sMOOchalicious

Time Goes By

2010-03-14T21:59:00.005Z

I can't imagine anyone remembers this blog. I've mostly forgotten about it. But, because I have lots and lots of things to do, I am procrastinating by catching up with it.

Here's a quick round up:
It amazes me, but my gorgeous little boy is nearing 11 months old; I am addicted to his smiles. My kitchen is still not finished, but we're almost there. Undiscovered Voices 2010 has wrapped up for us organisers; we're just waiting with fingers crossed for news of book deals. www.undiscoveredvoices.com. The next publishing event from me is a Children's Book Circle panel event on the Google Books Settlement www.childrensbookcircle.org.uk in early April. I've got some serious under-contract writing on the horizon and I'm so excited about it. I'm leading a super-secret, mega-exciting iniative that could make life better for lots and lots of people. I'm giving a talk to a group of 8-12 year old passionate readers and it's the thing I'm most nervous about. I have not done any actual exercise in months but I have been cooking up a storm in the kitchen. I just bought two new sweaters that I completely love.

There ya go... should do it for now. I hope it won't be another six months before I get back here again. But maybe you will forgive me if it is?

First Post-natal Blog

2009-09-20T23:06:00.009Z

So, um, on January 2nd I wrote that I would post on this blog as much as baby would allow - which turned out to be not at all. Sorry. But, I can say that I did manage #1 "give birth" and #4 "stay involved in the children's publishing world".

In fact, it is the pursuit of #4 that inspired this post.

On Saturday, I taught a fantasy writing class. It wasn't my first time speaking to group of writers, but it was the first time I had ever taught. If you want to know what they thought of me, just click on this *ahem* picture below which was created by the creative Candy Gourlay, one of the writers on the course.

And please refer to me as "Slasher" from now on.

Busy as a Bee

2009-04-05T22:23:00.003Z

Lots of fun projects have been keeping me busy.

My favorite of the lot is this one: www.undiscoveredvoices.com. This is the anthology contest that my friend Sara and I ran two years ago for the British Society of Children's Books Writers and Illustrators. It was hugely successful then and we're hoping this second incarnation will be, too. We had opened the submissions with a kick off event last Tuesday. The agent and editor judges plus the past winners came along to offer advice to the people submitting this year. It was great to feel the excitement in the air. And this year we have a beautiful website which explains everything if I haven't already talked your ear off about it. Yay!

My other big children's book industry project was co-hosting a Children's Book Circle event on the future of children's publishing. We had a panel of five speakers come to talk about digitally interactive publishing, e-books, sustainable paper publishing, print on demand and personalized printing. They were all great speakers and I learned a lot. That was also last week, on Thursday, and so I've defintiely been keeping myself busy and distracted from this Big Event that everyone is waiting for.

I've also been taking driving lessons, and have my driving test booked for April 16th. Gulp. Gulp because it's notoriously hard to pass driving tests in Britain and gulp because that's only eight days before my due date! I'm hoping the huge bump might win me some sympathy points.

Other chores: I've pre-washed all my baby clothes/cloths/blankets; I planted some garlic in pots on the patio; I've been ordering things online like mad for Baby's arrival.

Hubby's progress: He's fixed our bookcases to the wall, so I can start filling up the shelves. He's repotted our tall bamboo plants into fancy bigger pots, done some gravelling out front and also started pulling down the kitchen. This time, though, the kitchen won't stay in pieces for months. The idea is that everything he's ripped out will be put back (even better) by the end of this Easter weekend. When he pulled up the cabinets, we found a community newsletter from 1987 buried underneath -- it quite amusing as it's pretty similar to the newsletter we get now! Here's the kitchen in-progress:

And when we're not doing big projects, we're doing this... which, if you aren't addicted like we are, is Guitar Hero.

Photo Update

2009-03-15T17:18:00.006Z

I'm overdue on some photos that I promised. Here they are:

The new car...

The new kitchen...
Yes, it is still in its packaging, but it will be rudely awakened in about two weeks' time. The first pic is the fridge, dishwasher (yay!) and microwave. The second is of all the cupboards, shelves, door handles, etc., in a stack in our conservatory.

The new nursery...
Now posing as a guest room. (Sorry for the narrow shot. I'm still not quite used to my new camera.) Hubby has outdone himself with the beautiful new floor.

For those keeping tabs on my pregnancy, I'm now 34 weeks pregnant. (Gulp!) We've been going to NCT classes to meet other parents and learn about all the fun stuff that's going to happen in 6 to 8 weeks time.

I hope my next post will be about half of the new kitchen going in.

My work colleagues ROCK

2009-02-26T23:48:00.003Z

This morning at work, I came downstairs from a meeting to find a surprise "30" birthday balloon and shiny confetti all over my desk. Then, I got a special sparkly birthday cake and everyone sang me Happy Birthday. I LOVED it.

Here is a picture of my fabulous cake, courtesy of a friend with a camera phone. It was lemon inside with a delicious cream cheese (and edible sparkly) filling.

Husband liked it, too. I brought a big slice home for him.

And this is only the beginning of a long weekend of celebrating... me! I get a fancy dinner tomorrow night with the husband, an evening of karaoke, Chinese food and drinks (non-alcoholic for me) in London on Saturday with Da Crew AND a lunch with my neighbour on Sunday.

Getting old is fun!

Thank you Petaling Street

2009-02-22T22:07:00.005Z

Today I managed to successfully negotiate with a used car dealer. Wahoo!

Hubby and I set a price that we wanted to pay (even though we would have paid the sticker price), and I wheeled and dealed until we actually got that price. It wasn't easy and the dealer didn't want to agree to my offer, but in the end I managed to get £500 off the listed price. YeeHAW!

It's not a done deal yet, but we've locked in the price and I'm very proud of myself. So, thank you to Petaling Street (a street in Kuala Lumpur where I watched my dad haggle with hard-headed watch sellers) and also thank you to various websites about negotiation and to my husband for his patience.

When/if we get the car, I'll post a picture.

In other news:
-- the nursery is coming along nicely. Neil has painted the walls, hung the blinds and laid most of the new floor.
-- the IKEA kitchen is arriving on Tuesday.
-- we're just back from a lovely trip to Tucson to celebrate my Grandma's 90th birthday, to meet my gorgeous second nephew Caleb and to see my mom's beautiful new house.
-- we have our first parenting class on Monday
-- I'm taking driving lessons and am scheduled for a British driving test in mid-April. I hope Baby doesn't come too early!

Country Living

2009-01-24T16:57:00.006Z

One of the things I should have blogged about last year was buying our escape-to-the-country home. We've left concrete Croydon and moved to the Chilterns.

Here's the view from our bedroom window:

It's green and beautiful and it makes it difficult to go into grey, crowded London for work. The village is tiny and lovely, and we have wonderful next door neighbours who welcomed us on our first evening and have been good friends ever since.

Of course, we can't resist redecorating and renovating. We're redoing the kitchen, IKEA-style, just as we did in Croydon. We're turning bedroom three into a nursery, and doing a few bits and pieces everywhere else (new fireplace, new floors, painting everywhere...).

Progress so far:
We have had the hideous Artex ceiling plastered over by a skilful, efficient and clean workman (yay!), and we've had custom bookshelves made by affordable and skilled but not very communicative pine bookcase builders.

Artex ceiling:

Artex celing no more:

We've also bought a new couch:

My darling hubby has pointed out that my New Year's resolution about getting all the DIY done by the end of the year isn't really fair on him, but I've always been a little ambitious...

I'm off to IKEA on Monday to finalize the kitchen and place the order for everything, so I expect you'll see a picture of the stack of flat pack in the near future.

It's 2009!

2009-01-02T18:03:00.006Z

If there is anyone out there still reading: I can't believe it's been six months since I've posted! I apologize for my lack of follow through. Since it's a new year, I'm going to get back on the blogging horse.

I have a couple of things to blog about from the second half of last year that I will post in the coming weeks, but this post is a combination "big news" post and 2009 goals. Lots of my blogging friends are posting their goals for the year for all to see, and perceived pressure from all you people watching me will help get me get them done.

My first goal is combined with my "big news".

1. Give birth.
Yup. If you didn't know already (but I'm guessing you do!) I'm six months pregnant with a baby boy, due at the end of April. This and what follows will take up the majority of my energy and efforts, so the rest of my list will be short.

2. End the DIY.
Help my husband install a new kitchen, set up the nursery (both before baby, I hope!)and decorate the rest of the house so that it's completely done by 2010.

3. Begin the gardening.
One of my dreams for moving out to the country and having a proper backyard (oh yeah, we've moved!) is to be able to grow my own vegetables. I'm pretty good at killing house plants, but I'm going to try to garden anyway.

4. Become a better publishing employee.
Read at least 30 non-work books, to beat the measley 25 I read in 2008. Write those articles I've been meaning to write. As much as possible while I'm away from work, stay involved in the children's publishing world.

5. Enjoy the inevitable chaos.
I won't sweat the small stuff. I will make lots of mistakes, but it won't matter. I will not be hard on myself and I will have fun with my baby boy.

6. Don't disappear.
I will stay in touch with friends and let myself take a break when I need to in the hobbies that I love. I will post on this blog and play as much Scrabble on Facebook as baby will allow.

