Christmas Day, and the surrounding events

Christmas has been a big deal this year, and yet it’s been such an epic fail at the same time. Let’s get all the sad soppy things out of the way, shall we?

This Christmas has been, let’s just say, one of my least favorite. I’ve missed my family terribly as well as our family traditions. Christmas in England this year have been delayed at best. Decorations and getting a tree became most of a task than an adventure. I tried so hard to do everything I could, but I just couldn’t get into the Christmas spirit. Finally, 3 days before Christmas I made my last attempt at trying to make Christmas in England feel Christmasy—I tried to make a batch of 4 different holiday treats that my mom makes every year, so I could take some into the girls at work and some for the Vidler family for Christmas day. I started making cookies as soon as James and I got home (which was 9pm) and baked until 1am resulting in a break down crying fit, and my hubby consoling me. I exclaimed, ‘It doesn’t feel like Christmas unless there’s my mom’s holiday treats!’ and I was trying so hard to do everything myself instead of asking him for help. Finally, we, together, made up all the treats and headed to bed.

That’s the sum up of me missing my family and Christmas in Cali.

With that out of the way, here’s Christmas with the Vidlers:

The ENTIRE Vidler family had to work on Christmas day, aside from 7 year old Tony who hung out with me all day. We watched TV/movies that he brought over, he opened his presents, I made him a hot chocolate with his new SpongeBob mug that we bought him for Christmas, and then we went on a treasure hunt that led to the Hotel. I planned a Christmas Treasure hunt for Tony, which he loved, that made him go from Clue to clue (like the games my parents did for us every Christmas), that led him eventually to a treasure box with a combo lock on it. He had to figure out the combination, then inside was all his favorite things: Spongebob magazine, marahmellows, sweets, a giant Christmas pen, lego starwars figure…and I even let him keep the treasure box which I didn’t plan on, but he asked me if he could keep it. :)



Doing the treasure hunt with Tony was the first time it actually felt like Christmas to me for more than a few minutes. Then we had dinner at the hotel with the rest of the family. The Hotel was closed and locked, Harry warmed up the leftover courses, Sam and Alice served/brought everything to the table, James Sr. whined impatiently (he wanted to go up and take a quick nap before having to come down and open up the bar at 6pm again for the Christmas drinking crowd), and everyone helped clear the table and get things ready for the evening before heading back to the Dam Barn to open presents.

Opening presents went faster than I’m used to. John(the eldest brother, visiting from Manchester) was impatient and wanted to open up presents and ditch the family for the pub as soon as possible….but then again, that’s the way John is. My hubby, and Alice, got me a brand new Samsung MultiView Digital Camera. It’s AMAZING! And what I wanted….just years down the line when it wasn’t the most expensive new thing on the market (hence why they went halvesies on it). It’s a cool camera—the view screen flips 180* so you can do things like a self portrait shot and still be able to look at what you’re taking a picture of on the screen. The other feature this camera has that my old camera doesn’t(a feature I would LOVE to have all the time) is SOUND on the video. For some reason my old camera doesn’t have a mic on it, so I’ve been only getting video without sound.

Anyway…I haven’t been able to test out my camera yet because the guy James bought the camera from sold him an SD card, but the camera only takes MICRO SD, so we’re sorting that out soon.

James’ big present from me this year was a Gamer bean bag Chair. It’s blue and white(Chelsea football colors, which is his favorite), and has a back rest as well, so it’s like having another chair in the flat. HE LOVES his bean bag chair. And it's HUGE! He;s obsessed with sitting in it and sometimes will opt out of cuddling on the couch, just because it's so comfy. Just as well that he's obsessed with it, cause he got some new games for Christmas as well.


Other Christmas presents, just to recap:

Greg and Annie got us a Brita water filter(James LOVES playing with it for the first time, and now we’re drinking loads more water. THANK YOU!)

Mum and Dad(McClellan) got James a pepper mill and me an electric heating pad(which we were thrilled to each get. THANK YOU!!!)

Steven and Jeni send us over these cool picture frames. (Unfortunately one of them got chipped/cracked during shipped, but they ARE still functional, and it adds more character to the frames...so thank you!)


Alice gave James a stir fry pan and a Kenwood all in one mixer, so that will be put to use. And other than that we got an assortment of personal presents….bath bombs n’ soaps, video games, Bath and Body works lotions and hand sanitizers, MALT, DVDs(Harry Potter, Easy A), etc, etc, etc. The only other thing is that mum and dad sent us over a box of ‘little presents’, but I had WAY more to open than James…simply because they didn’t know what cheap gifts they could send him, so I ended up buying him 2 cheap Music Albums on play.com to make up the difference.

CHRISTMAS soon ended, and James’ Birthday began. For his birthday we went to London(2/3 hours drive) to see a Chelsea Football match. I even put on a Chelsea jersey to cheer on my hubby's favorite team!

James wore his Chelsea Christmas hat that Tony gave him as a gift. Goofy looking, huh? tehehehe

After that we went to Hard Rock Café for his birthday Lunch/Dinner,


And then we went across the street to Hyde Park and Winter Wonderland Carnival that we went to last year.

