Only 11 pay days to Christmas

Hello reader.

Before you know it, a new year has arrived and we're half way through the first month. Apologies for not updating this recently - have been rather busy.

The house is furnished now having spent days screwing beds, cabinets and tables together and my first visitor, Pete stayed with me over new year. He arrived early Xmas morning so I was up at 4am driving down to Heathrow. I saw only 6 cars and myself on the 50 mile motorway trip to London - me and 5 other fools. I can only guess that the others had were making a very worthwhile trip like me.

Whilst here, Pete quickly got acquainted with the local lads in the village. Discovered and got hooked on darts.........Didn't like losing. Took him to a freefall parachute place on Boxing Day where he 'flew' inside a chamber in which a huge blast of air kept him airborne. My Xmas gift for him - needless to say he loved it.

More here - http://www.airkix.com/pix_flix/flix_advert1.asp

Another trip to Heathrow this Xmas week to collect another guest, Lisa again. Lovely. I had been feeling lonely but now I had 2 close people here with me.

Did some sightseeing around the place and spent NYE in the local pub.

After new year, had to return to work so came with me each day and hit the Underground for central London each day.

We went and saw The Mousetrap one evening which was great. Performance number 22,000 and something after 52 yrs

Next week was spent in Glasgow, me working, guests sightseeing. I have to say that Glasgow always sounded dodgy to me but I really liked it - so much so that I'm back here now for another weeks work - as I type there is snow falling outside - not much but enough to remind you that its a cold place.

Time quickly came to return to Heathrow to let Lisa return home to the warm. Pete and I drove on to Wiltshire so he could visit his grandmother on his Mum's side. As we were early, we visited Bath - had a great day there

Next day, back to Heathrow again to send Pete back to the warm.

So, everyone is in the warm except me - as I said I'm currently back in Glasgow with work finishing what we started a couple of weeks ago. And things are looking worse - next gig could be a month in Sweden soon - Mick over to you for band suggestions...

Lots of wild and woolly weather this week - gales have sunk ships, uprooted trees and even caused a dozen or so deaths. Worst storm in 17 yrs apparently.

And England actually beat someone at cricket......how bad must the Kiwis be feeling....?

Well, onwards and upwards. Now that things are settling after Xmas visitors and work is less frantic, will keep you all posted more often

Cheers

Aussie Paul

Change of Plans

Hello again faithful reader. 2006 is ticking away fast. Hard to believe I've been here for 4 months - tempus fugit and all that.

More news on the housing front. The place that I applied for via a real estate agent in the local village actually came through. So I move into the Old Chapel this Saturday. Had to unravle the private arrangements that I'd made for the place in Chacombe but that was painless. Bought a load of stuff at the weekend to kit the place out. Should be ok there - short walk round the corner to Mums and of course the pub. Everything revolves around that place here. Anyone who's watch Coronation St or Eastenders would see a similarity ......

Pete arrives in around 10 days so thats great news.

The weather report - its around 10C at night and 12C during the day - very windy though. Gale force in fact. There seems to be a gale for 3 days then calm for 3 days.

Good to see England doing well on the first day of the Perth test. I wonder how they will engineer a loss at this one?

Next update when something happens.

Aussie Paul

Jingle Bells

Hi again all. Christmas is coming, the goose is getting fat etc. Things are gathering pace as the annual shopping frenzy kicked in at the weekend. Tried to drive to the local town (Banbury) for a spot of essential item purchasing and couldn't get near the place as there was traffic gridlock. Waited for a while and then did a U turn and put plan B into action - you guessed it - pint of Guinness at the pub.

I've been busy house hunting still - decided to rent rather than buy so have looked at a few places with little or no luck. One place I'd always liked when visiting this part of the world was empty but I found it was uninhabitable since the roof leaked really badly. That was a pity as it was a really quaint old gatehouse, probably a few hundred years old. I remember people living in there years ago and always thought that one day I could live there. I found another place in Chipping Warden, not ideal but that was the only thing available. Not much comes up for rent here so I applied for it. No answer after 8 days now so I'm guessing I was unsuccessful.