5th of July

2008-07-05T22:20:00.006Z

We had a barbeque today, celebrating American independence a day late, and the requirements to attend were to:

1. Be named Sara or Sarah
2. Be American
3. Be married to a Brit
4. Be married to an American named Sara(h)
5. Be my brother

We did sing some American songs (tee hee!) and there was debate over the American revolution. I baked a cake from one of my favorite blogs The Pioneer Woman. It was decorated with a yummy cream cheese icing and raspberries and blueberries, and it was really easy to do!

and found sparklers in letter form, which spelled out USA. (Feel free to start up the chant: U-S-A! U-S-A!)

My brother did the cooking.It got a little smokey at times!

It's the last time we'll entertain at our Croydon flat, as it will soon be sold. We've agreed a price on a new house and hope to move soon! I'll keep you posted on that...

Adventure Holiday

2008-06-27T21:55:00.009Z

Here are some highlights of the adventure part of my vacation in Utah.

I went rock climbing for the first time, and it was a real thrill. Adrenaline pumping, heart thumping, scared witless rock climbing. I loved it.

The climbing shoes were incredible. They were painfully tight, but the grippy stuff on the bottoms were SO grippy. Most of the first climb was about learning to trust that your foot would actually stay in that 2mm deep crevice when you put all your weight onto it. Wahoo! I can't wait to go again.

My dad gets some kudos for climbing. He's pretty old. Not too old. But, you know, old. (Tee hee!)

Sorry, I don't have video of me climbing. However, I do have video of The Husband. Unlike the indoor skydiving, Neil was so much better at climbing than I was. To make up for me being a little mean in that indoor skydiving post, Neil gets the video feature in this post. He was a real monkey.

I also went white water rafting for the first time. Any hard core rafters will mock my excitement, as these rapids were not very big. But it was exciting to me, and extra kudos go to my mom who came rafting, too, despite not being a fan of thrill-seeking. (I think she liked the thrill!) Next time, we'll go for bigger rapids.

We're all smiling there, but when the water splashed into the boat, it was COLD! Here's a video of our longest and bumpiest rapid:

Grand Canyon (no The)

2008-06-11T05:59:00.007Z

I am in Grand Canyon! (No one puts a "the" in front of it round these here parts.)

It is a stunning place. We woke up at ridiculous o'clock to get to a trailhead by 7am. Then, we hiked down a steep trail to Cedar Ridge for gorgeous views of the canyon -- though the river remained elusive. Here's me on the trail (in the white hat):

We had a fantastic guide who was so enthusiastic about the area; she kept us all in good spirits, which managed to last through the strenuous and sweaty trip back up. She taught us about the plant that tequila gets made front, how the Ponderosa Pine smells like butterscotch and Ooh-Aah Point. I don't know how long the trail was, but it was 1200 feet down into the canyon.

We got to see some sure-footed mules coming down the trail, though I think the wranglers didn't like having thier picture taken.

Rained Out :(

2008-05-26T13:10:00.007Z

I have no videos of chasing cheese to show you.

The pouring rain woke us up at about 7am and hadn't stopped by the time we were supposed to get ready, nor had it stopped by the time we were supposed to be leaving. We decided that, rather than swim down the hill, we'd wait until next year. So... stay tuned for next year! Rumor has it that my brother might be joining in on the fun!

So as not to disappoint my rabid fans hungry for entertainment, I can provide some footage of the practice runs. We went to Blue Bell Hill near Maidstone and the husband took a few tumbles. The idea is to use his Aikido ukemi to keep the speed momentum when falling... It's harder than he thought!

And, just for the fun of it, I tried running down the hill. It was scary, and I wasn't even trying to ukemi!

Chasing the Cheese

2008-05-25T23:46:00.002Z

If you are wondering what I'll be doing on my Bank Holiday Monday tomorrow... I will be filming my husband doing this:

http://www.cheese-rolling.co.uk

I hope to put a clip up here, and the only reason I won't is if it turns out to be a film of him breaking his neck.

The Flat is Finished Slideshow 1

2008-05-22T21:59:00.002Z

The flat is finished, and now we're moving out. Actually, the flat is finished because we're moving out.

Here is a slideshow showing the progression of half of the kitchen. This is the sink wall before, during and after the DIY.

More to come! Including snazzy photos using a wide angle lens...

A Lovely Song

2008-05-21T19:56:00.003Z

To get me back into the habit of posting, here is a lovely song for you to enjoy. I loved it the second I watched it and had to share it with you.

If you are my grandma, you don't need to watch the stuff after the song. That stuff is a bit silly.

The girl in the video is an incredible musician and you can find more of her music here: http://www.youtube.com/user/jaaaaaaa.

More posts soon!

Love you ALL.

I'm a winner!

2008-03-28T21:58:00.003Z

At first, I thought it was another spam email. But it wasn't. I have actually won a competition. About four months ago, I filled in a survey about my trip to the Forest of Dean. I lvoe taking surveys and this one was really interesting. It asked me to click on photos that I thought represented my experience in the Forest of Dean, as well as lots of questions about what I did and what I wanted to do. The survey was run by the official tourism website for the Forest of Dean and they were clearly doing some thinking about how best to get people to come and visit. I was happy to offer my opinion, and never really thought about winning the prize.

But I did.

The prize is... a trip to the Forest of Dean!

We get to stay in this gorgeous-looking B&B for two nights, free.

I can't wait to go back.

We're moving!

2008-03-16T23:05:00.003Z

My lovely hubby has just got a new job (yay, Husband!) and it's not in London (collective gasp). While he'll avoid being packed into a commuter train, he will have to battle with traffic instead. I will still be commuting into London, and the places we are looking at buying a house all have good transport links into various London stations.

We have to wait a little while for all the official paper pushing to happen before we can go on full on exploratory missions and actually loook inside houses but, while this was brewing, we've done a bit of driving around in the area.

If you work with me, please forgive me for being scattered (for the past few weeks and) for the next few weeks. If you are related to me, I may be a little ball of crazy when you try to talk to me. It's all going to happen pretty quickly as hubby will likely start his new job in four weeks. But we're both really excited to be moving away from London to the green, green hills of England.

For an example of some of the green, green places we like so far:
Wingrave

View Larger Map
Cheddington

View Larger Map
Cublington

View Larger Map

I'll keep you posted!

I'm back!

2008-03-03T19:54:00.009Z

I'm back from New York and from my long absence from blogging. There has been so much going on, but I'm back now. I'll use this post to tell you about my New York trip and will wait to catch you up on other things later. I don't have much on my schedule at the moment, so I can blog about all the interesting things that I've been doing, rather than the vegging out that I plan to be doing for the next few weeks.

For the past week, I've been on my first real business trip. I was sent to New York to represent my company to people who we haven't worked with before. I felt like a travelling saleswoman even though I wasn't really selling anything besides the good reputation of my company. I have decided that in every meeting I was successful in getting across that we are a great business to work with -- because we are! Hooray!

It was a real thrill to be back in New York on my own and working, but all the adrenaline and scheduling and bouncing around the city, I did get worn out. I'm not as young as I used to be. Luckily, I got to go to several interesting restaurants and cafes with my business meetings like CraftBar, a casual place with brown paper tablecoths and gorgeous healthy food, and Alice's Tea Cup a place for proper English tea with an Alice in Wonderland motif.

I also want to make a special mention of the hotel I stayed in: the Hotel Mela. It's a boutique hotel in an awesome location and is more reasonably priced that is neighbor competitors. Great rooms, great service (everyone is so happy!) and free streaming wifi. If you're ever going to New York and need a place to stay, try this hotel.

I also happened to be in New York on my birthday and my wonderful parents came up to hang out with me for the weekend. On my actual birthday, they took me to a great Mexican restaurant recommended by one of the agents that I met with called La Palapa. They had some really interesting dishes like cooked cactus and a rice dumpling smothered in a tomato salsa. Yum.

We also went to see Spamalot (which I have seen before and have a bit of fun history with) and I loved it all over again. Clay Aiken was in it (yes, I'm fan -- don't mock) and he was great. He was just as funny as the professional actors, with his fantastic voice to top it off. Interstingly, the Lady of Lake was the same Lady of the Lake that I saw in London, because the US and UK Ladies switched places for a time. She was just as awesome the second time around.

Lastly, my trip was awesome because I got to see so many friends: singing karaoke and trying to get free drinks (and embarassing myself a couple of times with my song choice), spending an evening with an old friend and it only felt like a couple of weeks since we'd seen each other, and hanging out with my family, shopping and walking around New York despite the freezing cold wind.

Off by a measly 10,000

2007-12-06T00:39:00.000Z

November is... thank goodness... over. In case you were wondering how I did on my word count: I wrote 40,000 words. In one month. I was 10,000 words short of the 50,000 word goal, but I did beat my 35,000 word secret goal.

And that Word War I was having with my friend? On the last day, I was 1500 words behind her and my day from about 2pm until midnight was typing as much as my brain would let me. I almost caught up, but ended up losing by 50 words. Sniffle.

However, adding my 40,000 words to the 12,000 words I had before November, I have now completed the very first, first draft of a novel. It's very exciting.

I haven't even opened the file since Friday (the 30th) but I will crack it open soon and see how much of a disaster it is. But for now, I am glowing a little with pride.

And here's a pic of my final minutes...

Apologies and excuses

2007-11-18T12:51:00.000Z

I know; I know!

