apart, so visit gets extended to full 6 months
-Goes back to US, 4 months later, English bloke comes to visit.
-5 weeks later, takes mom to the UK to sightsee and meet English bloke’s parents
-English bloke has an epiphany while riding Welsh Highland Railway and proposes
-Returns to the US, plans wedding in 5 weeks
-Are wed on 5 November 2009
-Apply for passport in new name, apply for spousal visa, pack up all belongings
-Moved to the UK 21 January 2010 (interestingly, about 2 years before my “goal” year)
So there you have it. And we’ve just celebrated our one year anniversary and soon it will be my one year anniversary of living in the UK.
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Happy Anniversary!
Remember, remember, the fifth of November
Gunpowder, treason, and….
A wedding?
Hard to believe, but today Tim and I have been married for one year! We’ll be celebrating tonight over at the Lincolnshire Show Grounds for their annual Bonfire Night festivities, which include fireworks in addition to the giant bonfire.
When we were picking our wedding date, Tim and I joked that we would get married on the fifth of November, so we would never forget our anniversary and we would always have fireworks on it. As luck would have it, it just happened to work out that we really DID get married on the fifth of November in 2009.
We’re still just as in love as we were when we got married, and I hope it stays like this forever. I love you Tim! Happy Anniversary!
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Happy Birthday Tim!
Today my husband (and yes, I still get a thrill saying that) is celebrating his 40th birthday! Yeah, we’re only 4 days apart (but I’m 9 years younger). It certainly makes having parties a lot easier. We had a big bash on the 29th and I’m sure I’ll be posting pics from it soon.
And now I can tell you all what we got him for his birthday! Me, his parents, grandad, aunt, & siblings all pooled our money together and bought him the driver’s experience at Cleethorpes Coast Light Railway! Ben (Tim’s brother) and I had wanted to get him a driver’s experience and we had been discussing it MONTHS ago…but all the places I checked wanted between £300-£600 for the experience…PLUS, they were all located in Wales, which meant that at the very least, Tim and I would have had to travel down to Wales (okay, that’s free on the train for us) and get accommodation somewhere. If anyone else wanted to come with us to see Tim drive, they’d have to shell out the same, so the driver’s experience would have easily started costing the family over £1000. I had thought about contacting friends to see if they wanted to contribute, but in the end, Ben and I had given up the idea and I told Tim we just couldn’t afford it.
Until we were at the Cleethorpes Light Railway last month. I snuck away from Tim (“I have to use the loo…”) and spoke with a secretary who told me their experience was only £150 for the day and it would include an opportunity for family to then ride behind a train Tim drove for free, too. I immediately texted my mother-in-law who agreed that it was a good price and said she and father-in-law would contribute, so I purchased it that day on a gift certificate for Tim to redeem whenever he wants. Even better is they claim “Your day’s training will be tailored to your level of experience, skill and ability”, so hopefully, Tim will really get a great day out of it since he already has quite a bit of experience, skill, and ability when it comes to trains and steam!
We presented it to him at his party…and he was [I’ll edit this in later as I’m writing this four days early. If I forget to update, assume he was surprised and happy]
I can’t wait for him to go!
*Of course, Tim did start to get concerned when my loo break took over 20 minutes. I blamed it on the long queue! Fortunately, there really was a queue as they had forgotten to unlock one of the toilets, so we all had to wait for the only open one.
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So Much to Blog…
There’s so many things I haven’t yet blogged about that I need to, so I’m making myself a handy list to remind myself what I need to write about in the comming weeks. I always hope I can bang out an entry each day, or at least a few times a week, but real life just catches up with me.
Sweet Adelines Region 31 Convention (all the way back at the first weekend in May!)
Beamish
Train ride across Hadrian’s Wall
Garden 2010 update
Beckenscot
Richmond
London
Abbey
Tattershall Castle (From Mom’s visit!)
Lincolnshire Life Museum (from Feb!!)
Trolley Museum
…yeah, looks like quite a bit to catch up on! I better start blogging….
Arachnophobia.
For those of you who don’t know (and really, unless you’ve stumbled on this randomly, if you’re a friend or a family member you know), I have severe arachnophobia. Spiders make me scream, cry, and run away in fear…even just looking at photos of spiders can cause me to hyperventilate. It all started when I was in high school, at least as far as I can tell. In the same summer, my friend Beth and I found what everyone assumes was a Black Widow Spider while on a trip to Maine, and then a few weeks later when I was away at camp in North Carolina, I woke up from an afternoon nap to have a spider crawling up my arm. I’m sure I probably didn’t like spiders when I was younger, either, but my first real memories of being truly afraid of them was when I was around age 14.
