Tuesday, April 01, 2008

View from the island

as most of you know we are on the move to the Isle of Lewis
we have started a joint blog about our journey!

go to view from the island

Tuesday, October 16, 2007

Pictures

I have been having fun with a new camera recently - and seeing as we seem to have been all over the place recently here are some links to the pictures. Click on to picture to get to our flickr account

firstly a few days with in the in-laws!













then off for a tour of the Highlands and Westerns Isles of Scotland


















then off to Treyarnon Bay in Cornwall with 60 people to celebrate our friends 40th - taking over the YHA







you may spot a theme emerging!

Friday, September 21, 2007

travels so far or not so far ....

On Wednesday morning we set off bright and early in our van (Evie) for adventures up north. This was the test for Evie as the furthest she has been so far is Hampshire!

We sailed up the M5 - with a quick pit stop In sunny Birmingham to collect bits for a friend and see where Gayle grew up (other highlights included Adam's old stomping ground and the Villa ground!). We made brilliant headway up to Dumfries and stayed in a awesome campsite in the Mabie Forest - where you can stay in a roundhouse, tee-pee, bunkhouse or your own tent or van. the site comes complete with compost loos and wood-fired hot tub and sauna - which was great! Pictures to follow.

Thursday morning we set off and as we stopped in Hamilton there was a strange clunking sound and Evie refused to get into gear... both of us felt slightly nervous but decided best ignore these things!! but by just north of Glasgow there was no getting her into gear and so i surrendered and Gayle called the AA - a "very nice man" arrived (who thought we were travellers!! how many travellers belong to the AA??) who did everything he could but there was nothing else for it - we had to take her to a garage... this the day before the Scottish bank holiday!!
we had visions of being stranded in Glasgow until Tuesday - not quite the plan!
Amazingly though the garage had the van fixed by this afternoon and we will be back on the road tomorrow after sampling some of Glasgow's nightlife tonight.
As i drove Evie through Glasgow i did ask myself why had i not got the gear box seen to earlier as it is now quite easy to drive!!!
Frank is not sure what to make of all the comings and goings!

Thursday, September 13, 2007

yoofs

On Monday at work I was delivering to a house in an nice town we all know - and encountered a group of young people spitting and shouting racist comments at an elderly Asian woman.
Being the shy retiring type ,i decided to intervene and got into a bit of an argument with the young men. at the time it seemed the right thing to do - i couldn't walk past and let them treat that person like that, but afterwards my heart was racing and i was not quite so convinced as to the sensible-ness of my actions!

the interaction with the young men started with just challenging 4 of them but the group grew rapidly to 10 and all of them were wanting to take me on!! somehow i managed to talk my way of of them all attacking me but given recent media coverage of young people attacking those that challenge their behaviour maybe i was lucky rather than a skilled linguist!

the good part is the woman was extremely grateful for my intervention and the young people left! but i still feel quite shaken by the incident.

Friday, August 03, 2007

What would you do?

there is an elderly woman (in her 70's / 80's) in a large supermarket chain and when she gets to the medicine aisle you see her open her handbag take an item of the shelf and hide it under her purse and then walk away.

So what would you do...

a. tell a member of staff

b. approach her and say what you have just seen

c. ignore it - she's old and might not have much money

would your answer be the same if she had stolen an item of food rather than medicine?

Friday, June 08, 2007

Wychwood 2007

Last weekend we went off to our festival of the season - a new one to us: Wychwood

It was excellent a good time to chill out - with some decent music and beer and company! and even a good cup of tea and slice of cake were available
more photos can be seen here

Thursday, May 31, 2007

Onion

Gayle showed me the Onion website with clips from ONN
there is a news article on Gap Kids clothing on her blog but this one caught my eye! Excellent


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