What I got for Christmas

So, in addition to my awesome new iPhone (I've downloaded about 35 free apps so far! Only paid for one), I also got my awesome professional grade GHD straighteners. Those were the two "big" gifts. Steve also got me a blanket that has sleeves on it, since I'm always cold! lol. And since I've been reading so much recently, Pete and Amanda got me a gift card to the book store and Steve got me a book by an author he knows I like: "The Sign" by Raymond Khoury. Oh, and Amazon have made the Kindle app for the iPhone free so after installing it, I bought another book from the Kindle store: "The Hunt" by Jennifer Sturman (it's a chick-lit series Ange introduced me to). The gift of iPhone just keeps on going, lol.

Steve's parents gave me a big bottle of Bailey's - since Jamaica when I tried the Rum Cream, I've been obsessed with cream liqueurs. Paul and Jodie also got me a smaller bottle of Bailey's Cream Caramel and a box of chocolates. Steve also got me a box of mint chocolates (my favorite).

I think that about sums it up. Steve did also get me some minor camera stuff I've been needing but nothing terribly exciting (a new lens hood and cleaner). And of course my mom sent me those cute little snow globes! The rest will have to wait until July when we will exchange gifts during our visit!

Oh, and this will disappoint Mom, but Steve forgot to get any Yorkshire Pudding for Christmas dinner! Can you believe it? I was disappointed when he told me but by the time I was digging into my food, I didn't even notice they were missing because everything else was so good.

Hope everyone had a good Christmas!

I got an iPhone

I got an iPhone for Christmas (don't cry James) and I'm currently using it to post! (even though I'm sitting right in front of my computer)


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

It just keeps snowing

It's still been snowing here off and on. Although we haven't got 13+ inches of snow like you guys, Steve discovered an area at his mom's place that has been untouched since it started snowing and it measured 5 inches. Steve said "I can't remember the last time we had this much snow." LOL, sad isn't it? Apparently we have Russia to thank for the "blizzard".

The interesting part is that they haven't salted the residential or back roads, only the main roads. At some point between all this on-off snow, it started to melt... but then froze over! So many of the residential roads, plus all the sidewalks, have a layer of solid ice and then another inch or two of snow on top of it. It's VERY slippery!

Still Snowing!

Okay, it's kind of sad that it snows 3 times in 4 days and yet you can still see the grass through the snow. But that's a lot of snow for England!

Let It Snow

In the last three days, it has snowed twice! Only a light dusting but not bad, for England. I was so impressed, I took a picture:



On Thursday, we had our work Christmas party. No one in England seems to like having their picture taken so here are the few I got:


Tracy and Andrew


Amanda (alluding the camera behind the wine bottle) and Pete


ME!


Half of the Community Department

And then on Friday, we went out for Amanda's birthday, during which I forced her to not hide from the camera:





Don't worry, I had a shirt on underneath that sweater.

That about sums up all recent updates! If I don't post again before the 25th, Merry Christmas and I'll probably see some of you on webcam Christmas day!

Pantomime Pictures

As promised (read previous entry if you haven't already):


This was one of the bit parts the rugby players had - Phil (with the axe) really got into it but Adam hated it. Apparently he doesn't like public speaking/performances - which left me wondering why he became a rugby player!

This was the "dame", played by a man. Very Victorian, despite this being a play about Aladdin, lol. The show was kind of all over the place in that regard.

Below is a picture of the genie and dancers. There's more photos on my flickr photostream.

Robin's First Pantomime

I'll start with explaining a Pantomime because I didn't really know what it was - apparently it's a very English thing. It's a musical comedy stage production which is put on around Christmas time but the show itself is not necessarily about Christmas. It involves a lot of crowd participation - ie, the actors turning to the audience and asking "what should I do?" and the crowd shouting back. It apparently begin as opera but no longer is such. Steve says it's tradition in a Pantomime for the lead male/boy role to be played by a woman and for the pantomime "dame" to be played by a man. Of course these elements are not unfamiliar to me but I've never specifically been to a Pantomime. You can read more about it here.

