There was a long pause…

It was more like an abated breath. At least that’s what I’m going for.

Life has decided to dish out the dirties to me this year. New Year’s weekend I got stuck with that cold/flu thing that basically sucks. Anyone notice that all of the cold/flu things going around lately pretty much suck? That it seems there’s no end in sight and your friends and family members decide that sharing is caring? Yeah, well, I’ve about had it with getting that gunk.

In other news, I have found myself in the possession of a nook. I only received it today, but already I’ve plowed through half of a book. Alright, it doesn’t really count as a book since it’s a tiny little thing. I imagine the physical copy is a quick read and that I could have just sat down in a bookstore and read through it, but I’m sure I’ll find the information invaluable as time goes on. I have yet to put any of my own content on there (PDFs or otherwise) so we’ll see how that turns out after I get to that point. I need to find my other microSD card… one is in the camera and the other is… well, I’ll find it eventually.

The nook was quite sluggish at first, which I expected from all of the reviews. I also knew that there was an update that helped with this little problem. It has and it did. I’ve never played with a Kindle, so I have no point of comparison, but I love it already. I’m enjoying how easy it is to read on. I like that I was able to take it to the gym, prop it up on the little shelf in front of me, set the font to the biggest it goes and read while running/walking on the treadmill. This in and of itself satisfies my multi-tasking ADD self. Okay, I don’t really have ADD, but it really does help. Makes me feel like I’m getting to do something WHILE at the gym. And reading books are on the agenda of “Things to do More Often”.

I’m happy with the purchase, even if my car decided to take a digger and cost me $700 to repair. I don’t regret the nook. I do, however, need to set myself a budget so I don’t over spend on books. Like $20/pay period or something. Or only buy a book after I’ve read one. Who knows what I’m going to do. I do have a ton of them on my computer to upload, so we’ll see how that goes.

In other news, I’ve decided to take my ever growing ass to the gym. I keep gaining weight, which makes me more depressed about being overweight, which causes me to stop at Chipotle, In & Out, and McDonald’s far too often. I need to limit this to once a week or less. I need to make hitting the grocery store a bigger deal.

Spring is starting to make it’s way here, and losing my car yesterday and being stranded meant that I walked to the gym and walked back. I also walked the mile or two to pick up my car. It was good for me and I needed it. I didn’t, however, need the honks and catcalls. I mean really people, grow the hell up already.

In other crafty news, I’ve started working on a pair of socks from Wendy’s older book, Socks from the Toe-up. I have been wanting to make socks from this book for a very long time, but I’m such a self-striping/hand-painted yarn whore that I never picked up any skeins of sock yarn that were less… variegated. I have picked up some wool yarn from KnitPicks as well, so that I may start on some new amigurumi projects.

I’ve had bad luck with patterns, and I think I’m going to start working on my own patterns before I invest the time in another ami doll. There’s just too many variables that don’t seem to fit. Numbers that are off, stitch counts that don’t match when having to put pieces together. Ah well. Photos of the new doll are after the cut. They’re kind of fuzzy.

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A Year in Review: 2009

So much has happened this year that it makes you wonder what might happen in 2010. The sentiment that seems to be the majority amongst friends and family is that 2009 sucked really bad and 2010 has GOT to be better.

Let’s see what 2009 had in store for me.

Good:
I graduated college.
Visited Portland, OR, Seattle, WA, and Vancouver, BC, Canada with my best friend.
I got an Xbox 360 from someone who must really love me.
I got to visit England.
My kitty is healthy and continues to be spoiled.
Continued to be a non-smoker.
The generosity of strangers, friends and family is astounding!

Bads:
My car kept breaking, and my windshield needed to be replaced.
I needed to talk to a counselor to make it through a semester of school.
I had a friend lose her husband.
I spent 8 months looking for a job with no luck.
I got a $0.27 raise for my 4th year of employment.
I spent too much of my time being pissed, angry, and altogether face-stabby.
Spent too much of the year  taking birth control pills that threatened to give me major heart problems before it was detected.
Student loans started to go into repayment when there is no additional money (nor jobs).
California has really poor management skills and pissed all of the tax payer money away. *sigh*

So needless to say, I’m one on board for the Eff Off 2009!! boat.

Everyone has resolutions of some type, even if they don’t call them resolutions. Here is my semi-predictable, and hopefully possible list.