There was MUCH MORE to it than last year. There was a Bar that was literally on a rotating platform that was furnished like a Carousel.

There were cool shops like a place that made wooden ties, and another stall which homemade soaps and bath stuff that were made to look like cakes, cupcakes, etc. VERY decadent stuff.

The rest of our 2 day London was spent sightseeing, but unfortunately which we were there we were sick. I had been sick for most of December, but it got worse while we were in London and ended up giving it to James. Luckily, it was after his birthday! So, he ended up having a good birthday on Dec 26th, then everything went to crap on the 27th and things started going array.

We had planned to get up early the 27th to go to Cambridge Theatre and snag two cheap tickets to Matilda the Musical(a fantastic show that we lucked out on seeing last year in Stratford before it because popular and went to the West End…the London Broadway basically).

Unfortunately, because we were sick, we decided to sleep in and only get there 30min before the box office opened at 10am, and there were already 15 people in line. They were only handing out 8 tickets at 5 pounds each for people under 26 years of age, and we were there too late. So instead, we ended up getting breakfast at this Café across the street from the theatre and sulking.

Sulking soon turned into happiness, when the food turned out to be amazing and distracted us from the sadness of not having gotten tickets.

After food we had a bit of time to kill, but during that time, we were traveling and ended up in Kings Cross Station, we decided to go try and find the Harry Potter bit--Platform 9 and 3/4 that we couldn't find last year because of all the construction. Wef ound it, and that also made me momentarily happy.

The other thing planned for the 27th was going to meet up with my friend Crystallynn, from California. She was in London for 2 weeks which coincided with our London trip so we planned to meet up in a pub in Camden. Unfortunately, because of a combination of tube closures and our own stupidity for staying at the Sherlock Holmes museum too long, we ended up getting to the pub an HOUR later than we had planned to meet up. With NO phone number and limited facebook access, we missed our meet up and I was completely distraught.

We ended up wanding around Camden for the rest of the day, then going back to the hotel to rest. At least the Sherlock Museum was good, right?

Here's a picture of James on a bench at Baker Street Station, the station right next to the Sherlock Museum.

The famous Baker Street Station has been connected with Sherlock for decades and there's always been little Sherlock sillouettes on the tiles on the walls, but since the new movie came out there are promotional posters too which I think adds some character to it as well.

James being Sherlock, by the Statue of Sherlock Holmes outside Baker Street Station.

Inside the house we took loads of pictures but these are the ones I liked the best with us in them.

James on one of the staircases, with the old ugly carpet on them.

Basically the museum was in the Sherlock house, 221b Baker Street, and was spread out in the rooms of the house, which carried up 4 stories. On the last one there was only a toilet(hence my weird pose here:)

and a small little bit/ladder that led up to the attic, which was filled with props of luggage.

Here's me in Camden, eating at one of the Moped seated bench tables outside some food stalls in the Camden Lock.

James, feeling sickies and still looking cool on the London underground.

Later that night we went for food at an American Style Diner(because James, still sick, desperately wanted a milkshake and a coke).

More travel on the tube......

And we were back at the hotel. We sent Crystallynn a message on facebook in a desperate attempt to meet up again, and luckily, she checked her facebook, sent a message back and gave us a location they were going for lunch the next day to meet up at.

I was NOT going to miss this chance again, so we located the place where they were going for lunch an hour later, then ended up killing time wandering around Trafalgar Square (which was close to where the café was).

Finally, at long last, we meet up with Crystallynn and her friend. We had lunch together, then went to this Benjamin Franklin house nearby.

It was more of a bragging rights “this is the oldest building still standing, with original floorboards, where Benjamin Franklin lived”. That sort of thing. The collest part is that they had a replica upstairs of the Glass Armonica, that Ben Franklin invented, and you could actually PLAY it! So we had a go at playing it—which is a bit like playing the piano. The gold bits on the rims of some of the glasses were the equivalent of the black keys on a piano.

After that we hit the pub, and I introduced Crystallynn to the greatest drink ever—WKD(wicked). I keep saying it’s basically liquid Sourbelt candy in alcoholic form. AMAZING!
After that it was goodbye and goodnight for us.

Since it’s tradition, here’s some pictures of our hotel room:

The hotel was extremely nice. They upgraded our room to an Executive suite on the top floor (7th) of the hotel, which had a great big bed, and a luxury bath tub. Very nice. We like…especially free upgrades. (BTW James is being weird, he was in every shot, and made funny faces/poses in each one, don't mind what he's doing). :P

The only other picture I have is one of James on our way back to Ross Vegas. He looks proper American Mogul here with his coffee and talking on his phone. I thought it was funny.

-JM

Getting ready for Christmas

HELLOOOOOOOO DECEMBER!
First and foremost I would like to announce the fact that I am a winner.

Yes, Nanowrimo is OVER and I have succeeded in writting (OVER) 50,000 words in Novel form! That entitled me to the above certificate stating "The Office of Letter and Light is proud to certify JENNY VIDLER author of STATE OF MIND a WINNER of National Novel Writing Month 2011".
So, that's a thing. :) I wrote a book. Yay me. and I got a certificate to prove it!