So last night, the Salford City Reds Community Department and local Pendleton College held a Pantomime at the rugby's variety center. Several lines included jokes about Salford, Manchester and local areas, including the rugby team and the football (soccer) teams (Manchester City and Manchester United). Oh and two of our players were briefly in the show twice. Although it's geared towards kids, there were a lot of adult jokes in it too, in order to entertain the parents. This particularly Pantomime was based on "Aladdin". Surprisingly, it was really good! I even literally laughed out loud several times. And the photography experience was great. Although I was officially only there to get shot of the rugby players on stage for PR, I took the opportunity to shoot the whole show. The community department wants to give my photos to Pendleton College so I'm hoping it peaks their interest in using me for other events they have.

I'm still processing the photos but once I'm done and picked the best ones, I'll post them. So stay tuned!

Thanksgiving

As most of you know, Steve and I had our own Thanksgiving dinner here in England (so nice to see everyone on webcam!). We invited our friends Pete and Amanda over to share it with us. We would have liked to invited more people but unfortunately, our apartment and our dinner table aren't big enough.

I was tempted to take some pictures of everyone and maybe even bring out the video cam because the whole reason we bought it was for times like these. But as we all know, Steve HATES being on camera and Amanda is no better so sometimes it's like a battle to get some simple pictures. Add to that the fact that Amanda wasn't feeling well (the poor girl had a fever of 101 - seriously, she should have stayed home!) so I didn't want to push it.

I did, however, get some pictures of the table partially set and of Steve cooking (face not included).





Oh! I forgot to mention! It appears adventures in cooking are never complete in our home without some kind of disaster. Steve had turned the stove on to boil the potatoes - he'd turned on one in the front and one on the back, thinking he'd put the pot on the back burner and then move it forward (not sure why). Well, he forgot and while holding a kitchen towel over the stove, it brushed the hot uncovered one and started smouldering! Luckily, it did not burst into flames and we did not set off the fire alarm, lol. We quickly ran it under cold water and all was well after that - well, expect for the side of the foil roasting pan giving out and dumping hot butter, oil and turkey juices all over the oven door. But I think that's enough excitement for the day!

New Coat

My old coat was getting kind of dirty and worn - plus, since I lost a bit of weight, it was a little too baggy. So I just got a new coat:



Cute, huh?

Printer is UP and running (sort of)

So I've finally been getting my Canon i9900 up and running again. I was first delayed due to confusion about voltage (US printer in the UK, didn't want to ) but Dad contacted Canon and got it sorted out. I then got the printer drivers installed and started printing pretty easily BUT the prints had lines on them. After 5 print head deep cleans, it was finally printing cleanly - but within 5 minutes, my laptop sporadically blue screened! So I rebooted and printed off ONE 4x6 photo only to be told my cyan ink had run out! Of course it's an easily solved problem but it's just annoying. Well, at least the one photo I managed to get out of it looks great.

SO... let the print orders begin! Who wants what?

I'm SUCH an idiot!

I've just realized that the BBC TV show "Spooks" IS aired on BBC America! It's just under a different name! "MI-5"! Unfortunately, BBC America's website is terrible and I can not for the life of me find out WHEN it's aired! But that's okay because I highly suggest everyone in the US buy the DVD's to get caught up anyway:

MI-5 DVDs on Amazon!

Since I originally thought it wasn't aired over there, I figured there would also be no DVDs available in US region. But since there is, I'm half tempted to buy this as a Christmas present for all of you because it's THAT good and you will love it.

Let there be WATER!

Our water is back - not at full pressure but still, low pressure is better than no pressure. Hopefully it won't go off again!

Oh Good

So half an hour ago, someone was banging loudly on our apartment door - not just ours but obviously everyone's. It was a maintenance guy... and anyone who has ever lived in an apartment building knows that when the maintenance guy knocks on your door at 9pm, it's never a good thing.