Goals for 2010
Read more books.
Go to the gym regularly.
Eat better, but never deprive myself of my personal food joys (just in moderation).
Eliminate all of my credit card debt (this one I’ve been working on, but I want the only debt I have to be the student loans before the end of the year).
Work on projects that I’ve been thinking about but keep putting them off.
Dye more yarn.

That’s about it. What about you guys? What are your hopes for the new year??

The REAL Holiday Spirit

So people often ask me why I don’t like Xmas and all of the holiday hooplah. I generally take the easiest way out and just say I hate crowds. Most people accept this answer as they fully and completely understand. Really, there are a handful of reasons.

Tiny History Lesson
Christmas (which will from here on be referred to as Xmas) was originally a Christian holiday as a means to celebrate the birth of Jesus. According to wiki (which I know is not the best source of information), the term “Christmas” is actually a mashing of Christ’s Mass, and totally makes sense. There’s actually a lot of interesting information on Wikipedia on Xmas.

Current Day
That being said, my dislike of the holiday has nothing to do with my lack of religious beliefs. Taking away from what the point of Xmas was originally, it has become a bigger and bigger cash cow for retailers. The list could go on and on about all of the scams, or even the downright rip-offs, of price inflation for the appearance of sale prices. Blah blah blah.

It’s more than that. This time of year boasts having “goodwill toward men”. It’s supposed to be about acting better towards your fellow man, and being more nice. Except, this is the time of year when we see people’s real colors come through. The pushing and the fighting in the aisles of stores. The fights and arrests of those who stepped over the line. The mad dash to get “the best parking spot” and nearly running folks over to get it. It’s about driving more angrily. The expectation to be treated with respect is higher, but the willingness to do the same in return is greatly diminished.

This is the time of year in which I avoid public places. I avoid having to drive unnecessarily anywhere, if I can avoid it. I don’t like other people’s disrespect and disregard to be made abundantly clear to me.

This isn’t about people acting as I would want them to act. This is about people who act better the remainder of the year, and from Black Friday on do they forget their manners and resort to overtly childish behaviors. Even saying that is putting children down because many are taught to treat others the way they would like to be treated. What kind of example are these people painting for children? Even if they aren’t acting in this way for their own children, they’re showing others that it’s okay to be that way. And it’s not.

The current state of the economy across the nation isn’t so fantastic. I’m probably on the “lucky” list for still having a job and a roof over my head. California is hit even harder than most with the decline of its own state government, its debt and an ever growing unemployment rate. These are desperate times. To keep their own families happy, they’re resorting to whatever means necessary. In my town, it’s even worse. 4th on the National Unemployment list isn’t something to scoff at, by any means. It means there’s less jobs, less money, and more desperation.

This is exactly the time of year in which we should show each other some respect. Many don’t. This is the time when those who can give a little, does. If you’re child is already going to have a ridiculous TON of presents under the tree, let someone else have the “last one on the shelf.” There’s no way of knowing if that’s going to be the only gift, or among many. It’s not a matter of knowing another person’s situation, but owning your own. Setting limits of what you’re willing to dish out by means of terrible behaviors.

I’m not exempt from acting badly during the holidays. This time of year puts me on edge knowing what’s to come. I avoid going out not because I hate crowds, but because I know myself. I know I have a terrible temper and a BIG mouth. When people are acting a fool toward me I don’t hesitate to spread the filth and make it be known to all how dumb someone is acting. It’s terrible and I know it. I don’t go out because it’s not for me to spread the hate during a time of year when we’re supposed to be kind to each other. Kind. Not loving. Not even accepting. Just kind. So staying in is my attempt at doing my part of keeping my bad attitude and Xmas hate contained within the walls of my apartment.

For those who go out and have to brave the wilds of malls, Wal-marts and shopping centers, remember that you don’t know how little or how much that other person has… so just be kind to each other. Be in the spirit of xmas, the way it was intended.

And I’m going to work on being less bitchy.

Alright, how about some NanoFail instead

I set my sights pretty high this year for nanowrimo. I wanted to actually write a story this year. I had to put it off in 2007 (even though I started) because of school. Last year (the year of hell) was just far too full of classes and homework and projects and boyfriend and drama (etc) that I didn’t even considering writing Nano. This year was supposed to be different though. I have all this free time now that I’m school-free. I had a handful of projects to finish (for xmas, if you must know) and since the projects I wanted done are now officially done, I figured why not, y’know?