Now that I've finally gotten my life back, it's been work, work, work and shop, shop, shop all boiling down to Christmas.

1. Work. Work for me has been a wonderful experience....unless I'm working with the one person I don't like. 1 guess who that is. Anyway....sometime this month the descision to keep or fire me will be made. Alice, the store supervisor, is hoping that the head office will give her store "the hours" to be able to hire another memeber of staff. Hopefully that will be possible and that memeber of staff will be me.
If not, I've had a great time at Store Twenty One and my employement will come to an end after Christmas. So far, I'm on the router through Dec 30th, with the exception of the 5 days before it when I asked off so that James and I could go to London for his birthday.

I won't have to work on Christmas day. But unfortunately, James WILL have to work. He's continuously working hard to bring home the bacon. He's the one making sure we don't go homeless and hungry (being of the higher wage), but hopefully the hours to the store will be given and I will be able to stay on and work on a regular basis.

I've had some pretty good times in that store. Mistaking 'cushions' for 'pillows' and having the mickey taken out of me(being made fun of, but in a loving way), impressing my supervisors by speaking french, making new friends, learning new things....all good times.


2. When I'm not working, I've been shopping ALOT, it feels like I'm always going out to get another piece of the missing puzzle. This shopping consists of Christmas shopping--presents decorations, etc.

And at the beginning of December, we're done. We've shipped off presents to Cali, bought presents for family members here, and gotten quite a bit of little decorations to living up our flat with Christmas spirit. And today, we got our tree and decorated it. :)



Today we had a LONG lay in (we slept til after noon thirty), then took a trip out to Ledbury where we got our tree from this really sweet tree farm. Then we brought the tree home, set it up, cuddled up and watched a few movies. We still have to get some tinsel garland for the tree, but it's pretty cute and we're happy with it.

Mid November Update

Good morning, afternoon, and evening ALL!

I recently had a phone chat with my mother who persuaded me to write another blog, even though not much has been going on. James and I have been working like FIENDS! More him, really. But occasionally I pick up an additional shift.

However, when we’re not both working, we seize the opportunity we have together and (if we don’t have any laundry to do at mum’s) we go out for the day. This past week James had 2 days off—sadly I only had one—but we were able to go out both days because my shift that fell on his day off wasn’t until 3pm, so we drove to Hereford (the equivalent of driving from Canyon Country to the Mall) and hung out and did some shopping. That was Tuesday.

Tuesday we had fun wandering around Hereford. We went to a Gaming Store to sell off 15 or so of James’ PS3 Games so he could get 2 brand new games: Uncharted 3 and Resistance 3. Since he got it he’s been obsessed with playing Uncharted, which I have to admit is a really great game to watch since it’s more of a movie than a game. So he’s been playing that while I’ve been Nanowrimoing, although I do have to admit it’s very hard to concentrate on writing when there’s shooting going on in the background.

In any case, our day out in Hereford was fun. We did some shopping, looked around at things we might want to buy, and supported the local farmers by buying a few delicious and reasonably priced mini loaves of bread (individual sized zucchini bread, banana bread, etc) from the farmer’s market they had out.

Then Wednesday when we both had off work we went out to the Gloucester Quays (pronounced ‘Keys’) and did a bit of shop/wandering around there. Worst part of the day: we went into a clothes shop called “Next: Clearence” where they sell big name stuff that hadn’t been sold in season, so they ship it to these clearance outlets and reduce them down. James has been tired of me moaning about my weight and how I can’t fit into any of my jeans, so he wanted to buy me a pair I COULD comfortably fit into(yes….I’m gained weight while I’ve been over here. Don’t remind me!) Well, I pick out LOADS of jeans, Im talking 10ish pairs, and go to the dressing rooms only to find out that the ONLY dressing rooms in the shop are closed until January for Health and Safety reasons. Bummer. SO no jeans for me. BEST part of the day: I got 4 books: The Hunger Games Series, AND John Green’s Looking for Alaska for 7 pounds (what’s that like, $10-15?). Pretty freaking good deal!

We also went to Toys R Us and picked up out first board Game. Sadly we couldn’t find “Ticket to Ride” like James wanted, but we got a game called “Hare and Tortoise” instead. Basically a VERY complicated version of Chutes and Ladders, with no dice. We’ve played it already and decided we like it so, I think we’ll be getting more games like it in the future.

Not too many pictures today but there are a few of our adventures outside of Ross:



James and I doing artsy camera shots through a mirror in a café in Hereford.


We found this in Toys R Us. Toys R Us Lego Table… LAME and impractical! (look, some kid’s gonna bash his knee up against legos under the table.

Dad’s Lego Table….SO much cooler! Just look at those nicely hand crafty drawers!

Now for General News.

Lately I’ve been feeling a bit down, and we’re not exactly where to pin point the cause of it. I’ve been depressed about my weight, the Nanowrimo book, how dark it’s getting (seriously it’s 10am in the morning and my desk lamp is brighter than outside!), work, etc. For whatever reason I’ve been down, I’m slowly starting to be okay again.

