Work avoiding again

Just been looking back at a few old posts. Realised its been ages since I did the watching, reading thing. Might be boring for everyone else, but I quite like looking back on that kind of thing. So...

Reading: Just finished Swahili for the Broken Hearted (travel book, South Africa to Egypt) now onto Ben Elton's Popcorn.
Listening: Harry Potter audio books on tape. Beatles LP, 80s LP, Radio One covers MP3s... Corrs in the car. Bought Now 67... unfortanately without reading the tracklisting!
Watching: Later HP films. Top Gear. Little Dorrit. Brideshead Revisited (the extremely long original series). Moulin Rouge. Layer Cake. Live Aid on the treadmill.
Playing: Wii sports. My arm hurts!

Oh, and have to say big thanks to Nan. She brought me some of Grandad's stuff. Can't wait to sit in the deck chair in the summer... will have to find some really bad bermuda shorts so I can emulate Grandad! Also brought some of the Guinness stuff I had given him over the years, and some centenary glasses she had sent off for. Thanks.

Thanks to apple being super kind and wonderful and lovely (free replacement power supply after rat nibbling destroyed original) I was able to show off the Macbook to the visiting family. So after dinner (which all ate, all still alive) and measuring of windows and trip to Highcross, I got out the Mac and tried to impress them with my photos from the fair. Ended up playing with Photo Booth. Was hilarious...

Was wrapping presents in the spare room the other night. There was a really nice sunset. Didn't really capture it though. Hard with a window in the way, and didn't have time to get the tripod.

Went to the car boot again this morning. Is nice being inside, much smaller so it doesn't take 4 hours, and I don't spend all my money!

Having had a very good week for getting rid off stuff from the loft and the garage have I just gone and blown it? Got rid of two printers, a PC and a monitor (and all of Remi's stuff) = good. Bought for 18 quid at the car boot a Kenwood Stereo = potentially great, potentially stupid. It seemed to work fine there, but then that was only him playing a cd. If my Sony breaks again soon and this Kenwood all works ok, then I have done great but....

Still 3 candles for 10p can't be bad ..neither can a Disney DVD for 50p.. and there's a couple of nice jumpers too. Don't go mad thinking you can only see one... t'other was in AW's bag at the time. Oh and yeah... thats an original 70s Tusken Raider figure!!

Aspie brain obsessed with the need for a tripod now... you'll see why later!

Not a great week... off sick for 2 days, having never really recovered from last time. Head still screwed up like last time too. Oh well. Friday night was nice, went to see a friend of Alison's performing in Oliver at the theatre in Nottingham. Saturday was craft fair (got something nice for Mum) and more bloomin PhD and then a wander round the fair taking pictures before helping at the Girl's Room at church (on the understanding that we're not girly at all but thats ok). Not sure how much help I was but I did make a lovely bead bracelet and ear-ring set (though I say so myself!) for Alison. Was funny listening to the girls slating people i had taught last year, and saying how they hate PE!

Anyway..enough rambling... here's the cool pictures (and I need a tripod cos I can't hold the camera still enough for a 3 second exposure!)



Here's the ride still (well... technically mid spin but...) fairly boring (unless you're on it... I would have puked... am truely getting old :-( )

Much more exciting moving!





Another one 'still'...

...and moving!


View from the Loft

Bet you didn't know you can see Big Ben from Fred St!!!

Ok... wii or Harry Potter... hmmmm

Sat Nov 8th. LU Rag Bonfire. So gutted. Yet again plans for getting cool photos of fireworks foiled by rain (and the 'missing' nature of a key part of the tripod I borrowed). Drat. I'll just have to post some pictures from the 'Ladies Night' (don't laugh / see if you can spot any!!) at the Peepul Centre in Leics a couple of weeks ago. Was a fab night... curry, karaoke (we rocked!) and a disco (v weird dancing to punjabi RnB). Gutted the DJ refused to play any 80s cheese... but then maybe he decided I was being silly enough as it was!

Lets just check out those Peter Kay moves again....

We made lots of new friends..



.. and strutted our funky stuff..


... round our handbag!!! (except it's NOT a handbag Karen)

Otherwise known as 'an excuse to invite people over'. Just back from a lovely evening at Fred, where celebrating Obama's win was a cover story for a lovely meal and then missing most of Little Dorrit, and mainly having some mates over for a beer. This last part turned into most of us watching You Tube videos on the Macbook and Ipod. Tim showed me some neat new SW ones. Anyway.. it being Bonfire night, and there being 2 aspies present we just HAD to have some fireworks... albeit ones stuck in a potato!

Sat 1st Nov had been in the diary for months. No wimping out for a pesky cough. Our second trip to Legoland. It wasn't just the fireworks that were SW.. there was loads of stuff. Starting with the Collector's Brick. I think Alison is the only person that would be so understanding as to leave Loughborough at 7am on a Saturday just to make sure that we got a free (to annual pass holders hehe) brick. We were so relieved when we got our hands on it... Alison was relieved because she knew I really wanted it (however much I tried to pretend) and I was relieved because Alison was stressing that the scenic route we took might have made us too late. So here is the all important brick... (oh and later on we managed to get the Indiana Jones one too)

Once we had the brick we explored the rest of the star wars stuff. We met a radio controlled Artoo...

..and a fat Stormtrooper!!!

and Obi Wan...

..and Chewie...

and Darth Vader. Who was very big and mean and scary. And not very nice to me at all.

...but I got my own back later...

We also met a very cool guy (ok...geek to the rest of the world) who made big models...


Another guy had made really small models of scenes from the films..

After I had done my Jedi training ...Karen had better watch out cos I've done my lightsabre training with a Jedi Master!!! ... I had a play with a JCB digger...check out the 'concentrating face'!!!


So pleased with myself that I got some balls in the bucket! Oh well....little things!

Unfortunately there are no pictures of the fireworks..mainly cos it was pee-ing it down. Oh well. They were done to various themes from Star Wars and they were cool (even though many were obscured by some numpty's legoland umbrella grrr). I loved the ones that formed a 3D globe and the ones that looked like exploding Death Stars, complete with the ring. Not sure the smiley face ones really fitted the theme, but they were nice anyway.

After a long day being cold and wet, and no complaining, even when she was dragged around looking for the SW quiz questions, or left in the rain while I queued for diggers or.... Alison finally gets her reward..

and yeah...she had nicked my hat! Although I was very suprised that A - she was wearing a hat (she must have been very cold) and B - she managed to look cute. Well acutally, I was impressed more than suprised at that. I think I look like a wally in any hat... but particularly in that one!

Last piccy... you can't go to Legoland and not get some... er.... Lego! I thought I was very well behaved today... no extra stuff, and very nearly stuck to the '2 pound coins in the pint glass' Lego budget. I liked this ship the best... though I was tempted by the one that came with the Huttlet minifig hehe. Got some mini figs to make movies with.. ideas on a postcard (well, email) please.