Settled

From the time my stuff was delivered to getting everything sorted and settled, it took me less than a week. In large part that was due to the fact that I forced the issue by having a house warming on Friday, 4 days after delivery. The house warming went well. I made some beer brats and cheese dogs on my grill. We can check the grill off the list of things to test. It successfully held burning charcoal briquettes while simultaneously hold raw meat mere inches above those.

Even though I have only been there about a week, the new place feels like a home already. I'm sure it has a lot to do with the fact that I have all of my stuff for the first time since March, but more than that I just really like the neighborhood and set up of my place. It has everything it needs and nothing else. I wouldn't want anything bigger or smaller. It is perfectly sized for what I need it for. Not only that, but it is dead quiet. I live at the end of a dead-end street and the opposite side of the house is a bike/running trail. Yes, I can hear footsteps and music from my neighbor above, but there is no outside noise. It's almost strange how quiet it gets, but I love it.

Another thing I really like is the kitchen. For the first time, I have a convection oven. I'm still learning the ropes on that one, but the fact that I can cook a deep dish pizza in 8 minutes is awesome. It has led to a fair amount of burning, but I've already gotten the hang of it for cooking fish and other meats. I plan on testing out how well it fares with bread tomorrow at my first weekly TV-on-DVD night in the UK. Wednesdays are no longer workable due to open gym basketball night, but Tuesdays are just as good. I made a ton of chili yesterday. So much chili, in fact, that not all of it fit into the refrigerator and I had to freeze half of it. I think that marks the first time I have ever made something fresh and put it into the freezer. Hopefully it doesn't end up sitting in there for the next couple of years.


Other than organizing, cleaning, and loving my new place, I haven't really been up to much. I did have a chance to go to some friends' place for a Tour de Franzia party this past Saturday. Basically, you dress like a bicyclist and drink boxed wine. The goal is to get through all of the stages (different types) in the fastest time. Like what often happens when I plan on only having "one or two" but don't have a good reason for setting that limit for myself, I had a lot more. I don't really consider myself to be too competitive, but I do consider myself to be skilled at taking advantage of the situation. I took about 20 minutes to drink my first glass of wine and the next closest person was on their third. By the time I hit 3, most people were on 6. By the time I hit 6, most people were on 7. When all was said and done, I finished second. I think they should re-write Aesop's Tortoise and the Hare fable to cover drinking for speed. It applies.

Coming up this week, a friend from Hawaii who is now in Australia will be visiting. We are going to spend a couple of days in Northern England followed by a few days in Ireland. After that, it's back to the US for about 10 days for a conference and a wedding. This summer is flying by.

Pictures and Video of My New Flat

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I moved in. It's done. The video is post-cleaning inside, pre-yard work, and pre-delivery of all my stuff.

I am at the library now since my internet doesn't work, but I will include some updates soon. I think if I get this published I can type out the rest on my phone. Not fun, but do-able.

Flat

Things here have started to level out. I don't have my house yet, but I'm pushing for next week still. I stopped by the house today to take another look. The yard has really fallen into disrepair. The grass and bushes are very overgrown and there is garbage everywhere. I will have a project ahead of me, but that's the fun of home (or flat, I suppose, but I do have a tiny yard) ownership, right? It beats paying the £80 per month that I would have forked over at the other place for grounds maintenance fees. Mowing the grass once a week should not cost that much.

At any rate, Wednesday July 8th is what I am hoping for. I spoke to my solicitor today and he said the paperwork should be ready to sign by then, but I won't be able to move in until at least the 10th. I will pester him more on Monday and see if I can't get that changed. I would really like to move in as soon as possible. These next two months are going to be very busy.

Nothing too exciting going on here. I've been hanging out quite a bit with the same crowd. They all live within a couple of blocks, so I'm not sure what is going to happen when I move a mile and a half away. It doesn't sound far, but it's way farther than two blocks.

The only items of interest I have to add are that I went to a Medieval Faire a couple of weeks ago in Knaresborough. Not quite as exciting as I was hoping. It was more geared toward children (note the dragon), but it was free, so I can't complain there.

Not very scary. There were some people dressed up in Medieval clothing. That's pretty amusing.

This is what toilets (called a garderobe) looked like in Medieval times. There was a sloped schute would help everything roll out into the river. Midgets or children would crawl up the exit hatch to sneak into castles and prep the doors before an invasion. My question: why not put a metal rod through the middle of the schute? Another interesting tidbit: they used the garderobe to store clothing. The smell kept the moths away.