The causes:

Weight Depression Cause: I’ve been gaining weight and I’ve had no outlet (gym—too expensive, walking—too cold, pilates—no time with my book writing!) to deal with it.
Solution: Luckily, James spoke to his dad who’s a member at Wye Leisure (it’s a spa, pool, gym…basically everything) and we’ve worked out that to sign up both of us on his gym membership would cost 80 pounds a month, which he’ll pay for for the whole year, and just take 20 pounds out of James’ wages each week. This way we can BOTH get fit and I can stop being depressed about freezing in winter cause my jeans don’t fit properly.

NANOWRIMO cause: Writing a book is flippin hard. It’s true what they say, after you hit 30,000 words you feel pretty low and down on yourself, which is where I am. I lack motivation to write and sometimes can’t be bothered to write in the morning before I go to work, but I get up and I do it eventually.

Solution: I’m almost done! One more week to go, then I’m done with NANOWRIMO depression!

Work cause: Work got me down the other day because Josie, my supervisor, said ‘You’re late’, to me when I clearly was on time. I was there exactly at 11am, but she said to me, “You know you’re meant to be here 10 minutes early, right?” I just nodded and apologized, but to me it’s B.S. because if we come in 10 minutes early and start working then, which is what they expect, they don’t pay us for those 10 minutes. So, I don’t see the point. As long as I’m there on time and not holding anyone up who’s going home when I come in. I don’t see the freaking problem. Solution: just deal. And get there 10 minute early and kill time in the break room after signing in on time anyway.

Darker Days cause: Since over here in England it’s darker in the Winter, that’s made me a little depressed. You know how when it gets dark outside, you mellow out and just chill before going to bed. Well here, it’s dark all day, so I’m mellow all day, but that turns into sad all day. I just really hope I’m not getting S.A.D. which is a disorder that makes people sad in the winter, in darker places of the world.
Solution: see very close to my desk lamp, and hope I don’t have S.A.D.

Reason why I’m moaning about all this is because James was very sweet about it. Even when I was unsure about my depression going away, he cuddled me and said everything will be alright. Then last night after work, he bought me a present, cooked us a light meal(because he knew I was depressed about my weight and how we’ve been eating lately), and surprised me with all of it when I got home from work two hours later.

He cooked us very yummy soup and salad, which sounds bland, but it was done in a way, with more ingredients that a normal soup or salad would have, that it looked like something that I’d order in a restaurant. It was very lovely.

And then he bought me this:

This is “Puddles”; Mr. Pudge Pudge Cuddle Pants. It’s a little pushie toy, but it has lavender/wheat inside a bean bag inside him that you take out, microwave then put back in him. It’s supposed to be something you can cuddle to bed to warm you up and it smells SO much like lavender when you heat it up that it relaxes you to sleep.

I love my Pudge Pudge , and my hubby!

That’s all for now. We’re supposed to go see Twilight and go to dinner with Lyndsey and Greg on Wednesday, so we’ll see if another blog comes out of that. Til then …..

NANOWRIMO break

Short blog, but with pictures! Just so I can get back to NANOWRIMO. Friday James and I went to Caerphilly Castle, the largest Castle in Wales and second largest castle in Britain. It’s pretty big. The most amazing thing about this castle is that it’s so big—it was meant to be a fortress for the Prince of Wales if he ever needed to protect himself, but it didn’t. The Castle was built as a fortress, but it was never really attacked. Most of its ‘ruins’ are because of age and because no one took care to look after the castle. People just started stealing bricks from it and it came apart from there.

This is a drawing of Cearphilly. This Castle is so massive, you have to take an aerial shot of it. In this picture you can see from the left, to the right...1 moat, the outer defensive wall, a lake that acted as another moat the entire way around the castle, then the inner defensive wall, and THEN the gate house that led into the Castle courtyard. BIG CASTLE!

Me in the Banquet Hall. They rent it out for weddings and such. Cool place. It was designed to be the church of the castle, actually.

The veiw of the back end of the castle court yard.

View of the surrounding town, part of the lake and outer defensive wall from the west tower of the castle.

James on top of the West Tower, with a rainbow behind him. :) Yes, it did rain while we were there.

And the rainbow evidentally came from Morrisons (a grocery store). We lol-ed.

Me, standing in the courtyard, with the gate house of the Castle in the backround.

There was a door at the back end of the castle. I posed, "Get me outta here! I'm lost! It's so big! I'm lost!"

Picture of the moat and the lake parted only by a small stripped of land and rubble that was once another defensive wall.

James, standing on the outside of the bridge leading up to the Gate house of the castle.



After the Castle, we wandered the nearby shops in town and we came across a Store Twenty One. So….since I work for the company, I thought I’d take a picture and show you guys what Store Twenty One is.

By the way, this is the coat I bought from work. But I got really jealous when we walked into the one in Caerphilly because they had my coat in more colors, including red and navy blue which I REALLY wanted as well, but I’ll only need the one coat so there’s no point in spending more money on them.