It’s been ages since I’ve posted a blog, and I’m terribly sorry. Here are some of the things I’ve been doing instead:

Co-coordinating an anthology of unpublished children’s fiction writers, judged by six industry professionals, from over 250 submissions. See www.britishscbwi.org. The book and its cover are in the middle column and will be printed and shipped out at no charge to every agent and editor in the UK in the hopes of getting these fabulous writers published. I do intend to blog about the experience once it’s all done and dusted.

Attempting to write 50,000 words in the month of November. See www.nanowrimo.org. I’m over 18,000 words, but that’s not a good enough pace to make the 50,000 word target. Still, I’m happy with my 18,000 words and will keep going in an effort to beat a friend at a “word war”. Between the two of us, the person with more words in the month of November gets to enjoy a yummy dim sum meal paid for by the person with the fewer words. So far, I'm winning!

Working like a dog. November is our busiest month creatively, as out managing director takes a trip to New York to pitch our new ideas. I’ve been working on a doggie proposal and a quirky witch proposal while attempting to edit a 50,000 word samurai book, manage a tidal wave of consecutive 4,000 word dinosaur books and a 12,000 word genie book. AAAHHH!

Visiting my lovely grandparents, one of whom was not doing so well, I’m sad to say. But my grandpa is back at home now, and I hope that things start to improve for him and my grandma soon.

Exercising twice a week. Aren’t I a good girl?

And, for pre-emptive excuses, here are some things I will be doing in the coming weeks:

Still attempting to write 50,000 words. So forgive me if my blogging takes another hiatus.

Still working like a dog. That samurai novel will come around one more time, I've got to finish that quirky witchy proposal plus another proposal that's very hush hush. And yet more dinosaurs.

Celebrating Thanksgiving with my parents in England. The celebrations will be loosely themed and perhaps not actually on the day of Thanksgiving.

Bidding on a snowflake. See Robert's Snow. I was lucky to win one of the snowflakes the first year, but I couldn’t get one last year. This year, I’m determined to get one in particular. Go and check out the story behind these snowflakes and the amazing art and bid on one that takes your fancy. Unless it’s the one that I want. Then forget you ever saw this link.

Reading the first draft of a novel by a friend of mine. I’m SO excited because I’ve been watching it evolve from a short story into a fully formed novel. And it’s going to be so good!

Being evaluated at my performance review at work. Dum dadum dum… DUM!

Athena

2007-09-29T17:21:00.000Z

If you're headed to Greece, I would recommend a couple of nights in Athens to experience the choatic city atmosphere, but not much longer than that.

We stayed at the sleek, trendy Fresh Hotel, and loved it. The taxi drivers had a hard time finding it, despite it's central location, and if you read the cyberspace reviews you'll gather that it isn't in the best part of town. But you'll feel cool every moment you're inside.

The hotel has won various design awards, provides the all-important free business center with internet access and has a fantastic roof terrace bar/restaurant next to the small pool called the Air Lounge. It turned out to be quite a happening night spot for the wealthy locals, and you can even see the Acropolis all lit up -- beautiful. We enjoyed both lunch and dinner up there, plus several rounds of cocktails at all hours on the big comfy couches.

General observations/tips
The Acropolis -- take your own guide book, one that includes the Greek gods, or buy one before you climb up the steps. You won't get any information about what you're looking at once you're up there. In general, there is a decided lack of signage in Greece, even in the tourist destinations.

Maps -- If you have a map of the city, don't give it to my dad to read. He might walk you in the complete opposite direction you want to go, through the seediest streets, insisting all the while that the Acropolis is just in front of you.

Car rental -- Don't worry, no problem-lah! We bought a cheap single-sheet fold out map from the airport and zipped all over the south coast. Most road signs are in the Greek and Roman alphabets. We didn't drive in Athens because everything there was to see was in walking distance.

Always wear your sunscreen --

Elections -- If you happen to be in Greece on election day be prepared to get stuck in crazy traffic and cut off by random, unannounced road barriers. The city streets were one big huge party with people waving flags, blaring horns and mass-celebrating, despite only re-electing the same leader.

Restaurants -- Two recommendations for you:
As I mentioned, we had a lovely dinner in the Fresh Hotel, so that's at the top of my recommended restaurants. The food was delicious, the waiter was lovely and they gave us free booze!

My second recommendation is really not to be missed. The food is very slow, but the atmosphere is awesome. The manager of the restaurant (perhaps the owner?) is chatty and charming, but the real reason to visit this restaurant is the live music. There's a small stage which was filled by the most passionate, engaging and adorable Greek singer. He is a one man band with several harmonicas attached to his acoustic guitar and a tambourine strapped to his foot. He is awesome. He gave 100% of his energy for two hours straight, took a short break and then went back on for another set. He played tons of Greek songs as well as several Spanish ones. Yes, there was a rendition of La Bamba! I'm afraid I don't know the name of the restaurant in English, but it's located on a small Sari Street, just off the trendy "Ag. Anargyron" in the center of town. Here's a pic of the sign, and the singer. It's worth tracking down if you can...

Next blog: Santorini!

A three hour tour

2007-09-26T22:15:00.001Z

Yes, the boat was gone, and the only person on board was about as far from a sailor as you could get. She was a Turkish sunbather, waiting for her friend to finish diving. All I could think of was how much I would be freaking out if I was in her situation.

There was much cursing and worrying, and we all began swimming to shore against the choppy waves. The boat driver had also been diving, but he had realized the problem much sooner than we had, hurried to shore and banged on house doors until someone leant him a phone. Now on the beach, the driver and the Good Samaritan watched through binoculars as two people: a diver and the Turkish girl's friend tried to swim out after the boat. It was probably half a mile from the shore, drifting farther and farther out of the bay.

After much insistent Greek over the phone, the boat driver finally got through to our instructor's partner who was back at the dive shop with another boat. Moments later, the other dive boat came racing across the water to the stranded boat, James Bond-style. The local watched through his binoculars and reported that the swimming divers had made it, and that the sunbather was being put into the rescue boat.

I didn't get to hear the sunbather's side of the story because she had to hurry off to dinner with her boss, but everything ended well. It turned out that though the anchor had been secured, the line to the boat had not been. The boat had meters and meters of line to let out and as we dived, it merrily did. It was a windy day and the boat picked up more and more speed as it floated, still anchored to the same rock. At some point, the boat pulled the anchor away from under the rock where it was wedged and then a bit later on, the anchor caught on something that it couldn't get loose from. The strength of the boat now moving at speed pulled the entire mooring mechanism out from the boat. Needless to say, the boat driver was a little upset. He said various words that I won't describe here.

In the end, the dive instructor took Neil and me out for dinner in an obscure Greek taverna, I think to apologize for us having to swim for shore.

Swimming with the fishes

2007-09-22T18:15:00.000Z

Hi all! I'm writing this from our hotel near Anavyssos. I'm a bit sad that tomorrow is the last day of our vacation, but it's been wonderful. I've been compiling my diving blog, but figured that I'd post this first half of it now, to whet your appetites. I'm skipping over the first week in Athens and Santorini (some great stuff to tell you about those days) for now, but will write it up with pictures when I get home. Meanwhile, here's our first day and a half of diving...

Husband and I are qualifying for our PADI Advanced Open Water certification, one step up from our first level diving qualification. We had to do five dives to improve our diving skills, each with a different focus.

Day One (Saturday), Two Dives. Verdict afterwards: Knackered.

The winds off the coast of Anavyssos were unusually strong this morning so we couldn't do the first dive off the boat as planned. Instead we went to a nearby beach dubbed "lawyer beach" for the wealthy lawyers that live on it. It was an 8km drive away from the dive shop. We did a shore dive in order to complete our Fish Identification specialty course. We saw lots of different kinds of fish: wrasse, damsels, parrotfish -- we even saw a moray eel, and Neil spotted a Little Cuttlefish. A great refresher dive.

At about 4pm we went back out, this time on the boat. We were tempted by an exciting looking canyon that we were promised we would get to see on another day, but this dive was the Underwater Navigation skills course. Compasses, lubber lines, bezels, and all sorts of other things I don't properly understand. The location was a bit improvised because of strong currents, and we had to abandon our navigation exercise of swimming in a perfect square, using the compass. We ended up doing the rest of the dive as a fun dive, and intended to carry on with the navigation the next day.

I had forgotten how much effort diving is: hauling the tanks around, the actual swimming, the excitement and the stress. We were too tired to do anything at all in the evening. ZZZzzz.

Day Two (Sunday), Two Dives. Verdict afterwards: Amused.

Our first dive today was breath-taking. We did our course in "deep diving" which means anywhere below 40 feet (18 meters). We went to 55 feet (26 meters), descending down a wall. Looking up at about 20 meters was really awe-inspiring. It was sheer rock with beautiful coral dotted all down it. If you know SCUBA, you know that you can't spend long down at those kind of depths, so we came back up to about 30 feet and then went into a spectacular "canyon". Inside, the ceiling was covered in coral and it was thrilling to be surrounded by rock. But the best bit was turning around to come out of the canyon to see the clear blue nothing expanding out in front of you, framed by the coral-covered rock. Awesome.

The second dive was a bit more... interesting. This was the second try at our underwater navigation course as well as the first half of our peak performance buoyancy course.

