May. May I stay please?

Can't believe it's been so long since I've posted an update but not much has changed and it does look like my time in merry olde England will be coming to an end soon.  It's been quite a learning experience and I've come to feel as much at home here as I ever did back in the states.  I've made friends and I do feel that in some ways I've contributed to the community but alas the home office has rules and they rarely break them unless heaps of publicity is garnered and I'm not quite sure I'm comfortable with that level of invasion into my life.  We're still hoping for a miracle before the first week of June but unless a wealthy relative kicks off and leaves me a fortune it's not likely especially since I don't have much in the way of family left.

There is so much I'm going to miss...the people both good and bad, the constant bird song, having four seasons in the space of an hour, the abundance of green spaces, canal path rambles and runs, driving that is akin to a slow speed video game, picking blackberries into October, saying hiya and grumbling about the weather while out walking the dogs and so very much more.

I will be updating the blog on a more regular basis with how I was able to assimilate and integrate while keeping true to my American self without (hopefully) being obnoxious about it :-)

Evening Walk

We don't always go for a walk with the camera but when we do...

Beautiful Bella

The mutts in motion

Ben taking a breather

Just posing and hoping for a carrot

England is absolutely gorgeous when the sun is out and you have to take advantage of it as much as possible no matter what the temperature is.  Pictures taken and edited by +TWBrit com, the last photo had 2 strands of pipe covered fencing across it and he was able to remove them from the finished product.  Give him a shout about prices if you need any retouching or editing done. 

Catching up

The blog has been silent for the latter half of January other than yesterday's attempt at putting up an earworm video (for some reason youtube and blogger are still not playing nice with the embed codes).  It's not that I've not had things to say but I've been so busy having to stare at the computer screen for other purposes that updating here fell by the wayside.  So what has been happening in my world?

We had a trip down to London--not for pleasure though, it was for a project that my partner is working on. I did finally get to walk across the Tower Bridge once we finished up with what we could do work-wise, can't believe all the times I have been there and not done that until now! It's finally sinking in that I live here and so was feeling much less like a tourist--having my very own oyster card contributed to that in a somewhat weird way.  We did get the opportunity to help a lady out with pictures on the bridge after her phone's battery died--I know I would have been devastated if I was visiting a place and wasn't able to get a picture of it for posterity.

Training is going well, my 3rd 20 miler for the Belvoir Challenge was last Sunday and thanks to trying to keep up with a speedy running club mate I ended up doing it 6 minutes faster than my previous two! Yes, I know, much too quick for a long slow run but I'm a believer in running by feel (within reason) because you never know how you will fare on the next one. This weekend I will do a shorter distance of 10-13 miles then do another 20 miler the week after before beginning the taper process.  

The training has been slightly unconventional in that I'm doing so many 20 mile runs but it seems to be working.  Other than a pesky ingrown toenail and the big toe that randomly decides it's going to start hurting if I run on flat sections for too long I'm relatively niggle free (knock on wood). We're just not going to discuss the emergency stop I had to make at the local sports centre on Sunday! 

The favoured pair

While watching Craig Ferguson Late Late Show clips on youtube today and admiring Margaret Cho's boots I remembered that I own the same pair that she wore on an episode a few years ago: The Frye Julia lace-ups!

I have travelled across Wales, England, and Scotland in these boots, road-tripped across the US in them, had a woman in Los Angeles, California pull into a gas station for the sole purpose of asking me what they were and where I bought them, slept in them and ran through airports in them.  They have been re-soled three times and I still get compliments on them every time I wear them. I LOVE those boots and if I wasn't planning on being cremated I would want to be buried in them.  

On the shore of Loch Lomond

Jetlagged

Doing my rock star impression in Austin, TX

Supposed to be working

Glasgow

Going by these photos it would also appear I have a uniform besides running gear...Jeans, boots, oversize tee and leather jacket

Random musings

Random musings tonight.

I *like* running hills. It might not always be fun but tonight was one of the good ones once my legs got over feeling dead from the past two days of being sat at a desk.