That night, since we had the whole day off together, James took me out to dinner at The Scrumpy House Restaurant. It’s a restaurant at Weston’s Cider Co. Brewery. Great food, reasonably priced, and yes…we had some delicious Westons Cider. Yum yum!

They had loads of old Westons factory signs in the restaraunt.

Me, sipping on some Perry(pear cider).

James looking at the menu, the whole of the restaraunt behind us. Oh yeah...the restaraunt is basically a converted barn shed, so it's quite small, but we liked it all to ourselves.

The other thing I wanted to tell you guys about is Bonfire Night. ‘Remember Remember the fifth of November’…and that’s not just a line off that crappy movie V for Vendetta. The fifth of November, otherwise known as ‘Bonfire Night’ or ‘Guy Fawkes Day’ is a MAJOR Holiday in British history that is highly celebrated, as big as Fourth of July for Americans, but more sadistic.

Basically every year on Nov 5th, people get together all over the place, have BBQs, light fireworks, BIG BIG celebration…oh yeah, and they throw a dummy on top of a HUGMOUNGOUS pile of wood, timber, extra….and light it on fire. Yes, Bonfire night has little children and adults alike cheering for a lit-le scarecrow or potato sack dummy (symbolizing a real life human being at one point) to be lit on fire. Fun holiday, but when you think about it, very very sadistic.

The real story is years and years and years ago, this guy, which everyone just calls Guy Fawkes, tried to blow up the English Parliament on behalf of the Spanish to bring down the government. For attempting such treason, he was burned at the stake, which is why we light bonfires every year with a little dummy on top.

The big thing to do in Ross Vegas is go to The Chase Hotel. It’s got tons of open field land, perfect to be sectioned off and have a huge old bonfire on the middle of the lawn, and still house the hundreds of people that pay to come and watch the bonfire being lit. A charity called the Ross Lions organizes it every year, charges admission, does food, drinks, glow sticks, sparklers, candy, etc and turns it into one big party that lasts a few hours. James and I went on a double date with his workmate Lyndsey and her boyfriend Greg. It was fun, but I forgot my camera, so no pictures of the huge bonfire.

Anyways, we watched the bonfire be lit, watched fireworks go off, had a few drinks back at the Kings Head, then went for some late night Chinese take-away. We might go out again for a proper Chinese buffet and a movie with Greg and Lyndsey on Wednesday because we’re all off work and school in the evening. So I’m quite looking forward to that.

Anyways, I best get back to NANOWRIMO. I’m on track, but barely. I’m glad I took those first few days of November to OVERshoot on my word count because since Friday, I’ve been barely making my daily word count, but I DO write enough to keep me on track before I go out(ie: to the castle, or out to bonfire night, before I have to go to work, etc.).

That’s all I got for now. Ta ta.

Last Blog til December, so make it a good one.

SO MUCH has gone on this week! Mostly having to do with work. First off all, I finally got my Staff Discount Card. They want us to wear Store 21 clothing for our uniform, and we get 40% off for uniform, and anything else in the store 30% off. So I went in on my day off, shopped for and got 4 long-shirt/dresses to wear for a uniform with wooly tights as it gets colder(cause lately I’ve just been wearing thin leggings, a skirt, and a ‘California weather’ top. SO as it’s been getting colder, I’m starting to freeze. So now my uniform and comfort requirements have been met. I also got a Winter Coat at Store 21 for about fifteen pounds. It’s a nice teal blue pea coat. I’m sure you’ll see pictures of it later on; when James and I can get out to do something for a day, when we’re both off, I’ll probably wear and you’ll get to see pictures and a blog of whatever we go out and do (we’re thinking on our next day off we’ll go to Carphilly Castle, which is supposedly the largest Castle in Wales—it has two moats! WOW!—but we have NO idea when our days off will coincide).

Besides James working like mad (just to give you an idea, last week he worked 51 hours, while his workmates clocked in at between 30-40hrs per person last week), I’ve been putting in more hours at work. My original schedule this past week was Sunday: 11am-4pm, Wednesday: 11am-3pm, and finally, Saturday: 2pm-6pm.

Sunday, I did my shift. Then Monday morning I get a call asking if I could come in because someone was sick. While I was at work Monday, I looked at the schedule and saw they added me for a shift Tuesday(3pm-6pm). But then Tuesday morning I get a call saying that one of the girls hadn’t shown up for work, so they wanted me to come in earlier, as early as I could, and do her shift as well as mine…putting me at 1pm-6pm instead of 3pm-6pm. Same thing happened Wednesday morning when I got a call at 8:30pm asking if I could come in as soon as possible because Louise, another girl who was scheduled to work 8:30am-5pm, was sick. So today I ended up working an 8 and a half hour shift. I’m quite pleased that work likes me enough to put me as their first-string call-in-relief, as opposed to the other girl who was hired for temporary Christmas contract—Katrice.

