The Answerphone

They call answering machines, "answer phones" here. Strictly speaking, we're all voicemail here. The Brits call it voicemail, I call it voicemail. Whatever it is called, the voicemail at Oxford Brookes is ridiculous. I know, you're wondering what my blogging obsession with phones is. Let's just say that the telecommunications industry keeps providing the fuel for this fire.

As part of your new staff welcome, they give you an 'induction pack' that includes everything you need to know to work here. It's a useful piece of kit. It is particularly useful when one goes to use their voicemail. I found it slightly odd that I had to dial the somewhat random number "3000" to get my voicemail. Then you have to enter your 4-digit pin. You then get a long welcome which you can't skip. You then get some choices. Press 1 to listen to your messages is entirely normal. After you have listened to your message (this is where I get the feeling that the system hasn't been updated since some telephone engineeer-type put it together in 1992) you have the option to "listen to your next message, press 3. Or, for more options, press star". Press 3? What happened to 1 and 2? Star for more options? Hmmm, that sounds intriguing. Since I'd now either like to save the message or delete the message, I'll go down mystery star selection...

So, what do you think happens next having pressed "*"? Well, you get the full slate of 9 choices. Forward, save and remove all fall under the same option: pressing "0". Okay, I'll press "0". Again, 6 options including forwarding the message, saving the message and returning to the previous menu. Thankfully, removing the message is also under this list. You press the very intuitive "hash" (#) key. Yes, every time you want to delete a message, you have to press three different keys. If you do it too quickly (becuase you've learnt the sequence) it will spit you right back to the begining: "to listen to you messages, press 1". It's a little thing, but it drives me nuts.

Then, to compound the problem, you have to listen to a message in its entirety. You can't select to delete or skip half way through a message. You're committed to the message. When you have someone rambling on the voicemail you can't skip. You know who it is, what they want and their phone number but there will be no skipping or premature deleting of the message. No, no. With this voicemail, you will sit and listen. All the time with your finger poised to go through the secret sequence of keys that will delete the message once it is finished (but not too quickly!).

This listen to the whole message system was a feature of a past voicemail system I encountered. I think Jason Hildebrand and I may have contributed to a revision and overhaul of the Industry Canada's (Federal Government) voicemail in the mid 1990s. Jason and I lived with Lisa Brake. She wasn't Lisa Brake at that time, but a young and impressionable Lisa Reifenstein. Somehow, Jason and I had ended up with a phone number for a Federal Government program to discourage smoking amongst youth. They appealed to the public to phone in catchy marketing slogans to a voicemail. Fools. Being a free call and the fact that Jason and I had just gotten back from a coffee that had somehow taken a wrong turn at the local bar, we started phoning this number and leaving ridiculous messages. The idea was not vulgarity or offense: merely to make whoever checked the messages laugh. For the better part of an hour we phoned this number with every ridiculous accent we could dream up. After about an hour, we started to bore and decided to phone Lisa's work phone number and leave the messages for her instead. This was much funnier for us. We could hardly dial the number, we were laughing so hard at ourselves. [The photo is of us flatmates: Lisa, me, Anu and Jason at one of the ridiculous parties we had... and standing in front the recently tinfoiled walls because it had better reflective qualities for the discoball.]

It eventually became so raucous that Lisa wandered into the room to see what we were up to. She must have suspected we were somehow doing damage to something. We explained that we were phoning the Govenment anti-smoking campaign number (but, of course, we had already switched to phoning her work number). She quickly saw the humour of leaving messages for some stranger to have to wade through. Fifteen minutes later, Lisa was in on the action. Leaving absurd messages is painful accents. The revelry continued for ages. Being a work day, however, we did evenutally go to bed.

The next day, I got the funniest email from Lisa. It amounted to, "you guys suck." Unable to skip through the messages, she was forced to listen to the whole evening before again--while at work, and including her own abuse of the messaging service. At lunch, poor Lisa had a sore neck from holding the phone to her ear while trying to work as hours of cackling messages crawled by, just waiting for each to finish so she could delete them.

Of course, I am not advocating such behaviour be applied to my work phone. And, just in case, I won't be giving out my work number to anyone who might read this! I merely want to point out that a decade on and Brookes is still using a similar voicemail.

Lisa Q Rocks

Today is a work from home day. I kind of love them, kind of hate them. The problem with them is that once I get going, the world around me ceases to exist. I actually find it very easy to focus and suddenly 3 hours of passed: I'm hungry, I need the loo, the teabag has been in the cup for hours and the milk is going sour on the counter.

Today, however, has been balanced. Spring is suddenly in full swing. The trees are flowering, the dafs are everywhere and the sun is shining. Just stepping out your door is a new lease on life. Everyone is now selling dafodils, which I don't entirely understand. They're as pervasive as dandilions in Calgary in mid July. They're quite literally drowing up in the gaps between paving stones in every garden. Well manicured lawns are awash with dafs, or the stubs of dafs that have been mowed. Why, then, would someone pay a quid for a bunch of them at the store? I guess because they're pretty. And yellow. If you particularly like yellow.

Also, today, Ange and I received our first care package from Canada. The postman knocked at the door, giving me a start and pulling me from my concentration. He handed me a shoe-box sized package in brown paper. Realising it was from Canada, I made a point of flipping it so I couldn't see the customs declaration. Lisa Q had sent us an entire box of homemade cookies. Oh my goodness. Lisa's cookies are like cocaine and I had about 3 dozen of them in my hands. Ange doesn't even know they've arrived. A deep breath. I'll only have 2. Five minutes later, I am savouring my third. Okay, new limit: four. That gives me one more. I gobble it down, hardly giving my mouth the opportunity to taste it. The box taunts me. It needs to be moved. I am so weak and the cookies are so good. The removal-from-sight process costs me another cookie. Five. And it is only 1:30pm. Thank you Lisa. You have made my day, possibly my week.

This weekend (on Sunday) we'll head to London to pick up Oma (my mum) from Emily's flat. Anna will get two days with Oma. I'm excited for both of them. Anna has changed so much since Oma saw her at Christmas. She knows a new animal sound. An owl says, "hoo hoo." It's a quiet, high pitched sound from the back of the throat and it is so cute.

Roomy

Our good friend Erin is renting our house back home. The roommate who signed on with her is moving out and Erin is looking for someone nice to move in and share the costs. Ideally female, clean and quiet-ish. Garrison Woods is obviously a really nice area and very central to Calgary: do you know anyone? If you do, please email me and I will put you in touch with Erin (if, in fact, you don't know her already!)...

And us? We've had a peek at what would be involved in buying a house here. You see, buying is really expensive here, but so too is renting. In fact, one might argue that renting is ridiculously expensive (rather than just really expensive) because you'll never see any of the money again. Oh, it gives me a headache. So, too, does the International Tax Office of the CRA. We're still waiting on a response to questions we asked them in a letter from October last year... We've followed up with 4 more letters but have heard nothing from them. Very frustrating. More of the finer points of moving country for you? Getting a British driver's license is not straight-forward. It seems they'll only exchange a Canadian license for a British one with a limitation of automatic transmission vehicles. We'll probably need to re-test (cripes, that sounds fun after 15 years of driving) to get permission to drive standard transmission vehicles. We're going to appeal. There's some pretty strong logic on our side but I fear bureaucracy will prevail and I will be doddling around Reading with a Driving Instructor, brushing up for a test to drive a vehicle that we have been driving safely for 7 months already.

The nitty-gritty, lingering issues of international relocation can sometimes get you down. But then we're going to London on Sunday to see Stella, Em, Armando and Oma. We'll go for a walk around Tower Bridge and it will all seem pretty damn cool...

TomTom and Lady Hambleden

Ange, Anna and I have moved from a stumbling pace to a full run into the 21st century. It all started with my swish Sony Ericsson W810i mobile phone. As discussed below, it does more than any phone ever should. Ange is fully equiped with a mobile as well. Anna has a toy phone that sings songs. We have digital TV and broadband internet. The car tells us the temperature outside. Ange and I have set up Facebook accounts (we could both use 'friends'!), though still discuss why exactly we do. Social networking site are all the rage, so we're hip.

However, we took the quantum step on the weekend when we purchased 'sat nav' for the car. Apparently the TomTom software is the cat's ass of sat nav equipment. It's intuitive, it's relatively inexpensive, it's like my phone: pervasive amongst those that care. We set it up tonight. It was very exciting: the machine talks to you, warning you of upcoming directions. It is a serious improvement over Angela with a map. We had to choose the voice we wanted. We had a choice between 3 female and 1 male American voices, 1 male Australian voice, and 1 male and 1 female British voices. The Aussie male reminded me too much of the beep test and after years of misdirection from Ange, I'm not sure I trust female north American. Ange vetoed the north American male voice because she associates directions from that accent with driving control freaks (i.e., me). We went for "Mary": the British female. After all, we live here so we might as well have the right accent and it really won out by elimination anyway.