Awkward wedding photo?

I've also had two flat tires (3 if you include my flat spare tire when I pulled it out of the trunk) in three weeks. I don't think I've ever had a flat before coming here. Today I had a huge screw puncture my tire. It was about a quarter inch across. Luckily my spare tire (which was actually the tire that was flat a few weeks ago) had air this time. Unfortunately, there was no saving my tire. I had to order a new one. Although I could risk not getting a new tire, my recent experience has taught me that I should not. It's just really strange that I never had a flat before coming here. Until the day before I sold my Honda in Hawaii I didn't think that it came with a jack. Since 2001 I had been driving that car convinced that if I got a flat I was plain out of luck. Word to the wise: crafty engineering means that jacks can be stashed in a panel that looks like it should lead to your tail light. Another piece of wisdom: if you clean your car more than once every 8 years, you may discover things like that sooner than I did.

I also wanted to mention that I have been doing CrossFit for about 6 weeks now and it works. It's a fairly new fad, but a good one. It involves a lot of pull-ups and Olympic style lifts, but it's all about intensity. The intensity makes it a good cardiovascular workout. This past Wednesday night I played two hours of basketball without getting winded. Three months ago I probably wouldn't have lasted 20 minutes without being doubled over. If you hate being winded from climbing stairs but also hate running, I recommend looking into it.

Happy Independence (from the Brits, ironically) Day!

London

Queen Elizabeth II. Check out her title at the end of the post.

London Bridge, staying up.

I had this past Friday off and was able to take a trip to London. I was in the locker room at the gym on Monday and they were talking about how Billy Elliot had won some Tonys the past weekend. Since I had Friday off and loved the movie, I decided that it was a great opportunity to get down there. The play was pretty good, but I preferred the movie. It's hard to get into something with a lot of singing in it. The movie was believable and did what a movie was supposed to do: it convinced me that the characters were real and I was able to relate to them. In the play/musical, that wasn't the case. Every time something big happened, it turned into a song. I don't know about you, but have never once in my life spontaneously burst into song before/during/after a particularly sad/happy/funny event.

The trip was very compact. I arrived by train a few hours before the show on Friday. I spent the whole day Saturday on my feet and moving. I was able to make it to most of the "must-do" tourist sites. I had a bit of luck when I showed up for the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace. As it turned out, it was the Queen's Birthday. I got to the palace about an hour before the "Trooping of the Colour" ceremony began and I moved up to about five people from the front. I saw the Queen, the entire royal family, and a lengthy military passing in review complete with the old uniforms, horses, and clanking swords. I couldn't help but laugh a few hours later when I was at the National Gallery and I saw a painting from the 1700s of a similar ceremony at Buckingham Palace. The palace, uniforms, and equipment looked exactly in the same in the 1700s as they did that morning.

Besides Buckingham Palace, the Saturday highlights included Westminster Abbey, Parliament, Big Ben, the Tate Museum, the National Gallery, the National Portrait Gallery, the British Museum, the London Bridge, and Hyde Park. I was also able to make a walk past the V&A Museum, Natural History Museum, and Science Museum later that evening in preparation for Sunday, as well. After such a busy day I slept well, despite the fact that I was in a hostel room with 27 other guys and someone was playing with my foot (which was hanging into the walkway as the bed was too short and I had to squeeze my feet under the bunk bed bars) at 4:00am.

Sunday was less eventful. My train left at 2:00pm, so I was hoping to make it to 2-3 museums before I had to leave. Unfortunately, the underground was more or less shut down. It took me 2 hours and a lot of changing of plans just to get to my first destination. By that time, I figured I would be better off making my way to King's Cross just order to avoid missing my train.

I made it back to Harrogate in time to meet some friends for dinner. All in all, it was a really nice weekend.

The Rosetta Stone.

Big Ben

Apparently they made a movie about me. I love my reviews.

Yes, the mummies and 5,000 year old statues were cool, but I especially like the roof at the British Museum.

Westminster Abbey

Trooping of the Colour, Buckingham Palace (The Queen and entire royal family are in this picture. Look closely.)