The buoyancy part of the course is to help you control your body in the water. If you know SCUBA, you know that beginners (like me) sometimes have a hard time floating along smoothly, staying in one spot without furious arm paddling, and controlling their depth. This is all to do with neutral buoyancy. The idea is that you don't move unless you intend to -- often the weight (or lack thereof) of your equipment causes you to rise or fall uncontrollably. You are supposed to make gentle movements with you breath -- if you are truly neutrally buoyant, when you breathe in you will rise slightly in the water, and when you breathe out, you will sink slightly. We had to do an exercise where we lie flat on the sand, breathe in to rise and breathe out to sink, bobbing up and down at an angle to the sand. Neil got it quickly, but I needed a bit of help from the instructor who showed me that I shouldn't be shy about inflating my underwater life jacket to reach neutral buoyancy.

The navigation part of the dive went rather well, if I may say so. My square was spot on and I even managed the more difficult triangle. It seems lubber lines aren't so unfathomable to me. Then, the instructor sprang the ultimate challenge: he told Neil to lead us back to the boat. We'd come down from the boat almost 40 minutes ago and neither of us really knew where it was. But after a bit of consultation with each other, Neil set off in the general direction. It turned out that he was right but he was wrong as well.

As we swam, another Dive Master came down to our instructor and we began a rapid ascent (from a safe depth). There was something wrong. She pointed down at a strange line in the sand below us, and as we surfaced, it became clear... the boat was gone.

...

How's that for a cliff hanger? I'll be back with the rest of the story once we're back from Greece.

Love you all!

Happy Birthday Grandpa and Yassas (goodbye) in Greek

2007-09-14T20:42:00.000Z

Yassas, all you sMOOchalicious readers. Husband and I are heading to Greece for twelve days with my parents.

The flight is at 6am tomorrow (ugh) and I'm feeling a bit under the weather. (Sneeze!) But I can't wait to get to the sunshine.

We're spending a few days in Athens, then going to Santorini, and then my parents fly back home. Husband and I stay on to do an advanced open water SCUBA diving course, just east of Athens.

So no blogs for a while, but I promise many pics and hilarious stories about us trying to navigate our tiny rental car around Greece on my return.

As for today's cultural activities: it was my mom's dad's 90th birthday today and we had a sixty-person strong family reunion.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, GRANDPA!

I heard the Welsh national anthem sung for the first time in both English and Welsh. My grandpa was born in Wales to British parents, and came back to London when he was sixteen. There was even a rendition of Happy Birthday in Welsh. It was a wonderful, joyful and touching event. (Way to go Mom and Dad for organizing it!)

Chainsaw Carving

2007-09-09T19:52:00.000Z

For the last day of our bank holiday trip up to the Midlands (Sunday, August 26th) we went to the Tatton Park Country Show, specifically to see the chainsaw carving. We were definitely the odd couple out in not having a dog with us. I hope next time we will.

The chainsaw carving section was big, with each of the 25 carvers having their own fenced-off section to do their long-term pieces. The long-term competitions were: the "Combo Competition" which uses log diameters up to 2ft in two categories, chainsaw-only eight-hour carve or full-power thirteen-hour carve. I wish I knew more to explain exactly what that means. The other long-term competition is the "Classic Competition" which uses log diameteres up to 4ft and takes 21 hours (presumably these pieces are worked on for all three days of the country show). Here is a wide shot and a close up of one of the fenced-off areas and the detailed, beautiful sculptures they were making:

And here are two little clips of carvers at work in thier fenced-off areas. Some day, I'll have a time-lapse camera to show the whole transformation, because just one cut doesn't really do it justice. I can't remember who the first carver is, but the second is the Japanese competitor, Toshiyuki Nagai.

The carvers also had finished pieces on display that were to be auctioned later on in the day. I would have wanted to buy either of these (or the owl above), depending on how expensive they were, but don't have the space to display them in. Boo. Unfortunately, they didn't label who produced which of these pieces, so I can't link or give credit where credit is clearly due...

The event we came to see was the "Speed Carving" which is perfect for spectators. It's one big fenced-off area for all the participants. The carvers have 30 minutes to carve whatever they want, and then it gets auctioned at the end to those who watched it being created.

I have video of the beginning of the speed carving and it's such a shame that my camera doesn't do audio. The noise of them "starting their engines" was glorious. We saw two old ladies on the other side of the fence watching with their fingers plugged into thier ears. We all got covered in sawdust.

There was one American carver who carved his bear in fifteen minutes flat and had time left to go over to help another American who was carving an owl. But all the bear-carver was doing was carving a slot into the bottom end of the owl-carver's sturdy tree trunk. At first I thought he was turning it into a post box, but then we saw him slicing off two long, rectangular sheets of wood from one of the gigantic tree trunks that were laying about. When he started sizing up the rectangles against the slot he was carving out, we realized that the two carvers were working together to create a bench. One pole was a bear, one pole was an owl, and the rectangles were the bottom and back to the bench. In typical American fashion, they carved and burned "Have a nice day" into the back of the chair. Brilliant. Here's a clip of the two of them just as they are starting out...

And here's a pic of the finished product. Just enough room for two!

The speed carving yeilded at least three owls (one carved by the only female carver), three bears, and three horses (one of them like a knight chess piece three foot tall). The carver were picking the collectable themes. There were also more unique pieces like a guitar (done by an American) and a skull (smooth and accurate, almost like it was made of plastecine).

I loved the chainsaw carving demonstration, and though the announcer was quick to say "don't try this at home" I don't think I can resist. For those of you who know how klutzy I am, my husband has promised to supervise. Woohoo! This will depend on us having an actual backyard and, of course, owning a chainsaw...

Walking in the Peaks

2007-09-07T14:49:00.000Z

We had 50% success with our walks in the Peak District.

The first walk was a twenty minute drive from Bakewell through beautiful and isolated countryside. Both of us would sorely like to move to the middle of nowhere and be surrounded by lots of green and very few people, but the trouble is that niggly thing of employment.

Ahem. Back to the walk.

Walk number one was to Thor's Cave.

"Thor's Cave is the most spectacular sight of the Manifold valley, dominating the central section of the valley. The rock in which it is set rears up out of the hillside like a giant fang with the cave entrance forming a hole in it ten metres in diameter, a sight which is clearly visible for several miles.

Excavations have shown that the cave was occupied as long as 10,000 years ago and this occupation probably continued until Roman or Saxon times, making it one of the oldest sites of human activity in the Peak. Stone tools and the remains of a range now extinct animals were found within the cave."

(above info from here.)

Thor's Cave is definitely a destination worth striving for, and strive we did. It took us an hour longer than the three hour estimate because we tried to improvise a shorter route the cave and failed. But we met a new friend along the way.

The second walk was the unsuccessful 50%. We didn't want to do a whole second walk as the first one tuckered us out, but we thought that we could begin the second one Neil had planned, find a nice spot to sit and read, and laze away the last few hours before we left the Peak District. However…

The path was often indiscernible, overgrown with weeds up to my elbows at some points. And the first half mile of it was by a quarry, lined with the above signs.

If you are American, you may not have heard of stinging nettle. Stinging nettle is the British version of poison ivy, and I was wearing Capri pants. Not only did I have to fight back the thorns, I also had to avoid this innocent-looking, heart-shaped, and unfortunately ankle-height plant.

We kept waiting for the fabulous vista or the bubbling stream to sit by. But by the time we realized that such a place was not on this map, we were too far in to turn back. And neither of us wanted to wade through the nettles again. So, there was no option but to finish the whole three hour walk.

The very last stretch was the worst with a narrow, muddy path through a nettle field. About twenty steps away from the clear break in the trees, I slipped and fell onto my backside right into a patch of nettles, which stung me even though my shirt. A true taste of the British countryside.

Then, to finish off the trek, as we left the forest of nettles, we passed a sign that read something like: this is a difficult path that we don't recommend you use.

And I wouldn't recommend it either.

The next post will be the chainsaw carving – with video!

Glorious Sunshine

2007-09-06T23:42:00.000Z

We drove 469 miles this past Bank Holiday three-day weekend from London to Bakewell (200 miles) to Knutsford (35.5 miles) to Leicester (92.5 miles) and then back to London (141.1 miles) – with a few little trips in between. We were up in the Peak District, in the Midlands of England and it just happened to be the only three days of summer we've had in England this year.

The village of Bakewell was beautiful.

We bought a traditional Bakewell Tart from one of the local shops to give to some friends we visited on our way home. A Bakewell Tart is basically a marzipan themed pie with a candied cherry in the middle of a layer of icing – definitely an acquired taste that I have not yet mastered. Husband loves it, though. But then he likes Battenburg (the most horrid British thing I have ever encountered).

Bakewell is very near to Chatsworth House, used in the recent Keira Knightley version of Pride and Prejudice. It was Mr. Darcy's home, and ever since I watched that movie I have wanted to see the sculpture room that they featured briefly – in particular, this sculpture, which fascinates and amazes me:

The cloth looks like transparent fabric, but of course it's marble. Astonishing.

We also were very impressed with the gardens. (Even more so than the gardens at Hampton Court!) There were so many different sections to explore, including a huge water feature full of naked, muddy children splashing around, a pinetum and a kitchen garden. There was also a little surprise sculpted garden… it was just like the inside of a house: tables, chairs, etc. Here's the couch bush.

Art was scattered around the gardens, and Sotheby's had just set up various pieces on display, including an out-of-place, massive sculpture of Kate Moss in a compromising position.