If you like seventies style, you gotta watch "Rush", I'm more NASCAR than F1 but Ron Howard made a very entertaining movie that was a feast for the eyes--and I'm not just talking about Chris Hemsworth aka Thor.  The wardrobe in this movie is AMAZING.



Finally remembered to submit my picture for the INKnBURN #MondayMontage!

I love living in England but that fondness ends at all the pay to park areas.  This is a selection of the parking ticket receipts I fished out of my car before taking it in to be MOT'd yesterday. It passed by the way :-)

Speaking of passing, I passed my Theory and Hazard Perception tests on Tuesday. Just missed one on the former and got through the latter with more than enough points despite scoring a big fat zero on one of the clips where I apparently clicked the mouse button too many times.  Some of the questions are common sense but for the majority of it you need to know the Highway Code book inside and out. It should also be the latest version, my book from AA was from 2011 and I had one question that wasn't anywhere in my copy.

Blackberries are still ripening although we are getting to the last of them.  Someone decided to bring out the camera when I was on the step ladder trying to reach over the fence and into the hedge trying to pick as many as I could to freeze for later.  I do appreciate getting to admire how awesome those boots are though. 

I'm being assimilated.  Yesterday I was struggling to say dollar rather than pound when discussing American/Canadian/British money.  

After joining an American expat women's group on facebook I was reminded about how lucky I am to be a runner and how much I appreciate the running club.  It has made the transition to living here so much easier than it would have been otherwise because it has introduced me to so many awesome people.  I still get homesick and miss my friends back home but I don't have the sense of isolation that so many others have.  

Today was the Scotland vote for independence, as of yet we don't know the outcome and I'm not going to share my feelings about it here but it does make me sad to think that any future visits I take to our neighbouring country up north might require a passport check.  

An April Day Out

So much has happened this spring and I've let it all slip past me without writing about it, tis a shame because every so often I enjoy going back through the archives and reading my "diary" as a reminder of what has occurred.  

We visited Creswell Crags in mid-April where I donned this oh so attractive bump cap/hard hat so that we could take one of the cave tours. Gorgeous place that reminded me of where I grew up and made me a wee bit homesick.

Creswell Crags

Bouquet in a heart shaped tree

After exploring there and re-fueling with tea at the visitor's centre we drove over to visit the Mattersey Priory ruins, an English Heritage site that is well off the beaten path and is almost literally in someone's back garden. 

The approach in 

Old meets new

It never ceases to amaze me that so many ruins exist and are so well preserved.  Yes, quite a lot has been lost and destroyed but the fact that you have this sort of thing nearly everywhere you go kind of blows my mind at times.  I'm shite with remembering dates and chronologies but this makes history much more accessible to me.  

Blooms a'blooming and swans a'nesting

My first spring in England and it's been a glorious year for it.  Apparently it is slightly milder than usual and the sun the past few days has been blissful even though it fakes you out and makes you think it is much warmer than what it really is.  The back garden patio has been getting some use both as a place to sip our tea and coffee while basking in the aforementioned sunshine and as a workout area--the latter has greatly relieved my partner because he has been having visions of me losing grip on a kettlebell mid-swing and it flying through the French doors or front window, lol.

Another thing I'm enjoying about here are the endless blooms. I'm sure I'm driving people crazy on facebook with my constant pictures of various flora and asking them to identify it for me.  Spring in the US midsouth is gorgeous but there has always seemed to be a two week time limit on the life of jonquil and daffodil season (I might be exaggerating a little) and here they are still going strong a month after I first noticed them blooming.  Since these are my favorite flowers this makes me a very happy woman every time I'm outside.

The mutts and I also discovered that it is swan nesting season on a walk along the nearby canal trail. The one closest to us is disused as a waterway and that means the swans are able to build their nests in the middle of the canals.  Expect lots of pics in the coming weeks of the progress since there are two nesting within a mile of our walk.  The 2 photos I have are from my phone but we will be venturing out with the good camera soon in order to get better quality ones.