As promised, here is the queen's official title, at the time of crowning, as per Wikipedia:

Her Majesty Elizabeth the Second, by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, Ireland and the British Dominions beyond the Seas Queen, Defender of the Faith, Duchess of Edinburgh, Countess of Merioneth, Baroness Greenwich, Duke of Lancaster, Lord of Mann, Duke of Normandy, Sovereign of the Most Honourable Order of the Bath, Sovereign of the Most Ancient and Most Noble Order of the Thistle, Sovereign of the Most Illustrious Order of Saint Patrick, Sovereign of the Most Distinguished Order of Saint Michael and Saint George, Sovereign of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire, Sovereign of the Distinguished Service Order, Sovereign of the Imperial Service Order, Sovereign of the Most Exalted Order of the Star of India, Sovereign of the Most Eminent Order of the Indian Empire, Sovereign of the Order of British India, Sovereign of the Indian Order of Merit, Sovereign of the Order of Burma, Sovereign of the Royal Order of Victoria and Albert, Sovereign of the Royal Family Order of King Edward VII, Sovereign of the Order of Mercy, Sovereign of the Order of Merit, Sovereign of the Order of the Companions of Honour, Sovereign of the Royal Victorian Order, Sovereign of the Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of St John of Jerusalem.

And if that wasn't enough, here are the some she has acquired since gaining the crown in 1953:

Sovereign of the Order of Canada, Sovereign of the Order of Australia, Sovereign of the Order of New Zealand, Sovereign of the Order of Barbados, Sovereign of the Order of Valour, Sovereign of the Order of Military Merit, Sovereign of the Order of Merit of the Police Forces, Sovereign of the Queen's Service Order, Sovereign of the New Zealand Order of Merit, Sovereign of the Order of St. Andrew, Sovereign of the Order of Logohu, Sovereign of the Order of the Star of Melanesia.

Believe it or not, the list goes on. Her business cards must be super annoying.

Almost Home...

I will be at the very end of this street.

I will soon have a house here in Harrogate. It's not the place I previously posted about, but there is a story behind that. To begin with, I was never extremely excited about the flat with the holes in the doors and no appliances in the kitchen. I was looking at it as an investment. With some work, I think I could have sold it in a few years for a decent profit. I still think that's the case, but I needed a place to live in the near term. Judging from how slow the speed of business is here, I could have been waiting to move into that place for months while the flooring was getting done or the cooker getting installed. Plus, it was right underneath some gigantic power lines, had no assigned parking, no outside storage, and was in a somewhat crowded neighborhood. It felt like an apartment, basically.

Living room with gas fireplace.

The realtor really messed up my bid on that first place, as well. I placed my bid over the phone on a Thursday because I was in Germany. On Saturday I called them back to see what sort of progress they were making. They had no news for me. I asked if there was anything I could do to speed up the process and the guy recommended that I bring in my mortgage in principal (pre-approval) paperwork. Even then he didn't make it sound like it was necessary, just that it would be helpful. I walked the paperwork over to their office that Saturday morning. The following Tuesday I called the bank that is providing the mortgage to let them know that I might be getting a place. The lender said that I should have been notified already of their decision, so she called the realtor for me. She called me back in a few minutes and told me that the realtor needed my mortgage in principal paperwork before they could place the bid on my behalf. By that point I was very frustrated. I called the realtor back and told them that they already had my paperwork. I told them to submit my bid. They finally did, but then called me back to tell me that someone submitted a bid before me. Long story short, I had to give an update with my "best and final offer" before noon the next day. At this point I really didn't want the realtor to get the commission, so I called the other realtor that had the property listed, but they didn't seem to be any more helpful.

Front of house.

During lunch that day at work I started looking online again for a 2 bedroom place in Harrogate. I found one at the very peak of my price range, but I immediately liked it. It had a garden (yard), it's own parking, a bbq pit, a gas fire place (just the idea of having a fire place makes me look forward to the cold winters with their 20 hours of darkness each day so that I have a reason to use it.), and it was in move in condition. When I got home from work I looked at the place again. The price had been lowered that afternoon by £5,000. At that point I knew that I wanted the place and that I had to get my bid in quickly. I set up a viewing appointment with the realtor and drove to the house to look through the windows that night.

Side of house abuts "push bike" / walking path

The next day I submitted my "best and final offer" on the first place, which was less than my first offer by £5,500. I'd still live there if I got a great deal on the place, but I was pretty sure that the offer wouldn't be accepted. (Apparently the other one wasn't either; the place is still listed). I also took a look at the new place. It was in good condition. Not great, but definitely move-in ready. I put in my bid for the full asking price. It ended up that someone else put in a bid that day as well, so it went back to the "best and final offer" stage. I raised my bid by £2,010. That evening I found out that my bid was accepted (even though the other person's bid was apparently higher) and now I am on my way to having a place to live!