There were two pieces I was really keen on. The first you might have expected me to like…

And the second I caught sight of from inside the house and was captivated.

Chatsworth House was a wonderful day out, and I'm grateful to my hubby for whisking me up to the Peak District at the last minute.

I shall save our the second day – the Peak District walks – for a separate post. You'll just have to hang out a little longer for the chainsaw carving.

I'm Back!

2007-09-06T22:07:00.000Z

I know, I've been slack at updating my blog (and calling all of you that I normally call). But I've got a good excuse. A few, in fact.

Firstly, just before the August bank holiday was my two year wedding anniversary, and I was away for the weekend. (More to come in future posts on that.)

Then, this past weekend we were down in Poole visiting family and friends as well as hosting our first-ever "party" in the form of a BBQ for my work friends.

In between it all, I've been responsible for co-editing (read: sorting papers for) a children's fiction writing contest. We've had 250 submissions, and it has been an epic task organizing them for the official judges. We had to send off the judging packets on Tuesday, and of course the photocopier broke when we were just about finished. Oh yes. It did.

I have absolutely loved working on this project, despite the mountains of adminstration. In my current job, I don't get to read anyone else's creativity -- everything I'm reading is based on a storyline we produce. So for this contest, each submission was a surprise. Some were delightful, others were not so. But I'm excited to be back involved with the evaluation of others' work and the search for fabulous stories and storytellers. It's something I got to do plenty of in my first publishing job, but not so much now.

Anyway, I hope you'll accept my apologies for neglecting my blog, and I'll busy myself putting together some pics of my exciting bank holiday trip. I'll leave you hanging with two words: chainsaw carving.

I'm Famous!

2007-08-10T07:58:00.000Z

Okay, not really. But I do have my picture in a publishing industry weekly. They spelled my name right and everything.

This appeared in Publishing News on Friday, 3 August 2007. Hooray!

Yes, that is my boss in the middle of the picture.

My company held a summer party to celebrate our new offices. Apparently they are "state-of-the-art". Woohoo!

The Village Fête

2007-08-05T21:34:00.000Z

I went to my very first fête today, a staple of British village life. A fête is like a traditional American school fair, but instead of cake walks and bobbing for apples, they have a coconut shy and a hoopla.

A coconut shy is a coconut balanced on top of a pole, and you have to hit it with a ball and knock it off for prizes. I think it is also a British tradition to walk away from the coconut shy and mutter that everyone knows that the coconuts are glued on anyway.

This was the "professional" coconut shy, £1 for three balls. By professional, I mean a purpose built booth with signs. I was told that this was not quite how the coconut shy would be in a small village. While we were watching, we actually saw two people hit a coconut dead on, but it still didn't fall. Hmm...

This was more authentically set up, but less traditionally fruited. It was a mango shy, 50p for three balls. We had a go at this one, and all four of us were unsuccessful.

A hoopla is throwing hoops over prizes. I tried the professional hoopla, £1 for two hoops. There was a sign clearly displaying what was a winning hoop and what wasn't. Look closely at the sign. If you're not winning, what are you doing? Unfortunately, I was not a winner.

This fête was technically more like a festival and put on by the Innocent smoothies people, rather than the village church. There were thousands of people there and hundreds of stalls with food, eco-friendly products, health products and, of course, smoothies. Yum.

Among other things, we did a bit of sponging: (That's my friend Stuart getting soaked.)

A bit of music, under a tree:

And a bit of ferret racing: (My ferret choice, Country Girl, beat Neil's choice, Ratso) (okay, and then in the second race, Neil's choice Silver Surfer kicked my choice Miss Cherry's butt):

I got sunburned in odd patterns, because of my partial sunblock application. Yes, Mom, I'm a twit.

But it was fun-tastic!

Pea and Prosciutto Soup (Zuppa Prosciutto e Piselli)

2007-08-04T12:15:00.000Z

In the style of a blogger that I much admire, the Pioneer Woman, I am going to attempt to post a recipe that I cooked last night, though I do not have as good lighting as she does.

I am not a great cook, but I do love making soup. I’ve been experimenting for a few months now with various recipes, and my husband suggested that this time I step it up a notch. The ham and pea soup I made last night is from the posh The River Café Cook Book (the blue one) and the reason I’ve decided to post about it is because it TOOK ME FOREVER. And I want some credit for all effort I put in.

Firstly: getting the ingredients was a tad epic. Frozen peas and any old ham just won't do for The River Café. We went to three different stores over the past two weeks to get the amount of peas still in their pods that we needed (2 kg) and the recipe asks for a 250g "hock" of prosciutto which I never managed to get. I could only find wafer thin slices, but on a last ditch attempt, I found a deli worker who would cut about half-inch thick slices for me.

Secondly: I then had to shell two kilograms of peas. This took me about an hour and a half, non-stop. Okay, this is really why I'm after some kudos. An hour and half of standing at my sink and shelling peas made me appreciate what apprentice chefs at fancy restaurants must have to do every day. Ugh. Not fun.

The rest of the cooking was easy peas-y.

For the stock, I put the prosciutto with a head of celery, half a red onion (the other half is used later), the stalks from one bunch of mint (the leaves are used later), two roughly chopped carrots and about one quarter of the pea pods into a big pot, covered with water and let them simmer for an hour and a half.

With half an hour left of the stock simmering to go, I chopped up one and a half red onions. Then I melted 50g of creamy English butter in our big wok and added two tablespoons of olive oil. The chopped onions went into the butter and I cooked them slowly to a light brown.

Once the stock was ready, I strained out all the stock and set aside the prosciutto. (I confess I couldn't bear to just chuck out all the stock ingredients so I snacked on the carrots while I finished cooking.)

Next, all the peas and half of the bunch of mint leaves went into the wok with the onions. After stirring that for a couple of minutes, I covered the mixture with stock and let simmer for 30 minutes until the peas were soft, topping up with stock once.

While that was cooking, I peeled the fat away from the prosciutto and then blended it in my blender to a "coarse purée" with a little of the stock.

Once the peas were ready, I strained out half of the peas and onions and put them into the big (now cleaned) pot that I cooked the stock in. The other half of the peas and the juices went into my blender for "pulsing".

Lastly, I mixed in the prosciutto purée and the blended peas and stock in with the non-blended peas in the big soup pot. I chopped up the remaining mint leaves, sprinkled them in, stirred and served!

The only note I would make to anyone trying this soup out for themselves, is to blend slightly more than half of the peas to have less peas floating. I feel like my end product needs a bit more soup to it, though having a decent amount of solid peas is important.

I actually served it to myself, as Neil was out. He still hasn't tried it yet, but I'm pleased with it. It says it serves six, but I'm guessing we'll be eating it all week.

Special thanks to Grandma for providing the huge soup pot, which is getting plenty of use.

Gardens galore

2007-07-29T22:17:00.000Z

I had a lovely weekend visiting my aunt and uncle, and on Saturday we went to Hampton Court Palace.

If you ever go, make sure to visit the Tilting Yard Café. We sat out on their patio in the glorious sunshine, surrounded by trees and ate lovely sandwiches, fresh lemonade (actual lemonade, not Sprite which is what the Brits call lemonade) and a delicious brownie.

After our lunch, we walked from garden to garden all the way around the outside of the palace. Each section of garden was distinct and it seemed that behind every wall there was a completely new garden to see. There were manicured yew trees, stunning flower beds, a "Great Vine" and naked people statues. My favourite outdoor feature was the two pond gardens that visitors can't walk through. You had to poke your head in through little viewing holes in the tall border hedge.

Inside the palace, we went on a tour with a lady in costume who told us a ghost story about King Henry VIII's fifth wife (beheaded for having an affair). Then we walked around the kitchens which had been set up to look as it would have in the early 1500s. There were several rooms, all necessary to feed the 500+ people that would dine at court, hoping to catch favour with the king.

The first room we saw was the butchery. Please note the blood stains spattered on the wall. Gotta love that authenticity.

The weather was very kind to us, and I think I might have even got a little colour on my pale cheeks. Hooray for summer!

The book of the year has arrived!

2007-07-24T11:48:00.000Z

No, not that book.

This book!

What's it about, you ask? You mean you haven't heard of it? You missed the huge media blitz? The street parties? The countdowns? Well, okay, then... I'll tell you:
My Sister the Vampire #1: Switched is the beginning of a faboo new book series. It's a little bit of Parent Trap, a lot of Sweet Valley High and a dose of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

This book is very, very close to my heart. It's one of my babies, and it's the project I am most proud to be involved in at my work.

So, please, if you live in the USA and you like me even just a little bit, buy a copy of this book. Go to your local bookstore and ask for it. If they don't have it, gasp and say that you heard it was going to be the next big thing, and they should order five copies.

If you don't like bookstores, you can still buy it.
Here's an Amazon link: Buy this book!
Here's a B&N link: Buy this book!

I promise you a fun and funny read, and lots of gratitude for you support.

Buy one for you; buy one for a friend. Or just buy one to prop up your wonky table. I'm going for numbers here, people.

Off to the ballet... school

2007-07-13T23:20:00.000Z

I'm very excited. Tomorrow, Neil and I are going to The Royal Ballet School end of year performance at the Royal Opera House. It's a showcase of all the students at the Lower and Upper Schools (ages 11-18, I think) coming together in a variety of performances to show off how fabulous the talent of the school is.