I had an idea. It was a pretty good idea, if you must know. I was mostly excited about my idea. It just happened to be a fail idea, though. Works well in the movies-ish type of way, but no way could it coherently be told in story form. Not to mention that I haven’t actually read a good book in so long that I feared I might resort to using sparkling and beautiful ad nauseam until I hit the 50k word mark. I suppose it is a possibility.

In the end, I was putting off things like hanging out with the boyfriend, or going out at all, to pretend like I was going to do some writing. I wasn’t writing. I was catching up on Greek (on Hulu.com) and knitting. Watching Greek and knitting was way more fun than trying to figure out how to move a story along that was so obviously being forced (which, trust me, is the point of Nanowrimo, but doesn’t mean it has to be that hard).

I debated for a couple of days over whether or not I should keep trying. Just plug along and eventually I would get over the “hump” and the story would flesh out and viola! I’d have another novel on my hands. I just wasn’t feeling it. It just didn’t feel right. I’ve written plenty a nano novel without any plotting, or research, or the like. I’ve also had difficult points where I had to nearly force myself to be bothered to care, let alone to write it out. There are many chapters in my previous nano novels that are “tough” to read (imagine having to be the one to write it!). This year was simply different.

The process of Nanowrimo has changed. What it means to me has changed. It used to be this fun event that I toughed out along with so many of my other friends from across the world. It was a learning and growing experience. It was ridiculous and unnerving. We joked about adding flying ninja monkeys, or killing people off, and it was reasonable. It happened. It wasn’t about the story, it was about the process.

For me, once Nanowrimo became what it is today, people have lost sight of what it used to be like. It used to be about growing as a writer, now it’s about the race to word count. It used to be about telling a story, now it’s only about “having the word count to brag about.” Notice a trend? It’s not a personal journey anymore. It’s definitely not fun anymore. It causes me stress. A large portion of that is because I want to believe myself to be a writer at heart, but really it’s a craft I have yet to perfect (if there is such a thing). Not to mention a craft that I have pushed to the wayside. It’s not something I do all the time. It’s not something I do daily, that’s for sure. So how can I write a novel telling a story about characters I don’t even care about. I don’t even know who my characters are!

I said it before though, I haven’t really been doing much reading either. It’s not that I think I should mirror my writing style towards anyone in particular, but you have to keep your brain primed for the kind of stuff you want to write about. I haven’t read any fiction all the way through in so long I’ve forgotten the last novel I’ve read (within the same year!). I have this pile of books (yes, a large pile) that I’ve picked up over the last couple of years, and they haven’t been shelved appropriately… well, because I don’t want them stashed. I want them where I can see that they’re asking to be read. They’re needing me to look at them and be curious what story is between the covers.

So late Saturday night I grabbed The Friday Night Knitting Club by Kate Jacobs. Not the first on my list of must-reads, but it’s on there. I picked this one mostly because it’s about one of my favorite hobbies… knitting (of course).

Maybe if I can open up the reading repertoire it will also open myself up to the better writing I’d like to do. As easy as it is for me to explain why passive-voice writing is BAD to other people, I’m falling prey to it far too much… and it’s annoying.

So this year nano takes a backseat to other things in my life. Including reading, knitting and going to the gym.

Putting Life Back Together

Now that the big decision of “to move or not to move” had been dealt with I’m faced with the reality that I’ve let a fair bit of life slip by the last couple of months. At times I think it’s because I wanted someone else to fix it for me. That going away was going to magically make it all better. Really, it wasn’t. It was a night thought though.

Up until a few days ago life was stuck in limbo. I wasn’t sure what was going on, or where I was going to be. I was wondering daily whether I had made the right decision, or contemplating the severity of… well… all of it. Once the final decision was made (and it wasn’t mine to make, mind you) it felt as though this huge weight had been lifted from my shoulders. I didn’t have to wonder anymore. I didn’t have to weight the pros and cons. It just was.

Over the course of the last few weeks I’ve been slowly reading through all of Laurie’s blog entries. There’s a funny connection that you can make to a total stranger when they put their entire life on the internet for you to read. It’s so very personal and real. I feel like I know her and that we’ve been friends forever. I’m not delusional, but it just feels like that.

Over many of the months in 2008, and even in 2007, she had yard sales. She decluttered and got rid of things. She stopped buying excessively. She put an end to all things clutter in the home. I know this feeling. This desire to have some semblance of control over the mass quantities of things is one I’ve felt for a long time.

