Things Wot Have Happened Since I Turned 27

Helloooooooo!!!

Well my New Year's Resolutions included communicating more and yet this is my first post of the year, and the first in 3 months! Bad.

Since last time I've been a very busy bunny. I went for my interview in early December, waited until two days before Christmas to find out I'd got it, started the induction early February, had some excellent physical intervention / restraint training, and finally had my first day working in an autism college near the end of last month. I am officially a Residential Education Worker in a college of around 25 autistic young adults, mostly male, who attend lessons and also mainly live there around the year. It's a lovely place surrounded by fields and near a beach, with a great emphasis on art, music and drama and physical activity. A good time of year to start, as it's starting to warm up now and in the summer hopefully there'll be lots of opportunities for hiking in the Welsh hills, adventure days and the usual activities they're all into now - walking, going to a movie, playing quazar and paintball, theatre trips, going to the animal farm, visiting restaurants or going to the pub... I'm putting the word out for a trip to the dry ski slope sometime! It's great to be actually on my feet for a living and using my brain. I'm awake for the first time in ages and really enjoying myself!

My trip to Kirchberg over a week ago was incredible! I'll post some photos soon, although I didn't take nearly enough! That's always what it's like when you go away on your own, you spend all your time making buddies and never recording the moment. Until the last night, that is, when I went off on one snapping every nanosecond. Great laughs though! Met some totally wicked people from around the globe and made great friends! After a week I excelled at the 4-inch-nail / sharp-end-of-the-hammer / log game in the Aussie run pub. I can't recommend that town highly enough. My fab snowboard instructor Niels had me twisting and turning and doing spirals within a day! I could only 'rutsch' when I got there. A couple of days in though, it was all over for me when I tripped backwards on a steep slope, and landed twice on my back (cuz I took off again in-between) on the compacted ice. Such paaaaaaaiiin. Poor Niels had to 'rutsch' me all the way down to the next chairlift and take me back up to the gondola. I refused mountain rescue. After a night of liberating Jaegermeisters, I tried again the next day but found I couldn't even make a single move. Took me forever to reach the chairlift, went back up for some pommes frites and a hot choccy, and asked the mountain rescue guy if the gondolas would be going back down that day. The way up had been blowing gales and they'd had to halt it for minutes at a time while we swung like monkeys around this mile-high cable. Scary. When we reached the top they told us that had been the last trip of the day. Eep! But Mr. Mountain Rescue then told us they had another trip down planned in exactly 7 minutes. I told him in pig's German that I was injured and would never make it, so he zoomed us on his skidoo all the way over to the gondolas! Best fun ever! The next day was spent bumming round town and drinking hot chocolates. I did buy Austrian chocolates to bring home as presents, but scoffed them all myself! What you don't know won't hurt you Dad, you never read this anyway!! x x

Sad news is that my beautiful little 21 year old kitten Heidi died last month. I never expected to be so overcome, but I was totally heartbroken. She was having trouble going to the loo, and we took her to the vet. He congratulated her on how amazing she looked for such an old lady, and took her overnight for a bit of a 'clearout'. But the next day my mum called me and said she actually had a tumour. It was too big and she was too old to do anything about it. We collected her and took her home for the afternoon, gave her lots of little treats and cuddles before we had to take her back. When we took her home again we put her in a leafy little spot in the garden and she now has two little pots of miniature daffodils there as well.

So that's all my news for now. Next up is e-mailing everyone I've missed in the last couple of weeks! But for now, I have to get ready to be in work at 3pm, so I'm going to go and find me shoes.

Welcome to 2007!

Vix x x

Almost 27!

Can't believe on Tuesday I'll officially be in my late 20s. Or does that not come until 27.5? Or was I already at 26.6666? Can't I still stay mid for a while?

The past few weeks have been wicked busy, but fun! I've finished the theory side of my course and sat the exam (I find out how I did in a few weeks time), started the practical today which was immensely scary, ditched working again two weeks ago, got an interview for a hopefully nicer job next week, booked a small cheapy trip to a hostel in the mountains in a couple of months to try out my beautiful new snowboard wot I bought (yay! a pretty K2 which also donates some profits to Breast Cancer Care - good fuzzy feeling), saw Pink in concert (oh... wow...!) and watched my avocado trees grow another few inches! Although Armando lost his first four baby teeth recently, giving him only 5 leaves total, where Alonso has about 18 already! Can't believe they're brothers sometimes.