This evening, Tim and I were out in the garden taking some pictures, and I happened to look over at what we now call “my tree” because I dug out all the junk and weeds around the bottom of the lilac and planted some flowers, herbs, and vegetables. I spotted what looked like a ball of something very tiny. I thought it might have been a spider’s web and the spider might have caught a lot of tiny bugs or something, so I asked Tim to get rid of it (fear of spiders = not wanting them around “my tree” because then I wouldn’t be able to even pull weeds there). Uhm. He tried to touch it and about a hundred (Tim will probably say it was less) teeny tiny spiders started to move. A momma spider LAID AN EGG in my garden and the damn thing hatched.
Fortunately, Tim was able to yank up the plant it had formed on (it was only an offshoot of the lilac) and tossed it in the green refuse bin….but now all I can think about is those little spiders and how some of them might still be in my garden, building webs in my flower beds and even possibly crawling into the house.
Sometimes, I really hate my fear. And, it’s stupid because everyone tells me that there are no poisonous spiders in the UK…but I still am scared of them. We bought an electronic “spider repeller”, and while it’s kept away the bulk of the spiders, we still get some…that Tim always has to catch and release outside.
Maybe I’ll be able to sleep at some point tonight….or maybe the thought of the spiders will keep me up all night.
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Update on Boots
I contacted Boots via email about the face wash, and got a very nice apology email and was asked for my mailing address for them to refund the cost of the original product. Imagine my surprise when I received a gift card in the mail for £15 – twice the amount of the original product!
I have to say, Boots went over and beyond the call of duty on this one. Both times I spoke with someone from Boots – in store and in email – I made it clear that I had purchased BOTH bottles with £5 vouchers and both times I was refunded the full price of the product and then some.
I have switched to a different No. 7 face wash that does not contain “Acer”. It doesn’t feel as nice as the foaming wash does, but it does the job. Now I just have to figure out how to get rid of the bumps left on my face from the old facewash!
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Feeding Lambs
Since I promised I would blog about this…
My friend Lynne had some lamb visitors at her house a few weeks ago. Her daughter’s husband raises lambs, and these were lambs that were rejected by the mother. Since they were all visiting Lynne this weekend, the lambs had to come along, too. Mom and I got to feed them their dinner!
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Congratulations Lincoln Sounds!
We won! We won! I’ll have a longer post up later about my experience at my first convention, but I just had to post that WE WON!!!
Lincoln Sounds came away from Region 31 Sweet Adelines convention with a bronze medal in the small chorus (under 30 members) category!! With 501 points, we exceeded the goal we set for ourselves and we were less than 20 points below the silver medallist.
Go Lincoln Sounds!!!!
Wooooo
[Photo courtesy of Linda’s facebook page.]
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Read Labels Carefully!
A few months ago, I went into Boots in search of face wash. A few friends of mine from us2uk recommended the No. 7 line, so I went to that counter first. The woman I spoke with suggested the Gentle Foaming Cleanser, so I bought a bottle. Since I had a voucher for £5 off, I bought a second bottle before I was finished the first one.
I started breaking out on my chin badly. Regular pimple cream wasn’t taking care of it, but some antibiotic cream did, so I was really confused as to what was causing it. I got to the end of the first bottle of face wash, and was separating it for recycling when I noticed “contains maple”*. Uhmmm….so I scanned the ingredients list (which I had looked at in the store) but still didn’t see maple listed. I was frustrated, but glad to find the source of the spots.
I decided to start googling all the ingredients listed, and sure enough, the scientific name for a sugar maple tree was listed. Because, doesn’t everyone know the scientific name for everything they are allergic to? I sure don’t. And I found out that every type of maple tree has a different scientific name. Fortunately, they all start with “acer”, so I should be okay in the future.
Fortunately, the Boots store let me return the unopened bottle and I purchased different face wash, but I’ve learned an important lesson:
Always read the little blurb on the back of bottles. Even if it is full of adjectives telling you how nice the product is.
*Maple, along with oak and sycamore, make up the bulk of my allergies. Really, I didn’t even think the UK had maple trees!
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UK Wedding Reception
Tim and I held a reception for his family on the 17th of April so his family would get a chance to celebrate with us. It had been our plan from the beginning to hold a reception in the US and a reception here in the UK for both our families, so no one would feel left out. I think it went over pretty well!
We had the reception at the Duke William Hotel on Bailgate in Lincoln. While we did have some problems with them initially in terms of communication, once we finally got things settled down, it worked well. The staff at the Duke William really outdid themselves in terms of food – we had so much food we almost didn’t have room for it on the table! My mother-in-law’s friend who attended our reception and then a party the following day at a more expensive venue even said that we had more/better food!