I'm shooting for a move in date of July 8th, but I was already told not to get my hopes up. Things move slowly here, like I said before.

Side "garden" (yard) with storage sheds, sun deck, and brick bbq.

Kitchen with shattered window.

In other news, I am starting to meet more people and am really enjoying my job. This past weekend I went on a "house crawl." Basically, it's a pub crawl except to people's homes instead of pubs. I joined about halfway through the evening, but I soon caught up. It was a lot of fun, but the night ended badly for my phone. As I was walking home from the last house at around 1:30am, I got a strong urge to listen to Neil Young (I have a tendency to listen to American folk music a lot more regularly when I am in a foreign place). To quench my urge, I grabbed my 3 week old iPhone from my pocket, but the little guy was slippery like a fishy. It jumped out of my hands and onto the sidewalk. Everyone knows the saying, "liquor then beer, you're in the clear; beer then liquor, never been sicker." A less known piece of wisdom is, "beer, then shots, then a mixed drink, then more beer, then some wine, followed by eating all of the taco toppings after the shells ran out, then an urge to listen to Neil Young while walking home in the dark kills your iPhone." It's catchy, I know. Ironically, as Kate pointed out, Apple just announced their new iPhone yesterday and the lowering of their prices on their old models. It is going to cost me more to fix my iPhone in the UK than it would cost me to buy a brand new one in the US. Bullocks.


Something positive that came out of the house crawl was the fact that I know where half a dozen people live now. On Sunday I ate dinner with some friends and came to find that I had a flat tire afterwards. No worries, I had a full sized spare in the trunk. As my luck would have it, that was flat too. I looked up the nearest service station on my GPS, picked up the tire, and started walking. An hour later I was still walking. What I didn't know before I started is that there are no service stations in Harrogate. It was amazing. I went to the three nearest places listed in my GPS and they had all recently been converted into something else. Just as I was considering my next move, I noticed that I was standing two houses down from one of the places I visited during the house crawl! I knocked on the door and borrowed a bicycle pump and got a ride to my car. After a quick tire change, I was off and running.

That is the major news from the weekend. I have Friday off this week, so I am taking the train down to London for a weekend there. I've never been there before and I am looking forward to it. I am going to the play Billy Elliot on Friday night. I think that is one of my favorite movies of all time, so I'm guessing the play should be pretty entertaining as well. I have nothing else planned at this point, so I will have to tear into my Lonely Planet on the train.

York Minster (it doesn't have anything to do with this post, but I walked past it the other week when I was out)

Cloudy Germany, Sunny England

I spent last week in Germany for a work trip. I get to go there every three months in order to check up on some of my people there. This time around I didn't spend any extra time there since I just took over two days before I left for Germany. However, in the future I plan on spending at least a long weekend there after every trip.

Germany was good, but since I was working I didn't get to see much. I did have some time on the last day as my flight was in the evening. I went to Heidelberg castle and the Gutenberg museum. The castle in it's current form was built in the mid 1700's. It's claim to fame is having the world's largest wine cask. How big is that, you ask? Just over 58,500 gallons. It is absurdly large and not functional. After only a year or two of use, it started to rot from the inside (they were never able to fully fill it) and it was too expensive to fix. From then on it was empty.


The Gutenberg museum is home to the first books ever printed. Unfortunately they didn't allow any photography, so you'll just have to take my word for it: they were old. The exact date of printing isn't known, but somewhere between 1452-5 Gutenberg started making Bibles. The first ones, which the museum had 3 of, are called B42 (Bible with 42 lines on each page). The museum also had a large selection of other printed works from the 1450's through today. My favorites were the pictures from the 1400-1600's. A lot of them looked like cartoon drawings from today, but (to put it in perspective) some were created when Christopher Columbus was a young boy; almost 40 years before sailing to America. For some reason I always imagine people from the distant past to be angry and without a sense of humor; however, a good number of the pictures had people smiling, making faces, or doing something funny. Maybe it is just that famous German sense of humor that is timeless and unstoppable.

