Neither here nor there

The sky was fierce today with much thunder and lightning - it was brilliant.

Also had a super long chat to my friend Meridy, who moved to Sydney a few months ago. Ahhh I do miss my friends!

I was really disappointed when I found out my ring was not going to arrive today... instead the earliest will be the 5th August. It's true what they say "A watched kettle never boils", well I have been waiting for almost 3 weeks now and gee, time can move slowly when looking at the clock!

So decided to treat myself to a movie - you guessed it, "Harry Potter". It was not nearly as good as the other HP's but set the scene for a great 7th movie! Finishing the evening with some Indian take-away, "West Wing" and my baby!

I want one!!!

This was just too adorable not to share - so cute!

I can't wait to get one!

Bleakness...

Just realised the we have NO photos of our trip from Sydney to Adelaide. No 12 Apostles, No giant lobster, no submarine "city", no crater, no photo's of Melbourne - but then that's no great loss! ;-) and even worse... no photo's of my friend's wedding either! Bleakness I tell you; Bleakness!

The weekend

This weekend I started a book "The Adventures of Harold Trollope", he is my great grandfather. It's been very interesting and entertaining so far and I can't wait to finish!

Also went to see Ice Age 3 - in 3D. So imaginative and extremely cleaver, a great laugh!

Apart from that, and a rare appearance at the gym, just worked on the 2008 blog. When we were burgled in Dec and they stole our laptops, with it, all our photos. I am only now, just beginning to realise how many memories were captured and lost!

So I'm "beg, borrow or stealing" photo's to make up for this loss ;-)

Just so grateful I uploaded some pic's on facebook, at least those have been saved!

Cleaning

I bought a clothes drying rack today and bizarrely enough they had vacuum packed it

Definitely not user friendly when unwrapping!

As I was also in a spring cleaning mode today, decided to include some admin and stumbled across these...

From top left across:
BBC Security Pass (SP), BSkyB SP, RSSB SP, SP for the Queen Mary II cruise, ITV SP, Skandia SP, WCC SP, Open Water Divers Card, a very old ID used for London transport, a fake "student" card forged in Cairo for $40 - all students got major discounts on transportation (bad bad bad me! hehe), Euro Card for when I went travelling across Europe on the next card - Bus-a-bout and of course the infamous London Oyster Travel Card.

Such great memories!

Harry Potter...

I've never been that into Harry Potter. I'm more a chick-flick type gal and always thought HP to be super scary! yeah yeah yeah yeah I can just hear what you're thinking! :-)

Anyhow, after all this hype about Harry Potter I decided it's about time to do something about it...

1. First stop Video Store
   
2. Popcorn
   
3. Couch
   
4. Uninterrupted hours just HP and me
   
   

Watched all 5 movies and surprisingly LOVED them. Of course that's because I could just press pause whenever necessary!!

Point of note:
The DVD's in the video store all have Finnish covers and synopsis's, and if that's not confusing enough there's no way of knowing if the movie is actually an English or Finnish one - so unless you recognise the actors...

Just embracing the culture!

Just another manic Monday!

Today has been one of THOSE days...

You know, when the alarm goes off and you say to yourself, just 5 more minutes. The 5 min turns out to be an hour later - when you bolt up and realise you still have to shower, wash and dry your hair, tidy the apartment, eat some breakfast, draw out some cash and be at the acupuncturist in just 20 min!

Now, my hair doesn't do "rush" well - unless it's blow-dried to my scalp it becomes wilder than a lions mane. So there I am trying to eat my toast with all this hair getting in the way and I'm wondering why this darn tea is taking so long to draw, after taking a quick gulp realised that might be it - I never boiled the water! doh...

With no time to waste, toast in one hand, an umbrella in the other I run down the road in the pouring rain. Not looking where I'm running - SPLASH - hit the biggest puddle ever, now my jeans are soaked and it's too late to realise that perhaps flip-flops aren't the best thing to wear today either!

As I open the door, I think to myself "phew made it, nothing else could possible go wrong..." I should have known to touch wood for my sunglasses were trying their best to keep my hair tame but came shooting off my head, as I turned around to pick them up I accidentally hit the corner of the table and broke it!

Think I'll just curl up in bed for the rest of today and wait for tomorrow to arrive!

Bits and bobs...

Now that the 2009 blog is up to date, I started the 2008 travel blog. Wow... I'm surprised how difficult it is to remember what happened only a year ago - is this an age thing?!?!

While I've been trying to think about what happened last year, I remembered a few things that happened this year...

• A while ago I decided to become more Eco-friendly so bought some "Ecover" cleaning products. After a couple of weeks and loads of washing later, it was time to do the dreaded ironing. The clothes felt SUPER soft almost as though I hadn't washed them. After some investigation... turned out I had been washing with "Conditioner"!
  
  
• We've bought steak - only to discover it was horse meat! (Shame, poor horse - Needless to say it was left untouched!)
  
  
• Bought chicken - which turned out NOT to be chicken and I'm too scared to ask what the vile taste really was!
  
  
• I spent an hour translating "How to cook oats" from Finnish into English- where is the instant 1 min oats when you need it the most!?
  