I'm also being chauffeur to my Mum at the mo, since she shattered her meniscus cartilage in her knee and needs keyhole surgery and a hoover. So we drove down to Canterbury (soooo pretty!) to visit big bro Ben and wifey Sandrine who were celebrating their 5th anniversary a year and a month early (while making the most of Sandrine's sabbatical from Melbourne Uni and visiting the family all over UK and France, and holding a party as close to where the two countries meet as poss!) They'd hired half a pub for the evening but we bumped into most of the family during the day already, just wandering around town. We found Anna, Ellie and Lydia in Canterbury Cathedral, immediately got the giggles and almost got chucked out by the serious man in the high-vis sash. Then we partied all night and spent the next morning and afternoon in nearby Whitstable, recovering on the beach with a picnic of cheese and wine and cake, mmmmm. It was also Sandrine's mum's 70th birthday so we had bubbly too! Apart from me (designated driver - made it up with extra cheese).

Some pics...

Me and bro Benji and his new(ish) dreadlocks! ... with his belle épouse ... The parents (Mum with silly pout, Maurice and Genevieve) outside Canterbury hostel (PS - what a breakfast!) ... Winner of the ugliest face competition ... Canterbury Cathedral gate ... the downstairs crypt of forbidden photography ... Solemn message of prayer left by my little minx of a cousin Lydia ... Sunset mode pays off at Whitstable harbour ... Boaty photie ... RANDOM EXTRA: 21 year old Heidi after her bath (hee hee!)

Yes even after selecting 'crap' mode on my camera this blog still doesn't want to accept any more photos.

Tomorrow, I will pop to the local pig / goose / goat farm where they build things and feed things and run educational things for kids and always want volunteers and I'm going to try and see if I can spend the next few weeks with them here and there in between fitness thingies and driving jobs and dentist appointments (there are boringly practical advantages to skiving as well).

Later!
xxxx

Halloween!

I love it!

Here are some photos.

We found ourselves a newly opened rock club, on the banks of the River Taff, heavily draped in cobwebs and other ghoulish things and full to the brim with cheesy Axls and aspiring Slashes, mostly dressed in a costume that would allow them a prop to play air guitar on. Scythes, swords and chunky axes. It was sooo much fun!

I was a witch doctor, complete with feathers in my hair, strings of teeth around my neck, wooden spoon / magical skull spear, chocolate eyeballs, and a papier mache bone thru nose which kept falling in my beer. Angharad was a little devil with glittery horns and tie, Dan and Paul made the greatest effort and bought last minute capes and horns for 97p in the local shop, to become her minions.

We giggled at everyone, ate lots of sweets they were giving away (the lollies were 'orrible and we decorated the little skull man instead) and drank some weak beers. I love Halloween!

The King's Shilling

Well not quite, but I have been called up to perform my civil duties as a member of a Jury in December. I got a big fat ludicrously PINK letter through the post, which got me all excited until I saw what it actually was. Not that I wouldn't love to do it, I'm actually looking forward to it lots, problem is it's going to completely interfere with my fitness course, so I'm going to have to beg them to change it over to next year. Hopefully not to clash with any other sort of silly plans I have for the next 12 months after. You're not having my Mayan Christmas!

Good news is my temporary assignment offered me a full time post. Bad news is I turned it down because it'll get in the way of my doing valuable things with my time, hee hee! I can't wait to start doing my own thing!

Hey I got 27 out of 30 in my mock test yesterday at school! You only need 24 to pass the exam and we haven't even finished the course yet! Although, I still need to bone up on bones. But I'm a whizz with those muscles and energy systems! I had a cup of tea to celebrate when I got home, and used the mug that said 'I'm not perfect but I'm so close it scares me' :P

It was so wet and cold today my bones are wobbling, so I'm going to have a hot bath and read my book. See you!

x x

I Love Christmas

I just got the 'Christmas Feeling' over the weekend. We went out to a gorgeous tiny village pub with some friends, Andrew & Sarah, and had a proper homely dinner. I had roast potatoes and leek sausages and lots of red wine and a gorgeous cheesecake for pud, and a hot chocolate and Baileys after that. It was incredible! My fantasy dinner.

