While I was living in London, I wrote that one way to tell the class of a neighborhood was to count the children playing outside. Well, it seems you can also count the birds. A recent study found that the population of birds in urban areas of Britain is directly related to the wealth [...]
Shutdown Day
What are you doing on Shutdown day?
24 March 2007 is going to be “one of the biggest global experiments ever to take place on the internet. The idea behind the experiment is to find out how many people can go without a computer for one whole day, and what will happen if we all participate!”
The [...]
Winter Finally Arrives
After wondering for most of January if perhaps there was not going to be any winter in Europe this year, we are pleased to report that Mother Nature has finally relented and sent a bit of the white stuff for us to enjoy.
Having moved here from Myrtle Beach, where snow is something you read about, [...]
2006 In Review
There are no two ways about it, 2006 was an eventful year for me. There is not really any part of my life that didn’t see change during the year, and most of them underwent pretty radical reshaping. From the very beginning, 2006 was a pretty monumental year for Jenn and I.
January
I began the year [...]
Pissed as Newts
The Pissed as Newts London Pub Crawl
Blow, blow, thou winter wind…
Now that the clocks have been set back, darkness falls in London around 5:00pm. When we first arrived in the middle of August the sun didn’t set until after 9:00pm, so the change has been somewhat abrupt.
I do believe that I now understand the English mania for tea, however. Looking forward into six months of [...]
Autumn Comes To London
The temperatures are dropping, the rain is picking up, and the air has that unmistakable crispness to it (when it’s not raining, that is) that signals the arrival of Autumn and threatens the winter that comes after.
It was a couple of days ago that I first noticed the crispness, the snap to the air, and [...]
Settling In?
It has been six weeks since we first landed in London, and most of that time has been spent in a mad rush to get one thing or another accomplished: basic furniture, telephone, internet access, transportation, electrical appliances, banking, finding our way around, etc.
This past weekend saw us get the remainder of our furniture delivered [...]
Welcome To The Third World
It is now twelve days since my broadband was supposed to be switched on, and still nothing but the run-around from the bastards at BT. Even though I wasn’t daft enough to use their shitey DSL service, it is their business to handle any problems with the physical line, and there seems to be one.
I [...]
Slowly But Surely
Things are beginning to settle down now. We finally have a phone at the house, so if you had our US phone number, email me to get our shiny new UK one. ADSL will be active on Friday of this week, so I can finally stop squatting at the library…
Jen has started her new teaching [...]
Uhhh….come again?
My life in England so far:
Me: “I’d like to open a bank account please.”
They: “Do you have some money?”
Me: “Yes.”
They: “Excellent, here you go.”
Me: “I’d like to rent a flat”
They: Do you have any money?”
Me: “Of course.”
They: “Brilliant! Here’s your keys”
Me: “I’d like to make a phone call from my house please.”
They: “Maybe later.”
Me: “Well, [...]
Setting Up House
Today we get furniture! Since we arrived on Wednesday, we have been sleeping on the floor, but today our Ikea furniture arrives. Hopefully we will have it all assembled by tonight. Man, has this move been expensive…
Missing In Action
…I know I have been MIA recently, but I think I have a reasonable excuse…
As of 9:40pm EST tomorrow I will no longer be in the United States. Since my last entry I have:
Sold our house and 90% of its contents
Arranged shipping for the remainder of our belongings
Sold our Car and motorcycle
Found homes for our [...]
Under Offer
Holy Lockbox Batman, that was fast! It seems that our realtor has some sort of magical powers. Less than 72 hours after our house first listed, we have accepted an offer, contingent on financing, of course.
On Monday we had visions of our house sitting for months and months while we continued to make the mortgage [...]
London Calling
…and suddenly, everything changes.
Posts have been light around here recently because I have been preoccupied with trying to arrange, on very short notice, our impending move to London. Regular readers will be aware that we have been actively searching for somewhere to move. Well, the search is over. Due to a strange chain of events, [...]
These are the ramblings of 