Part of coming to the realization that you may move to the other side of the planet is the idea that you will not have to pack all of your belongings and decide if it stays or goes. And of those belongings, what is worth keeping and what is worth giving away, throwing away or selling in a yard sale. This is completely overwhelming. Completely. The first time I thought about it, I nearly cried. I think I did at some point, but not the first time. The first time made me gasp.

Since I’m not going anywhere and I’m staying right where I am in my tiny little apartment I’m going to have to seriously reconsider the quantity of stuff I have. I tend to keep things because there’s a memory attached to it. I want to remember who gave it to me, the moment in which I received it and all that nonsense. Except, when I really think about it, do I need to keep holding onto stuff that I never use? Stuff that I only occasionally look at and think, “Ahhh, I remember that day” until it goes back into yet another box and is forgotten for another year?

I don’t think so.

I made some progress last night. I went grocery shopping. Not just for tons of food (which I bought) but for stuff that I will actually eat. Another great thing I picked up from Laurie is the “No Dieting” concept. I’m not going to diet, per se, but I’m going to keep as much junk food out of my home as possible (so as not to be tempted) and I’m going to keep stuff I like and is healthy. Even if I eat mostly the same thing every day. So I bought a lot of frozen stuff that’s not filled with mass quantities of sodium and fats. I bought stuff that’s slightly better for me and will keep in the freezer for awhile. These ready-made meals are not for taking to work. They’re for those days when I’m holed up in my apartment and instead of ordering pizza, I’ll grab one of those. I mean, I really need to cut back on the pizza ordering. I actually got irritated that the online ordering system wasn’t working and I had to *gasp* call them!

And so I start the process of reorganizing, and removing a lot of the stuff I’ve been carrying around with me for years. I don’t need most of it. I don’t need much of it at all. It’s time to say good-bye to all those boxes and label the boxes I do have so that I can read them and find what I’m looking for more easily. I want to rearrange my apartment and find a much happier medium between computer, television, yarn and cat.

It’ll be a long process (since I just read that for Laurie it took many months and even years), but it’s going to happen.

And all of this while trying to knit Xmas gifts and write a NaNoWriMo novel. November is proving to be very interesting already.

Harbor of Learning

Working here at the Small Town Hospital, like many other hospitals, the staff have to take these little quizzes to make sure we remember and know about things like airborne or bloodborne icky goo stuff, how to handle fires (electrical and chemical), and a handful of other things. Since I am not part of the licensed/Doctorly/patient-take-carey staff, my quizzes consist of only a handful.

It’s lucrative business. I’m not sure how the whole thing works, or even how well it actually gauges knowledge of anything, but it’s really rather silly. Each employee has to take them yearly.

I can honestly say that I don’t even think they change any of the questions. You have to pass each quiz (which is anywhere between 5 and 8 questions) with an 80% or higher to move onto the next one. At the end of each quiz it tells you which answers you got correct and which you got incorrect. Jot these down, cause you’ll use them later. Now comes the tricky part. Take the quiz again and change the wrong answers (usually they’re True/False questions) and resubmit.

Again I say, I don’t know how accurate it is at actually gauging anyone’s knowledge or understanding of the material. I personally don’t even believe that the questions change over the years.

There is one question, though, that I get wrong every time. Not because I’m an idiot, but because it is genuinely wrong. Taking into consideration that the quizzes and the questions were created many many years ago. And the questions have been slightly modified to reflect the current standards of the healthcare world, some need to be updated.

The question is a True/False. It simply says: The customer is always right. I answer false. False. False. False. Every time. False. The answer to get 100% on the quiz is True. But alas, that is not, realistically, the correct answer.

Working in retail and food service, I remember this mantra being pounded into my head from long ago. As time passed and lawsuits increased, this mentality has changed. The customer is NOT always right. A lot of times they’re not even close to being right. They’re in the “wrong” ballpark and they’re batting a 1000.

All of my schooling has taught me a lot because the field of Psychology is ever changing. It’s so hard to point your finger and say “yes” and be absolutely positive that that is the answer. There’s this grey area. Especially because the majority of Psychology involves the ever-flawed human. Things change within a person and their thought processes daily, hourly, etc. Let alone attempting to take into consideration the vast differences between each of us. We can find like-minded people to befriend, but there is no other person who thinks and feels exactly the same as I do. Or you.

So the “customer is always right” is inherently flawed in it’s very nature.