There is another water leak. They are turning our water off again. They left it on for half an hour so everyone could fill their buckets to flush their toilets. And they said it should be back on tomorrow but we've heard that one before, haven't we? So who knows. Seriously, this is getting absurd! I thought this was all done and over with back in June but here we are again.

This, plus all the other issues we've had here, such as the paint peeling off the ceiling in the bathroom from the humidity and the lights ceasing to work whenever we replace a bulb (seriously, we're down to ONE overhead light in the bedroom). And the shower head in the bathtub will not switch off and revert back to the faucet. Oh and lets not forget the great shower leak of 2007, a result of the shower not being caulked properly. It's so obvious this place was cheaply built but it's not cheap to buy or rent. Someone has made a fortune and doesn't care that everyone else is getting ripped off.

I need to go meditate or something before I pop a blood vessel or whatever from pure rage.

Another book review

The Last Queen by C.W. Gortner


My rating: 1 of 5 stars
I know it's very early (on page 12) but I'm not impressed with this book so far. For starters, there is a sentence that ends with "a symbolic symbol of defeat". This just struck me as very poor writing - you don't need both words "symbolic" and "symbol" because by definition, a symbol IS symbolic!

I plowed on, determined to give it a chance. But then came to a point when the women of the conquered moors committed suicide and Catalina's (Catherine) eyes were covered to protect her innocence since she is the youngest. This confused me because just prior, the entire royal family rode through the battlefield where the dead and dying still lay. Surely this is no less horrific than watching someone commit suicide?

Additionally, I'm not even sure I believe that the children would be present at the battlefield upon victory. In this book, Juana described her childhood as mainly living in tents alongside battlefields. She even describes the sounds of battle as the sounds she fell asleep and awoke to and in the background of her tutoring. It just doesn't sound very realistic to me - surely the children would be safely tucked far away in a grand house or palace?

I haven't completely written it off yet, only because it gets so many good reviews both here and on Amazon. But this book has a lot to make up for if my opinion on it is going to improve.

Update: I thought if there were no more issues like this, I could enjoy finishing it. But there are. On page 17, the author actually uses the phrase "I could care less"! Not only is this an extremely modern term that has NO place in a novel set in the 15th-16th century but technically, it's not even correct grammar. I'm not even a grammar guru or anything but I still know a phrase like this in a book like this is just appalling. I'm shocked that not only would an author use this term but that it would go unspotted by the editor!

This is more subjective but not long after that, Juana is told she will marry Philip of Flanders. Despite having been betrothed to him since childhood, Juana is shocked. I just found this unrealistic. Although I'm sure leaving your home and family for a foreign land to marry a man you've never met would be distressing and daunting - but it was not uncommon so I'm confused by her shock. Juana follows up her shock with a childish whine "But why me?" I just found this really annoying and it didn't make me like her character at all.

Juana then goes on to try to persuade her father to not marry her off to a foreigner. He uses some very see-through reverse psychology and frustratingly, it works. It doesn't say much for Juana's intelligence and again, it doesn't make me like her character.

Sorry, I know I'm only on page 39 but I gave this book more than enough chances - continuing to read even after what I saw to be at least 5 major flaws. The sixth was the last straw. My husband says life is too short to read books you don't like so I'm giving up on this one.

View all my reviews >>

Michael McIntyre!

I was so excited to see comedian Michael McIntyre last night and he didn't disappoint! I was a little worried because his delivery style borders on "over the top" so it's possible that he could get carried away with his success and fame (he's hugely popular over here) and wind up being annoying rather than funny. But that hasn't happened! At least not yet. At one point, I was laughing so hard, I literally had tears in my eyes! And I got a shirt that says "I'm absolutely gazeboed" which is one of his many catchphrases from his most popular act that made him famous. You can see it here, it's the first joke!

Salford Quays by Day and Night

So my little photoshoot on the balcony the other night has inspired me to take more photos around the Quays. It's such a nice area and there's so many photo ops just waiting to be had, shame on me for not taking advantage of it sooner. I've named the project "Salford Quays by Day and Night" because I plan to do a ton of photos both at night and during the day. I don't plan on them all being HDR though. But HDR does work well with night shoots and I'm doing the night side of right now.