The nice thing about having it catered was we didn’t need to worry about the food. Tim, my mom, his mom, his sister, his aunt, and I all met at the venue in the morning to do the decorating, but then we were free for the rest of the day. Tim and I took my mom around bailgate and to the castle square, where the monthly farmer’s market was happening. We also walked around the cathedral, and stopped off at a friend’s ice cream shop for a treat before going to get dressed.
Tim and I had decided we wanted to take some photos over at the cathedral, so he and I took off with his camera and tripod and found a nice spot to take some photos. By the time we got back to the pub, some of our guests had arrived!
Everything was fantastic. My brain started going fuzzy after several glasses of wine and champagne, but everyone had a great time. We soon were left with just family, and we cranked up the stereo and sang and danced until midnight when the landlady asked us to turn down our music! We took that as a sign to break up the party, and packing up our things was super easy since we only had to pack up the items we wanted to keep. The pub would be cleaning the room in the morning. Such a huge difference from the US reception when we had to not only clean up all the food, but also had to sweep the floor and put away the tables & chairs!
Thanks to all who came to make this a fantastic night for us!
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Volcanic Ash…What a Pain!
First, I must say that I’m incredibly happy that my mom’s flight managed to land last Thursday. Her flight must have been one of the last to land at LHR before they decided to close the airport, as we were hearing things about cancelled flights on the radio on the way back home after picking her up. We didn’t worry much about her return trip since it was all the way on Tuesday, and we had our reception for Tim’s family on Saturday (separate post about that later). On Monday, we found out her flight was officially cancelled. The email directed me to a link to rebook her on a new flight, and the earliest I could schedule her was on MONDAY, the 26th of April. Please note, Mom was originally supposed to leave on the 20th, and had only been granted 5 days off from work. Fortunately, her bosses are understanding and have told her to “enjoy her extra time” with me, but at the same time, this issue could cut into our future plans for her to visit this Summer.
Of course, we are enjoying the extra time together and managed to do a few more touristy things on her visit. We went to Stratford-upon-Avon on Tuesday since Tim already had the day off, and this weekend plan on going to Woodhall Spa. We were concerned about how we’d get her to the airport on Monday, but Tim’s bosses managed to let him take off Monday on short notice (after he explained why he needed it off).
But still, such a pain. Thankfully, Mom was visiting me and so has a free room to stay in. I can’t imagine what would happen if she was staying in a hotel somewhere!
Even worse is the predictions that the ash might move over the weekend and could disrupt flight again. If her Monday flight gets cancelled, I don’t know what we will do (well, have a longer visit, I suppose!). On the other hand, I’d rather her flight be grounded over the plane going through potential engine damaging ash!
Also, fortunately for Mom, her passport was stamped with the generic 6-month visitor stamp, so we have time if she is stuck longer. Also, the UKBA is allowing anyone who has an expired visa as a result of the volcanic ash stay with no penalties, they are just advising people to hold onto proof that they were originally leaving. See http://blog.us2uk.net for details.
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Rail Strike
Rail Union Announces Strike Dates
Since I’ve gotten a half a dozen emails or IMs asking if this affects us – Yes, it does as Tim is a member of the RMT union. The strike will be April 6, 7, 8, and 9. Instead of doing 4 straight days of strikes, they have opted to do walk-outs in 2 4-hour stints each day. 6am-10am and… 6pm-10pm…basically, the busiest times of day (commuter time). The strike is a NATION-WIDE strike over policy changes. The way Tim explained it to me and his aunt is this – the company wanted to cut some corners and said “hey, we can let people go and still make all our safety inspections. We’ll just change them around so fortnight inspections become monthly, monthly becomes quarterly, and quarterly becomes annually”. The union doesn’t like that. There also were some issues in other regions where people got dropped a grade because their position changed and proper procedure wasn’t followed (if your position gets dropped, you’re supposed to keep your pay!)
There is still a possibility of the strike being called off, but if you are a commuter, I’d try to arrange for alternate plans on those days just in case!
Don’t worry about us. We’re still okay financially. The strike days actually only affect one days worth of wages for Tim, as the 8th and 9th are scheduled days off for him.
I’ve posted this to FB and LJ as well.
Friday Night is Music Night
On Friday, Tim and I attended the second-to-last night of a drama and music festival being held in Lincoln. The Lincoln Sounds were participating in the competition and there also was a quartet made up of our members as well as many of the members also performing in the Lincoln Mix, a combined choir of the Sounds and Harmony Lincs. Harmony Lincs is the male barbershop group that inspired the ladies group to form.
