Getting very, very close to d-day now. All our stuff has gone into storage - thank Zeus for my lovely iBook, the internet and the radio (although my desire to take to Eamonn Holmes' face with a cheese grater is almost overwhelming). The high point of this morning so far has been bluetoothing my entire address book from my iBook to my phone. Technology is just so cool these days. My life, on the other hand, is clearly not.
Anyway, thanks to everyone who came out for a drink last weekend. Morning Bride were, as always, brilliant and it was great to bump into a couple of people I haven't seen in a while as well. Feel like the liver has taken a beating over the last couple of weeks with all the going away celebrations - I keep telling myself that for the next six months I'll be living the 'my body's a temple' lifestyle so what the hell, but the condition of said temple could be seriously compromised by departure time at this rate. (Yeah, yeah - temple isn't a word usually used to describe it, I know.) What the fuck, it's been way too much fun anyway. So happy to see everyone and will really miss you all. I'm still not even vaguely clear on what happened to JP, though - I know I've spoken to him since, but I just don't understand!! If you're reading, mate, I'm meeting up with Stew next week for a final farewell, so maybe you could come along to that and actually, you know, speak to me. I *believe* there has even been some suggestion that Stew might pay for dinner...
So the house is empty and I've been tucked up in my sleeping bag for the last couple of nights. Pleased to report that it's very snug indeed, which is good news considering London has been bloody cold for the last week or so.
My passport application is in, albeit later than expected because I cocked it up. No really. I managed to completely overlook the fact that I required a countersignatory until the morning of my appointment. As I am the only person tragic (or paranoid) enough to actually carry my passport number around with me, I had to reschedule and call on civil service star Sarah to come to my rescue. Which, of course, she did. She even rewarded my sea sponge-like organisational skills with this extremely groovy new compass.
Speaking of which, could everyone send luck and healing vibes Sarah's way. She's been training to run in the London marathon and has achieved super-human levels of abstinence from all the fun things in life since the start of the year. Now, with just a couple of weeks to go, she's tweaked some of her bits and is waiting to hear if she can run. She's worked really hard, so any spare good thoughts winging her way would be much deserved.
If Sarah makes it to the starting line, she will be running to raise funds for Crisis, a charity helping the homeless, and can be sponsored
via this link.
Come on, who wouldn't want to sponsor this girl. (Yes, that is a fountain in Trafalgar Square but I hasten to add that this photo was taken some time before the aforementioned marathon training regime commenced. She hasn't been in fountain-swimming condition for *months*.) I'll post an update as soon as there's news on those running bits, so get ready to sponsor.
I may not post often, but I sure do post long. The house is ridiculously cold right now but the real estate agents have called to say they will be bringing someone round to look at the place and I don't want it to be all warm and toasty when they get here. Nothing against any future occupants, you understand, this is all about making things difficult for the estate agent scum. That name again:
David Daniels. Fear them, all you decent, intelligent renters, for they are to civilised human beings as Fosters is to actual beer. I know, I know - that's real big and clever, you say, freezing your toes off to inconvenience some random scum bag. Fuck you, it is big and clever and my tiny toes are warmed by the thought of even this pathetically small inconvenience I might cause them. Soon, I shall be heading out to watch the cricket anyway - may the Aussies stuff South Africa for many good reasons but mostly to irritate my barman Sean. If you didn't know me, you could start to think I'm bitter and twisted. Well, it makes me happy.
Passport should arrive Thursday and then it's off to Portsmouth for the ferry on Friday. Farewell local drinks at the Eddie tonight from about 7.30pm-ish. I know, it really is taking the piss, isn't it - how many going away drinks can two people legitimately have. The answer, clearly, is an *infinite number* of going away drinks. Frankly, I'm about to crack open a can of Red Stripe and have a going away drink with myself. My filthy, hobo-beer drinking appearance (Grrr's description of Red Stripe, not mine) should help further deter potential renters and I don't even have to go to any effort because it's what I look like anyway.
Next update before we leave for Portsmouth - 6 days to go. Woo hoo!
Me with my passports. Both of em. And they thought they could keep me out...
The spoils of Grrr's beer money frog - 134 shiny pounds. And we're going somewhere that has cheaper beer than London!! (Okay, I am aware that *everywhere* has cheaper beer than London, but still.)
Anyway, thanks to everyone who came out for a drink last weekend. Morning Bride were, as always, brilliant and it was great to bump into a couple of people I haven't seen in a while as well. Feel like the liver has taken a beating over the last couple of weeks with all the going away celebrations - I keep telling myself that for the next six months I'll be living the 'my body's a temple' lifestyle so what the hell, but the condition of said temple could be seriously compromised by departure time at this rate. (Yeah, yeah - temple isn't a word usually used to describe it, I know.) What the fuck, it's been way too much fun anyway. So happy to see everyone and will really miss you all. I'm still not even vaguely clear on what happened to JP, though - I know I've spoken to him since, but I just don't understand!! If you're reading, mate, I'm meeting up with Stew next week for a final farewell, so maybe you could come along to that and actually, you know, speak to me. I *believe* there has even been some suggestion that Stew might pay for dinner...
Come on, who wouldn't want to sponsor this girl. (Yes, that is a fountain in Trafalgar Square but I hasten to add that this photo was taken some time before the aforementioned marathon training regime commenced. She hasn't been in fountain-swimming condition for *months*.) I'll post an update as soon as there's news on those running bits, so get ready to sponsor.
For the next six months, this will be our new home. Yup, it's the Vaude Taurus Ultralight 2 person tent. Weighing in at under 2kg and less than 50cm long when packed, it's excellent for carrying on the bike, but I suspect will prove very snug with two people wedged into it. At least Grrr's thin. We are yet to practice putting it up, which is something we need to address in the near future. Unfortunately, the tent is slightly larger than our garden and I fear the cops would move us on if we tried to pitch it in the park - perhaps ninja-style night pitching in random public spaces will be in order.
For all our energy needs: our groovy new Solio charger. Solar powered - fully charged in about four hours of full sunshine - it can be used to recharge our mobile phones, the DS, iPod, Walkman, etc. Sadly it doesn't have quite the kick to fill up my iBook and won't be able to charge the camera battery (I don't think - still trying to find out if we can get a connector for that!) but it certainly cuts down on all the chargers and leads we normally cart around to support our pathetically gadget dependent lifestyles - and it's lovely free, green energy! Working alongside our solar battery charger, we're pretty much green energy fiends for this trip. 
To record the majesty of our journey (no, really), we've got this little beauty - the Canon Ixus 900 Ti. It rocks. Wanted something really compact and easy to carry on the bike, but which had some manual functionality and decent performance in low light or reasonably close. Obviously, the 10million megapixels is bollocks - I'm not really going to blow my pics up so they can be seen from space - but I've been mucking about with it for a week or so and I'm impressed so far. Took it to the British Museum for a test run at indoor, often low light conditions and some of the pictures are great. The digital macro setting was good for close up work and with adjustable ISO you can bring camera shake right down without a tripod. I've not taken many outdoors shots as yet, and as always it has a million pre-programmed settings that you are never going to use (Foliage??), but double thumbs up at this stage. And it has a viewfinder - which I find helpful as I'm still struggling to get into the habit of composing a picture with the camera held a foot from my face (tragic, I know).
