Tuesday 29 May 2007

The Sweetest Gift

So Josh has been working long, stressful hours on a big project for work. The guy that he is doing this project for sent me flowers on Friday as an apology for keeping my husband on the computer all hours of the night. It's funny since those of you who know my husband know that he would be on the computer all hours of the night with or without a project for work. A fact of which I have come to terms with long ago. I don't mind since generally I am on the computer all hours of the night as well. :) Nevertheless, the flowers were gorgeous and I am enjoying my house full of flowers. Check them out below!

-18 days :)
Rachel

Monday 28 May 2007

A Perfect Day for the Beach...

You can't hear me, but there is a hint of sarcasm in that title. This weekend was the perplexing and mysteriously undefined holiday, the May Bank Holiday. That's it, that's what they call it. Three day weekend because it's May and hey we haven't had a holiday in all of one month.

We had the pleasure of entertaining a lovely house guest, Felicia, who is taking some time off to tour around Europe. She added us to her list of must-sees when she found out we'd moved here. I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed her time here. We walked around and shopped most of the time, while out we met a girl at the Body Shop who could not stop talking and to whom Felicia pimped me out and had us exchange numbers since I am a big loner with no friends. ;)

We went into London on Friday and shopped Covent Gardens and found an amazing store called Lush. (There are a few in LA if you ever get a chance to go! They sell complete organic bath products that are just phenomenal.) Anyhoo, we made a friend at Lush as well. Seems we like to make friends in girly product stores. Her name was Sarah and she told us all about her friend who was playing in Leicester Square (pronounce Less-ter) at a place called Sound. She told us how her friend grew up in Thailand and toured around. She sounded like just my style, so we called Josh and made him meet us in the city. Sarah was right, her friend was amazing. She had the feel of India Arie. We had a blast! (Plus we shopped way too much, which is always fun!)

The next day we planned on renting a car and heading down to Brighton beach. Great idea for the end of May Holiday right? Well sure except it was gloomy and cold and rainy, surprise, surprise. :) So we loaded the car with our picnic of sandwiches and Felicia's amazing guacamole and headed on down to the beach determined to enjoy it "irregardless". We ended up eating our picnic out of the boot (for you Americans, trunk) in the car park.

We walked around beautiful, gloomy Brighton. Despite the rain it was still picturesque. I felt like I was in a postcard from the 20's. The pier is so retro feeling. All we needed were big floppy hats and bathing suits to our knees and it would have been the perfect time warp. It was great. We took a million pictures and annoyed Josh as most often they were pictures of the same thing ten times. (Gotta get the perfect picture, right?)

Later, we ate soft serve cones in perfect blue and white striped chairs along the pier and looked out over the Atlantic while listening to Elvis tunes blare out over the loud speaker. Josh punked out and didn't ride The Scream(not sure on the name) which was a ride that basically was a big crane that throws you out over the ocean and spins around and all that good stuff that crazy carnival rides do. Of course, because it costs too much. Ah hem... It's like $16 bucks a ride.

We ate dinner at a place that was a family style sit down dinner and only served Fish and Chips. You can have it many different ways, but it all boils down to fried fish and french fries. I have to admit it was the best Fish and Chips I have had in England, thus living up to their claim of Best in the World.

We headed out of Brighton towards home. We had to stop by a petrol station to top up and I don't ever want to hear another Californian complain about the price of gas since it cost us $40 for a little over a quarter of a tank! That's QUARTER OF A TANK! So no more whining! We only went about the distance of half the trip to Vegas.

The next day we were going to hang out and drive around locally, but ended up waking up at noon and pretty much laid around lazy all day. Felicia and I have been inspiring each other left and right! I found my groove with my knitting and I have tons of ideas for projects that I want to try in the future.

We dropped her off at the airport this morning sending her on her way towards Seville where Josh and I spent two weeks for our incredible honeymoon last year. I convinced her that a more beautiful town you will never find. Hopefully she enjoys it as much as I've built it up.

Well that was our 3 day weekend and now it is just thumb twiddling and anticipation building rapidly for the 19 day wait until I will be able to set foot on American soil again. :)

Cheers,
Rachel

P.S. Click on the picture to check out all the pictures from our trip!!! You'll love them! Yes, you, I'm talking to you. ;) Click on them now!
London/Brighton

Monday 21 May 2007

Geocaching, Take two.

Despite a week with nothing but clouds and rain, the sun managed to peek itself out for a while on Saturday morning. This time around I actually pushed Josh to go out. We decided to go hiking and geocaching. Check out the pics below of our day!

This is my new friend. :)


Who needs a skateboard?

During this whole thing there was an old lady watching us and cracking up! She approached me after with the thickest cockney accent I've ever heard that was actually real. I couldn't understand her, but she was trying to tell us go to the playground. You can see Josh on the zip line in that playground in the video below. They have the most entertaining playgrounds ever. Check out the rope thing below.


Never let go, Jack!


This is what Josh had me traipsing through to find some box.


We Found It!!!


Josh signing the geocache log.




Saturday 19 May 2007

Thursday 17 May 2007

Do you think these get thought through properly?

Only old people can cross here. The funny thing was a few feet down the road was a crossing sign with kids and an adult. Didn't realize there were different areas to cross the street depending on who you are...Or what you are according to this. Remember though only new zebras, no old zebras allowed. I have been keeping my eyes peeled, but I have yet to come across a zebra crossing. I hope to soon, what a great picture that would be. Maybe I will bring a lawn chair and a thermos of coffee and stake it out. :)

Tuesday 15 May 2007

Rediscovering Woking

I know I haven't been blogging as often lately. It just seems a bit on the pointless side to me. Who really wants to hear about my adventures in the Peacock Mall yet again? I don't even want to go let alone talk about it. Yet, since starting the art class I've had to walk in a completely different direction to get to school. I decided the other day to take a few pictures along the way to show all of you the pretty little views I have on the way.

In addition, Josh dragged me a few days ago, kicking and screaming I might add, to the back woods of our little town. The other side of the train tracks if you will. Actually that implies that there is a bad side of the tracks. There isn't. Most of Woking is actually quite charming.

Anyway, I digress. Josh dragged me out to the river and the woods on a geocaching mission. (Side note: For those of you who don't know, geocaching is a ... shall I say nerdy sort of hide and seek. Only with expensive toys. Basically, you log coordinates into a GPS and you follow the compass until you've reached the coordinates. People usually hide a film canister with a piece of paper and you sign your name. Something along the lines of Rage wuz here and all that jazz.)


So we traipsed out on what Josh assured me was a quick jaunt to find a film canister. We ended up at least a mile and half out into the damp woods near a deserted cemetery. Seriously, deserted. The only thing left there is a broken down brick wall surrounding what looks like a piece of land that may have once contained the dead.

I must say though there was something hauntingly beautiful about the area. I want to go back this weekend since the forecast, cross your fingers, shows sunshine for the weekend. I only had my digital and I am definitely looking forward to exploring the area further with my 35 mm.

So that was my week, in a nutshell. (Leaving out, the depressed, lonely, self-pitying moments.)
:)

Check out the pics below of our adventures.


My Walk To School
Pics from Geocaching