February in the UK

Thought it was time for an update on what I've been up to in this long, cold English winter.

Well, its still cold, and the thought of 4 more months of cold doesn't do wonders to the morale, but I think I'll manage with my interlude in Costa Rica next month to visit my sister. Most excited about that, the thought of sun soon makes me feel very happy!

Chris and I went to a Burn's night celebration, a Scottish night to honor a poet which involves men wearing kilts, saying the Burn's poem "Ode to the Haggis" and then everyone consuming a large slab of the stuff, accompanied by 'neeps and tatties'. Won't be eating much of that again for a while!

We celebrated Australia day with a small party at my place, introducing the English to fairy bread, vegemite, sausage sizzles (unfortunately from a fry pan) and lamingtons (I realised why I'd never tried to make them before, they are so fiddly!). It was good fun, listening to the hottest 100 as well.

Chris departed the UK the week before last. I was conveniently in London for a few days for work to visit the zoo and science museum, so we were able to spend another night together there. We were very touristy and checked out the extravagant and pastiche Harrods, where we purchased some pork pies (they were two for one so we thought we could splash out :), and admired the wares. Then we headed to Piccadilly circus, Leicester square, Soho for a cocktail and Chinatown for dinner. Yummo. Was a really nice night. London has a very exciting feel about it.

Chris left the next day for Japan. He is currently in Hong Kong, and still has to visit China, Thailand and Vietnam before he gets home to Australia in mid-March. As it looks at the moment we wont be seeing each other til I get back to Australia, which I think will be around September at the moment, after I've travelled around Europe in the Summer. Will be hard, but as before I'll keep busy...

While in London I visited the zoo for work, and got to hold an animal called a kinkajou, which is also called a honey bear, and is native to south and central America. It was so cute (see pic)!!

Last weekend I went to visit Tim (circus days) who is living in Alston working at a kids adventure camp. They mainly get school groups in there. It is a very nice part of the country with dry stone walls and green hills and not much else except pubs so we went to a few of those, hung out with his friends and work colleagues, and watched some quality Tom Cruise flicks like Top Gun and Days of Thunder. Hilarious. It was great to get out of the city though and see some of the pretty English countryside, although next time I visit I'll hope for some warmer weather!

This weekend Nita visited from Glasgow. We went to some funky cafes and bars and watched a few films, so it was a nice relaxing weekend.

Work is super busy this week with school half-term next week. The theme is the science of chocolate, so I'm finding it really hard writing and researching chocolate with out eating too much of the stuff! Oh well, it could be worse.... Researching mould would have a much worse effect....

The last pic is of Adrian, me, Chris and Baz down at the local pub the Bluebell having a game of pool on Adrian and Chris's last night in Newcastle. They'd spent so many evenings there....