The rest of the week went as planned. I finally got a lay-in Thursday and Friday, which I took FULL advantage of because I’ve been getting a cold lately, so I slept in until 1 or 2 then took it easy the rest of the day—ate soup, pumped up on OJ and cold tablets(for running nose, which was all I have, but it could’ve gotten worse if I didn’t take it easy). It was nice to have a lay-in, considering that the previous 3 days I’d been woken up by my phone going off and work wanting me to come in early, forcing me to get up earlier. For me, interrupted sleep is horrendous, but it’s worse now that I’m married….James likes to go to bed SUPER late(earliest he’ll go to bed is between 11pm and midnight). Because of his late shifts, he’s used to going to bed late, but I’m not on a regular basis. And it’s hard to go to sleep without him, because for one thing, I like to cuddle to sleep, and for another, even though out flat blocks most of the outside noise, the floor of our living room(which is right above our bedroom) is not double glazed, so I can hear ANY noise going on upstairs. If he moves on the couch, the couch squeaks, which makes the floor squeak, which I can plainly hear. If he gets up, I can tell where he’s walking because the floorboards creek. Etc..etc..etc. So, If he gets a late night, that means I do too, unless we BOTH have to get up early in the morning, then I insist that we both go to bed early, but that doesn’t happen much. Trust me, If I knew I was going to be called in to work earlier, I would’ve made him get an earlier night, but I didn’t, so those 3 days my sleep was interrupted AND cut short.

That combined with not having a Winter Coat until Thursday got me a little sickies. Anyways, enough about me ranting about sleep…

Some good news/gossip around Store 21, is that we’re hiring for 2 new positions. One is a Store Manager because Alice, our current store manager is also a REGIONAL manager for the company and has been pulled away from our store lately to work on regional matters. So, along with Josie, our other store manager, they’re thinking they might need someone temporarily to fill in when Alice goes away, and the position may turn permanent if Alice gets offered a full time regional manager position, which looks semi-likely. The other position is another Sales assistant(like me) who would ideally replace Tilly, one of the regular girls who just quit. We need the extra hands for Christmas, but I’m hoping that if I do my best and can be considered the best ‘new’ addition to the team (over Katrice, and whoever they hire now), then I might be able to take Tilly’s permanent position instead of whoever they’re going to hire.

All this is important and relevant to me, because as some of you know, after Christmas(meaning Boxing day, Dec 26th), I may be out of a job because that’s when my contract with store 21 is over. Having Tilly quit means there’s possibly a spot for me available to join the team full time, but rumor has it that after Christmas they MAY NOT be keeping on that many people. Chances are if they had to choose one of those positions to keep on after Christmas, it’ll be the manager, and not the Sales assistant. But, all fingers crossed, if they are keeping on a Sales assistant to replace Tilly’s spot full time, then It’s looking like I’m the best candidate so far. Wish me luck....James and I could use the money in the future.

As for everything else that’s going on, life in the flat is pretty good. Our rent just came out the other day and we’re slowly realizing how expensive living is. We’re making due with what we have, but if I don’t get more and more hours towards Christmas(which i’m not too worried about because they said we’d get more hours) or I don’t have a job after Christmas(which IS more likely to happen—me getting let go), then we’re going to suffer. We have loads of money put aside, but that might only carry us on living expenses until February at best. So, I’m REALLY hoping I can find a full time position ANYWHERE!

Oh! The other exciting news is that last Saturday I got a call from James(who was at work) at like 10am, asking me if I’d like to come into the hotel and help the chambermaids. James figures his dad remembered that I offered to help the chambermaids if they needed help/were short handed some days, and thought he’d be nice and ask James if I wanted to come in. Confusing, I know...But anyway, I DID come in and helped Cheryl and Corinne clean the rooms for 4 hours! The hotel was fully booked and the other chamber maid was out or on holiday or day off or something, so they needed an extra hand. They taught me how to do simple stuff at first like short-sheet the beds, empty the trash and clean all the dirty tea mugs/glasses. Then when I finished that in all the rooms they let me watch them do one of the rooms (finish cleaning and refreshing the room) and then let me help clean, fold the towels, make the beds, etc. Just in case they were ever short-handed again and could call on me. I know I’m not going to get a full time gig there being a chambermaid at the Kings Head, but it’s nice to know that I’ve learned something that could make James and I a little dosh(cash) on the side if I’m free and I get the call. Don’t know how much I got paid for my time working there(James clocked me in and out on his time card, so it’ll just go into his wage statement), but I did get paid for my efforts.

Another thing I wanted to talk about was Matilda the Musical. The Original Cast Recording of the musical FINALLY came out a few days ago and I couldn’t wait to get it. It’s so good. Seeing the Musical in Stratford last time I came here was a fluke—we barely got to the SOLD out theatre in time for the show and lucked out on getting tickets because some people hadn’t shown up on time, so we got them! Since I’ve seen that show it has easily become one of my favourite ‘Broadway/West End’ Calibre Shows, right up there with ‘Into the Woods’, and ‘Spring Awakening’. And ever since seeing Matilda I’ve had the songs stuck in my head, whether I knew the lyrics or not. Now that I’ve finally bought the soundtrack I’ve been listening to it and all the feeling that I felt while watching the show came flooding back to me.