Consider each person’s level of knowledge. We can all have gone to the same schools, got the same grades and been taught all of the same information, but each of us will remember and retain different bits and parts. Nothing wrong with that. Until it comes down to who is “right” and who is “wrong”. Especially if those are the ONLY two choices. When you put something as black and white as right and wrong into the mix, you throw the proverbial monkey wrench into the mix.

Customer is complaining that they were treated unfairly by staff. Okay. That is their perception. If looking at exactly what Staff Person did, and how they talked and treated the Customer nothing on paper is wrong, does that mean that Customer was truly wronged? Yes, but only in that it is their perception and who are we to judge and decide how a person thinks and feels outside of ourselves. If, however, Customer said, “Staff Person called me an asshole” is Customer then right? If legitimately Staff Person did not call Customer an asshole, this mantra and belief that ‘the customer is always right’ puts Staff Person at fault 100% of the time. Without question. Without investigation. Without fail.

Let’s say for arguments sake that Staff Person did call Customer an asshole. Does it immediately put Staff Person at fault and should then be punished? No. There is always a story. There are also always 2 sides to a story such as this one. What if Customer called Staff Person’s mom a whore? What if Customer threw something at Staff Person’s head while they were trying to walk away from the otherwise heated situation? What if Staff Person had just had enough with Customer’s bad attitude and it was just bad timing? What if Staff Person has now worked two doubles (being on the floor doing patient care for a total of 24-hours) and snapped at a normally regular situation? Staff Person is still human, after all.

As human’s we’re expected to act professional at all times, especially in a service industry such as medical care. The problem is, the customer is not always right. Over the years I have had to curb and tone down my initial instinct to fly off the handle, declare unfailing stupidity, and scream my fool head off. I still have little to no patience for stupidity, but I also have to keep myself in check with regard to these declarations.

And when I am the customer wanting my wrong to be righted, I will gladly accept that I am not entirely right and often working on limited knowledge of what I’m wanting fixed. This does not make me infallible. Nor does it make any of you.

Oh the rain…

The thing is, I actually LOVE the rain! Especially the first rain! Oh the smell of rain and this weird feeling of everything getting clean. Including my car (which has not been washed in far longer than I care to admit).

But if there is one thing that can throw an entire population off kilter it’s introducing some weather to the daily routine. The thing that cracks me up is the fact that we were WARNED about this. The weatherman has been telling us for days that the storm was coming (and no I’m not referring to Colbert’s homostorm and I’d like to the absolutely hilarious parody video he did, but I’m blogging from my phone… And google is your friend) and that it was going to be a bit of a doozie! High winds, torrential rain, flash flood warnings, you name it, we got it.

Every year we go through this here in Hell, California. Every. single. year. It’s really not different than any previous year, except the day apocolypse begins. And every year it’s truly the end of the world for folks. They just can’t remember what it was like less than a year ago when it was, you know, raining last.

See, people in California act like they’ve never seen rain before. It’s a day-ruiner. They frantically drive so close to the back of your car that I could tell you the dood’s hair color, from looking out my rear-view mirror… In the rain… And through the gook of not having washed my car in something close to forever (dark brown, btw, guy who rode my ass all the way into work).

And it’s not just the rain or the weather change that seems to throw people off, but the severity of the change. It was over 100 degrees not that many days ago (couple weeks) and thus some folks are still stuck in that mode. We here in Hell, California don’t actually get the transitionary bit in between weather changes.

I have yet to figure out what the deal is, but I welcome the rain. It helps taper off the allergies and the horrific smoke-filled air (which should be illegal to EVERYONE thankyouveryfuckingmuch). It’s a nice refresh after such a harsh summer.

But really, in case of road issues, stay off the ass of the car in front of you! Cause I’m going to have just as much time to stop as you, only you’re going to use me to help soften the blow… And I’d really rather you didn’t.

Lasted about a week

So the blogging thing seemed to last about a week before I found out all these other things that needed to be done. I’ve been gaming a lot, which isn’t too surprising. Been distracted even more. One of these days I’ll actually not feel guilty about not going to the gym and answer the phone when Narilka calls… since, well, I asked that she would.

There’s a lot of stuff going on in my life these days. So much so that I don’t get to spend much time thinking about it. Or too much time thinking about it. Depends on who you are I suppose.

The days when I want to talk to someone it seems everyone’s busy. And the days when I find myself busy, everyone wants to talk. It’s kind of funny how that all works out. Or not surprising. Who knows.