I went to the same show last year for free (hooray!) because I worked on a series my company helped produce in conjunction with the school called, as you might imagine, The Royal Ballet School Diaries. Because we worked very closely with the Marketing Director at the school, we were taken on a backstage tour of the Royal Opera House, got to watch the rehearsal the day before the matinee and also the actual performance. Fascinating stuff.

This time, I'll be an anonymous spectator, but I'm really interested in seeing some of the girls that I’ve become fans of. You see, for the book covers, we got to use actual RBS students as models.

I'm a big fan of "Lara", real name Ruth Bailey.

She's won the Young British Dancer of the Year award, at a very young age as well as other awards and solos. I remember speaking with the photographer who took the pictures for the covers. He wasn't surprised how well she was doing because he was amazed that someone of her age could perform such a difficult leap so precisely, and well enough for the photo to win approval by the very discerning head of the school.

I'm hoping to see her again tomorrow, still shining like a star.

Done a runner

2007-07-09T21:36:00.000Z

This whole tenant situation was a bit tense this past week. After last weekend, when the tenancy expired and the tenants refused to leave, we geared up for an all out war of paperwork in the courts. But after getting a whole lot of attitude from the !£$%^&* tenants, they said that they would leave on Friday.

Once we foud out that filing paperwork at the court would cost us £150 ($300) we decided to hold off to see if the would actually leave on Friday without a fight.

When I called on Thursday to arrange a check out time, Friday had become Saturday, and I saw before me a future filled with this same phone conversation over and over again. However, he finally agreed to a concrete time on Saturday. It was a good sign.

We drove down to Eastbourne, about an hour and a half away from us, and at the appointed time we rang the bell. No one answered. We went upstairs and rang the bell. Still no answer. We let ourselves in and the flat was empty: they had "done a runner" as the Brits would say.

Plus side: they are gone.
Minus side: we have no forwarding address and they owe us money.

Sigh.

But at least we didn't have to go to court, which would not have been entertaining.
What was entertaining, however, was the lady on the other end of the National Landlord's Associate advice line, who got more incensed at the situation than I was. She encouraged me to write a letter to the tenant's father decribing ourselves as honest people just trying to get by and the "disgusting behaviour" of the tenants. Clearly, she is a woman who loves her job. And I must say, I am tempted to take her advice.

Everything but the kitchen sink

2007-07-03T22:39:00.001Z

Well, our kitchen is transformed, but we're still not quite up and running.

The sink is in but not connected. None of the complicated looking white plastic pieces are in place yet. And the cabinets aren't screwed to the wall either. (We've also got tiling and painting to do.) But this is the general idea…

We are still doing our dishes in the bathtub. I can just hear myself now talking to my children, echoing all the newlywed home improvement tales my parents told me. I'll say in my shaky, old woman voice: we didn’t have a couch when we moved into our first home – we didn’t even have a television. And we had to wash our dishes in the bathtub. So don’t complain to me about having to unload the dishwasher, ya little so and so!

There is currently no time table for kitchen sink completion, but I'm sure my husband is sick of me nagging. So, it won't be long. In fact… it's 11:30pm and poor husband is working on it as I type.

Tenants from hell

2007-06-30T21:55:00.000Z

Updates on and pictures of my kitchen sink will come when I get back home tomorrow. I have heard that we’ve made real progress, but haven’t seen it as I have been down in Seaford with my Grandma. Unfortunately, this is not a regular social call – we've got some very tricky business in Eastbourne, nearby.

I haven't blogged about this before because I didn't want to grumble, but now this is so all-consuming that I can't avoid it: in September, my husband and I bought an investment property in Eastbourne to rent out and ride the property wave into retirement. The beginning of our property empire. We hired a management agent and expected it to be smooth sailing.

However, the !£$%^&* management agent turned out to be very bad at choosing stable tenants and handling maintenance issues – basically, very bad at his job. We finally extricated ourselves from his contract, but have not yet been as successful with the tenants he installed.

These !£$%^&* tenants have not paid a penny of rent since April. They have not paid any money on time since February. After giving them every chance to pull themselves together, we followed all the legal steps and served the relevant notices to evict them. Now they have refused to leave.

You know that worst case scenario when you buy-to-let? Well, that's just about where we are.

And I'm SO MAD.

On the upside, I get to fill out tons of paperwork and negotiate with the Eastbourne County Court in trying to get a court ordered eviction. I also get to have argumentative and belligerent phone calls from the tenant. What fun! Not sure if this counts as "trying to keep myself entertained" but I am guessing that it will turn out to be a particularly British experience. Stay tuned for a very grumpy Sara.

I hope the new sink will cheer me up.

Wash Out

2007-06-25T20:58:00.000Z

My Sunday did not go as well as I hoped it would. As I said in my last blog, Sunday was supposed to be my first live cricket match. But... as occasionally happens in England... it rained and rained and rained and rained and rained.

So we didn't go.

We ended up watching Shrek 3 at the cinema, which didn't really make up for the disappointment of missing the men in white. I felt most sorry for my husband's middle brother who drove about two hours to come and see the cricket. He could have stayed home and watched the movie with significantly less effort.

We put up a good show for a couple of oldies though. We were out partying until well past 11pm on a school night. (Oooh...) We were drinking shots like proper college kids, and everything! Please, don't tell my mom.

My first English cricket day out will have to wait -- and so will my sink! Those of you at the edge of your seats waiting for more pics of our kitchen construction will have to wait until Thursday to see any progress. My construction crew is not available on Tuesday, so it will be at least Thursday before I can wash any dishes.

Ew.

57% Complete

2007-06-23T22:33:00.000Z

Due to the !£$%^&* leaving great big holes in our floor, we haven't finished our kitchen reconstruction, despite a long day of hard work. Rebuilding the floor took a lot of time.

We took most of the morning to cut down the old cabinet fronts to use as floorboards...

and then cut new laminate flooring to size to go on top.

I use the term "we" loosely. I sat in the bedroom and did a lot of very important work.

Next, we had to build the base units to figure out exactly where the sink was going to sit and where the pipe holes would need to be in the cabinets. (I did actually help at this point, as I am the Flatpack Queen.)

Then, we had to figure out the plumbing. The new layout has the washing machine on the opposite side of the sink, and the sink is shifting about two feet to the left. After scientific calculations and elaborate diagrams, we had a plan:

The plan worked! The only hitch was, it was about 9pm when it was finished. And then we discovered a rather annoying little hitch: IKEA only half-cut out the sink hole in the countertop that we paid £25 for them to cut out. I can't imagine this is the standard procedure, and they will be receiving a phone call from an inquisitive ME tomorrow morning.

The DIY segment of our show will be back on Tuesday. In the meantime… tomorrow is my first cricket match!

What Lies Beneath... our cabinets

2007-06-22T21:49:00.000Z

The final stage of kitchen destruction has begun! For the past four hours, my father-in-law and husband have been demolishing the final piece of the kitchen – the part where the sink is. Cue dramatic music.

The first thing we discovered in taking away the cupboards where our fridge will soon be is that the !£$%^&* who put together this kitchen didn't bother to sensibly bury the wiring in the wall behind the cabinets. No trunking. No fixture whatsoever. Just loose dangling wires.

You may have also noticed the hole in the floorboards in the photo above. We can thank the !£$%^&* for that as well. They seem to have taken it up to let one of those wayward wires stretch across under the kitchen floor. But that little gap is nothing compared to what we found directly underneath the kitchen sink.

It's no longer a mystery why we had little furry visitors a few months ago. Blech. But you may be pleased to learn that my ingenious construction crew are using the dismantled wood cabinet fronts to form new floorboards to fill the gap. Recycling! Hoorah!

I'm pleased to say that we've made fast work of it. We have already installed my beautiful new sink. Here it is...

Kidding.

Stay tuned for more progress tomorrow.

The Royal visit

2007-06-18T22:27:00.000Z

On top of all our eating, we managed to squeeze in a trip to Windsor Castle on Saturday. It was only about ten minutes drive away from where we were and, conveniently, on the way home. Windsor Castle is, according to the audio guide, the oldest lived-in castle as Her Royal Highness Queen Elizabeth II lives there most weekends. It's huge-mungous and rather beautiful.

In the next picture, you can just see the Union Jack, the flag of Great Britain, peeking over the top of the tower. For those not in the know, this means that the Queen is not in residence.

When the Queen is actually there, her own Royal Standard is flown. So, imagine our delight when we witnessed a new flag being run up the mast. The Queen had arrived just in time to greet us personally. How lovely!

Unfortunately, we didn't see her or even her car. One of the chatty wardens told us that her entrance is well away from the tourist queues. No entry fee for her! By the way, I'm not on the phone in that picture. That is the audio guide pressed to my ear.

It was the day before a special service for the Order of the Garter, so St. George's Chapel was closed. And, as it's the summer, the Queen's State Apartments were closed as well. However, we were able to wander around the grounds and gawk at the amazing Queen Mary's doll house.

While we were waiting in line, Neil and I had a discussing about the sign that read: "Queen Mary's Doll's House". As you all know, this implies that there is only one doll to whom the house belongs, but the number of rooms (man servants, maids, nurseries, Queen's rooms, King's rooms…) implies that there are many dolls. If you've clicked on the link above, you see that the website uses "dolls' house" which implies the suspected many dolls. I prefer to use "Queen Mary's doll house" as there aren't actually any dolls in it at all, and it's really Queen Mary's house made for dolls. That is: the house belongs to Queen Mary, rather than the dolls. Fascinating discussion, I'm sure. The security guard was looking bemused, but it seemed important at the time.