I got back to England last Thursday night and the weather has been amazing. Super sunny, warm air, and almost no wind. It's a bit of perfect, as the Brits (or is it the Aussies?) say. As I mentioned an earlier post, Harrogate is a city of parks. What I didn't mention (because I had no idea) is how crowded the parks get when the weather is nice. It's like every living creature instinctively swarms the the manicured grass and flowers. I have never seen so many pale, shirtless hungover men in my life. I'm generalizing a bit here, but the Brits like to drink. It doesn't really matter where they are or what time of day it is. Walking past pubs at 9:00am on a Sunday, one would assume that it would be empty. In the US, if you saw someone drunk at that time of day you would probably think them to be a college student preparing to attend a sporting event or a raging alcoholic levelling out the shakes. But here, respectable looking people in collared shirts and expensive shoes are cranking away at drinking off their hangovers. No day of rest for them. Later in the afternoon they mosey on over to the park, take off their shirts and sun their white bellies. Their bloated faces are doubly assaulted by the alcohol and sun; it makes for some red faces.


In regards to the question of where I will be living, I put in a bid on a flat (apartment) last Thursday. It definitely needs some work, but it only has holes in the doors, not the walls like the place in Leeds. The carpet is old, dirty, and bunched up all over. Under that are those old white tiles that measure 1'x1' and are most often found in schools built in the 1960's. If I buy it, I would plan on replacing all of the flooring with wood, maybe bamboo. Some of the walls are painted (badly, but that's easily fixed) and some of the walls are wallpapered (also badly and not as easily fixed). There are a couple of spots in the cupboards (closets) where the cement wall is flaking off. The kitchen doesn't have any appliances; no hob (stove), cooker (oven), or refrigerator. There is some water damage in the second bedroom and mold. Hopefully it is just where the last people dried their clothes and not an issue with the foundation or window framing. All in all, it seems livable. Hopefully the realtor gets back to me in the next day or two regarding my bid. I went 5% lower than their asking price and the place has been on the market since last fall. It's a repossession.


Lastly, here is a short video of some bagpipers playing in the park next to my flat. Notice how perfect the weather was for a Sunday afternoon. I read three Mitch Albom books this past week (even though I wasn't a huge fan of any of them) and I started on some Mark Twain short stories today after the bagpipers finished playing. I'm starting to do the same thing I did when I was in Japan: reading too much and not wandering in my new surroundings. I hope to fix that next weekend with a trip to... somewhere.

England So Far

Things have been moving along in England. S...L...O...W...L...Y... Maybe I am just more impatient than I ever realized, but it seems that there are a lot of steps involved in order to get anything accomplished here. Part of the impatience on my part is that I want to buy a house or flat. It is a time consuming process and I would like to get settled sooner than later. There were a lot of steps along the path to buying a place that I glossed over in the planning. When I got hung up on my inability to get a bank account, pre-approved for a mortgage (called a "mortgage in principal" here), phone, and car quickly, it threw a monkey wrench in the whole planning time line.

It took me two weeks, but I finally have a bank account, cell phone (I got an iPhone; it's so good), and a car. I still haven't found a place to live permanently, but I am in a one bedroom apartment for the time being, renting month to month. Since I only got a car a few days ago, I only had yesterday to look at properties. The number one thing I learned is that actually going to the place and walking around the neighborhood is crucial. There are some nice looking houses that are in miserable neighborhoods. On the flip side, some pictures don't do some places justice.

My original plan was to buy a place for around £60,000, but there really isn't much in that range that is livable. My new target is to buy for under £90,000. Even at that price, the search isn't easy. Historically, at lot of the places I am looking at were only 1/3 of their current price 10-15 years ago. The past year has seen about a 20% reduction in real estate value, but many analysts suggest that the housing prices in Great Britain will continue to fall (some say by another 50%).

This is what £55,000 will get you in Leeds. I'm tempted, but it's in bad shape. Note the hole in the wall in the guest bathroom.

I understand that I could be making a costly mistake by buying here, but let me go on record as saying that I understand that and am willing to take the risk. Right now the pound is fairly weak against the dollar. For the past few years it has been around $2 to the £1. Right now the exchange rate is at about $1.55 to the £1. Who knows, maybe the pound will tank against the dollar, but historically, the current level seems to be the equilibrium. As you may have guessed, I'm hoping we get back to the $2/£1 in a couple of years when I will be looking to sell. At any rate, there is my line of thinking. If you ever hear me complaining that I made a bad decision, just refer me back to here.