I haven't mentioned it here but I became a certified Nordic Walk Leader through the British Nordic Walking/INWA course at the end of March.  To borrow another fb quote from right after I got my certification, "I can't teach you but I can get you lost!" I was told quite firmly though that getting people lost during sessions is kind of frowned upon, lol!!!!  I am very much enjoying the nordic walking and looking forward to learning how to run with them soon, best yet I'm meeting people that I wouldn't ordinarily get a chance to chat with during our Tuesday morning classes.

All in all, life has been quite good lately. I have had several adventures that need to be blogged about and just as soon as I find the memory card reader so I can transfer images from the camera to the computer then hopefully I can get some posts up soonish. 

Committed

I've gone and committed myself to the Janathon 2014 and one of the requirements is that you workout every day and then try and blog about it (or you can tweet).......yep, almost messed that one up on day 1, not the exercise part, that was done and dusted hours ago but this writing every day? Well, there may be lots of picture posts this month without any words to go with them ;-).  One good thing about it is that it will get me more active about commenting on other blogs again, I've gotten very lackadaisical about that over the past couple of years.

2014 has kicked off quite well though. My partner and I opted for a night in because the mutts are terrified of fireworks and thought it would be easier on them if we were here--yes, that's the age old trick of blaming it on the dogs, lol.  A minute or two before midnight I headed out the door with a suitcase to walk around--a delightfully quirky practice that a friend talked me into doing for the first time last year.  Apparently it means you will travel a lot in the coming year and it certainly worked for 2013.  I might not have traveled to many new to me places but I got to go with someone to whom they were new so that's as good if not better.  Although based on how long it took for my belongings to arrive from the US I might should have put some clothes in the empty suitcase I wheeled about just in case that is what jinxed me.

While doing the stroll down the street the fireworks started in earnest, I already knew that British people were quite passionate about their pyrotechnics but nothing quite prepared me for New Year's Eve in England.  There were explosions of color everywhere in every direction for miles......even when you couldn't see the actual firework burst on the other sides of the hills surrounding us you could see the white glow against the clouds and after a few minutes the "smog" from the gunpowder. It might not have been London but we didn't have to deal with the crowds either.  I was absolutely enthralled, Ben and Elsie quite a bit less so.

Oh, back to the workout part.  Elsie the Miniature Schnauzer Menace and I ran 4.62 miles in 45:12 this morning, not bad considering the not quite gale force winds and the two hills we had to huff and puff up. After a small breakfast and a fair bit of wasting time on facebook I finally did my Truckin' Runner challenge of 90 bicycle crunches then a core workout I borrowed from Pinterest which involved even more bicycle crunches.  It was the v-ups that kicked my arse this morning though, couldn't get through the set of 30 and 20 without breaking them up into smaller sets of 5 and there might have been some girl pushups mixed in as well.

Love this reminder

Hey, I'm an expat!

Interesting article that seems to be creating a lot of conversations on various forums. I agree with some and I think she has her head up her ass on other parts of it.  http://www.businessinsider.com/us-expats-in-england-2013-10

Yes, there are derelict buildings and strip malls in England, we passed what I would call a strip mall last night--not as prolific as the states and the billboard/signage is not as overwhelmingly obtrusive but we are talking a vast difference in the size of the countries. Note I didn't say population, just the sheer land mass difference.  Not everyone in the states has walk-in closets, basements, or garages and quite a few houses here have the latter two (basements are called cellars though, and as an aside it depends on where you're at in the states as to what nomenclature is used) but I will agree that walk-in closets are few and far to find. Shoot, closets in general are scarce unless it's a new build.