We weren't allowed to take pictures inside the dimly lit room where the doll house is kept, but it was quite a spectacle. There was so much to look at. Highlights include: the library stocked with readable books, the miniature cars in the basement, and the tiny replica Crown Jewels behind vault-like bars.

At the end of the visit, we learned that we could fill in a form, get it stamped and then get free access to Windsor for one full year. In a few months, we'll try to go back and see the things we missed, and say hello to our old friend, the Queen.

Our Second Edible Adventure

2007-06-17T23:18:00.000Z

The Hind's Head, though the less-hyped of Heston Blumenthal's two restaurants, is just as exciting and wonderful as fancy-schmancy The Fat Duck.

It is a regular English pub with a pub food menu cooked as best as pub food can be cooked. You may have heard of the triple-cooked chips (translation for the American readers: thick steak fries, fried three times) which are every bit as yum as you might think. We had made a reservation and sat upstairs, rather than downstairs by the bar, the first come, first served area.

Our little table was right by an open window and we could watch all the people walk right by The Fat Duck. The picture in yesterday's entry of the street was actually our view from the table. Once, we watched a taxi driver point out the restaurant to a group who still missed the door. Lots and lots of uber-posh cars were baffled by the lack of signs or obvious parking: an Aston Martin, lots of Porsche and silly SUVs. There was also a wedding happening nearby, and we saw the most amazing hats!

On top of the wonderful atmosphere and prime people watching, I had the most delicious pea and ham soup, light and sweet with chunks of slightly salty, soft meat. I'm going to try to recreate it somehow here at home. Neil loved his oxtail and kidney pie (translation for the American readers: gross and ick) and wondered aloud if this food was even better than the Fat Duck meal. For dessert, we had "Eton mess" which, as an American, I needed a translation for. It is strawberries and cream made into a mess with chunks of meringue mixed in, and it was heavenly.

If someone asked which of the two restaurants I would pick to recommend, I would struggle to decide. But I wouldn't struggle on recommending the place we stayed. It was Red Roofs at Oldfield.

It's a 25 room Victorian house right on the river with a beautiful garden and a lovely breakfast room. Each bedroom is decorated in a different style, and we stayed in the Gold Room. Everything was gold. Everything.

This was our view:

The most impressive room was the lobby.

The husband and wife team owners were friendly and welcoming, and have done a wonderful job restoring and maintaining the building. It was the perfect place to stay to compliment our gastronomic experiences.

I think I'll save the Windsor visit for tomorrow's entry. That will keep me constant on my posting!

An Edible Adventure

2007-06-16T21:34:00.000Z

In 2005, I gave Neil an I.O.U. birthday present for a special meal at a restaurant that had long intrigued him. I busily set about trying to get a reservation at this place, but failed repeatedly. After various attempts, and perhaps a delay or two due to finances, I finally asked the polite but unyielding reservationist what I had to do to get a table. She was happy to tell me: be among the first to call on a Monday morning two months before I wanted to dine. With precision timing, two months of Mondays ago, I phoned up and secured a table at The Fat Duck. Hooray!

In any restaurant, Neil always picks the weirdest thing on the menu: spicy chicken feet, sheep testicles, anything guaranteed to repulse me. The Fat Duck is the ultimate in the unusual, and he was keen to try the tasting menu. If you don't already know, the restaurant is run by food scientist Heston Blumenthal who has established a philosophy about disrupting people's notions of food: what it's called, how it's prepared, what it looks like. The first line of the "Philosophy" section on his website is "No food is intrinsically disgusting…" Neil is a firm believer in this. I am not.

I am mocked in my family for being an extremely picky eater. I don't eat anything fishy, nothing with eyes, nothing that looks or sounds gross like blood pudding or foie gras. I don't really like meat and do tend to pick the same thing at a restaurant I've been to before. At first, I had planned to call myself a vegetarian who was allergic to fish. That would get me out of most of the disgusting things on the menu, but would also have me skipping most of the courses! Neil also didn't want to experience it all on his own, so I took a deep breath and decided that no matter what they put in front of me, I would eat.

Well, yesterday was the big day, and after a bit of a panic getting stuck in standstill traffic on the M25, we finally arrived in Bray near Maidenhead at the most innocuous looking restaurant. I didn't even spot it when we were driving by. The exterior and the interior was so understated; the focus was entirely on the food. Here's a picture. Can you guess which building is the three Michelin starred restaurant?

It's the light browny-beige one, on the left side, with the roof slightly sticking up.

The first course, of sixteen (!), was my favourite. A waitress brought over a contraption, poured in liquid nitrogen and then "cooked" a green tea and lime meringue, which we were instructed to eat in one bite. It collapsed in my mouth with a puff of refreshing and tasty gas. Yum.

My second favourite course was Neil's favourite. It was a three part experience: first I took a little strip (like those mint gel strips) that dissolved on my tongue to "begin the flavour of oak" according to the waiter. Then, he placed a wooden box on the table, filled with moss. Yup. Moss. He poured boiling water over the moss, which we guess was sitting on dry ice, and the vapour of the forest wafted up. Finally, came the actual eating of an oak moss and truffle toast, which was the most unique flavour of the evening.

Honourable mention goes to the hot and cold tea which was fascinatingly half hot and half cold. I didn't really enjoy the snails or the foie gras, but I ate them both with only the tiniest worry that they would come back up all over my Heston Blumenthal embroidered napkin.

Every new plate brought something I'd never had before. It was a once in a lifetime experience, and we both thoroughly enjoyed it.

Special thanks to Dad for picking out the wine before hand. I would have failed miserably had I been presented with that huge wine list without preparation. And the first choice wasn't there, so that back up selection was needed. We had the V.D.P des Côteaux des Fénouilledes, Le Soula, G. Gauby 2002 from Languedoc – very smooth.

That was Friday night! Tomorrow, I'll tell you about our Saturday: lunch at the Hind's Head – Heston Blumenthal's take on pub food – plus a trip to Windsor Castle, and the fabulous hotel we stayed in.

I can fly!

2007-06-03T22:36:00.000Z

My mother-in-law gave hubby and me a voucher for an indoor skydiving experience, and we went yesterday. It was so much fun!

We had a long drive up to Bodyflight Bedford, but it was worth it. After a bit of instructional videos and safety demonstrations, we were ushered into a tube three stories off the ground, where a huge fan (or system of fans?) was forcing air through at more than 100MPH. Wahoo!

Neil and I each got two individual flying sessions of 1 minute 15 seconds each. As you'll see in this little highlights video, I was slightly more successful than my lovely husband. Grin.

Before our session, we got to see some real experts in the tunnel. There was a group doing formations and one guy did a backwards flip out of the very small exit door from about ten feet in the air.

If you're interested in how the wind tunnel works, a different company's website has a cool explanation.

P.S. Someday, I will skydive for real.

Subscribe!

2007-06-01T12:08:00.000Z

I love the internet. You can do so much! With a little help from strangers, you can reach out to your friends.

You may have noticed in the column on the right that I’ve added a little box. With generous free video tutorial from FreeVlog I have managed to create a feature where you can sign up to receive an email each time I post a blog. That way, you'll never miss a moment of my exciting blog!

Just enter your email in the little box, and a friendly service called FeedBurner will send you an email for each new blog I post. That might be easier than having to check the site all the time. After you put in your email address, a pop up window will appear asking you to copy in letters from a picture. Then, you're on the list!

They promise (and I promise to make them enforce their promise) never use your emails for anything other than sending updates about this blog.

So whaddya say… wanna sign up for sMOOchalicious by email?

Forest of Dean, Part Two

2007-05-30T19:41:00.000Z

On Saturday night, we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves at The Ugly Duckling. I had a version of Eggs Benedict and then a delicious chicken and pine nut pasta. Hubby had all 10oz of his Herefordshire Rump Steak. Yum. We were by far the youngest people in the restaurant and at one point I looked around to note that Neil was the only man in the restaurant, besides the waiter, who was not balding.

For anyone in England over this holiday weekend, you already know that Sunday equalled rain. We managed to keep ourselves entertained by exploring all sorts of little nooks and crannies of the forest: villages like Lydbrook and market towns like Ross-on-Wye, without really getting out of the car.

Our brilliant idea for evening entertainment was to drive to the nearest city, Gloucester, and catch Pirates of the Caribbean 3 in a cinema. We had a hard time finding the cinema, and despite getting there an hour and a half before the movie started, all the evening performances had sold out. Doh. We tried driving around Gloucester to find a place to eat, but discovered that Gloucester was… as they say in Jolly Old England… pants. (Feel free to contradict me if you know different, but I'd say Gloucester was a pit.)

We ended up hightailing it away from the concrete jungle back to the green forest and stumbled upon this, where we ate our pub dinner and warmed our cold, wet toes. Lovely.

Monday worked out just right for us, weather-wise and traffic-wise. We snuck in one last wood before we had to head home: Puzzle Wood. Rocky paths lead you up, down, over and through rocks, crevices, eerie trees and huge mushrooms. It's an old iron mine and has become a labyrinth of pathways and bridges, now set up as a maze for children and child-minded adults to run around in. Apparently, JRR Tolkien spent a lot of time here; I can see why.