  
• The floors at the airport are made of wood and pristinely preserved - very nice!
  
  
• Marc missed his flight to the UK last time as there were major strikes on at the airport - this happens quite often and without warning!
  
  
• The doors lock backwards here... good thing to know especially when using public toilets!

Oh... and this is the "Premiere" opening of Harry Potter, which happened last night - a far cry from Leicester Square Premier openings!

It was held at the "Tennispalatsi Finnkino". This used to be an indoor tennis court facility, now converted into a cinema - have to say the most comfortable cinema I have been to with the most delicious tasting popcorn EVER! Yum

So it looks like this weekend I'm on my own as Marc has just left for the UK and I'm in bed with a tummy bug! :-(

Happy Engagement Graeme and Mishi, sorry I couldn't be there to celebrate with you. xx

The Tong Master - in Finland

Woke up to a gorgeous day!

After a great sleep in I headed off to gym... then off to the shops to pick up a bbq / braai.

Although it's small - it was BRILLIANT to be able to braai again... and as it's a disposable braai - no mess no fuss!

Marc was the "Tong Master..." of course.


Just perfect for the lamb sosaties I had made - very domesticated and yummy indeed!

Shop till you drop... or not!

So today Marc and I decided to check out this AMAZING outlet store which had a 70% discount sale... quite excited about the prospect we hurried over.

WOW... the advert was huge in the papers - quite the opposite of the shop! It must have been 3sq metres IF that! We opened the door, took two steps... moved our necks and that was that - most uneventful indeed.

So we headed over to catch a movie: Rajattu Maa (Crossing Over - Harrison Ford and Ashley Judd) it was too much of a "Crash" wanna-be film - entertaining enough though!

Then we strolled around new areas of town we hadn't yet frequented. Found a great shoe shop - and had to contain my laughter when I saw these

Priceless!

Quick story:
Yesterday I became a blonde again (after a year of being a red head and a brunette). Just in the nick of time too, as today I had a seriously blonde moment...

I was in an outdoor store looking at all the latest camping gadgets and stuff; when I came across this baby's stroller - a serious 4x4 stroller. I was quite impressed so pushed it a little, checked out the tyres, inspected the trimmings looked inside it, then went to call Marc over... only to return to find a frantic mother pushing her 4x4 stroller towards her husband and baby. Turns out this shop doesn't sell strollers after all!

Headed back home with some Indian Takeaway and Series 4 of The West Wing.

Snuggling in now for a great evening ahead...

1 Month Today!!!

Started posting to my blog one month ago today, have thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it. To date have had 95 hits - I am very pleasantly surprised!

Started my own business in May and am doing my first launch in October... so busy busy busy at the moment - hence the short post.

Life is good... enjoy!

2nd Anniversary

Can't beleive we've been married for 2 years already!

And just as happy as the day Marc proposed, on this private beach in Australia!

You can still see our footprints!

Chinese Medicine!

Today I went to an acupuncturist, heard such great reports about it so decided to try it out for myself.

Well it was... interesting. Afterwards I did feel amazing! Anyhow, as I was leaving, the acupuncturist told me to take one of these a day:

It came in the white "egg-like" shell. Yip it's the black thing. It tasted about as bad as it looks...

Now those who know me, know I DON'T take tablets very well on the best of days...

OH MY WORD... it was the second worst thing I have ever put in my mouth. The worst being some quinine tablets I had to chew when I was 12, in order to go on the school camp in a maleria infected area - scarred for life!

Had to try REALLLLLLY hard to keep it down. So I decided to actually check out the ingredients: Black-bone chicken, Sweet Wormwood, Oyster Shell, Deer Horn, Ovum of Mantis, Starwort Root - to name a few!!!

Needless to say the rest of these were quickly disposed of! brrrrrr I've got shivers just thinking about it...

Out and About

Where has the time gone - Happy 4th of July USA!!!

Went into a coffee shop a few days ago, saw this most unusual bell. You had to "wind" the handle and these metal pins would bounce off a braille type roller pin, as it chimed - similar to a Kalimba or Mbira. Very cute!

Anyhow, after not gyming in ages and all this coffee - (which just by the way happens to be the best coffee I have ever tasted in my life!) Marc and I decided we need to become a little bit more healthy...

So we are now fully stocked with nutrient supplements (Compliments from Arnie the Pharmacist)

Also working out SOOOO hard with our new "Vibra Tone" belts we bought... HAVE to watch lots of T.V. while the celullite just melts away!

And after all that hard exercise....

It was time for a great breakfast. So this morning we headed out to a stunning little restaurant

The food was delicious!

Went for a walk around the park - Saw this amazing woman... geeeeee she was a great contortionist!

Then this horrific band... the music was unpleasantly loud - I'm sure they must have tinnitus!

Then what would a day out be like without a quick pop into the shops - this was a VERY nice shop!!! One whole floor for handbags another for shoes... and it was around there where I lost Marc.

We also caught the Helsinki tour bus - all photo's posted in "February 2009 - Finland" blog. Trying to keep all country photos together

All in all a great day with some great weather - loving the Finnish Summer!