Speaking of British-ness, Ange had the most ridiculously British day at work on Wednesday last week. She left her office at the all-girl boarding and day school she works at. She walked across the courtyard to the car and drove east through Henley-on-Thames to Marlow, where she went north down a narrow, single lane country road that runs into the heart of the Chilterns. She was going to the Manor house in Hambledon (yes, discussed previously with photos). She had been invited by Lady Hambleden (yes, I'm serious) for lunch after the school had donated funds towards a charitable cause sponsored by Lady Hambleden. The ate their three course lunch which included apple crumble for pudding. Ange sat slightly perplexed with the cutlery at her disposal and quietly waited for the ladies around her to start. Turns out the spoon goes in the right hand and the desert fork is used to break and move the crumble to the spoon. After pudding, they retired to the drawing room for tea. Manor houses in the countryside, aristocracy, tea in the drawing room. It seems an unlikely work experience in Calgary. Chalk it up.

This is doing the rounds on email right now, but it makes me laugh, so I share it:

Miscommunicate

It has come to my attention that I may have appeared a bit put off by all the visitors coming to stay with us. No, no, no!!! Definitely, it is quite the opposite: we're absolutely excited to have everyone and will happily and excitedly take more people who make the trip! Don't, for a moment, second guess our sincere desire to have you stay with us! We did, after all, set a 4553 record of 14 consecutive weeks with guests in the summer of 2005!

I do think that this spring may be getting into the realm of double-booked. But the only consquence of that is possibly some couch time or an inflatable matress in Anna's room for a night or two (we can pull Anna's cot into our bedroom)!

So, let's get that guest house full for the whole summer: come on 15 consecutive weeks!

Rockets

Have you ever eaten so many packets of Rockets that your toungue hurts? I have. Tonight, in fact.

Thank you United Way friends for sending them!

Taking Bookings

Our friend Rachel has been a star over the years. When I first came to Britain in 1999, I arrived in Southampton on a beat-up old motorcycle packed heavily (and, arguably, dangerously) with my bag and camping kit. I stayed with Karen, Catherine and Victoria. They generously put me up for absolutely ages. I probably wore out my welcome 3 times over, but they were too kind to ask me to leave. Amongst the friends I made during that time was Rachel. She's Welsh. Not having ever gone to Wales, she recommended it. In fact, she went a step further and suggested I stay with her parents in Wales. It turns out, her parents' kindness and willingness to take in strangers was akin to Rach, Karen, Catherine and Victoria...

I headed up to Wales, stopping briefly in Bath on the way to see what all the fuss was about. £10 entry to the baths at Bath meant I am still left wondering what all the fuss is about. I must correct that this time around.

Anyway, I showed up in the village of Ebbw Vale. You can't believe how kind Gareth and Sue were to me. Imagine if some 24-year-old guy rolled up on an old motorcycle, covered in oil and soaking wet to your parents' doorstep. They didn't know me. Heck, Rachel hardly knew me. I think back and it strikes me as incredible they had me in. Gareth helped me set various day itineraries around their region of Wales each night and Sue prepared me a pack lunch to take with me each day. It was unreal. Ange and I visited Gareth and Sue later when we were through Wales again. We still exchange post cards.

The point of my digression? Ange and I were quite excited about a planned trip to Wales this coming weekend. Sadly, Rachel has to move house in Southampton and can't get away. We quickly looked at re-booking our trip and I came to the sudden and somewhat distressing realisation: our next free weekend is in May. And we only have two free weekends in May. I need an online event registration system to manage our personal calendar (did anyone at Cambrian House read that?)!

I can't entirely figure out how we have managed to get ourselves so booked. Oma is coming. Grandma and Dziadek are coming. Erika is coming. My cousin Claire and Aunt Lynn are coming. Aunt Val and Uncle George will be here. We have two weddings. I have a stag weekend. We're going to Southampton, Mundesley, Dorset (twice) and Portugal. Ange is going to Exeter for work. I am going to Durham for work. I think we might need a holiday to relax from it all!

Today the sun is out and pouring into our front room. I'm working from home. I think Anna and I might feed the ducks at the river after nursery.

A couple of photos (just in case you're not actually reading and just want the photographic update)... Anna and Carys enjoy a lively game of pass-the-present, which was more like adventures-with-wrapping-paper:


Warren and Carla Rae stopped by on their way back from India. Anna likes Carla Rae (and Warren too!):

Facebook update? I have 15 friends: 11 non-family!

Facebook

Three days ago I had never heard of 'Facebook.' Of course, one hears about these sort of social networking websites in the news and such. I'd heard of Bebo and MySpace, but never this Facebook thing.

I flicked on the computer and an email came through from my cousin Claire. Claire is cool. I am not. Claire has "invited me to be her friend." Who am I to refuse? So, I diligently clicked on the link in the email. It was all a bit confusing, but I remained committed and eventually filled out my name, where I lived, my relationship status (clearly I'm not the target audience) and I even uploaded a photo (which, of course, included Anna). And then it was over. Claire was my friend. I was Claire's friend. I thought something might happen, but it didn't. Somehow, I just had another little profile up on the world wide web. World wide.

To my genuine surprise, I received another email the next day from a good friend who I haven't spoken with in ages. It really couldn't have been more random for me. She, too, had invited me to be her friend. Suddenly I have two friends! Motivated by the landslide of random affection coming my way, I put in some more information on myself (cue marketing people salivating at my predictable behaviour). Again, having done that, I was struck by the void it left. I went back once or twice to confirm that everything I had put in was, in fact, still as I had left it. It was.

Only hours later, my younger brother Thomas has emailed inviting me to "be his friend." Of course, this offer was too much to turn down... only somehow I managed to mess it up and I couldn't accept his kind offer of e-friendship. So, I clumsily found my way around the site a bit more and clicked on some link that asked Thomas to be my friend. Fingers crossed!

I'm now both suspicious and deeply intrigued. One, what kind of online viral thing is this that I can be asked 3 times in two days to be peoples' friends? And, from such a random assortment of people I know: it was time to do some serious research on what kind of website I was dealing with.

With both Claire and Thomas in the mix, I was suspicious that Facebook was cool (Jen is cool too, but she is more my age!). I needed a group of people who knew cool to see if they were involved. Field Hockey. A quick search revealed that Jenny, Jenn, Jube, Hilary, and Kaitlin (and surely loads more) were all on this Facebook thing. My gut reaction was "Oh God, get off. You don't belong." And I probably should heed this feeling... but I'm now so intrigued by it. Not only that, I only have two friends! Jenny has 136 friends. I surely have 10! As soon as Tom accepts me as his friend, I'm up to 3. But really, Claire and Tom are family, so I am not sure they count. So, let the campaign begin to get Ben 10 non-family friends on Facebook!

Laying Low

A weekend of nothing just happened. Cripes. It started off on Friday when Anna was turned away from daycare. 14 months old and she's suspended from nursery! In fairness, the nursery has a "48-hour" policy when children can return from a bug and she was nowhere near that threshold...

Anna had been sick on Thursday morning (snow day), so I picked her up and brought her home. We had just got in the front door when I lifted Anna from her buggy. She looked at me in the eye, swallowed once and puked all down the front of me and her. I'm not particularly on squirmish, but the sheer volume of vomit tested my resolve. I smiled weakly at her and pulled her tight. She was clearly distressed and I wanted to minimize the puke hitting the floor. As we bounded up the stairs to the bath, poor Anna nearly squirted out of my arms we were so slimed.

A short bath and a change of clothes and Anna was suddenly herself again. There were no more accidents though the naps were longer than normal, which was good because I was able to get some work done. Being that she was so well, Ange tried to take her into nursery on Friday. They were having none of it and Ange phoned me to give me the update when she returned home. I jumped back in the car and did the return trip to Reading in rush-hour, having successfully avoided rush-hour on the trip in (I leave pretty early). Anna was lovely all day and she started to building on her first steps... almost a walk! It was very, very exciting and there was a lot of cheering. One of those gold medal (or silver medal, eh Alberta--that was just as sweet!) moments. Rightfully, Anna was very proud of herself.

Friday night was quiet. A movie, a nice dinner and some pleasant French wine.

Sadly, the weekend took a turn Saturday morning at about 2:30am. I woke up with a start. "I feel ill," I thought to myself. "How much wine did I drink?" was the immediate second thought. "Not nearly enough to feel this bad." So, it started. The most brutal 20-odd hours of flu that I've endured in a very long time. Field hockey was thankfully cancelled due to snow on the pitch, which was good for me because I wouldn't have been there.