They also had some friendly shaggy cows.

The birds! I hinted in my last post about the birds. There was a wire just outside our bedroom window, and I tried on at least four separate occasions to catch these brightly coloured and elusive birds as they perched on it, eyeing up the bird feeders below. Trouble is… my camera has no zoom and so you can barely see the birds to identify them. Sorry. Here is the best I could get.

One last thing before I sadly leave behind my forest adventures: a quirk about the Forest of Dean. The sheep. Lots of countrified places in the great United Kingdom have sheep, but none quite so… liberated… as those in the Forest of Dean. Here, they are suicidal, lounging in the middle of the road (60MPH speed limit) and wandering across around a bend. I think we did pass one that had been hit. Stupid sheep!

Still, I hope someday I'll get to see those sheep again.

Forest of Dean, Part One

2007-05-26T18:28:00.000Z

Our first two days in the Forest of Dean have been fantastic. On Thursday evening, we arrived at our bed and breakfast after about four hours in the car and were greeted by a beautiful, welcoming garden. We are staying at Viney Hill Guest House, and it's delightful. We have the top room, facing front and this is our view. The amount and variety of birds in the garden below is incredible, but more about that later…

Our first dinner was uninspiring, but our Friday morning breakfast was perfect. Our B&B has a breakfast room with a large bay window, overlooking fields and a paddock. With the sun shining through and whatever you could want for cooked breakfast coming readily, it's a good way to start the day.

We know the weather is going to be temperamental this weekend, so we decided to get most of our outdoors exploring done first. Friday was our bike rental day. We spent about four hours biking around trails in the forest.

I had laid out a clear plan as to where I wanted to bike, but the map that the rental place gave us was so clear and encouraging, that we decided to do as they suggested, with only a few detours.

We found a pub with a pond outside, and sat and ate our burger\Ploughman's while watching a family of three ducks splash around. Here's the duckling… just adorable!

For those of you who don't know, hubby and I are currently voluntarily without a television, but we're both Neighbours addicts. So, we made special provisions in the schedule to come back to the room and watch the episode. It's been ages since I've seen it, and didn't even know what some of the new characters looked like. Much to hubby's annoyance, I wasn't so impressed with some of the new "ladies" on the program.

For our evening meal we went to a truly inspiring hotel/restaurant called The Florence. It's a quaint white building set just next to the river, on the border with Wales. The view from the dining room is incredible and the food was wonderful. If anyone comes out this way, you cannot miss the chance to dine at this place. (I think if we come back, I'm going to beg to stay there!) Unfortunately, I forgot my camera, but the website has a good one.

Today, we went around the Sculpture Trail – one of the things I was most excited about seeing. We went wandering around the forest and every so often came upon some odd/wonderful art exhibit nestled among the trees. Neil carried our big umbrella, which meant that the rain stayed away.

We found a fun little café in the town of Newnham and, though it was chilly, we sat outside in their enclosed garden and ate toasted baguettes. After that, it was on to a fantastic garden, Westbury Court Garden, in Westbury-on-Severn.

Tonight we're off to a fun-looking restaurant called The Ugly Duckling. We're both hungry, and can't wait!

Ode to my computer

2007-05-22T23:19:00.000Z

I have recently purchased a new computer, after much agonizing over a mega-portable laptop that I couldn't afford. I really wanted this one (Vaio TX):

I almost settled for this one (Gateway NX):

But luckily, I stumbled onto my new precious baby in a computer shop.

My new computer, the Samsung Q1, is a conversation piece. People on the train regularly strike up conversation with me about it, and we're talking about Britons! They ask if I can access the internet, write directly onto the screen and disconnect the keyboard. To all, I can happily answer: yes.

The Samsung Q1 is a "tablet PC" which is a cross between a PDA and a laptop. The fully functioning computer weighs a buoyant 779g and measures 227 x 140 x 27mm (WxHxD) (For my US readers: 8.94 x 5.51 x 1.06 in and 1.72 lbs.) It has an accessory pack with a USB keyboard and FiloFax style holder that approximately doubles the weight.

But you don't need the keyboard. The whole screen is a touch screen, and there is a handwriting recognition feature (I scrawl, it changes my scribbles into standard text) and a voice recognition feature (which actually works!)

I've got everything I need all in a mega-mega portable package. I can take everywhere, whack it open on the train and finish up that just-about-to-be-late storyline. I can even use it on the Tube. My biggest brag: I got it on eBay for two thirds the retail cost – with the keyboard and USB data transfer cable. Love it!

For a more erudite and comprehensive review see TrustedReviews.

Happy Birthday Grandma

2007-05-18T16:18:00.000Z

My grandma turns 85 tomorrow. She's pretty amazing.

She is more qualified to use a computer than I am, having completed various certificates in various Microsoft applications like Word, Excel and Access… I can't even use Access!

Whether she's playing WordZap, watching her great grandson on YouTube, or cataloguing her recipes, she is truly a grandma of the Noughties.

She is so hip, that she's even reading my blog.

Happy Birthday, Cybergranny. I love you!

A Tuesday night adventure

2007-05-16T08:26:00.000Z

Yesterday, on the train home from work, my hubby called my cell phone. This is an unusual occurrence in itself. Our home phones are a little bit past it, so it is hard to hear what's going on, especially on a noisy train. He just managed to say that he wanted to meet me at the station and ask what time I'd get there.

As we hung up, I began to wonder what was going on. Why did he want to meet me at the station? He'd done this once before when he'd forgotten his keys, but he was calling from the house. That couldn't be it. Was he taking me out for a surprise dinner? Unlikely, as we've got lots of yummy food in the house, and he's got to study. It was all a little odd.

When I got to the station, he was waiting just outside the ticket barriers and he didn't look happy. I asked what's happening and he says, "I think our car's been stolen."

Oh. Crap.

He wanted to go to the police station which isn't far from the train station, and file a report in person. On the way to the station, he filled me in.

He remembers vaguely where we left the car last night when we came home from Aikido, and I did too. It was parked on the left side, a little way up the street from our flat. It's always a question as to whether we'll find a space on our street that late, especially now that they are tearing a road that intersects our for water mains replacement. And now that space is empty. Car = gone.

The whole walk to the police station, we are incredulous. It's not a fancy car, worth money or good for a joy ride. There wasn't anything in it to steal. The alarm was on, and it has an immobilizer. Why would someone bother?

When we get to the station, the man behind the bullet proof glass was, I must say, a tiny bit dismissive to start off with. Are we sure it was stolen? We should check if it's been towed. Hubby assertively asked for the number to call the impound, and I think the cop took pity on us. He took our details and started to make some phone calls.

As we waited, I learned that my hubby has never been in a police station or a jail, nor has he ever been in a police car. On the other hand, I have, but for very benevolent reasons.

Finally, he motioned us over. Our car had been "relocated."

Relocated?

What the $%^& does that mean?

Our car had been relocated to a street away, and we should check on the car for notification as to why this was done.

On the walk to the car, there was a lot of grumbling.

When we finally found the car, we found a ticket under the wiper. A ticket!?! A ticket that claimed we had parked in a restricted bay.

Now, my hubby is a very conscientious driver and parker. We're not the sort to try to get away with anything. It's all very above board. So, there was a lot more grumbling, and we decided to investigate. We won't let these parking attendants push us around! Power to the people!

We stomped down our road to the parking spot, and found that there was a no parking sign on a pole one parking spot away from our spot, saying in tiny font that the parking spot in front of the house we parked in front of was restricted for a week's time for skip loading. Please note… there was no skip there. Otherwise, we wouldn't have parked there.

ARG!

Just right now, I went to go and take a picture of the sign and the non-existent skip, but the sign has been removed already. Which is very annoying. However, it will be more annoying for this poor guy with the black car:

He's parked in the same place we were removed from, has a ticket on his windshield for £50, and won't even have the sign (one parking spot away) to refer to when he gets back.

Please note the pole where the sign once was is clearly in front of another parking spot, not the restricted one where the black car is.

Curses on parking attendant quotas.

Do-It-Yourself

2007-04-30T20:13:00.000Z

Our Do-It-Yourself adventure has been ongoing for over a year, since we bought our first little flat in April 2006. We call this our "practice house" as we've done all the improvements, except updating the electrics, with pretty much no DIY experience. We're trying to decide if we can do this "for real" on a proper house. My hubby has decided we can. I'm not entirely convinced. As I said: ongoing, over a year.

This is what we bought (cooker wall and hallway):

This is what we did to it shortly after moving in:

Four months of wallpaper stripping and plaster repair later:

Ten months after moving in:

In the wonderful world of Do-It-Yourself, it is interesting to learn what "its" you can and cannot "do yourself". I can strip painted wallpaper myself, but only for about eight hours. Then I cannot anymore, even when there is more to do. I cannot plaster or fix a badly plastered wall. Well, I can, but not without bumps, indents and general non-flat-ness. I can put IKEA flat pack together, hang cabinet doors, and affix door handles. I cannot cut coving, but luckily, my hubby can. My latest experiment is tiling on the cooker wall. It's going well so far…

What do you think? (I still have the bottom and the left rows to do.)

I thought this might be a fun one for my first blogger entry. For my previous blogs, check out my MySpace blog.