Most grocery stores (shops) here do offer delivery service but it's not used by "everyone".  In my experience it's about equal on the eating out or carrying your own for lunch in that with both countries it depends on the workplace.  I'm not sure what the conveniences are that she is referring to when it comes to housework and I air-dried my laundry quite frequently in the states.  I do concur with missing my American style washer and dryer but that is more of a time issue rather than the quality of the machines because I could usually wash and tumble dry a load of towels in less time than it takes to do only the wash cycle.  Tumble dryers are widely available here but in our case it would have to go into the garage (that mythical thing again, lol) and it's quite expensive to operate here so we have made the decision not to buy one. That's not to say that we don't have a dryer, our machine is the combination style and it simply takes far longer so it's easier (and cheaper) to just hang everything out when possible

The public transit is far more available than in MOST areas of the states but depending on the area it may not  be near as convenient as what she has in her corner of the UK. I can't speak as to the effectiveness of the NHS as of yet because I haven't lived here long enough but the US insurance system has bloated the health services industry to a point where it is disgraceful.

I could go on and on and there are quite a few insightful points made in the article I do agree with but there were just a few that had me scratching my head and wondering if she'd traveled much into the rest of the UK.  However I am still very new to living here myself so my perceptions and experiences will continue to evolve.

Hanging out

It's currently sunny. I have just hung out some wash so this means it will be raining in 30 minutes.

Ben and Elsie 

The benefit to living in England is that the pics above and below were taken this month, yes in November and it has been cold. 

Lushness in overload.  

Outside the office window

Obviously not winter there:  Cold War Kids "Hang Me Up To Dry"

Wednesday shakeout

Bonus points if you know what this is

After much procrastination I finally emailed and met up with a local running club--actually had emailed two and after I couldn't make the first run coming up for the second one I never received an email back when I explained and asked was there any other time that they met up for group runs without having to wait another week.  Oh well, guess the person was being uber-cautious and while I can understand that, I'm not too impressed with not receiving any sort of reply.  The closest one made me feel welcome and I'm hoping that I can find a few people that I can run with on other days of the week besides the official group meetups for some easier workouts.  On the bright side, I ran 6.29 miles in 53 minutes on some pretty big hills during the Thursday run--felt good to be pushing a little harder than what I had been doing but I still need work to get back to last year's condition.  I also now have an England Athletics number so yay to reduced entry fees on certain races!  

Elsie the miniature schnauzer menace and I ran 9.5 miles Monday while exploring a new route, about 2 miles longer than what it should have been because I missed the turnoff on a bridle trail.  I even had a small copy of an OS map that I stopped to look at twice and still managed to get "lost". I still got to the other trail that led us back home just slightly further out than I'd planned, lol.  You would have thought Elsie would have been napping the rest of the day but she came home and started playing and wrestling with Ben and the partner, who says little dogs can't run distance???

A dog and her girl 

Yesterday the household stuff finally arrived from the states and I'm sore from carrying boxes and unpacking--29 out of 35 boxes are empty and even if everything is not put away properly it is at least in the room where it belongs.  Needless to say I missed last night's run after being on the go from the time the driver knocked on our door at 0715, yeah, that was a LITTLE earlier than expected.  Surprisingly after sitting on a dock or being in a ship for 2 months and 1 week everything was meticulous and still smelled like the sandalwood incense I like to burn. My partner said I should mention that it was due to his super mad skills in box making and packing that everything arrived intact.  It was slightly hilarious this morning realizing after so long with very little choice in what to wear that it was almost overwhelming having all my clothes available again.

Stocked up on Brooks trainers before moving 

I'm still sore from yesterday and today's weather started out horrible but Elsie and I were both needing a shakeout run.  It was so funny, there was rain pelting the windows, the wind was howling and my partner asked if I was sure I wanted to go out when the weather was so bad--my reply was "It's England, if I stayed in every time the weather wasn't nice I'd only run 2-3 times a month."  Slight exaggeration but not far off.  Anyways, we were almost two miles into the run and the sun came out and the world just seemed to glow, so worth heading out when it was so miserable mere minutes before.

6 weeks

Today is my six week anniversary of living in England, guess I should have done the one month commemoration post thing but that would mean me actually noting the date and then acting upon that info. Alas, remembering dates are not my thing and I'm a bit of a procrastinator.