Enough business time, right? How is England? In a word, it's cool. Cold on some days. It does rain a lot, but not in a bad way. It's also quite nice on most days when it's not raining. The temperature is lower than I thought it would be. I only brought one pair of jeans, so I have worn those every single day so far. I haven't washed them since I've been here, either, which is cool. The pants are starting to become shaped like my legs even when I'm not wearing them.

Back on topic. Ok, so cars here are cheap. I was thinking about buying a BMW, but there wasn't much room on the inside. I also looked at a Hyundai Sonata, but the seller's paperwork was messed up. In fact, the majority of the paperwork on all of the cars was wrong. Great Britain's nit-picky system of constantly filling out forms does not mean things are done right administratively, it just means that people go around the rules in order to avoid the bother. On every car I looked at (which is about 10), the paperwork was wrong. The strange part is that on many occasions I had to explain why I wouldn't buy a car from someone when their name wasn't on the title. People would get upset with me because they thought I was insinuating that the car was stolen. And don't even get me started on customer service here. I walked out on buying a Honda Accord I wanted because the dealer was flat out rude. Anyway, I got so sick of searching for a car that I eventually bought one without even really looking at it. I went straight to the paperwork and it was all correct! I got so excited that I bought it. I didn't even sit in the car. Stupid, right? Yes, it was. The car smells like smoke, the radio doesn't work, the power windows don't work, and it didn't even have the floor mats in it. But, I do have a car. A 2001 Daewoo Lanos. I could have bought a 1998 or 1999 BMW 318 for the same price, but I didn't. Hopefully it was the right choice. Believe it or not, the cost to insure the BMW was about $15 a month cheaper. I don't understand that at all. The Lanos seems to be an ok car, but I have to down shift any time I come to an incline. 1.3 liters doesn't make for a large engine unless it is in a riding lawn mower.


I'm off topic again... England... Lots of stones; houses are all made of stones. So are the fences. If you could see how many stone fences there are, I don't think you would be able to imagine a stone being left over anywhere in the country. Not to mention the thousands of hours of work to build the fences. Thousands of miles of stone fences. I went on a 15 mile walk today in a place called Nidderdale and was most impressed by the number of stones I saw. Countless... There are sheep everywhere. Literally everywhere. I heard today that an adult sheep only costs £14 here. That's about $25. I'm not sure how much a sheep weighs exactly, but that seems like a lot of meat for a low price. Plus you could make an awesome sweater in the process.... The roads are insanely narrow. When you drive through some of these old towns, which could be a thousand years old or even older, you realize that 1) city planners didn't exist during England's glory days and 2) no one ever suspected cars would be so wide. Also, you can park almost anywhere. It's great if you want to pop in and buy something at a store (which no doubt closes at 5:00pm... even most "convenience" stores do.), but it makes driving through the already narrow streets even more interesting... Parks are also abundant. The city I am in right now, Harrogate, is famous for it's parks, but they all seem to be so well kept. Flower beds, trees, ponds, stone walks, and well manicured grass. I think they must have more grounds keepers here, per capita, then anywhere else I have ever been.


I guess that is it for today. I need to get some rest. This will be a big week for me. Up until know I have been hanging out trying to learn my job by watching, but starting this Friday the person I am replacing will be gone. I need to start asking more questions, but I am ready to take over. Oh, yeah; I'm going to Germany the following week. That should be fun as well.

HI / AU / NZ / IL / NY / UK

I flew a few hundred miles shy of 40,000 in the month of April. That's equivalent to circling the earth at the equator over one and a half times. I am happy to report that I have arrived to my final destination of England. The reason for all of the flying is that besides moving overseas, I took about three weeks in Australia and New Zealand on the way. It was a great trip. At a glance: I read some books (Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Of Mice and Men, The Maltese Falcon, Slapstick), I went to some museums in Auckland and Wellington (partly because the weather on the North Island didn’t allow me to do my planned mountain biking trip), and I met up with old friends and made some new ones.

One of the highlights was definitely renting a car and buzzing around New Zealand’s South Island for 5 days with a British guy, Lewis, that I met the night before the trip started. We slept in the car and ate sandwiches of olives and sardines and "tasty" (i.e. sharp) cheese. Travel was a bit problematic due to the Easter holiday, when the whole country gets two weeks off. Once we figured out that sleeping in the car was a good bet, we didn’t worry too much about lodging. On our trip we saw a lot of the Lord of the Rings scenery, quoted a lot of the Flight of the Concords, and traded the names of good movies and bands. We also spent some time on the Fox and Franz Josef Glaciers, hiked around Mt. Cook, and participated in some "extreme" sports. I went skydiving and he went bungey jumping in Queenstown.

