Happy BirthdayS

Well, we celebrated mum's birthday yesterday with the BIGGEST meal!! Of course we also celebrated Trinity's so I guess everyone had to eat twice as much heheh! Today is of course Trinity's FIRST BIRTHDAY! Tomorrow we are celebrating it at Connections with all of her "adopted" aunties and nanas :) We are having games and party food!
We did have a busy weekend - Jared's footy at 11am, Carolynn at calisthenics for her concert at 2.30pm (it started at 3.30pm and went until 6.30pm) Then Sunday Carolynn had production practice at 9am (it was so foggy too, that early) and then we picked her up to go to mum and dad's at 12.30pm. In the meantime Jared made mousse and Carolynn made nanny's birthday cake, and Adam 'made' Trinity's cake... and we bought meringues instead of making a plate for the concert Saturday! Now Tuesday till Thursday Carolynn has production and has to be there at 6pm, we are staying to watch on Wednesday with mum and nanna... now we have to get ready to meet Stephen about Trinity's Baptism!

Today Munchen -- tomorrow Venezia

Another 'on the road' report -- we#re in Munich and going to ship (well, train) out to Venice tomorrow morning. It is a 7 hour train journey ... which hopefully means we can catch up with the sleep we've been missing! So many brauhauses (?), so little time.

It has been very much fun so far, but I can't figure out how people stay so healthy with the 'traditional' diet of bier, bratwurst, bier, rindwurst, bier and bier. And we haven't even started with the desserts! Can anyone name a famous chocolate dessert from the heart of Bavaria? (Here's a clue ... it rhymes with Spocklate Hungarian.)

I think last night was the best one so far -- we stumbled upon a friendly local who got us talking, and eating radishes, and of course drinking. So much drinking. But hey, when in Rome ... (oh wait, that's not for a couple of days yet! This is so much fun.)

Chris has booked us a hotel in London now, using one of those last minute deal websites. It#s nothing too flash ... just a 5 star hotel in the middle of London city proper!! Booyah! For not much more than the rat infested, crumbling, smelly and down right lovely places we're also going too. (Actually accomodation has been really good so far. Even Amsterdam, although a bit dodgy, added to the atmosphere of the place. And the Meininger in Munich is brilliant! It#s onlz 2 euro for .5L of the local brew, which is very tasty indeed. Argh, this kezboard is reallz getting to me now!)

Today we visited a concentration-camp -- now a shrine of remembrance for all the POWs who were incarcerated (bad spelling? Blame the Deutsche keyboard, or the Deustche bier) there by the SS over 6 years. Interested, shocking and a very weird way to start the day!

Afterwards we walked around looking for some stuff in our guide book, and accidently found several places a lot more interesting than the one we were looking for! Doing a lot of walking actually -- it will be nice to just sit on the train tomorrow morning.

Hope everyone is well and happy. I haven' sent the postcards yet, but maybe in Italia (since Dee did Italian at school and therefore IN THEORY should be able to keep us out of trouble). Not sure when we#ll be online again (as always) but looking forward to reading what everyone is doing ... feels like I#ve alreadz been away for ages!

Okay, tschüs und gutnacht all.

In Frankfurt

Gutentag! Happy birthday Dayna, we were in Brussels and celebrated for you with a bunch of backpackers at our hostel -- it was 1€ for Heinekens in the vending machine downstairs! Happy birthday to Mum also, since we might not be back online for a while, and happy birthday to Cheryl for the same reason! I hope everybody has (or had) an brilliant day with lots of fun and games and presents.

We´re currently in Frankfurt au Main ein Deutschland. It´s extremely hot here, as it was in both Bruxelles und Amsterdam -- and in Amsterdam we were in a tiny, decrepit little hostel room with three single beds ... which we ended up sleeping on top of, with the window open to the night air ... and the traffic, and the drunks and the stoners walking past. All part of the experience I suppose.

I´m going to try to get a postcard at each place we stay at and send a different one to everybody -- Damien and Cheryl will get the first, provided I can figure out how to send them!!

Okay, going to sign off now -- having issues with this Deutsch keyboard and trying to touch type!

PS. I love the new headers too! Nice work. Looking forward to the Halloween one, Dayna.