Ange and Anna escaped the house while I lay on the couch. I was very sad that I missed Anna's first haircut, which was on the to-do list for Ange and Anna. Apparently, the novelty of the event was enough to keep Anna seated though she was somewhat perplexed that the cookie she knew to be in her hand couldn't get to her mouth. When, with the help of mum, she was able to work out how to get her hand from under the cape, the cookie was slowly consumed with a healthy dose of hair as well. Hopefully this little trim will help the hair grow in thicker. That is Ange's thought on this matter, though I remain skeptical. Cutting my hair hasn't exactly helped it grow in thicker...
As I started to turn the corner on the bug, it became clear that Ange was not going to escape it either. She took over the position on the couch only hours after I had been able to get off it. We were unable to go to Dorset to visit "Aunt" Dorothy as had been the plan. It was a shame, but this was a nasty little bug. Aunt Dorothy, at 96, certainly didn't need to catch it and I'm certain the drive down would have been truly unpleasant for Ange had she been able to get out of bed... We'll re-group and look forward to next weekend! It is one of the last we have 'free' until sometime in June. Fast times ahead!

We'll leave you with a photo of Em and Stella. Not surprisingly, Armando is a photographer. So this photo is probably copyrighted or something. Though I have used it without permission, I implore you not to do the same!

Giant Day

February 8, 2007. It was a big day. Emily and Armando had their baby, Stella, this morning. Anna took her first steps. And Britain was blanketed with snow.

Anna took her first couple of steps today. We had just finished a successful potty visit and had put her "Baby" down. Her baby is a large stuffed monkey who is soft though slightly odd looking. "Baby," is one of her few words and monkey is very clearly called "Baby." She loves Baby. I placed her on her feet about half a meter away from Baby and instead of flopping and crawling, she took a step. At that point, momentum was on her side and two more steps followed. There was a lot of cheering from dad.

I worked from home today. I had been warned that snow and British roads is a recipe for spending a long time in the car. I stopped by Ange's school to take a couple of photos of the campus in the snow. It was really very pretty, as you can see:

Stella

Stella Beatriz Ribeiro was born this morning at 1:45am. According to a text from Emily she was born 6 lbs, healthy and very beautiful.

There was a bit of a text frenzy last night. Amrando, Emily, Oma, myself (and who knows whoelse?)... It is pretty neat to get the latest in a few words over your phone! I can't believe they could be bothered, but I am grateful they were...

Photos to follow.

Baby Night In Britain

So exciting!!! Emily has gone into labour! Well, 'labour' itself might not be so exciting, but the net result is very exciting indeed. Here's today's progression:

2:12: Emily had her inducing drugs at the Royal London Hospital. (Note: 'Royal' in East London might lack the some of the luxury normally associated with the word)

5:30: Light contractions have begun.

6:48: Strong but 'low' contractions. She's on her way!

To make it real for those of you haven't seen my sister since she was in grade 8, a photo of her from her visit two weekends ago.

The Wrong Impression

Don't worry, there is little chance of this blog becoming a social commentary. There are far too many amusing and ridiculous things that happen to the three of us for that to ever happen. However, I was just on my yahoo email and was surprised to see that London was jittery and in a state of high security alert. The story (ca.news.yahoo.com/s/afp/britain_attacks_blast) leads one to believe that England or, at least, London has security patrols and police running amuck looking for would-be terrorists and this latest blast has tensions high and people in shock.

I was startled because I hadn't heard about it all day, despite listening to the BBC (albeit Radio 1) on the way into, and the way home, from work. I quickly pulled up the BBC website to read more on the chaos that surrounds me. The incident didn't make any of the lead 10 stories, leaving me to wonder about this chaos that is reported to North America. It's all about Bird Flu today. And the consequence is that 154,000 turkeys have bigger worries than terrorism. The Beatles and Apple have settled their differences over the word "apple." Italian football is in crisis after a policeman was killed in football riots. There will be no more Mars bar ads directed at children (Jamie Oliver can take a bow, in part). And a lady who killed her boyfriend's cat got a suspended sentence. Oh the turmoil.

Weekend in Caversham (on Thames)

Back when I was not working... and roaming the coffee shops of Caversham (you may recall from earlier posts this was as much for escaping the cold of our initial flat as to explore the town), Anna and I met Joyti and her daughter Calis (who is about 6 weeks younger than Anna; her name is Welsh and I'm certainly spelling it wrong...). With work and travel, we hadn't been in touch in some time. On Wednesday, I was home by 4:30 with Anna when Joyti spotted me letting us into our house as she packed up from a visit to the Waitrose. She came over and we had a good, albeit brief chat. It was really nice to run into friends just being on your street. It was all very Sesame Street.

Not wanting to put off getting together, we decided to meet on Friday at the Griffon Pub. Taking 12-month-olds to the pub is less Sesame Street, but very Caversham. I think I have gone on about this pub before, so I won't bother with the whole schpiel. But, Ange, Anna and I arrived to meet Joyti, her husband Allain, her husband's son (from before) Michael and, of course, Calis. They had managed to get the large table in front of the wood-burning fire. The atmosphere was great. We had a really nice evening. Allain is from the Caversham area and knew of loads of great walks and historical 'oddities' and points of interest. Indeed, had we been more flexible, we would have gone out walking with them on Sunday too! In the end, it was a good pub dinner, a nice pint and good conversation about all sorts of things. Anna like Calis' books most. Second was either Calis herself or the mashed potatoes.

Satuday was hockey day for Ben. The team I coach put in a solid effort but they continue to make too many simple mistakes. Despite being deadlocked 2-2 at half time and well into the second half, a series of simple, simple errors led to three counter-attack goals and a 5-2 loss. The score-line was not reflective of the play, but we would have done well to get points against a top team in our league. I played half a game with the 3s afterwards. They let me flick on short-corners. I really need to practice. I managed a goal, but mainly I was hitting the runner out. I felt kind of badly for him. In addition to running out about 10 times, he got hit in the feet or shins about 7 times. The 1s rebounded on Sunday in a Cup game where the team played through some shocking umpiring (which hurt both teams at different times: i.e., it wasn't biased, just really poor) and displayed some lovely finish. The final was a convincing 4-2 win and we move onto the next (5th) round. It was fun to get into the game myself at our club's top level. The taste for playing at a good level gets in your mouth and you want to really get into it again... but it is simply too much time from Ange and Anna. Next year some tough decisions need to be made about hockey commitments.

Pete Charles Turner and his lovely girlfriend, Lottie, came to the game. It was good to have PCT watch as he is playing in the league above us and they're looking at promotion in the National League. His perspective was excellent. It was also just good to seem him and Lottie. They came back 'round ours and we had tea and ate a whole package of chocolate rich tea biscuits. Is there a better way to end a weekend than cleaning off 40 chocolate rich tea biscuits between 4 people?

The New Office

There has been a office shuffle at my office. A group has moved into another building as one department expands and takes on more offices in our building. As part of the move, our little department has shuffled some people about. The net result for me is a new office. Like the last one, it was probably--at one time--a bedroom in the old mansion where we work. In this instance, however, I don't have a fireplace. It is strange how I am vaguely disappointed by that. It isn't like the last one worked. In fact, the other office was probably colder, so a non-working fireplace was more of an irony than anything. Nevertheless, it is just kind of cool to have a fireplace in one's office. Especially for a colonist back in the old country.

The new office appears to have been a dumping ground for past publications, merchandise and office 'stuff.' I have a box of black bookmarks made from recycled tires with brightly coloured writing all over them. There are 4 computer keyboards in here--all slightly grimey. There's a safe that no one seems to know how to open. There is an ancient laptop computer that is locked to the desk with no key to unlock it (at least, I haven't found it yet). There are publications ranging from 2000 to last year, though the bulk of them appear to be a Spring 2003 newsletter to parents and families of students. Random.

Still, there is a very large desk and nice window that allows light to pour into the room. The window itself is a bit odd by Canadian standards. It has an after-market double glazing. To explain: there is the old loosely-fitted single pane window made up of two sections of six little panels. It sits as it has for probably the last 100 years. You can see that the frame has been painted dozens of times. The rope that works the mechanism for opening and closing the window appears worn and is caked in layers of old paint. Then, affixed to the inside of the window frame is... another window. It's kind of modern and of no particular quality. You might see one like it on an ATCO trailer or at your summer-only, 1970s-built cabin in Invemere. It is just two sheets of glass that can slide up and down in its little metal frame, which is mounted on the old wooden one. It is just odd. Mind you, it is perhaps no more odd than the fact that I just spent a paragraph describing it.

The view is largely of the car park, though if I stand right up against the window and crane my neck a little, I can see many of the spires of the Oxford churches. When the trees fill in, I will lose that view, but it will be very lush and green. It is all very pleasant. And quiet. In fact, I declare it a good place to work. And, should anyone want to know what was new in the spring of 2003 at Brookes, I have that knowledge at my fingertips.

Poorly

It seems most of the UK has a bug these days. It has even affected BBC's Radio 1 as a range of different DJs have hosted shows to cover for regulars off sick. Our office has been no exception and I was forced to take a day off on Wednesday. I slept most of the day and then went to get Anna out of the daycare early. It was an amazing day. Warm, bright, sunny. The flowers are starting to come out, the trees are budding and the birds seemed to be everywhere. Anna and I went for a little walk through the park and then down a road of old Victorian mansions (which are now mostly renovated and split into duplexes or flats) on the way home and it really felt like spring. Had it not been for the headache and sore throat, I reckon it had the potential to be the perfect spring day... in January.