Adjustment continues, in some ways it feels like I have been here forever, at other times it feels like an extended vacation which I'm sure is exacerbated by still not having the majority of my belongings.  There were two moments of pms-induced homesickness last week that had me hiding out in the back garden and crying, I am sure there will be more of those to come.

Would have been helpful if I hadn't packed these in the boxes to be shipped

The exploration of the canal paths and area via running is amazing, I surprise my partner (and myself) at times by pointing out places and landmarks that I've discovered.  Monday I found a site where people write about their memories of various villages and it was incredibly cool to be able to say "Oh, I know where that is" in reference to the local area.

Feed us or move on

food, cars, and stuff

Today was my first long drive in the Mini mobile on a route that took us through Milton Keynes--lots and lots of traffic with seemingly endless roundabouts in heavy rain.  Talk about getting thrown in, at least I had someone to talk me through it and it wasn't the dreaded Magic Roundabout.  The trip ended up being a washout since the car dealer we were making the trip down to view a couple of Land Rover type products was apparently not interested in selling any cars today.  Yes, it was drizzly but no one came out to say hello while we wandered all about the lot looking at various vehicles.  Even after we walked into the building the salesperson simply waved us into a corner office and didn't bother getting up to say hello.  Once we inquired about the vehicles we were interested in and if we could look inside them he told us that test drives were appointment only.  He finally asked if we had driven far (over a hundred miles!) and you would have thought there might have been some give, but nope, "Appointment only, especially since it is raining."  WTF???? It's England, it rains a LOT!  Their loss, it would have been a guaranteed cash sale.

After that we decided to head off in search of a pub lunch but ended up spotting a Mexican food restaurant (Chimichanga) while driving through Amersham. Cute place even if it is a chain and unlike the car dealership, GREAT service! Main difference between this place and a Mexican restaurant in the states is that we didn't get complimentary tortilla chips and salsa, I'm not sure if this is the norm in the UK or not.  Oh and the pico de gallo could have done with a few more peppers.

The tried and true steak fajitas

No run this morning due to an achy back from yesterday's fall then following it up with a full day's work cleaning out the garage (which still isn't clean by the way).  Ended up taking a just over 2 mile walk with the mutts instead.  

I hate planks.  How can something so simple be so difficult?

borrowed from pinterest

However I had an excellent run this morning once I forced myself out the door into the cold drizzle--hey even the locals here are complaining so I am not going to feel overly wimpy for complaining.  Left Ben and Elsie at home because I wanted as uninterrupted a run as possible, with the canal paths you will always have some slowdowns because they are so heavily used but the scenery is worth it.  The rain kept most of the dog walkers home so no "good morning love" salutations this morning (I look forward to those!).  Our next door neighbor came by with his dog Sammy just as I finished up and I'm sure he thinks I'm insane because I was rocking those post great run endorphins and might have been a little hyper during our chat, lol.

Actually the elephant pic above looks like a cheeky shot that someone took of me yesterday while I was attempting to tame the front garden somewhat!

No clue as of yet when our container of shipped items will arrive from the states but I am needing it here already because most of my cold weather gear is packed up in it.  I fully expected to be here in August so nearly everything that was unneeded at the time was boxed up.  Mid-summer in Arkansas means you are not thinking about heavier clothing for October in England.  It will be nice having all the smaller furniture items as well so that we can make the living room more, well for lack of a better word, livable.  We are starting to make progress on it though, finally got the drum kit downsized and some of the clutter put away (I'm not posting the pic of the stack of gear against one of the walls). 

I think I need an Americana pillow to go with the Union Jack!

The fireplace is a bit dire--AKA ugly. The landlord went for cheap rather than aesthetically pleasing, he also opted for the electric instead of gas thus using up one of the few outlets available.  Anyone have suggestions on how to disguise, minimize, change the looks of it before I get lost on pinterest for the day?