I'm Back

Well, it's been over a month since my last post. It seems like even longer than that, so much has happened.

We spent a few gruelling days preparing our London home before we moved in. We sanded and varnished the pine floorboards in the bedrooms and the hall. We laid down a laminate floor in the living room (sadly the original floorboards had been removed from this room) and we painted the living room, the hall, and our bedroom. Why go to all this trouble you may ask, if we are just renting the property? I don't realy know, ask Heather! Actually, I am really happy with the place. It looks great, and it really feels like home with our personal touch on it. A great place to come to after a day of work in the big city. You can see pictures of our new place here:
PICTURES (note: the bathroom colors were not our choice, but we did not get around to repainting it)

Our move went extremely well. We used a company called Taxi Vans, and I was really impressed with them. Since I have only had a UK license for a year, I was not allowed to rent a moving van. So I rented a man with a van for the day (much cheaper than a full blown moving company). The best part was that he had to help me carry everything! He was amazingly quick and efficient. We had the van loaded much quicker than I expected. I had to wait for a couple of hours for our landlord to come and inspect the house and give the me the damage deposit. In the mean time, the man and the van and Heather went to London. By the time I got to our house in London, the man with the van had already unloaded everything (with Heather's help) and left for another job.

I have been settling in to my new job quite well. It is an interesting change to be designing Hifi equipment instead of pro-audio equipment. Another big change is that I am one of the more experienced engineers now instead of the youngest one. So far I have managed to fool everyone into thinking that I really do know what I am doing! This company really makes an effort to create a community in the workplace. They have special events and evenings out for the employees, and a company trip once a year. Every Wednesday night some of them get together for football. It was a lot of fun (scary how out of shape I am), although not quite as intense as some of the games with Brewer's Blues at Salt Lake Indoor Soccer.

We have been trying to explore a different area every weekend. There is so much to see and do, and lots of it is free! We have been to Greenwich (nice little artsy area with bookshops, antique shops, and markets), the Tate Modern (London's famous modern art museum), the British Museum (amazing collection of artifacts from ancient civilizations around the world), and lots of other great little places that just seem to pop out of no where.

On the train the other morning, I was reading the free Metro paper when I saw an ad for the Brad Mehldau trio. They are a jazz trio from New York and we have four of their albums. I checked for tickets as soon as I got to work, and there were eight seats in a row available in the balcony (I think there must have been a last minute cancellation), so I grabbed two of them. The guys are all stunning musicians, the kind that are so good that you hate them as much as you love them, and you wonder if it is really worth ever picking up your scruffy old guitar again.

In other news, I turned 30 last week, but I don't have anything very philosophical to say about it. Heather got me 30 presents that she had aquired while working at the charity shop. I got all kinds of great stuff like England football jerseys, Chinese bookends, an old globe, old records (you know the old black plastic kind), and a bunch of cool shirts.

If you bothered to read this far, you are just about caught up. I really do want to keep this blog going as I am anticipating all kinds of excitment over the next year. I've got books to read, I'm really going to be pushing my music, and we are hoping to sell the car and replace it with a VW camper to go exploring in. Stay tuned...

JE