Ange, who has taken about 3 sick days in her life and didn't miss one when she was pregnant left early twice this week to go to sleep and try and fight off the bug. Our North American immunity just isn't up to the task. Little Anna has been fighting off the same bug (I think) for a few days now but remains in good spirits 99% of the time regardless. She clearly as her mum's genes on that one, as I am miserable to be around when I'm sick.

Friends & Family

It was a big weekend for the Fitch-Dudeks. On Saturday, Emily and Armando came out to the 'country' from London. They arrived in the afternoon. Ange and Anna met them in town and walked back across the Thames to Caversham. When I arrived back from field hockey, the tea was on, the biscuits were out and everyone was in good spirits. Anna darted around the room, playing with anything that she ought not to play with.

We're at a point in time where everything should go in a cup. So, one has to be careful where one leaves their mostly-finished tea cup. Keys go into the tea cup, keys come out. Mobile phone goes into the tea cup, mobile phone comes out. Camera doesn't quite fit in the tea cup at this angle, camera doesn't quite fit into the tea cup at that angle. Camera is disgarded.

We watched An Inconvenient Truth which was both facinating and spurred some great conversation. Whilst it was largely 'preaching to the choir,' it was still somehow comforting to see that a film about the perils of our wastefulness get the level of exposure the film has generated. One hopes that the message isn't dismissed out of hand through a sense partisan bias by those in the States who see themselves as Republican.

With Em and Armando staying over and Anna now into her room, Ange and I took the opportunity to test out the guest house. The "guest house," you ask? We live in a two bedroom terraced house, meaning that space is at a premium. At the bottom of our garden sits a shed. Of course, 'shed' or 'guest house' is a matter of perspective. If you're about to visit us, it is definitely a guest house. If you've just visited, it might be funny to tell people that we put you in the garden shed. But really, it is more guest-house-like than shed-like. Our garden is entirely decking, so you walk outside from the kitchen to the small wooden structure at the end of the garden, or about 15 feet. The previous owner had made it into his working office, so it is quality. The guest house is fully insulated and has double glazed windows. It has a de-humidifier and a heater. We have an extra heater there too. There's a full king sized (British king sized) bed. And, I can now say with authority that it is entirely warm, dry and comfortable and very private. Certainly, I would rank it as far superior to our original flat that we moved into.

On Sunday, we ventured into London for Emily and Armando's baby shower put on by their friends Dave and Dan. We drove in, which was a minor accomplishment for me as it took us right through the centre of London and I didn't get horrifically lost. Picadilly Circus is appropriately named. Dave and Dan have rented a fantastic flat in an old converted match factory. Very cool setting and a super party. The spread of food and games was second to none. Em has some top quality friends. Both Dave and Dan who through the party and the many, many people who came to celebrate with her despite the fact that noone here really knows what a "baby shower" is.

Ange, Anna and I charged back to 'Caversham-on-Thames' after the shower. Only one wrong turn without navigator Armando. It put us 20 minutes wrong but did take us over Tower Bridge. Twice. It is a very nice bridge.

Then, as if the weekend wasn't a resounding success, my old workmate Jasmine and a colleague of hers, MJ, made the trip out from London to ours for the evening. They're only in town for a couple of days from Calgary and their willingness to take the trip on a Sunday night is a testament to them. People-people rock. We chatted 'til late about all sorts and they're both the sort of people who get you excited about everything life has to offer! It was so good to see them. Fantastic.

Ripe For Abuse

There has clearly been a long history of bureaucrats with very little foresight (see previous post on the placement of a nuclear power station). Reading's oldest church (dating from 979) stands only meters from the road sign. Surely current bureaucrats don't wonder why this sign suffers from (surely constant) vandalism.

Water is for Drinking

Anna sat in the bath last night playing with her Playmobile boat and its little sailor. Man goes into the boat. Man comes out of the boat. Man goes into the boat. Boat sinks.

At one point, the focus switched to a little red lobster who has a wind-up tail at the far end of the tub. She started to crawl but slipped. Both Ange and I moved forward to rescue, but she was back up having only had her mouth go under water. She swallowed the mouthfull of bathwater. She looked up at us as she smiled. And then the look. It seemed to say, "hold on a minute..." And we watched with amusment as a relationship was firmly established in her brain. She had realised that the stuff in the bath was the same stuff in her cup (just, maybe, a little soapy... hopefully only soap...). She laughed and ducked her head down for another swig. She looked around, crawled two paces and look another swig. For the remaining minutes of her bath, not more than a few moments went by before she excitedly slurped up more water. We both had a laugh as she enjoyed the rest of her bath in the largest sippy cup she'd ever seen.

Huffed and Puffed

It has been windy the past couple of days. Vancouver style. Ange's school now has an outdoor swimming pool after the roof blew off. I missed it on Friday as I leave in the dark, but our garden wall blew over too! What is extraordinary to me is that it is a brick wall.

After years of hearing about the Big Bad Wolf, I had more faith in brick. Who is going to break the news to the pigs that they need new building materials?

So Many Telephones

When we decided to move to the UK, I announced to Ange that we were only going to have one phone. We would only need the mobile phone. With that, all needs would be met. Sadly, the telecommunications companies of Britain have conspired against me.

We bought our mobile phone from Orange. A hip little number. One that all the kids have. A Sony Ericsson w810i. In addition to being a phone it is a mp3 player, a camera, a video camera, a flashlight, an alarm clock and a games machine. I suspect it does many more things, but I can't be asked to work them out.

Life with the Orange phone lasted about 2 weeks when we realised that they didn't have a decent international plan. I looked into many options, buying a calling card from the Post Office at one point. What seemed to make sense was to buy a pay-as-you-go long distance SIM card (they're cheap: £10 was all we had to fork out) and fire it into an old mobile (which we had from my brother Sam). This would have the dual benefit of giving us a phone with cheap long distance (5p a minute to Canada) and allow Ange a mobile for emergencies. Suddenly we had two mobile phones.

As we moved into our house, my focus was entirely on broadband internet. There were lots of options (discussed below in another entry) but going with Orange made the most sense, cost-wise. The hiccup? We needed a BT (British Telecom) phone line. So we got a BT phone line. The house came with a phone, so one might as well plug it in. Bob's your uncle, we have two mobiles and a landline. For an extra £1/month, we got cheap calls to North America (4p per minute). How could I resist: Ange's mobile is almost certain to give you a brain tumor with extended use and it is a pain to top-up, so I signed us up to BT's international plan.

Last night I get a call from Orange. With our 'Livebox' (read: internet modem thingy), we get free calls to over 100 countries around the world. Cripes. All we have to do is plug a phone into this Livebox thing. You know I won't be able to resist. Free calls? Time difference being the only obstacle to phoning friends and family? By Sunday, we will probably be the not-so-proud owners of two mobile phones and two landlines. Four numbers, not including work numbers. If you include plastic phones that light up and play songs when you hit the numbers, we will have six phones in the house. I fear we have become slaves to the age of easy-peasy digital communciations.

Balance

Anna plays a game with Ange and I. It involves walking around the house with her little hands clasped around our 'pointer-fingers'. Her crawling has reached astounding speeds now and she seems to want to move onto walking at the same rate or... or, it simply not worth doing.

So we walk with her, Ange or I hunched over, exploring and re-exploring the chairs and the couch and the computer stand. I find bits on the floor and make a mental note to go back after the walking game and pick them up. The I forget and re-discover the bit on the next circle of the house.

She leads the way by leaning in the direction she wants to go. Much of this leaning takes on a fairly severe angle. So at 45 degrees to the floor and with her little legs pumping away, we are probably learning very little about walking. As I retold this little story to Chris in an email, I mused that she might, however, be in training to be a sprinter...

The Little Absurdities

Today was any given Monday. I woke up early to the sound of my phone alarm. It's an annoying little jingle that both gets me out of bed and makes me want to crush my phone all at the same time. That I'm using my phone as an alarm at all is the first little absurdity in my day. We don't have an alarm clock. We've tried to buy one. The local gadget store sold one that projected the time onto the roof, which was a little more clock than we wanted. The Tesco had one with a digital radio but it cost nearly $50, which seemed too steep. Argos (the Consumer Distributing of Britain) has one: we've seen it in their catalogue. But getting to Argos has proven problematic. So my phone is our clock.