However a stroke of luck. Bumped into someone who was a family friend - was a kid when we first met - he said he had a small single storey place for rent so we went round and had a look - its ok so I move into Chacombe village in a couple of weeks. Its about 3 miles from Mum and will be great when Pete and Chris arrive around Christmas. Needs a bit of tidying up but will serve the purpose. The village is typical of the area, old cottages and narrow streets. Will take some pictures ready for next post

I've been listening to the cricket each night via the internet. Good to see the Poms actually playing cricket at last in the second test even though day 4 was like watching paint dry. Would have been good to see them win this one but a combination of Shane Warne and England's suicidal tendancies handed a win to Oz. Now can a team that declares in their first innings with 500 and something runs and wickets in hand lose by 6 wickets? England seems to discover new ways of giving games away. Never mind, my team won.

Well loved ones, will write again soon.

Paul the Aussie xx

All the leaves are brown, and the sky is grey...

Wild and woolly weather is the feature of the week here. Howling gales and driving rain prevailing. 80mph winds some days.

I was working at Heathrow all week in a data centre which is not the most glamorous of places. All James Bond like with retina scans and fingerprints taken to get into the place.

I've been following England's miserable attempts at winning something internationally and must say I'm proudly wearing my Aussie badge. The mood here is that England will get thumped in the cricket - what with players coming back cos they can't take the stress and a British Lions guy also being sent home. I bet they are the laughing stock over in Oz. I was pleased to see that they managed to get over the line against South Africa though after the 2 teams spent 60 minutes bashing each other around and 10 minutes playing rugby.

What happened though with the Micks beating Oz though? I took a verbal beating over that one - had to put my England hat back on for a day.....

Christmas is 5 weeks today so I'm looking forward to seeing Pete again.

It is planned that Phillipa the doll will be filled with helium and attached to the local pub when they put up the Christmas decorations. Will keep you posted on that

As you can tell, not much happening so just a short note this week.

Hope everyone is well. Miss you all

Aussie Paul

52 not out

Scotland - the land of devils in skirts. Spent the week working up there modifying some call centre gear. Drove at 4am on Monday to Birmingham airport to catch a flight to Edinburgh and met a colleague who came over from Texas for the same gig. He looked like papa smurf so I found him easily at the airport. Then the fun started. I had a map showing me the way to the first customers call centre which was actually near Glasgow so we picked up the hire car and set off. I have never seen so many roundabouts. They were every 100 yards or so and the yank and I got horribly confused. The funny thing was that we had to do the same journey every day and somehow found a different way every time. Another thing that caught my attention was that call centre people are usually in the business of communication but neither of us could understand a word they were saying. Ken, being older than me hid behind the excuse that he was hard of hearing when someone said something to him and then looked at me for translation. All I could do was nod and smile. One day in a cafe there at 6am I asked what was up for eats. She said something and I said that would be great - blank faces all around then until another woman in there who was laughing at this point told me that she said the place wasn't open yet.

Anyway, a busy week - one day worked 36 hours straight but got back in one piece on Friday around 5pm. No time for sight seeing unfortunately and even if there was time, it was thick fog for most of it.

Saturday, Nov 11 my 31st anniversary. Went to the pub and was greeted by the locals bearing gifts. A copy of a book called Grumpy Old Men and a doll called Phillipa Hole. We spent ages blowing it up and had no energy for anything else Had lots of laughs and ended up taping her to a friends front door at 2:30am whilst he was asleep. Phillipa has since disappeared but I think she'll be back sometime soon.

Great news this week is that brother Chris is coming over on Dec 28 so with Pete arriving on Christmas Day that completes the family set. First time ever we'll all be together for the festive season and first time for 8 or 10 years we've all been together at the same place since San Francisco.

As always, love to you all. Keep in touch

P

Gunpowder, Treason and Plot

Hello again all. Nov 5 which means Guy Fawkes night. This also means that I can go and do one of my boyhood fun things - buy fireworks and set em off. I love it. Bought a big pack of F off rockets which I'll frighten all the local dogs with later.

Good news is that Pete's flights for his Christmas trip to England have now been booked - he gets here on Christmas Day around 5am which is great. He's here for 3 weeks so not all of his summer holiday will be spent in the cold. Talking of cold its been really cold here. Scraping frost off the car at 6:45 am each morning is a good way to know you're alive. One morning this past week the car temp thingy said it was -5C outside.

Brother Chris is planning to come over sometime between Christmas and New Year so that'll be great too. First time we've all been together for many years.

Early start on Monday - 4am. Have to drive to Birmingham to get a flight to Edinburgh. Working there all week with some sweaty socks. Typical. Freezing weather and they send me somewhere even colder for my first excursion. Although it's cold there have been some spectacular sunrises and sunsets. Quite stunning in fact.

Watched England rugby union get beaten by the Kiwis today but noticed that Aus could only manage a draw with Wales. Blimey. Times must be tough if they can't beat Wales....

Will take some snaps in Edinburgh and post them next week. Meantime, love to you all.

P

No Bourbon, 12 Pubs, 12 Beers

Hello again friends and relatives. I hope you are all fit and well. 2nd week at work was quite enjoyable again. Starting to feel part of the group now. I'm off to Edinburgh next week for 5 days so that should be good.

Saturday was the rescheduled sponsored walk day which was quite a laugh. 12 pubs and you're supposed to have a pint in each. I walked with Steve, the Griffin's landlord as he wanted to get a wriggle on and get back for the halloween night planned for Saturday evening in his pub. Plus neither of was sure of the route so we didn't fancy trying to find our way in the dark.

We all met up at 10am athe the Rose and Crown in Chipping Warden and set off around 11am. Next stop Griffin which was all of 3 minutes walk - feeling good already - made it this far. Then about a 2.5 mile jaunt through the countryside to the next one in Wardington. Hooky beer here. I'll cut a long story short but we only stayed as long as it took to have a beer given that it gets dark early here now but we made an exception at the next pub in Chacombe as they had Fuller's ESB here. Couldn't resist a brace. A short jaunt away we found ourselves in the next stop - a golf club - no real ale here - so Guinness was the order. Then on to Middleton Cheney about 3 miles away where there were 4 pubs in quick succession. I think we had London Pride in one, Eagle Ale in another and Spitfire in the last. Then the bit I was dreading - a 5 mile (8km) uphill slog back to Wardington. I just put my head down and marched as fast as I could as it (and I probably) was getting a bit murky. They'd set up a pitstop on this road where soup and sandwiches were on offer - a great idea. Was very relieved to get to Wardington and enjoy an Abbot Ale. Then back across country another 2.5 miles to arrive at around 7pm at The Rose in Chipping Warden for the final Hook Norton of the day. All up I believe 2000GBP was raised by about 25 of us. We only had 2 people ahead of us all day and we only saw the main group once or twice as we were leaving pubs 2 and 3 I think. Some of them have done this 12 times before so they had several beers and a long break in each pub. I found out on Sunday that some didn't make it back til after midnight. I may have left out some other pub details here as I'm sure there was a couple more but I should have made notes - weather was quite overcast but remained dry and fairly comfortable - even worked up a bit of a sweat on the trip uphill back to WardingtonThen on to Saturday evening - fancy dress halloween party in The Griff - quite a good night. Needless to say I slept through til 1pm on Sunday but pulled up feeling pretty good - just a few minor aches. Well, on into week 3 at work. Looking forward now to Bonfire Night on Nov 5th.

Will update you all again soon. Mum's doing quite well by the way.

Love to you all P