There’s something about a day off when everyone else you know is stuck having to work that just makes the day off even better. I can’t really explain it. Government people and banks have today off. Most everyone else doesn’t. I asked for today off because the boyfriend had it off. The big plan was to go to the pumpkin patch where they would find pumpkins for Halloween and I would stuff my face with cakes, pies, and ciders made of apples and anything else related to the fall.

Alas, the boyfriend’s son came down with the flu, thus quarantining his house. I stayed one night, but didn’t want to test my luck with the plague. With everything going on, this was one of the last things I would ever have expected, but it happens when you go to a public school. It’s far too easy for some parents to write their children’s sickness off and send them to school where they are able to spread their plague to any and everyone else. When really, the best thing would have been to Stay. Home.

I digress.

And I don’t do the things I should do. And I forget to blog. And I forget to read blogs. *sigh*

Things I want to bring home from the UK

Here is the current and most up-to-date list of things I want to bring home from the U.K. They are in no particular order (except that I’m trying to remember them as they happened).

1. One of the taxi cab cars. They are the only one’s shaped that way and they are way cute (and totally British!!)
2. One of the brick and white buildings from St. James Park.
3. The bedding out of the hotel room (it’s poofy and luxurious!)
4. One of the adorable hoppity hop rabbits from around the hotel grounds (there are a bunch of them).
5. The teeny tiny old school Mini that was WAY too cute for words.

I know there were other things, but at this point I’ve forgotten. I’ll recruit help in remembering and ammend the list when I can.

Day 3 of the Adventure

Arriving in London at 7am meant that there was a really opportune time to try to go to the city and see some of the sights. I didn’t sleep much on the plane which meant that I was running on fumes by the time we landed. I figured it would be fun to take the train and go see some sights. And so, we did.

Once in the city we began walking around. Found a cute little cafe where we shared a plate of fish and chips (this was a HUGE serving of food) and we wandered around Trafalgar Square and into St. James park. We almost went up in the London Eye after crossing the Thames, but by that point the waiting in line would have surely meant me falling over and sleeping wherever I was.

We grabbed the train back to the airport and drove the long haul out to our hotel, just outside of Cirencester. It was a painful drive and really we probably should have pulled over and slept. *shrug* ah well.

Yesterday (Tuesday) we attempted to trek to Cardiff. It wouldn’t have been so bad if we had an actual map versus the really terrible Google maps directions. Which were accurate, but didn’t give nearly enough information to make driving around Cardiff possible. We were looking for this Doctor Who thing, and we definitely didn’t make it in time for the last showing so instead we hit up the Odeon movie theater to see Harry Potter.

Things I’ve noticed so far:

1. People are SO polite here. It’s almost shocking how polite they are. It also makes me realize how much American are just douche bags. *shrug*
2. Drivers are considerate. Good grief even when there was an accident and traffic it took a small fraction of the time it would take if it happened on ANY highway/freeway in the states.
3. There are an obscene amount of different languages and accents everywhere you go. It’s not a bad thing, it’s just such a contrast. When we went down to breakfast yesterday there was this girl who was Polish in descent, but was raised in Greece (and was in the UK for work). Definitely cool.
4. The food, while it tastes good, is cooked in SO much fat and oil that I can literally hear my heart scream out to me to stop. And they LOVE meat flavored everything. Nothing like a bag of “Lays” Smoked Bacon flavored chips.
5. There is no night life outside of London. Everything closes far too early for my tastes (though I’m sure it’s just because of the lingering jet lag). This is something that is easy to overcome.
6. The weather. It’s definitely a HUGE change from the 2-week long 100+ degree days that I’m glad to be missing out on (at least half of it!). It rains randomly, and at times there is no sun. This is one of my concerns with moving to Seattle without actually experiencing it. So far it doesn’t bother me too much. I like the cool weather a lot. There are no air conditioners. <3
7. The toilets don’t fill with nearly enough water for me to feel comfortable. Heh.

I could see myself living here. I absolutely love it. Every time someone talks I want to hug them. We saw a Dalek cake at the Tesco last night (Tesco is like a Wal-Mart) and I wanted it. Had no desire to eat it. Just wanted the Dalek cake. Totally adore all of the Doctor Who stuff around.

Overall this has been a really amazing trip and it’s fairly early on day three. Still a few more days to go and hopefully some more sight seeing. For now, I sleep.