At 7am, about 30 minutes after I leave and just as the light starts to appear over the Oxfordshire fields, I call Ange to wake her up. Indeed, rural Oxfordshire is lovely in the mornings. The cool nights lend themselves to early morning mists. The mists wander through the trees that separate the many green fields of the rural drive. Dorchester, with its ancient abbey, passes on my left as I head to work. I then pass through the village of Nuneham Courtenay, which is comprised of a series of nearly identical small brick 'duplex' houses that look to have been built in the 1800s. The roofs sag slightly and the black timber framing contrasts against the brick. The doors are all noticably smaller than anything from the past 200 years. And, as a backdrop to this lovely drive, which sits high on the hills to the west is the Oxford Nuclear Power Station. Its cylindrical towers, just like those Mr. Burn's Springfield nuclear power station, rising high above the church spires that sit in front of it and the smoke rising into the sky. What bureaucratic process led to putting a massive power station next to one of Britain historical gems?

I work in an old mansion. It is now a place for Oxford Brookes Unversity receptions and houses most of Corporate Affairs for the university. It is probably only about 150 years old. My office was probably a bedroom at one time. The Victorian coal fireplace mantle is still there, but the opening has been covered to prevent drafts. The old single pane window fits loosely in the frame ans shakes in the wind, but a second glaze has been retrofit to the inside frame and provides modern insulative properties. Oddly, the men's loo remains unheated.

Returning home after a day of work that has been entirely enjoyable, the little frustrations of rented accomodation strike me as vaguely humerous. The perspective of the arctic flat still in my mind, these don't amount to complaints: merely observations. Because water standard water pressure leaves something to be desired here, the owners of our flat have installed some sort of motorized pump to pressurize the water before it makes it to our shower. It makes an aweful noise as it gets going but worked quite well up until this weekend when it suddenly started to cut out. At first it was only once or twice a shower. It slowly got worse until this morning's shower, when it quickly deteriorated into horrible convulsions. The racket of the motor coming on and cutting out while water spurted and sprayed. I stood there incredulous. Why is having a normal shower such a luxury for me over here?

Then, tonight, as I went to make some quesadillas I realised that the owner of the house had only provided the most ridiculous of cheese graters. Barely the size of the palm of my hand, it amounted to only about 1/4 the size of the block of cheese I was trying to grate. It slipped and slided. I grated the cheese and my finger. Who would bother to make a grater this small? Was it actually a Monopoly character? Our quesadillas were not the cheesiest ever.

By contrast, we needed a couple of items for dinner tonight. We didn't need to bundle up: it was 10 degrees at 6pm. As we walked out, one or two of the houses in our terrace were burning their coal fires and the smell of coal fire lingered in the air. The smell immediately launched me back to our travels through eastern Europe. It can't be 300 yards to to the Waitrose supermarket. We bought our items and were back in the kitchen in 15 minutes. It's just different. Yes, it is absurd that Oxford has a power station on its horizon, that water pressure is strangely unattainable and that we've rented a place which has provided a cheese grater completely incapable of grating cheese but tomorrow I will drive back from Oxford along a route that will take me up a small rise and through a village that looks much like it must have 300 years ago (apart from the speed camera keeping me to 30mph). And I will shake my head at the beauty of the Norman church that sits amongst the collection of houses, pubs and shops. And then I'll pick up Anna and she won't care about the phone alarm clock, the power station, the water pressure, the cheese grater or the church. She'll just be happy to see me. I'm already looking forward to it.

Anna Likes Cake

We arrived in Abbotsford a little bleary eyed (see post below) where Oma and Opa kindly shuttled us back to their house near White Rock. We collapsed into our beds and fell asleep. Somehow, 11 hours later came early.

It was only a few days to Christmas, but we had Allison and John's wedding to prepare for and take part in (Ange was in the wedding party and I was the emcee), Christmas presents to buy and wrap and a big old birthday party to celebrate with Anna. Oma and Opa were fantastic about taking Anna, allowing her to get a semblance of a routine while we went off to meet with the rest of the wedding party on the 20th. Allison was a bit stressed at this point. I always fear telling a story about Alison lest I fail to do it justice. Allison is probably the best story teller I have ever met, but since many of you can't ask her about the week, I will dare to relate a few wedding and wedding-prep tidbits. Also noteworthy is that crisis follows Alison in an uncanny way. The many crises of life provide fantastic material for the later retelling of the story but can make the moment a little harry.

Allison had originally wanted to elope to avoid all the stress that goes into planning a wedding. Instead, she chose to have her wedding during the busiest social time of the year, only two days before Christmas. On hearing of this new plan in August, Ange and I shook our heads. We would do what we could to help from England.

Anyway, Allison was a bit stressed. We sat having a glass of wine discussing the logistics leading up to the wedding. John summed up the their perspective well, explaining to me at one point that, "Allison and I are perfect for each other. We can make disaster out of anything." As we were leaving, Allison confirmed that Ange would be coming to the nail/spa thing the next day. Nail/spa thing? We hadn't received that email. You could see Allison starting to twitch. "No problem!" I interjected before there was time for genuine concern by either Ange or Allison, "We'll work it out." And, of course, it was the least we could do to work it out so Alison didn't worry about it.

The result was a little drive for me in the lower mainland, which I would do a million times for Allison and John. But I might also take this moment to note that the Lower Mainland (or Vancouver for those not intimately tied to the city) commute accentuates my completely conflicted feeling about the city. It is shockingly beautiful. We have loads of friends there. But the endless driving! Oh my goodness. There is seldom a day I spend in Vancouver that I don't drive in excess of 100km in bumper to bumper traffic. So, the next day Anna and I hopped in the car in White Rock and drove across the municipalities of Surrey, Delta, Coquitlam and Port Moody to drop Ange off. While Ange, Allison, Katrin and Tracey enjoyed the spa, Anna and I ate lunch in the mall food court with pre-Christmas shoppers who held expressions as if they had just done a similar commute. We then headed back. I don't think at any point we exceeded 60km/h over the 2.5 hours in the car.

However, arriving back at my parents house, we prepared for Anna's birthday party. Oma was putting on the full spread, as the full Vancouver family contingent was coming over. She even made a beautiful 'Care Bear' cake for Anna. Anna slept.

The party was a resounding success. Anna played gleefully with her cousins Lydia, Chloe and Rebecca while we enjoyed the lovely food and caught up with the family. By the time we were ready for cake, Anna was asleep at the wheel. She could barely keep her eyes open. She could not keep her eyes open in mum's arms when the cake was pulled out. Not knowing what cake was exactly, she clung to mum seeming to wish that mum would just take her to bed. The candle was blown out for her by a cousin and a piece cut for Anna.

She looked at piece of cake before her. She studied it. She held out a hand, then took it back. She repeated this a few times, sometimes tucking her head into mum's shoulder as if she might choose sleep over this thing before her. Finally, curiosity and the sense that the whole room was hanging on the moment, she grabbed a bit of the cake in her hand. She squished it in her hand. Inoffensive. She grabbed a bit more and put it to her mouth. Seeing the moment that someone first discovers homemade icing on cake is something to behold. Her eyes lit up. The other hand went to the plate to fill itself with this amazing substance. She looked at Ange and I, her eyes pleading with us:

Have you had this stuff?"
"You have?"
"Why the hell haven't you introduced us before now?!?

Then, as she stuffed her mouth hand over hand, the tiredness overwhelmed her. Even as she fell asleep, her eyes only half open she stuffed more cake in her mouth. A few minutes later, she was asleep in her crib without a noise of protest. The party and the cake must have occupied her thoughts well that night as she slept in the next morning til nearly 9am.
We could be fairly certain that Anna liked cake. But just in case, it made cameo appearances at the end of the next couple of lunches to similar joy. Based on this, I can say with some certainty that if an interactive blog happens that involves pink Care Bear cake, I would recommend your money goes on the cake.

Lille-Reading-Calgary-Abbotsford

When I booked the trip to Lille, France back in October I was thinking of a couple of things. One was how beautiful France was near Christmas and the appeal of a Christmas market to set the mood for the holidays was strong. Second was that field hockey would wind up for the holidays early-ish in December. So, with no further forsight, I booked the weekend of December 15-17 for a Christmas excursion with the family.

We woke up on at a leisurely 9am on Friday morning to head over to the train station, where the First Great Western train service calling at everywhere imagineable took us to Waterloo (we chose this long option because it meant avoiding the tube with Anna and a very full stroller). We grabbed a coffee and boarded the Eurostar which whisked us off to France. It was all very efficient. In fact, it was so efficient that we arrived in Lille before I had time to realise that I had no idea where the hotel was from the train station. And then we did something I should know never to do. We just started walking. It wasn't aimlessly per se. I phoned our friend, Dan, who had been there and recommended Hotel Ibis (a French chain akin to Best Western) who managed to sort me out with a very general direction. I eagerly asked people for directions, using the opportunity to practice my disasterous French. Something must have been lost in translation as we ended up at the wrong Hotel Ibis. Happily and yet strangely the wrong Hotel Ibis (the one without our reservation) was a mere 300 meters from the correct Hotel Ibis.
We settled into our room quickly after a good 6 hours on the road. Rest being for those smarter than ourselves, we turned the show around and headed right back out for a lovely dinner in the old town. A British family with three kids made for an excellent distraction from Anna's meagre protests at being couped up in a high chair having been in the buggy/stroller/chariot all day. We capped the night off with a speedy tear around the Christmas market and a mulled wine.