We had a fantastic time. I wish I had been up on stage with the ladies, but being in the audience was just as good. Each group had to perform two songs in different styles. Unfortunately, we didn’t take home the top prize. The men’s chorus beat us by just one point! One point! How awful. But, we’ll get them next year because I’ll be singing ;).
After the festival, there was a party called Afterglow in the oldest building in Lincoln. Tim and I were invited along, and we got to mingle with the members of my group and Harmony Lincs…and I got to sing. Tim had actually never seen me sing before, and he said he could tell how happy it makes me. I am so excited to be a part of this group!
Roll on convention!
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Lincoln Sounds
Thursday has just become my town day/social day.
After spending time volunteering at Cancer Research, I’ll be walking up the hill (steep hill!) every Thursday to go to Tim’s aunt’s house for Tea (dinner/supper). After Tea, I’m headed over to rehearsal for the Lincoln Sounds, a female barbershop quartet group and a member of the Sweet Adelines international.
Last night was my first rehearsal, and a chance for me to get the feeling of the group. I was immediately asked to join in and sight-sing, and had a blast! I forgot how much fun singing was, to be honest. The choir director had me join him in another room during their break to test me out with some scales to see where I would fit, and well, let’s just say his compliments to me left me blushing when I returned to the group! The director was fairly impressed with my singing (!) and thought I could do one of three voice parts* – what he called Soprano 1, Soprano 2, and Alto 1, but the ladies in the choir call them “tenor”, “lead”, and “bari”. Cue a fight for me between the three section leaders!
In the end, the leads/Soprano 2’s won out, because I had been rehearsing in their section standing in front of the section leader and she really wanted me. LOL.
There is an “audition”, but at this point I think it’s a basic formality, since they all want me. They give you three weeks to learn the audition pieces, and then six to learn their “Sing Out”** songs, but I really don’t think I’ll need that long. I catch on quick! I’ll also then become a member of Sweet Adeline International, which is pretty cool. The group is also excited because since SA is a US-based organization, the judges at competition are from the US, and the groups get skill points for diction and for using an American accent. Apparently the Sounds lost some points on it last year, so I’ve been asked to help with diction as well!
*In the past, I sang Soprano 1 for four years, Soprano 2 for one year, and Alto 1 for one year.
**Sing out is when they go to other places to perform.
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One Month!
I’ve officially lived in the UK for one month, as of….well, right now, since my plane landed at 530 in the morning on the 21st of January. I’m settling into married life and life in the UK, and things are starting to get sorted –
*I’ve been added to Tim’s bank accounts and have received my debit card
*I have my NHS number and card and have been in to see the GP several times
*I have an EHIC card, so I’m covered if Tim and I jaunt into the rest of the EU and I need a doctor
*I have my NI number, so I can open savings accounts and get a job (if we decide I should)
*I have a library card, which has proven to be quite useful
*We joined the co-op and started earning a small bit for dividends
*I’ve been contacted by a local choir and have been invited to attend rehearsal this week
….the only thing left is for me to sort out the Provisional License, I think. As that requires sending off my passport for a month, I wanted to make sure I got everything else taken care of first.
It’s been a wild and crazy month, but I do love it here. I love being with Tim and we’re slowly getting the house sorted (and re-decorated) and everything is falling into place. We’ve even got most of the reception here planned already!
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Broken Memories
As most of you know, I’ve recently moved across the ocean to be with Tim. In addition to shelling out nearly £600 for my visa (close to $1000), plus extra for the expediting, we also spent a fairly decent chunk of money shipping most of my personal belongings across the ocean.
Since I wasn’t moving an entire house or taking any furniture, I contacted a shipping company who would take my boxes and seal them on a pallet and put them inside on of their containers to ship it across the ocean. We paid over $600 for this service (I think it worked out to around £400 on the credit card)….and I’m very disappointed.
The whole thing went seemingly painless – I did all my packing and used well over 300 sq ft of bubble wrap on my breakables. Most of my boxes were the same size, having come from my mom’s office the last time they ordered envelopes. Nothing weighed more than 50lbs (even my book boxes), and everything was clearly labeled. Two of the boxes were labled exactly to the specifications of the shipping company for fragile items – “FRAGILE” on all sides, and “TOP LOAD” in large letters on the top and two longest sides.
I had things covered well. Tiny things got wrapped in bubble wrap and went inside larger things, plates were wrapped the whole way around and stacked on their end, anything hollow (like a pitcher) got filled with clothing or plushies, and each box of breakables was lined with both bubble wrap and blankets/clothing.