The Show is exactly like the movie Matilda, but there are sub-plotlines and themes that weren’t as expressed in the movie. For instance, the tradgic story of Miss Honey(with her parents dying and Ms. Truchbull taking over their house and becoming Jenny Honey’s ‘guardian’ is paralleled in the Musical by Matilda periodically reading a story in one of her books about an Escapologist and an acrobat who have a daughter that, when they tragically and mysteriously die, is given to the acrobat’s sister—a mean and evil wicked person who throws the little girl into a little cottage and locks her away forever.

And there are such great Themes in the Musical about childhood wonder and excitement, embracing being special and unique(Matilda’s abilities), facing adversity(grown ups, being different), and overcoming the odds. It’s honestly an amazing musical. It excites you, makes you want to laugh, makes you cry, makes you want to overcome adversity and prove your worth.....It makes you feel like a kid again. Honestly, if you can, hop on youtube and search it. Go on itunes and listen to the music. It’s SO GOOD. Songs that I really love, and you don’t really need to know the storyline around them(except from watching the movie, and vaguely knowing the movie plot) are: “Naughty”, “When I grow up”, “Quiet”, “My House”, and “Revolting Children”.

Well that’s enough of me rambling about my favourite things. There’s just one more thing I need to talk to you guys about before I go.






IF YOU DON”T READ ANYTHING ELSE IN THIS BLOG, AT LEAST READ THIS NEXT BIT!:

This year I’m taking part in something called NANOWRIMO. It stands for National Novel Writing Month(which is in November). It’s something I found out about online from youtubers, and it’s sort of an online community thing. The goal for the website is to encourage new writers, but also just to keep people reading and using their literary skills as writers. Whether people do this for fun, or to actually publish fictional works in the end, I think It’s a great program.

Basically, anyone can do it. All you do is sign up for free on the NANOWRIMO website. Then from November 1st until Midnight November 30th you write a 50,000 word (something like 175 pages) fictional novel. The website is just to have a support group of people to keep you going, keep you writing, and you upload your ‘counter’ everyday, that shows how many words you have written so far. At the end of NANOWRIMO you upload your novel to the website for ‘submission’. The Forum leaders of NANOWRIMO check your novel to make sure there are 50,000 words without any cheating(repeating the same word 50,000 time, etc) and you get a completion certificate. There’s no other real prize, except for the knowledge that you’ve written a 50,000 word novel, which is an accomplishment, but if you want to upload your work and your progress throughout the month, you can.

The reason I’m telling you this is because NANOWRIMO says that if you tell people that you’re writing a 50,000 word novel you A) have a support group, B) have a group of people ‘counting on you’ so you feel more pressure to write and get it done because ‘all eyes are on you’ to succeed or fail, C)people will be more understanding when you ignore them during November.


So that’s me! I’m doing NANOWRIMO, so this very well may be the last blog you see until
December. Please accept my sincerest apologies, ahead of time. Thank you and goodnight!





EDIT: Oh! One last thing. We’re at Alice’s doing laundry, and I’m uploading this blog, and there’s one little development I wanted to share with you before I disappear forever (for November).
For the past month everyone has been moaning about ‘how are the bunnies going to keep warm in the hutch during winter?’ To better explain, I have to describe how the hutch was: There is a series of 3 open metal cages against the garage. One is used for tilly, the outdoor dog, and 2 of them are used for storage. They have proper wooden dog kennels inside the cages, but have been out of use for a while and sort of disintegrated. When the bunnies and Guinea pig came to the house, they needed a place to store them during the night, so they cleaned out one of the wooden ‘hutches/kennels’ that were used for storage, and put the animals inside. There’s a little ‘doggie door’ in the wooden hutch that was uncovered, and the rabbits could get through so for the time being they just placed a wood board in front of the hole, blocked it with a rock so the bunnies couldn’t get out.

Up until now, the make-shift board holding the bunnies in had been fine, but now that it’s colder and the wind is getting through the make-shift board ‘blocking’ the hole, isn’t really blocking anything, except for the bunnies getting out. So, for the past month I’ve been hearing “We should board up that hole properly”, “We should get something for the bunnies...a new hutch so they’d be warm”, “we should move the bunnies into the garage. They’d be warmer in there.”

And I’ve even chimmed in saying “Look, all you need to do is get a tarp, they’re cheap, and just chuck it over the kennel to keep the rain, wind and snow out”. But so far.....no one has done anything but talk. So, Thursday on my day off, while I was in town, I stopped at a DIY(Do it yourself) Store to ask if they had some tarp. They did, so I bought one. And Tonight, first thing when we came to mums, I took a spare bit of wood(that would cover up the whole in the hutch/kennel COMPLETELY, screwed it into the kennel, made a few friendly winter adjustments inside to make sure nothing could get in or out, and covered the hutch/kennel with the tarp. EASY PEASY! Weeks of talk....and Something finally gets done—and we don’t even live here anymore! Anyway, I just wanted to share that new development, and maybe now, they’ll stop complaining about Winter and the bunnies getting cold.