Emily (my sister) and Armando (brother-in-law) arrived the next morning to spend the weekend with us. Emily is well pregnant now, meaning her and Anna travel at about the same speed: both troopers with limits. There were coffees to be had, shops to be perused, and a market to be enjoyed. We did it all and had a wonderful visit with Emily and Armando along the way. Anna even got to try a merry-go-round, which she enjoyed immensely. Dad enjoyed it considerably less. I can't figure out why, given a speed setting for 2 year olds, I managed to feel as poorly as I did coming off that ride, but it was a good few hours later before I was ready for dinner!

We enjoyed a lovely dinner that night and a hotel breakfast the next morning, before more French coffee and a mid afternoon departure to London. Sunday tube service could not stand in our way this round as we boarded the train directly from Waterloo to Reading... we collapsed through our front door at about 9pm, having left Lille at 3:00. This is where some foresight back in October would have been ideal. We had to get up at 6am to catch the bus to Heathrow.

6:00am came early. We had packed ourselves into a backpack and a ice hockey bag... and two little "day" packs, a diaper bag, a stroller, and a car seat and base. The walk took a while, but we boarded the coach on time and found ourselves at Heathrow in plenty of time. The flight was uneventful and we landed in Calgary and passed through immigration with out a hitch. Damian kindly picked us up at the airport in his truck, which is only marginally smaller than the coach we took to Heathrow. We visited our house, which Erin has kept beautifully, and the Brakes had people by to visit with us. It was a grand evening of visiting good friends, only affected slightly by the shocking tiredness of the two days of travel. I drifted off to sleep as the Flames put on a poor show for my only hockey of the year. Erin kindly let us borrow her car the next day, allowing us to get countless chores done before she took us to the airport and another flight to Vancouver. We really could have used the little TV in the back of the seat that seems to be on nearly every WestJet plane except for the one we took to Abbotsford that night, but were able to hold oursleves and Anna together until my parents picked us up from the airport.

As we waited for our luggage to arrive, my mum briefly fretted about Anna crawling on the floor at Abbotsford Airport. As I thought of Anna crawling on the Eurostar, in the kids plays section at Heathrow International, and the floor of the plane in front of our seats, I couldn't help but chuckle. Somehow my perspective on Abbotsford grimy-ness didn't raise any red flags.

Ikea's The Same

We were heading south to Kent, but at the the junction entering the M25 (the motorway that surrounds London) we headed north. Because of how the roads connect it was actually the quickest way to meet up with my Dad (and his wife Sue and my brother Sam) at the Ikea on the far side of London. It made "sense" (in a way) to drive around the north side of London to go to Kent via Ikea. It was a long drive anyway, but a minor accident caused traffic chaos, adding 40 minutes or so to our journey.

Dad faced similar Sunday traffic woes and by the time we were all at Ikea, we had only about 30 minutes to rush through. We were astounded how it was essentially identical to the Ikea in Calgary. Inside the giant box store with no windows and lots of lovely show rooms, there was little to distinguish the two stores on opposite sides of the world, except that the London Ikea was possibly busier than its Canadian equivalent, if that is possible...

Our house is furnished, but we were still interested in some fairly specific items to make things more comforatble. A computer table for our internet-less computer. We needed some drawer units for holding clothes. We need a couple of chairs to supplement the few that came with the house. It was such a rush through Ikea that we felt compelled to make no decisions at all. We were tempted by the super cheap items in the last few thousand square feet of "market" section, but the queues were too much. Despite driving hours out of our way, we had nothing except for a strange longing for cheap press-board furniture. Why is Ikea so much like Macdonalds' fries? The quality is essential rubbish, but you want them. You long for them. And occassionally, you just need them.

We were on our way to Kent to celebrate my aunt and uncle's 40th wedding anniversary. It was sensational. Not only was Dad, Sue and Sam there, but Emily (my sister) and her boy Armando were there too. My uncle Ron is in the (book) design business in London and he knows how to do things 'right'. The reception was an afternoon tea at a stunning manor house in the hills of Kent. There was a traditional jazz band that played fantastically in the corner. It was just the right volume to be perfectly enjoyable but allowed everyone to chat. The food was lovely. We had a chance to catch up with cousins and June and Ron themselves and got to sit and chat with family as well. Anna was decked out in a cute little pink number and was pleased with all the attention that was showered on her. June and Ron even arranged a magician for the kids and had generous gifts for all the children. It was a wonderful afternoon and we were all a little sad when we had to go. Below is Anna and Grandad:
I spent the rest of the week researching the cost of various different furniture options for us. With no internet, I went old-school and got catalogues from all sorts of companies. I peered through them whenever we had a free moment. For those who remember Consumer's Distributing in Canada, they have an identical set up here called Argos. It's a bit hit and miss with Argos on the quality front and most of our supplied furniture is Ikea anyway so we were leaning heavily towards the Ikea option. Using the catalogue--curse Orange--we established that the nearest Ikea was about 60 miles away in North London. Astonishingly, it was open to midnight. This little discovery was made at about 8pm on a Monday night. By 8:15 we were packing up to drive into London. No crazy traffic was my thought. Driving in London is still a bit intimidating, so the idea of fewer cars made it more appealing.

Sure enough, traffic was light as we ventured into London. There is something called the North Circular, which was the original 'ring road'. The only thing about the North Circular (and, indeed the South Circular) is that isn't always the most identifiably major road. There are loads of traffic lights and roundabouts. It is often one lane with residential homes on either side. There are little shops and pubs. It veers to avoid parks. There are pedustrial (or 'zebra') crossings. It is not unlike Elbow Drive in Calgary. Only there are some 15 million potential drivers rather than a few hundred thousand as Calgary might offer. Still, we drove nearly straight there, arriving at about 9:30. It turns out that a surprsing number of those 15 million odd London area residents had chosen a cold, November, Monday night to go to Ikea. The mamoth cark park was full. After finding a spot and trudging in, we braved crowds that I would associate with a Saturday morning. However, armed with our now slightly dog-eared catalogue and a resounding sense of purpose, we went directly to what we were after. Snap decisions were made. Efficiency ruled the day... or evening. By 11pm, we had picked up our flat, heavy carboard boxes full of press-board (or is it Ikea-drug?) furniture.

The addiction had been satiated as we fled London back to our sleepy little town... which was indeed asleep when we got home at half twelve. A weight had been lifted. We had braved London and Ikea and came out with things that would make us more comfortable without compromising our pseudo-trendiness. Anna slept and quietly went to bed while we unpacked the boxes into our front room.

As it turned out, the boxes sat for a few days in the front room before we were able to deal with them. It's one thing to see them in the show-room, but quite another thing to bring yourself to put them together with a tiny little hex-key that hurts your fingers with every screw that tighten past a moderate resistance. Additionally, one box didn't even have instructions! We phoned Ikea. The lady explained to me that it wasn't a problem as the instructions were online. I told her about Orange and she posted me a copy of the instructions for our Kläppenburg (or whatever) drawer unit. Royal Mail had them to me the next day. Then we realised that in our flurry of purchasing we had actually forgotten to pick up one of the drawer units from the high metal shelves of the pick-up area. The frustration nearly brought me to my knees but what can you do? What WE will do, is do without. And that is actually working out okay. ₤50 saved. That's a family flight to Munich! And if I can write this much about a trip to Ikea, imagine the blog potential!

We leave you with a gratuitous blueberry shot:

Long Time, No Blog

Well, it wasn't by choice. Sadly, the internet provider I chose had problems sending us our 'connection pack'. My first inclination is to rant about Orange's internet service but I will say nothing other than it took Orange (a mobile phone company which offers broadband as well) 4 weeks to get us online.

Things have been very busy as our routine here becomes more clear. I have started work (though only for two days a week until the new year) at Oxford Brookes and the team I work with seem excellent. Ange continues to very much enjoy her work as well. Anna likes her nursery and the other children and seems to be settling in.

There are all sorts of things that need doing, which have occupied much of our free time, as we get established in the new house. The other day Anna and I were on a mission to get a TV license. It's a strange concept to North Americans, to be sure. Thankfully, it isn't based on my ability to actually make sense of and use the TV with the various remotes that are required. The house has a satalite from the previous owner and Britain has a free satalite service appropriately called Freeview(mind you, you pay for a TV license). While there are loads of cool upgrades you can pay for: films, cartoon channels, reality channels and the North American Sports Channel (NASP) which was 'discussed' and despite it showing more than 300 NHL games and nearly every playoff game "we" was decided against it. We might re-discuss when the playoffs roll around.

