Congratulations to my gorgeous friends, Autumn and Brent. They got to welcome a healthy girl into their lives. From experience, I get to say that it is awesome! So, welcome to the club you two. And now, I bet you are thinking that you should’ve taken ALL the clothes, huh Autumn?
In the effort to make home here, I pursued locating a toothbrush holder. Now, there’s no Wal-Mart, no Bed, Bath & Beyond here. The closest thing is the Gates shopping center, which is like Northpark Mall in size and any strip mall in content. The equivalent to BB&B has toilet paper stands, mirrors, towels, sheets…but no toothbrush holder. I was advised to go down the hall to another shop. This shop was like Dollar General ad infinitum, ad nauseum. But no holder. I improvised and bought a ceramic cup. It’s adequate.
Many of you know that I’m an avid reader. Part of the reason I’ve taken so long to update is because I got caught up in re-reading “Sarum” by Edward Rutherfurd. And yes, Grandmother, I’ve read “The Pillars of the Earth”. Read it about 10 years ago. Re-read it about 3 years ago. I agree it is really exquisite. Anyway, “Sarum” is about the history of Salisbury, from Stone Age to Druidic times to medieval to Boney to the 1980s. Rutherfurd is the kind of author I call ‘sweepist’. His writings ‘sweep’ through centuries following families. Dostoevsky-vite? Hmm. And being an avid reader, I’ve signed up for a library card too. And for Kiddo as well. She can check out movies for free. I have to pay a lb. OMG. This library is precious and meh. All age level books are mixed up together. I grabbed a book without really looking at it and come to find out that it is teen fiction. And bad teen fiction at that. I’ll still read it anyway.
On the late evening of 2nd June, the local video store owner drove over to our house and said, “OKinUK, you have my videos!” I had forgotten the due date and they were overdue by two whole days. Egads! I went in the next day to pay for whatever late fee had been incurred. No late fee. Just some minor admonishment and promises on my part that it’ll never happen again. HOW I FELT: it was an odd feeling; I’m rarely truly embarrassed so I’m pretty sure this was something like it, maybe with a bit of chagrin thrown in. She did admit to being ‘snippy’ but chalked it up to the fact that I wasn’t the only wayward customer she had that night to receive that special personal touch. Sometimes, a girl just wants to get off her feet after a long day at work, what what.
On Friday evening, Kiddo and I went on a bus to the city centre to meet SciMan for dinner. Went to Marzanos- they have the best deal: up until 7 pm, pizzas are £5.95. Kiddo's meal included dessert and soda! At the end of the meal, I honestly had the thought that the lovely, exquisite chocolate ice cream was wasted on her almost-3-year-old taste buds. It was better than Breyer’s. They do dairy products really well here.
Can’t use my FF Visa bank card at Boots (Boots is like CVS). The British make a huge fuss about signing the back of the card here. If it doesn’t have a signature and has “see id” instead, they’ll refuse it. A bit pigheaded, really. How easy it is to fake a signature but really hard to check a photo id? This is one of the few areas where I really have to say under my breath, “idiots.” Eventually I was able to purchase (after walking back up the hill to my bank and withdrawing money) a combination hairdryer and flatiron. I think it works pretty well. I’m happy with the results anway…SciMan thinks it makes my hair fluffier than I normally style it. Go ahead.
While on the bus, heading towards dinner, a guy got on the empty (except for us) bus. He sat right next to us in the back. He was texting and continued to text while opening a bottle of Stella Artois with his teeth. As we drove on, I did interrupt him to ask him if open containers were permitted in public places; earlier I’d seen an empty box of wine at the bus stop along with several days old vomit. Anyways, he said to the effect of “f*** ‘em those don’t like it”. I could be wrong, it was difficult to understand him. He asked me, “You a Yank?” and then proceeded to tell me that he didn’t like Yanks, but he like Canadians okay. Wonder what that’s aboot.
For any of you who may be interested in my daughter’s bowel movements, she’s completely potty trained now. Have had only one accident and that was at home late at night. And no, she doesn’t say “I have to use the loo.”
I’ve got movies to take back.