All's Well with the Vidlers

Just a quick one today, to let you all feed your Jenny addiction. Not major has been going on lately (hence why I haven't blogged), but here are the little updates:

The husband has been working like a MADMAN! In the past 2 weeks he's gotten 1 day off....and on his day off, he still had to come in a do a few odd bits for his father.

My work has been going good. It looks like for now I'm on 8 hours a week (2 shifts per week). This week I worked a 4 hour shift on Wednesday, and another 4 hour shift today. I'm really starting to like it there at Store 21. I'm starting to get along more with my co-workers(although sometimes it does feel like I'm still the outsider 'newby', but I'm getting there). And the work is really easy. I got trained on the Till for the first time on Wednesday, and I've already gotten better at it from so much practice.

Wednesday night after work James and I went into town to get some cooking odds and ends we still wanted/needed from 'The Cookshop': large chopping boards, a biscut tin, and some cookie cutter shapes. I was really excited about my cookie cutters(a bat, a pumpkin, a star and a christmas tree) so I started baking cookies thursday morning on my day off. With a little facebooking with mum, I got the recipe and make the perfect cookies--the first batch I've made on my own in our new home. :)

Last night while James was at work, one of his workmates, Lynsey(whom we've hung out with before outside of work and I get along with) and I went to the Wye Leisure centre. This is where James' father goes to the gym, where he took me to the swimming pool and where I had my massage done last December. It's a very nice complex and it has everything you need for a good workout or relaxation. Lynsey and I went in the swimming pool and hot tub facilities the whole time (while Lynsey's boyfriend, Greg, went to the Gym), and afterwards we went to the Kings head to have a drink and see James.
One interesting thing while we were there was that James' Dad was socializing and drinking in the bar, which he doesn't do that often. And when Lynsey and I came in a sat down he said hi to us and for the first time introduced me to the people around me as 'my new daughter in law'. he's never called me that before, and even though he was drunk it was still really nice to hear. By the way--Drunk father-in-law = hilarious. He kept ragging on James about his gut, and kept talking to me about getting his to the Gym, or even making him do a 20 min daily run around Ross. So funny.

That's all the hilights really. There's been a few trips to mum's house to do laundry(which tonight is one of them). and also tonight Russell is coming up for a few drinks and stopping the night. It's always good to see friends, and we haven't seen him since the last night out just after I got here.

ta ta for now loved ones!
-JV

Another Blog? with Pictures of our new flat?!

Didn’t expect another blog so soon did ya? Well, Things are going well. I had my first day of work, and now James and I are at his mum’s house doing laundry, catching up on TV programs, and hacking the internet.

Work today went well. The Retail store I work for, Store Twenty One, is a nice quiet little clothes etc shop. There was only me, another new girl and the manager, Alice, on today. It’s a Sunday so store hours are less and it’s less busy. Alice showed us around the store and a few procedural things, like signing in and out, and then sent us to do some tasks around the store. Basically I price checked things, and labeled all the new sale items; then for the last hour just straightened up the store, putting things in order, etc. So, pretty easy first day. And I’m working again on Tuesday and Friday. Now All I need to do it sort out a bank account so that they can pay me.

On my break, 20 min break, I even popped in to see my husband since he’s only 3 shops up the high street from me and I had a cream tea—very yummy: a scone with clotted cream and strawberry jam, and tea—on my break.

Now, had a bit of dinner, and chilling out watching the new Doctor Who and Idiot Abroad TV programs. And now the long anticipated pictures of our new flat!:


Here's the outside view of our flat.


This is the view from our front door--a courtyard with astro turf and an archway to more flats.



This is again the courtyard area, but from our 2nd story, livingroom window.

Here's our living room; complete with table, table lamp, couch, coffee table, bookshelf, Tv and TV stand.

This is our kitchen, which is also upstairs and is basically the same room as the living room--the kitchen area is just a seperate little unit. You can see we have our refrigerator, some nice counter space where we have a microwave, kettle and toaster, the sink, a little drying rack by the sink, small stove top and over on the back wall, and we bought a little fruit and veg multi-tiered basket stand thing that we use quite alot.

Here's our wonky staircase.

The bathroom, small, standard. We made it our own by getting a little storage unit, a toilet paper storage stand, and a scale and wall fixed medicine cabinet(which you can't see in this picture).

Our very messy bedroom, still sorting things out. On the left is my new dresser, and on the right is the old dressing table from the Dam Barn.

The cute little laundry bins we got. They're quite handy to take to mum's to do our laundry because it's just fabric bins with medal rads that hook onto the metal stand. Light and easy to carry into the car on the way to mum's.

Here's Jame's Side of the room: The Bed, The bedside table we got at a carity shop for 25 pounds, and the cute lamp we got at, my now current place of business (we bought this lamp, then as we were leaving James saw the 'applicants wanted' sign in the window).

And that's it really. Not too much left to finish our place for now. We still have to get a hold of Rob, the guy who helped us move most of our furniture into the flat, and see when he can help us move our Dining table and James' wardrobe into our flat.

So there ya go. Pictures galore. Any other requests and I'll take pictures of that, but that's the overview for now.