Anyway, we require this TV license and, after asking a number of Brits, it seems that the Post Office is where one buys a TV license. What one can do at the Post Office is nothing short of amazing. The Post Office is a one-stop interaction point with the national (or federal, if you like) government. In addition to every form you'd ever want and a payment place for all sorts of things, the Post Office offers (this is weird...) bank accounts, credit cards, insurance (house, auto, and life) and a number of other things you would simply never expect from Canada Post.

The downside of the Post Office offering every imagineable service is that there is almost always a lengthy queue. Anna and I braved the queue one afternoon shortly after getting a TV from Dad. Still, the North American in me wanted to reject the all-encompassing role of the Post Office in society, so I meekly approached the post office attendant: "I know this is a post office but people assure me that in addition to needing a license to watch TV, I can get it here at the post office.... ???" The attendent was so nice but regretfully informed me that the Post Office was no longer in the business of selling TV licenses. Perhaps some Senior Post Office person decided it wasn't closely related enough to core business, whereas selling insurance and running bank accounts was...

Regardless, the lady who was helping me was indeed helpful and friendly and directed Anna and I to a nearby petrol (gas) station. Hmmm. The petrol station was a good hike in the drizzle, but we marched over anyway. After waiting in another queue of people waiting to pay for their petrol, we approached the man behind the counter and asked for a TV license. He stared at me kind of blankly. "I was told by the people at the Post Office that this is where you now get television licenses." It turns out the big barrier at this point was going to be the English language. It wasn't really spoken by anyone working at the BP petrol station.

"Need receipt," was all I got from him.

"Right. Well I don't have a receipt at this point as I haven't bought anything." I offered back.

"Need receipt."

"I don't have one..." I was quickly realising that this was going nowhere.

"Need receipt."

As I gave up, slightly annoyed and slightly perplexed. The gentleman behind the counter seemed relieved that he could go back to petrol and junk food transactions. I stood in amongst the crisps and chocolate bars wondering what to do. Finally, I asked someone in line about TV licenses. She was as confused as I was by the receipt thing, but was quick to re-assert that I needed a license to watch TV as the fine for watching without one was significant. She just bought her license online. I thanked her as I silently cursed Orange under my breath and started wandering back home as the darkness of early evening settled and the drizzle continued.

The whole episode took me nearly an hour and half. We watched TV without a license that night and thankfully noone got hurt. Ange bought the license online at work the next day in a matter of minutes. I cursed Orange again.

World Wide Web Woes

I've just sat down at a large faux-birch IKEA style desk at the Caversham public library. There are three old computers that chug along and I sit somewhat dumbfounded in front of one of them. They keyboard seems to have an issue with the letter 'n': it doesn't like to type it without a good hard smack of the letter. It is all strangely reminicent of our travels across Europe in 1999 when Ange and I would seek out some public internet access to quickly set about composing a group email. In the background, despite it being a library, there is a very loud conversation between an old lady who has lost her keys and the nice gentleman who works here. He's helping her go through her purse as she's a bit hard of sight as well as being hard of hearing.

Why does Ben find himself at the public library to write this blog entry? Well, the move from the arctic flat went very smoothly. Moves are made easy by having hardly any stuff. We are now into our terraced house and it is warm and well furnished with fewer dangers for a growing toddler than the last place. And, while the move went off with hardly a hitch, connecting to the world wide web has not gone nearly as well. Just about everyone over here offers broadband internet. From the grocery store Tesco to the mobile phone companies to the more traditioanl telephone companies and digital tv providers. After limited research, I have opted for the broadband plan offered by our mobile phone provider, Orange. Orange offers a great rate but can't sort you out with connectivity for 10 working days. So, I find myself at the library listening to the conversation with the deaf lady and the library attendant (they've found a set of keys... but they're the wrong one. Very strangely, they're the keys to her scooter?!?) and madly trying to pound out an entry on this keyboard before my time runs out.

We will have internet access from home on December 2. Or maybe later. But probably not sooner. That's what the lady at Orange said. So, the blog will hit full swing again in early December and I will also respond to everyone's email at that time.

In the meantime, I'll leave you with an Anna update... she is now moving with alarming speed. She can stand, even unsupported, though only briefly. And, we may have found another favourite food. Blueberries. We can only afford frozen blueberries here (because fresh ones are about £3 for 100g), which presents an interesting mess dilemma. Anna loves them, but as they become unfrozen, blueberry juice gets everywhere. So, she essentiall stains her lips and mouth and hands with every meals we serve them, leaving her looking like she is slightly hypothermic. Of course, with our new heated house, we know this isn't the case. Certainly, it would have been cause for alarm at the last flat, but we're out of the woods for "freezing in your own house" concerns. So, look out for an interactive blog in December: bananas vs. blueberries. Start the hype, this could be big.

Anna also starts daycare next thursday... which corresponds with me starting work. I'm not sure how I feel about it at the moment. The last few months have been a gift. We'll update 'feelings' later. I surely can't add to the chaos at the library right now by getting emotional.

Epilogue: The old lady has found her keys, thanks to the library attendant, who heard them jingle in her coat. Her 'scooter' isn't a motorcycle, though there were shared looks of concern amongst a few of us when we thought it might be: it is an electric 4-wheel sitting thing with a basket on the front. Phew.

Future early December blogs to look forward to: TV Licenses: Can Ben Fail? and IKEA's in London? How Hard Can That Be To FInd?

Tourist in Oxford

Sunday morning we woke up early and started gathering things for our day out in Oxford. Ange had been in touch with a former colleague from the University of Southampton and had arranged to meet in Oxford after decided that it was mostly a central meeting place for us (she lives further away in Birmingham). Five miles donw the road, I realised that I had forgotten the camera (leaving only the phone camera) which was most unfortunate because Oxford is lovely...

I took a different route to Oxford than I had when we went up for my interview at Oxford Brookes. While scenic, it was considerably slower. Then when we got to Oxford, I made the critical error of following the route in Oxford chosen for me by Google Maps. Cripes. I ended up in the "Buses Only" section of road all through the centre. I managed to get off, only to head in the wrong direction. Ange patiently tried to navigate us through the center of Oxford with our less-than-suitable map. The map is of the UK generally; however, for cities, it throws and olive branch by giving you a 2" by 2" mini detailed map of the city center.

With only the occassional road actually named on our map, we were in a bit of trouble. Further, unlike North America, the posting of street names in the UK are a bit hit and miss. In fact, often they're just missed. So we started out driving tour of Oxford center. At one point we thought we had it worked out, only to be foiled by a road closure... and then another road closure... and another.... it seems they were having some sort of run in town which seemed to arbitratily close roads in all directions. Or, at least, the directions we wanted to go. But, we prevailed and finally found the car park we were advised to park in.

Alison and her husband and two young children met up with us on the high street. It was a great day of exploring a stunning little city. Alison's husband had gone to uni in Oxford and showed us all over. We visited his college and ate our picnic lunch on the steps of the library. We also visited the Oxford Natural History Museum, which was an excellent choice with three young children in our company as it was voted the most family friendly museum in Britain. So much to see and touch. Importantly, to touch. Anna was well pleased with the cheetah and we returned to him many times to both pat and to laugh at. To Anna, he was a very funny cheetah. The funniest she's met, in fact.

There was also a french market in town (like the one that visited Henley) that was advertising itself as a Chrismtas market but was, in fact, just a regular French market with nothing Christmassy about it. Still, it was excellent and we had French goodies.

In the end, it was a great day! It was a little short, which is to be expected when it involves cheetahs and non-Christmas French Christmas markets which make everything far too exciting for a nap. Mind you, even dad needed a nap! And the company was great. I'm sad that they live so far away!

Tomorrow, we move into our new house! Hooray! This, of course, is presuming that Countrywide Letting Agency doesn't come up with some surprise thing that we needed to do but haven't, despite us asking if there was anything we needed to do. I am sure it will provide some sort of story that isn't entirely interesting but that I will recount in great detail regardless.

By A Hair

It was cold when I wandered into the kitchen at 7:15 this morning. Not as cold as a couple of mornings over the past weeks, where we had the frost overnight but still a cold that would clearly challenge our fridge.

Yesterday mum arrived from Canada. Anna and I picked her up from Heathrow and braved traffic on the M4 until cutting cross-country and through Henley towards Caversham(-on-Thames). We stopped for a quick walk about the town, showing off the lovely old buildings as if they somehow belonged to us. We had delicious, but over-priced mochachino at the Café Nero and a nice chat with mum about settling in England and what the family was up to in Vancouver.