So we all started talking Christmas! We're hoping for snow (eep!) and we'll be getting up morning-time, opening our stockings, having a Baileys for brekkie, opening up one prezzie, going for a walk down to the park, building snowmen (hope!), maybe popping in the local to wish everyone Merry Christmas over a beer or two, coming back and starting on lunch over another Baileys and some festive music, sitting to watch the Queen's speech while opening a couple more prezzies and throwing wrapping paper balls at her majesty when she starts on, then we'll eat our dinner, have a nap, wake up and make mulled wine and watch the Eastenders Christmas Special, cry, pick at leftovers & crackers and cheese & pistachios & booze, open another prezzie, play a board game, snooze, do the dishes, sit down and feel fat.

Doesn't it sound lovely? That's how to do Christmas, Christmas-style. Next year, Mayan style!

Vix x x x x

Aaaaaaah!

AAAAAAAAAAAAA!

Howdy!

I've been gone a while, but thankfully chucked in a hellish job and now have no employment to get in the way of my yapping.

Over the last few weeks, and after lots of chopping and changing and courses being rescheduled, I think I've finally sorted out a plan for the coming year or so. So hopefully I'm off to Boston soon to get my first Pilates qualification, and following that up in Spring with Pilates 2 in either NY or Boston again! I may even do a quick course here just to allow me to join the Register of Exercise Professionals, which is useful for insurance, etc. Unfortunately it means spending another year here before I can get away properly for my Central American trip! I may as well avoid the hurricanes etc and leave October 07. But I'll try and get away somewhere else in between now and then to stay sane. I've decided it's 'proper job' time now, because I can't be temping for another 13 months! Cross your fingers.

So anyway it seems I've used my total photo quoto! So I'll just bung 'em on Flickr. News-wise, Mum came back home last weekend, and I jump started my mini from her car in order to pick her up from Cardiff bus station in the middle of the night. Stupid car. And then we didn't leave for another hour while we tried to find help for a distressed lady my mum found there. She'd only just become homeless and could barely speak English and was shivering from fear. The police were so unhelpful and rude. Hopefully she at least got some shelter from them that night and was helped the next day.

Then we sat up all night at home drinking probably about eight cups of tea, while Mum blabbered on about her trip and showed me all her crazy African artefacts. This place is littered with big and little trinkets from all over the globe, it's turning into quite an eccentric house of knickknacks, with the addition now of all my porcelain chicken buses, volcanic rocks, worry dolls, giant toucans...

She loved my surprise: A brand newly restored Victorian hallway floor! She wasn't expecting it at all actually, which is nice, and I'm glad it all worked out in time, cuz it ended up so pretty. I gradually ripped up all the vinyl floor tiles, glued down with the most stubborn ick ever created, and cleaned up the crud bit by bit. It took me about an hour every four tiles, and eventually destroyed one iron (apparently she wanted a new one anyway!). Those things wouldn't come up unless I practically burned through the tile and melted the ick enough to lose it's stick. I've got arms like Mr T now, honest! Then I went through just over 3 bottles of meths to remove the ick. I also acted all clueless down at my building site, and they donated me a load of grey grout and gripfill, and I relaid some tiles that had popped out. One patch was missing a whole lots, and I managed to find them just slipping down a hole going underfloor, inside the electricity box along the wall! So I worked out how to make them fit and plopped them all back in and regrouted the whole floor. That was fun! Then I totally scrubbed the meths residue away, left for three days and used a special polish the night my Mum was due home and got the whole thing gleaming. We finally left the dining room and went off to bed at 4.20am, and she noticed! Hee hee! So I need another project now. That'll be the loft - making a bit of a cute room up there for myself for the next year, and clearing some stuff out for a car boot sale!

My auntie Anna and Els and Lyd came back down for about a week too, just before Mum came back. It was great! We had another band practice - we're getting much better and far more tuneful! We walked down to the beach and had ice cream, navigated the swans, smashed rocks on the cliffs, looking for fossils, watched the skaters injure themselves at the ramp park and got blown about and sleepy in time to go home and nap. Seriously! Also spent some time down at Cosmeston Park where all the prettiest dogs get walked. Had more ice cream - or a blue squishee in Els' case..!

So now all the excitement is over it's time to apply for some proper meaningful employment! I'll let you know how I get on. The last job I had is honestly the first one I've ever had to quit - I've put up with lots of jobs where people have walked out after one day, and I've stuck it out til the end. I thought I was made of steel. But this one broke me totally. I've broken my run of stubbornness that I was so proud of. I seriously couldn't take another day. No talking, no breathing, no eating with cutlery, no looking away from the screen, no toilet break (without suspicion), no drinking from bottles, no minesweeper or Internet, no singing, no sighing. I'm serious! I was really only joking about the breathing.

Adios for now. Lossa love!
Vix x x