Love the new headers - again!

Thankyou for my b'day wishes.. didn't get up to much. wanted to go away for the weekend (just somewhere close and relaxing) but didn't book it early enough. d'oh! o well.. i'll just plan something for in a month or so. *grin*

I like the updated header - with Big Trin. ;) could you please send me a copy of that one? (i want to start working on a Halloween header - so I bags that one, okay?!) heheh..

hmmm.. what else have i been up to? well.. working.. lots of working.. i keep "acting" in other (more senior) roles.. and for now i'm filling in for Fletch (he's got a position in the parent department for about six months) being the Team Leader for a while (until they run a 'process' for the temporary role).. ahhh.. joys.. ;)

otherwise, i'm trying to go through my stuff and get rid of things.. i've re-organised my kitchen (with some help *grin*) and am getting rid of the purple crockery and cutlery (but i'm keeping the black stuff!).. and going through the lounge may be next.. and then the junk room.. ;) and then i'll have to have a garage sale or something to get rid of everything.. heheh..

anyway.. i'd best go.. i've got another HUGE day tomorrow - got to get the van to work for 7am or thereabouts.. blah!

hope everyone is well (now)..

*hugz*

Happy Birthday Dayna!

Happy birthday for yesterday Dayna! Sorry I didn't post then, we had a busy Saturday.. as i assume you did too? What did you do for your birthday? Did you get the present we left at Mum and Dad's house? Anyway, we hope you had an excellent day!

Quiet Bandwagon

Hey all, I just thought I'd post and ask what everyone's been up to.. it's been a bit quiet here on the old Bandwagon. For me, well I've been getting better, although I still have a cough, as do most people I know right now. I haven't had any more early morning stress though. I haven't been going to the gym, but Cheryl has been and I hope to go again next week.. although it's been really cold these last few days, and that makes my cough worse, so it'll depend on that. So basically I've been trying to stay warm and get healthy. What about you guys?

Flights to Brussels and the fast train home

We've bought our flights to Bruxelles from Glasgow - £30 each, including taxes and check-in and all that jazz.  It's on Ryanair, who are "cheep uz chups "obviously (it could cost us more to get to London from here).  Sure, the aeroplane doesn't leave from the main Glagwegian airport, and sure, it lands about 45 kilometres south of Brussels proper ... but in each case there's a train that will get us where we need to go.

Eurostar isn't as cheap as I'd originally thought, unfortunately.  £150 for a one way ticket on a Saturday, from Paris to London.  On the other hand, I think it's only £90 for a return ticket ... go figure.  Chris should also get a discount because of his Eurail pass, so that looks like what we will do.  It's still extravagant, but how often do you get to go under the Channel in an underwater train?  Doing 180 mph no less -- that's 300 kilometer per hour.

Which is fairly fast.

Signed, sealed, delivered - train tickets!

Well Tracey the lovely travel agent came through for us alright -- £750 in total for both of us, first-class tickets all the way.  We're even getting a 90 minute stop in Florence!  (Yeah, 90 minutes isn't long, but well, it's long enough to enjoy a coffee, and we can always go back.  Yay!)

It doesn't include us getting from Edinburgh to Brussels at the start of the trip, nor from Paris back to Edinburgh at the end, but we figure we can fly from Glasgow to Brussels for cheapish (hopefully!).  I want to take Eurostar under the channel when we're coming back (it's only about £40 for second-class, and it means we don't have to face Charles de Gaulle again -- it was quite harrowing the last time we were there, what with giant French policemen with even bigger automatic rifles tellings us (I assume) to go back the way we'd came (we were just looking for a taxi!).

I'll be looking at that tonight.

Exciting Morning

Well, Cheryl and I have had an exciting morning, but not in a good way. I woke up at about 6:30am with a weight and numbness in my chest, which radiated out to my arms and legs and left a weird battery taste in my mouth. I got up and was really dizzy, and then feverish. So we called an ambulance. The guys came out and checked my heart rate and blood sugar, both of which were normal, and the feeling seemed to be passing, so i decided not to go to the hospital.

However after they left it came back, and continued to wax and wane, so Cheryl booked an appointment for me at the Medical Centre for the morning. We went along and i got checked out, hooked on an ecg machine and had blood samples taken. Everything seems to be normal.. I was worried there was something wrong with my heart, since the sensation started there, but they checked everything and it's healthy. In fact apart from being sick, i'm pretty much healthy overall - the only thing wrong was that my good cholesterol levels were 0.1 under.. but my overall cholesterol levels were low anyway, so that's ok.

Unfortunately that does kind of leave the possible cause open, but the doctor thinks it's a result of the cold which i've had for the last week, so i've got some antibiotics to help with that and hopefully the two will pass together. All up it's not the nicest way to start the day.. hopefully tomorrow will start a little quieter and less stressfully.

Thanks, Tracey!

We may have figured out our travelling plans, thanks to Tracey from STA travel.

The problem, of course, was that we're in the UK and therefore don't qualify for the Eurail tickets -- Foxxy, on the other hand, can't get an Interail ticket since he's all the way over in Australia (and they cost more anyway).  And of course, whilst the Eurail tickets are first class, the Interail ones aren't.

So Tracey looked at our timings, listened to our predicament, and vowed, "As is my solemn duty, to protect and serve travellers and wayward children, I shall PRICE for you the individual first class tickets!"

Tracey clearly has a flair for the dramatic.  She's getting back to us tomorrow.  Yay!

Ticket Troubles

We're having some hassle organising our train tickets for the holiday in Europe.

Turns out that the tickets we wanted to buy -- £300 for 16 days 1st class travel through all the places we want to visit -- are only available for people who haven't lived in Europe or the United Kingdoms for 6 months.  The tickets that WE are allowed to buy are some £200 more expensive ... and cattle-class.  What, the British are so used to paying too much for trains that they're just going to take it?

Yeah, probably.

Anyway, it means we have to figure out what we're going to do, and figure it out soon.  We don't really want to travel separately, so we might look at buying each leg of the journey separately.  Dee's going into STA Travel to get their advice today.

Very annoying!

Er, no.

Oops.  Looking at the broadband bill again I think I overpaid by £5.66.

Ahem.  Please disregard my rant.

Internet Providers? Meh.

Internet connectivity hasn't gotten any easier -- ISPs are, as a general rule, either a) expensive (by locking you into a contract) or b) incompetent.  It was true in the dial-up days and it's still true.  Take my current ADSL provider -- I won't name them, but they're the only ADSL2 provider in Scotland (and maybe the whole United Kingdom) who won't ask for a minimum 6 month contract.  And they rhyme with "spooltog".

When we moved, I rang up to get my account transferred to the new address.  Nope, can't do that -- I need to cancel the old one then reapply for the new one.  So I do that (or so I think).  It takes weeks to get the new connection, and then I finally logon to check my old account ... and I still owe £5.66 for the last four days of the month.  When I wasn't in the house.  How does that go again?

The customer call centre has been outsourced (can you guess to where?) and they don't have any connection to the finance department ... even to the point of transferring my call.  So I get a double-dose of the 15 minutes waiting on phone whilst inane pop music rings tinnilly in my ear.  I'm just glad I've got a headset, and can mute the microphone and actually continue working.

Why must it be this way??

Bendigo Photos

Here are some photos, as promised. We put in the one of us with Trinity to demonstrate what happens whenever anybody else but Lisa Carolynn or Jared tries to hold her. Mum and Dad look like it's under control, but she was on the way out :)

And here's a photo of Jared making a silly face.. I told you i'd put it on the internet ;)

Finally this fine photo is William in the hat I made him :)

Damien and Cheryl's visit

We 'celebrated' Trinity's birthday first, (by opening the pressie from Uncle Damien and Aunty Cheryl) Then it was Cheryl's turn (she got to open a pressie from us) Trinity got a big book of first words with great pictures (of trousers and pants heheh) We gave Cheryl a set of knitting looms. It was really cool, she and Damien got some wool from mum and had a go. Damien made a hat for William and Cheryl started a hat for Charlotte (Damien finished because he used the smallest loom) I'd bought a set for us as well, and Carolynn and Jared have been loom knitting too. I couldn't resist getting a photo :)