When we got back to our flat in Caversham, mum was only slightly taken aback by its sparsity and frigid temperatures. She opted to have a nap on our bed rather than the pitiful little futon we had managed to borrow for her visit. While mum had a nap, so should have Anna. But it wasn't on. So, Anna joined me in a quick jaunt down to the high street to pick up a thermometer. I had tried to pick up a thermometer at the Tesco and the Waitrose, the local pound store (akin to a dollar store at home) and a hardware store in Henley. The supermarkets both showed me a thermometer to read ones' temperature with while the pound store had somehow managed to sell out of them. I guess others are having similar questions about their houses with the onset of autumn. The store in Henley had them, but they were horrible little things that they were charging 5 quid for. I simply couldn't justify $12 on a thermometer. Luckily, the 'everything' store on the corner (where we buy birdseed) had them for a couple of quid. It's even made in Britain. But it is a cheap thermometer, so I can't guarantee the accurateness of the readings it gave: but I am assuming it was consistent, so the relative temperature of the fridge and the kitchen should be soundly measured.

Getting back to the plot: I walk into the kitchen and it is cold enough to see your breath, but I don't believe it was the coldest it has been. Still, our little experiment wasn't about the coldest the kitchen ever got, merely that we would measure the temperature on the morning of Friday, November 10, 2006. So, the temperature in our kitchen? 8 degrees Celsius (or, if you prefer, about 46/47 Fahrenheit).

Our fridge? Well, in this instance, the seemingly obvious answer was the correct one. But, just how close was our fridge in managing to be the colder of the two?According to our cheap-o thermometer from the everthing store, it was 7.5 degrees Celsius (about 45/46 Fahrenheit).

Well done to Shivani and Jacqui! Jaq, you've won yourself a British chocolate bar on the draw. What can we get for you? Shiv, you may bask in the satisfaction of getting it right (though in the hearts of everyone who was thinking, "Gaww, it has got to be the fridge that is colder, no matter what Ben thinks!", I am betting you were not thinking the difference would be half a degree)... and, Shiv, when you visit us: I'm sure we'll have chocolate on hand! ;-)

As a side note, after cooking a meal using the gas stove and cookers, the temperature shot up to nearly 13 degrees Celsius. Though still a little cold, persepctive (let me assure you) is everything and it felt quite nice...

Interactive Blog #2

When I last wrote that the fridge had become redundant, I admit to trying to be funny. Only, I fear I may have been closer to the truth than either Angela or I care to admit.

There are some strong indications that our kitchen is abnormally cold by the standards set in the Western world in 2006. First, we bought bananas last week and have left them on the counter to ripen. Only, they haven't ripened. I think the refrigeration unit that is our kitchen has slowed the ripening to a near stand-still. The upside is that I went to Waitrose and got a reduced price on a couple of bananas that were already ripe and needed getting rid of.

The second indicator is that Ange's plant never needs watering and seems to be in a state of non-activity. By contrast, the same type of plant she took into her office needs watering daily. Over a week and not a drop needed for the one in our kitchen. It's like being in the fridge at the florist. Maybe we should buy some cut flowers for the rest of our stay here?

Wearing shoes in our kitchen is simply a must. Not to do so borders on painful after a short time. And, in the morning, walking into the kitchen almost takes your breath away as if you've jumped into a cold swimming pool... the breath you do manage to let out is clearly visible.

So, what's interactive about this silly complaining? Well, we're going to do an experiment. It can generally be characterised as such:

Is our kitchen colder than the inside of our fridge?

I can honestly say that I think this will be incredibly close. We may have to go to fractions of a degree to declare a winner. Here's the plan: on Friday morning, we will have left a thermometer out all night, and we will measure the temperature as we come in (before we boil the kettle or run the toaster). After recording the temperature, we will put the same thermometer in the fridge for 30 minutes or more before measuring the temperature of the fridge. We will declare the coldest (the fridge or the room in which the fridge sits) on Friday before Canadians are done work.

So, you just have to post on this blog which you think will be colder. Of those who get it right, we'll draw for the chocolate! Now, I've got to get my toque before preparing dinner...

GCH

First off, it isn't astonishingly cold here. The Reading area appears to be marginally colder than Southampton, which was on the coast. We have had two mornings of frost here, whereas in Southampton there was hardly ever a frost, even in the middle of winter. Despite not having the sea to slightly moderate the temperature it is, as they say, a damp cold. For a Canadian example, the temperature is nearly identical this week to Vancouver, only with much less rain.

The thing is, furnaces are kicking in all over the lower mainland as autumn sets in. Us? Well, we don't have a furnace. It's funny, they advertise gas central heating (GCH) as a feature on rental properties here. It is becoming abundtantly clear why one might think that a feature rather than a "nice-to-have". I must first qualify that we have been very lucky to have been let the place we're in: it is inexpensive, shockingly convenient for both Ange and I, it has been entirely flexible and it is very clean. It is however an old building and the flat we're in seems to have been squeezed in at some point, as it was needed. Rather than central heating, it has four wall-mounted electric heaters. One in the lounge (common room), one in our bedroom and another in one of the other two bedrooms. Haphazardly, there is also one in the hallway. So, for those who are paying keen attention, you'll notice I haven't mentioned two critical rooms: the kitchen and the bathroom.

To round out the picture, I will explain that when most of these older home in Britain were built, "singled glazed" windows were installed. In other words, a single piece of glass. And if one might think that a lone piece of glass doesn't act as insulation, in addition to being right, they'd also have to appreciate that most of these old wooden window frame don't actually meet and seal, so windows are essentially always open in some capacity. So, put together a night of frost, a house full of open windows and nothing of substance to heat the house with the open windows and you have the picture more or less... Not surprisingly, rental accomodation also advertises "UPVC double glazed windows" as a feature.

With our windows and feeble electirc heaters, only two rooms are currently moderately unlike being outdoors. Regardless, it is cold in our accomodation. I don't honestly think I'd be lying to say that the fridge has become reduntant in our kitchen. But, we're only 10 days from double glazed windows and gas central heating, using radiators. Glorious radiators.

Yesterday, Anna and I trecked down to Ashford, Kent. I have an aunt and uncle there and my cousin, with her husband and three children are also there. Anna had a wonderful day playing with Max (6), Freddy (3), and Mimi (6 months) and all of their toys. It was great. Dad even dropped by on his way back to Norfolk from a job on the south coast. Anna was also given a super-cute toque and mitts by Aunt June and Uncle Ron, so she's all ready to go into the kitchen, bathroom and third bedroom of our flat. Mimi, Freddy and Anna pose for a photo:

And the Winner is...

Anna got up this morning with her usual chipperness. Ange took her down and started her on her breakfast while dad really worked hard to drag himself out of bed. Not surprising to any parents out there, but it still amazes me slightly that my new life of liesure involves getting up earlier than I have ever had to for any job that I've had (except for the odd coffee shop gig back in the day)... To the right, Anna early this morning in her hoodie, as it was shockingly cold in our flat.

A quick inventory of food revealed that we were in need of avocado for the favourite food selection lunch. Dad alo needed a coffee. It was brisk outside, but sunny. Like Calgary, only not quite that brisk. We stopped to get a coffee at the new coffee shop in town, which has supplanted all others for a blend of affordability and quality. We then visited the Waitrose to get avocado, picked up a nice little bottle of Italian red wine that is ridicluously cheap as this month's specialty and then walked over to the butcher. With a tiny fridge and no freezer, I find we end up buying food almost daily. The butcher is particularly friendly and when I explained that I wanted some steak for fajitas, he pulled out a couple of little steaks that he figured would be difficult to sell because of their odd size and gave them me them at cost. Then (and this makes a special trip worthwhile) he offered to cut the steak into strips for me. He noted that his knife was probably sharper than anything I had... if he only knew. And he could have seen very clearly, because I happened to have our Swiss Army knife on me to cut fruit in an emergency hunger situation.

When we got back to the flat, Anna was giving all the signs for a nap. So, we made our first of three attempts at a nap this morning. She's learned to roll over and get herself up adn crawl/stand about the crib, so naps are beginning to be more and more a time to play in the crib rather than actually sleep. However, as the one truly warm room in the house, I suppose I shouldn't complain. Anyway, after lying down, sitting up, and flopping around the crib for 40 minutes, Anna was ready for her pick-the-favourite-food lunch. As promised, the food was layed out on her high chair tray as equally as I could, as can be seen. I have to confess, I had secretly chosen avocado to win this little eating lottery with a suspicion that the cheerio might just slip in based on the level of comfort she has dealing with cheerios (a fairly regular snack fo her).

By now it was all business. Anna was hungry and she had 5 of her favourites about to be placed in front of her. There would be no humming and ahhing. She would go right for one without question. But which would it be?

We see Anna just prior to selection carefully considering her options (cheerio fans, don't worry, the tray was no yet on her high chair and after taking the photo, the cheerio was moved back into position)...

And the winning food? The food of choice? The preference when all the options are presented? Banana. Second was the gouda cheese which she certainly hadn't finished chewing before the avocado was stuffed in too. Kiwi was fourth, leaving our most popular choice in dead last. Anna Fitch: making healthy choices at 10 months old.

Robyn and Matt, you've won and all-expense paid trip for a chocolate bar of your choice to Calgary, Alberta! You'll have to email me your address as I don't actually have it?!? So we leave you with the moment of truth: