Hablo muy poco espanol!

It's been a great couple of days! I've been chilling out today with old and new friends in London. I'm staying with Lara, a friend who I went through vet school with in Australia, who lives in Goodmayes (almost into Essex), with her brother. It's been a relaxing day spent shopping for last minute things for our trip to Spain, and having a BBQ in the intermittent sunshine on what has been quite a nice warm day!

We went to the Hillsong church ball last night - which totally ble us away! The most entertaining ball I've ever been to! there must have been at lest a thousand people there, maybe two, everyone looking fantastic in black tie gear. there were heaps of different rooms at the venue, one a real disco feel, with a free Ben a Jerrys ice cream stall, pop corn and fairy floss, a DJ and huge dance floor. There were regular dance acts which would perform on the dance floor, with routines from Austin Powers, to street dancing and an African dancing group (10% of proceeds from the night went to the Wototo Children's orphanage in Uganda). Another room had couches with tables and cheese and grape platters, with a wine bar, then another had a more classical feel, with a string an flute ensemble playing at one stage, and some other acoustic performers. Next to that was a room with paintings on the walls, and a huge frame suspended from the ceiling with a lady painted like a statue standing in it. People could go up and pose with her for photos, and if you were lucky she would move to pose with you! Another room was a french style cafe, with tables and chairs, another like an arabian lounge, with low tables and cushions to sit on the floor, another was a dance/club feel with a live DJ and dance music, and yet another had a Jazz band with sax, double bass and blues set up! Needless to say, it was an awesome night, far exceeding anything I have ever experienced in a night out! I will put some photos on here when I get back from Spain. I ran into a friend from uni, who I had stayed with in May with my bro, and met some of Lara's friends from Hillsong. The funny thing was, I only spoke to one english person all night, all the rest of the people I met were Aussies, South African, and a couple of Kiwis and Americans! It was great to meet some fellow travellers, though, and chat about all sorts of things, and of course, work out connections or people we know in common from back home!
I'm hoping to have a couple of visitors to experience the other side of England (ie the not london part!), I really think there is so much people miss out on just living in London the whole time they's in the UK.

So after our relaxing day today, Lara and her brother Dan are busy packing for our trip to Spain. We leave here at 4:30 tomorrow morning, and head to Stanstead airport to fly to Valencia. With all the heightened security after the terrorist scare, we're allowing 3 hours to check in.
The good news is that the check in and luggage handlers strike that was going to happen this weekend has been averted!
Thanks to the people who have been leaving comments on here for me - it is so good to hear your news! Marilyn, it's great to hear that things have come together well with the farm, and Christine, I'll have to give you a call when I get back from Spain - I'm already getting excited about Paris in December!
Laurie - if you're reading this, could you let me know your email address? I'd love to hear what you and the cell group are up to.
And everyone else, I'm thinking of you all often, (more often that I am emailing you, no doubt!)
watch this space for photos of classy dresses, Spanish sunshine, and tomato-covered people!

Adios!

At a local pub quizz with work mates

Close up of the surgery door

The work building, the driveway to the left leads to courtyard, the office, drug store, radiographic/ultrasound, kennels, lab, and main clinic all lead off this courtyard through different doors. It's ok to run outside all the time in Summer, but I'm not looking forward to it in a wet winter!

The work cars (see previous post!). My lovely Peugeot 307, and.................

.... the Maverick; which would you prefer!!

With some of the nurses and vet at the Buxton Carnival

I have no idea who this guy was, but he was funny to look at, and the mittle kid on the back was having a ball!

One of the carnival queens on her float. The hours that must go into decorating these must be phenomenal! There were lots of marching bands, huge trucks decorated and community groups and some businesses participating.

A dressed well in Buxton. A lot of the towns in the area have well dressing carnivals, and Buxton is the largest. All the Carnival queens ride in the Buxton Carnival parade.

Another well-dressed well

With another familiar face in the chatsworth scuplture room

One more of Chatsworth!

Plans............

I've finally managed to book a few days off at the end of this month. This in itself was an exciting prospect, though once I had the time organised, I was left with the challenge of filling it with something exciting to do! Options included a bit of a week long road trip around the country visiting lots of friends who are living here there and everywhere. The second option was a Haggis tour of Scotland, which had been recommended to me. Then I learned that a good friend of mine is going to Spain to throw tomatoes at her brother, and anyone else in the vicinity!!
That sounds good, hey! So I have just finished booking flights and accomodation to the La Tomatina festival in Valencia, Spain, and then on to Barcelona for a few days afterwards.
I'm also going to the Hillsong Annual Summer Ball in London with Lara (afore mentioned friend), which sounds like a great night. Just have to find a ball gown from somewhere................ :)
I'll post a few more pics of things that have been happening the last month or so above...............................

Nostalgia

Life is trundling along here, work is going ok. We have a new locum at work, which might mean I get a chance to take some time off at the end of this month, which would be great!
The car I have at work sort of fell apart a couple of weeks ago, (well, it is a Ford after all, can't expect much better I suppose). the gear box needed replacing, (and that has nothing to do with me putting 20L of unleaded fuel into it's diesel tank a week or so before - how dumb can you feel?????!:). So I had to put up with driving a brand spanking new peugeot 307 around for two weeks! It was lovely to drive, but now I have gone back to the old Maverick, complete with new gear box and three new tyres. :(
I made the most of having the Peugeot and drove over to Chesterfield, which is about 20 minutes from here, and caught up with Lee, a friend from uni, on her last day there before she moved onto her next locum position. WE checked out the markets and looks around the cathedral with the crooked spire, which Chesterfield is famous for. Apparently it was built in a bit of a hurry several centuries ago and they didn't wait for the wood to dry properly, so as it dried out over time, the whole spire has spiralled a little bit. it looks quite precaious but is so tightly joined now that it wouldn't fall down very easily at all!
I then drove further south to 'Fenny Drayton' the village where my Grandparents used to live. It was where my family stayed the times we came out on holiday, the last of which was about 13 years ago, so it was really quite surreal to be there again. I saw my Grandma's old house, which has had some extensions on the front, and the little park where we used to play with some other kids in the village, and where I saw snow for the first time. Lots of little memories came flooding back, and driving myself around, places were all connected up so they made more sense. I dropped in on a friend of my Grandma's and my mum's (and now mine as well!), who used to live on the next door farm to my mum's family in a place called Bentley in Warwickshire. Mrs Farmer is a lovely lady, and absolutely loves animals, and worked at a vets for a while herself, so we sat and chatted for ages. There had been some really severe storms, which I had driven through on the way down, and there was not power in the Village, so we drove to the next town and got fish and chips for dinner.
I drove home feeling like I had reconnected with my mum's side of the family, and I will be back down that way again to see some more friends no doubt.