Wimbledon is a tough act to follow, but...

...how about this:

I'm MOVING!



After much debate I have decided that, although I have *loved* this last year (aka "The Year of Decompression"), I miss the buzz of city life. So, I'm heading in to settle myself somewhere inside the Big Smoke.

So, if you want to take advantage of the current spacious and luxurious accomodation I've landed in the suburbs, I suggest you get here before mid-August. I'll be happily settled in (probably much) smaller and more modest quarters from September forward.

wimbledon!

I spent the day at Wimbledon today...it was months in coming, but it totally snuck up on me! Months ago, I sent in the public lottery form, opting to take whatever tickets I could get (you do have the option to say I want this particular day on this particular court...but I don't follow tennis closely enough to care who I saw or when I went).

A few months later I got a letter telling me I had been chosen in the lottery...and now had the option to purchase tickets for Court No 1. WOOHOO!

I went for it, but have been so busy the last few months that it feels like the last time I thought about it was 2 months ago, and then suddenly last week I realized it was almost time to party with the rest of the tennis-loving world!

So...here are a few pictures from today's festivities!

iPod...don't leave home without it

On Saturday, I trained in to London for a day of neighborhood exploration (I'm considering a move closer in to the Big Smoke). Because I was carrying around my handy-dandy A to Z guide, I wasn't up for any additional and unnecessary paraphernalia to weigh me down, so I left my iPod at home (and any consideration of a second book for reading material was certainly out of the question).

Bad move.

On the train home, we left Waterloo station right on time (as usual), but stopped about 8 minutes into our journey for a 10-minute delay due to 'faulty tracks in the area'. No problem. Minor delay.

In about 10 minutes, we were again merrily on our way. And then we slowed to a second stop just before reaching Wimbledon. This time, the train guard made an announcement that there was a signal failure further down the line, and there were NO TRAINS moving anywhere in the area and the expected delay was approximately 40 minutes.

Nice.

At this point, the sum total of my entertainment consisted of trying to count the leaves on the tress outside the window of my train compartment. About 15 minutes later, we pulled in to the Wimbledon station, where there was plenty of people-watching to be done, thankfully. But even that bit of mental stimulus would have best been accompanied by some fresh tunes.

I arrived home approximately 2 hours and 10 minutes after my train departed Waterloo station. Normally, this journey would have taken 30 minutes (including the walk from the Woking train station to my flat). Certainly, it could have been a lot worse, but...

I will never ever again be without my iPod on a train. Never.

happy birthday to basim!

music recommendation

I don't do this very often, because frankly I'm more of a follower than a leader on the music scene. However, for those of you who like Norah and haven't discovered this album, go to the store RIGHT NOW and get it.

and there was much rejoicing

It's going to be a good week. I could sense it when I got up this morning. All my laundry is done (if you ever live in England you'll understand why that's actually noteworthy), my flat is clean, I had a very productive weekend, I have new clothes hanging in the closet anxiously awaiting their first outing, and...

...STARBUCKS OPENED TODAY!

As I was approaching the shop on my way to the office, I spotted a guy sporting that familiar green apron tying balloons to a few of the outdoor chairs. I slowed, smiled and steered closer to the target. I asked if they were open yet, and he informed me that they would be open at 9:00 this morning.

Ten minutes after 9:00, I was walking out of the office with that silly "I'm so excited I can't stop smiling" grin on my face (which lasted all the way through my round-trip journey). At 9:15, I was queuing (yes, I was IN LINE in their first hour of business on opening day) for my first ever grande two-pump mocha in the great and thriving metropolis of Woking, England.

Ah, the beauty of consistent recipes and naming conventions worldwide. There IS a place where I speak the same language as the locals...it's called Starbucks. And in that place, life is good.

Everyone at the office thinks I'm off my rocker, but they don't understand, do they?

sometimes what's "right" just doesn't feel good

I'm sending an email to my boss and Word is telling me that my first attempt at is grammatically incorrect.



Fair point. When I noticed the green squiggly lines and thought about it, I realized that, technically, "there's" is a subject/verb agreement error (and that I regularly make this mistake in speech due to inattentiveness). And even though I don't think I'd ever say it, I thought I'd try what would be technically correct.