Would you like to see the state of some of my boxes? Just scroll down to the gallery.
Yeah. Now, before I get into this further, let me talk about delivery.
I received a phone call on my mobile on Thursday while I was at the GPs from the delivery company. The man I spoke with on the phone told me that he had sitting in front of him my instructions for delivery (which mentioned things like our narrow driveway and that you couldn’t see the house number from the road, so look for number 9 and we’re attached). The man assured me the delivery driver would bring along a dolly (I’m not sure what it’s called, but the thing used to move pallets around in a warehouse) to get the pallet up our driveway (which is pretty long). Yeah….no dice. The delivery driver plopped everything at the bottom of our driveway (our very wet and slighyly muddy drive) and said he didn’t have room for the dolly so did we have a wheelbarrow? We did, so Tim dragged it down to the end of the drive. I thought for sure the delivery man was then going to ferry my boxes up to the house (as this was the service I paid for!)…nope. My husband had to move all the boxes 100ft between the driveway and our walkway. It’s a good thing he had been home from work that day or I’d have had an interesting time trying to move everything before the rain/snow started!
Boxes inside, I decided to rip into the two most important boxes – the fragile/top load ones. Oh, and did I mention that the top load boxes did not go on top? And one of them had a box of books on top of it? Honestly, what was the point in writing in large letters “TOP LOAD/FRAGILE” if it was going to be ignored? On first glance, I thought things were fine, as two of my nanny’s plates appeared to be fine, and all my regular dishes looked okay. Off I went to the GP (again. still having arm issues), and then out to Tesco for our weekly shopping.
When we returned, I started unpacking, and boy, was I in for a lot of heartbreak. All but THREE of the antique dishes (my nanny’s dishes I specifically asked my aunt if I could have before I moved because I liked them and wanted something of Nanny’s) are broken. Also broken is the base to a very large brandy glass (it#s supposed to be a candle holder), BOTH Princess House* cappuccino mugs (that my mom and I specifically bought off eBay so we’d both have sets!), the infuser to my glass teapot (shattered beyond repair or even recognition. Only knew it was what it was because that was missing!), a salad plate from the everyday dishes set, and several other items.
At this point, I’m really upset, so I fired off an email to the shipping company, forgetting that Monday was a federal holiday in the US. Fortunately, someone was in the office and wrote back to me requesting photos of the damaged boxes. All he could tell me so far was “I have learnt that all your boxes were placed at the top of the container when it left Charleston.” and “Seriously this does not normally happen when its packed correctly which seems you did exactly right.” I haven’t heard back yet, but since I paid for insurance on my items, I’m expecting to be able to claim some money back. Not the same as having your belongings, but a nice gesture as an apology.
*Princess House is an expensive glass sold in the US. AFAIK, it’s not available in the UK.
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Happy Valentine’s Day
Tim and I really struggled on what to do for Valentine’s Day. It was our first Valentine’s Day as a married couple, and really, our first Valentine’s Day to spend together, since last year he had to work 2pm – 10pm on it. Last year I managed to surprise Tim with a heart shaped cake* and a bunch of valentine’s on the front door. This year…we were stumped. We thought about going away for the weekend to one of the bed & breakfasts we enjoyed staying at, but then thought it might be crowded. We thought about going out to a nice dinner, but again, the crowded factor came into play. Instead we decided to just stay home, and I cooked a meal for us.
(there was steam coming off the food!)
For Tim – he had a steak grilled on the George Forman, steamed broccoli/cauliflower, roasted potatoes/sweet potatoes, and a side salad.
For me – I had prawns (shrimp), roasted asparagus, some of the potatoes and steamed vegetables, and a side salad.
I had never cooked a steak before, but apparently it was edible!
We tried grocery shopping at Morrisons this week (when we usually go to Tesco), and I didn’t know where anything in the store was. After two trips around it looking for the baking aisle, I gave up. This was our dessert:
I made butterscotch sauce (all you do is cook butter & sugar on the stove, remove it from the heat when it boils and add vanilla), and served it over ice cream and bananas. It was tasty, but not what I had been expecting to make for the day!
And Tim and I even dressed up for the occasion:
I even had a new dress! Tim’s granddad gave me some money for Christmas, and this dress was on super low clearance at BHS (marked down to £10!), so I picked it up intending to wear it when we went out…since we didn’t go out, I decided to wear it anyway.
Hope you all had a great Valentine’s Day!
*To make a heart: bake one square cake and one round cake. Cut the round cake in half. Set the square cake on a diagonal, and use the round halves to make the top part of the heart.
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