In Australia, I was able to get together with an old friend from work, Patrick. He is working down there and it worked out that we spent one weekend around Sydney and another around Canberra. We were able to catch an Australian rules football match, spend some (read: a lot) time in the pubs, and talk about the past/present/future.

After that it was a couple of days in Hawaii to finish up the moving business. That ended last week. Leaving was inevitable and I had time to prepare for it, so I was ready to move on. It’s really only when things are shocking that we are deeply affected, I suppose. I did everything I wanted to do and said my good-byes. I can’t imagine a better place to have been for the last three and a half years. I will always have happy memories of Hawaii, but I am really happy to be in England, as well.

The moves from Hawaii went well. Even when you have professional movers, moving is a time consuming process. I pulled more all-nighters in March than in the rest of my time in Hawaii combined. Say what you will about procrastination, but I somehow manage to get everything done just in time. When I was shipping my stuff, I was given an estimated time of arrival by the moving company of 9:00am. I finished what I needed to do about 12 seconds after that. There is no minute as productive as the last one.

I am very excited to be overseas (in the foreign sense, not the island sense of the word) again. I will be living and working in Yorkshire. I will be working in Harrogate, but I think that I am going to live in Leeds. All of the Brits I met over the past few weeks were well fond of Leeds. Plus, the cost of living is much much lower. In fact, it looks like I will be able to buy a place. The only question is if I get a newer, bigger place just outside the city or if I get an older, smaller place in the city itself. Both have benefits and drawbacks. While I would like to be in the downtown area, the flat I get would have more maintenance and heating/cooling costs associated. Outside of the city I might feel like I’m living in the suburbs, which I don’t find particularly appealing. I think I will try to get a place just north of the city on the metro line. A fair compromise. Whatever happens, I think that I will be living alone for the first time in my life. I have always had roommates. I love having roommates. The thought of coming home to an empty house is a bit disheartening. Especially in the dark, cold, wet England winters; however, I’m sure I will get used to the idea. I have been out of college for almost 5 years now, so maybe it’s time to take the next step in being an adult. If I get lonely I can always buy a robotic dog. Now there’s a genuinely depressing idea.

Unfortunately, my grandmother died this past Sunday, but I was fortunate enough to be able to attend the funeral. She was a great little old lady. She could remember dates and names like no one I’ve ever met. I used to love listening to her stories about the 1930’s and 1940’s. She could tell you who she was with, what they ate for lunch, and how much it cost (and how much she saved because she used a coupon). I will miss her, but I think it was just her time. Right up to the end she lived at home and continued going on her casino trips and bingo nights. She avoided the nursing home, even at 90 years old, so that’s something to be thankful for.

After the funeral, I spent about 5 days in New York. I stayed with Kate in the city and then we went Upstate to plant some trees on my land. Unfortunately, the 24 trees I bought from the online nursery were shipped two days after they were promised to arrive. Despite my multiple emails and phone calls telling them that I couldn't use the trees unless I had them by Saturday, they had them arrive the following Tuesday. Nice work. From the sounds of it, they aren't going to refund my money, either.

Despite the problems from the nursery, Kate and I were able to get up to the land for a day. I bought two trees from Walmart and planted those, along with a bunch of other plants in a little garden. Hopefully they take. A word to the wise about digging a hole: use a shovel. I learned the hard way that sticks and rocks are not as affective. Due to multiple factors (lack of shovel, heavy rain, flies, and a need to cook our food), we took an extra trip to Walmart to get some needed supplies. In the end, it was a good trip, albeit a short one and missing the apple, cherry, pear, almond, and walnut trees I ordered over a week prior. But I'm not bitter or anything.

That brings me to England. I had a lot of connecting flights on the way and my luggage was "held up" by the airline (it just arrived a few minutes ago; 24 hours late), but I arrived well rested and hit the ground running. I have appointments tomorrow to get bank accounts established, apply for a mortgage pre-approval, and test drive a couple of cars. I am also trying to view a couple of flats and get a cell phone (I think I'm caving and going with the iPhone...), but I haven't had as much luck organizing those.

So far everything over here is very nice. The city of Harrogate is exactly what I thought England would look like. Lots of big stone houses, beautiful gardens, and old people queuing for buses.