Apparently, Bill's grammar police are OK with this approach, but that just doesn't look right to me. So I went "long hand" and wrote it out.



Now, not only have I sent a grammatically correct email, but I have been made aware of my own regular carelessness with my speech.

Sometimes I wonder how people get by in life without (or without deference to) the red and blue squiggle lines. I think they're a God-send (and a source of much enjoyment)!

overheard in italy

So, I'm sitting in Piazza San Marco in Venice with my friend Laura. We're enjoying the scenery, people watching and beautiful weather. The two girls sitting to our right are busily sketching the facade of the Basilica in their drawing pads. The pigeons are scurrying about begging for hand-outs. Two little kids are playing chase with their dad around the square while another little boy traces the pattern laid out by the the stones that make up the square. The scene is perfect.

And then this guy shows up.



(Warning to the reader: some difficult or potentially offensive language / subject matter ahead)

His opening line: "I'm not helping you carry all that crap."

And it contined from there:

"I sat here for THREE HOURS while you two did all that shopping, so you're going to have to carry it all yourself...blah, blah, blah...

...I mean, I was sitting here on my a$$ for three hours, with nothing to do...blah, blah, blah...

...I even had to take a dump in those crappy toilets over there...[this comment was met with stifled giggles from Laura and me and the two sketching girls]...

...three hours...blah, blah, blah...

...What the hell did you buy for three hours anyway? Do you realize you were gone for three hours?

...I'm not carrying anything for you. Which water taxi do we take back to the hotel?"

This 'conversation' went on for about 15 minutes (which probably doesn't seem like very long to those of you who weren't there), and then one of the sketching girls leaned over to her friend and said "Hey...how long were they gone again? Was it three hours?"

I guffawed.

By the way...the two women who had been shopping for 3 hours were each carrying one bag each, and the bags looked to be not quite large enough for two normal-sized shoe boxes. How much help did he think they needed?

i'm stumpted

For the life of me, I can't figure out what this sign means.

reason # 27 to take voice lessons

I'm so jealous of Steven.

First, because he's a faster on-your-feet thinker than I am (I would have just blushed at being told my "singing was enough", and never thought to ask for a freebie until the opportunity had passed).

Second, because he actually DID get a freebie...just for singing!

It reminds me of some college friends who used to go to a music festival every summer, and they instituted a "sing for a pancake" breakfast at their campsite. By the 3rd year, they were taking LOTS of extra pancake-making-stuff with them, because they would actually have people LINING UP at their campsite, waiting to sing a tune for a free flapjack. Some people were actually GOOD.

I never sang, primarily because the sing-for-a-pancake breakfast was instituted after the summers I went to the festival (if any C-Stone pancake breakfast peeps are reading, correct me if I'm getting any bits of the story wrong). But if we're honest (and that's what we try to be around these parts), it's because I'm confident I have a horrific singing voice and would NEVER sing a solo in PUBLIC.

I'm sure this is something that can be helped (not necessarily cured) by voice lessons...which is one of the things on my 99-things-to-do-before-I-die list.

ALL THAT to say...you go with your bad free-cigar-getting-singer self, Steven. I salute you.

i LOVE my church!!

italy...an overview

Rome, Florence, Pisa and Venice. Wow...good times!

Since there are a few folks chomping at the bits for pictures, I'll get that part out of the way, and save the good stories for the next few days.

First...Rome.
Rome is wonderful...truly amazing that so much has survived. But every step you take feels like you're walking past some amazing bit of history, and you just don't know it. I've already forgotten a large percentage of the things I learned while I was there (as is evident by my sparse commentary to the pictures). It's so full of history that it overwhelms me...and amazingly, you actually tire of seeing "another really old something". Strange, that. I definitely recommend going, but any trip (at any part of the year) needs to be planned well, as it's ALWAYS full of tourists, and lines can be so long it's just silly.

Next...Florence, Pisa and Venice.
Florence is my favorite, but that's only because I like spending money there. Venice would be my favorite if I had been travelling with a boy I get to kiss. Pisa is just a quick day-trip from Florence, and you can see all you need to see in less than 4 hours. But it's worth going just to get that obligatory "I'm-holding-up-the-tower" picture.

Um...do I sound like I want to be Rick Steve's next personal assistant, or is it just me?