There's a chance they could be used promotionally for work at the rugby club too.

So here's the next one in the series:



I'm not as happy with it. Mainly because I framed it too tightly which left very little room for lens correction (the building in the background is still slightly tilted but I couldn't correct it anymore or I'd be cropped off the corner of the theater). I'll probably reshoot it but it'll do for now.

Unfortunately, it's raining tonight and tomorrow we're seeing comedian Michael McIntyre so the next photo will have to wait.

I'll leave you with a video of Michael McIntyre Live at the Apollo:

View from my balcony

You may have noticed my awesome new blog header. I thought the side bar was getting too cluttered so I moved my awesome self portrait to the header instead. I know, I'm so humble, aren't I?

And speaking of humble, here's an awesome HDR I did of the Salford Quays from my balcony.



I know, I'm awesome.

The Lost Symbol (belated)

Finished reading this about a month ago but only got around to sharing my thoughts about it now! Slight spoiler warning.

The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown


My rating: 5 of 5 stars
I was a bit disappointed to see The Lost Symbol follows Dan Brown's formulistic plotline of "academic expert teams up with attractive single woman whose "father figure" is somehow involved (usually injured or killed and often a leader of a "secret society") to unravel an earth shattering secret while on the run for their lives. But that is my only complaint.

Though not always 100% factual, the general concepts that Brown presents in his books always introduce me to new ideas and information I had never come across before and The Lost Symbol is no exception. Criticize his writing skills all you want, the theories that some of his novels are based on inspire probably millions of people to get on the internet and research it themselves. How many books have accomplished that? There is obviously something worthy about his material.

The theory of Intention in particular struck a cord with me. In a way, the concepts are familiar ones: prayer, positive thinking, even a bit of Karma. But to learn there are scientific studies going on as we speak which could potentially prove the benefits of such acts? Have I been living in a cave or is this really as groundbreaking as it sounds?

Though I can't credit Dan Brown with the idea or studies of Intention, I can thank him for bringing it to my attention in a fun, entertaining, action-packed story.

View all my reviews >>

Spooks!

My new favorite TV show is actually British! I haven't taken much to British TV so this is a first. It's a show about MI5 agents (spies) and it's aired on BBC (another first, I don't normally watch anything on BBC except the occassional documentary). So I was hoping it'd be on BBC America so I could recommend you all start watching it immediately. But it's not.

Spooks

Keep a look out for it in case BBC America ever pick it up because it's really, really good.

On another note, I was unable to upload the videos from Jamaica since some of them were too long (not blaming James, I prefer them to short clips). So I'm just going to burn them to DVDs for anyone who wants them.

JAMAICA!

So for anyone reading thing who was not in Jamaica, here is a TON of photos:

Robin's Jamaica Photos
Ange's Jamaica Photos
Mom's Jamaica Photos
Robin's Jamaica Wedding Photos

I'm working on the videos now!

Switching galleries AGAIN

So with Picasa, the display quality was poor. With Flickr, they limited free accounts to 200 images! I'm willing to pay Flickr for my pro images but for personal/family images, I wanted something free with no restrictions (or reasonable restrictions). I MAY have finally found this with photoshop.com! Check it out here.

New HD Mini Camcorder

Finally, I've got up the test video I did at Edinburgh Castle with our new HD camcorder:

Playing with HDR

I've always been against very surreal looking HDRs (High Dynamic Range) because I think they're just eye candy and people drawn in by the surrealness, it doesn't necessarily make it a good photograph.

But some HDR's are still fairly natural looking. So I decided to have a play around with them myself. I think the one from Edinburgh (first one) is more realistic but it's actually harder to get a realistic looking HDR than it is a surreal one - at least with this software it is. I can see how easy it is to go a bit crazy with them like some people do.





Steve suggested I get one of them printed on canvas. I don't know what sparked that idea but I'm considering it.

Military Tattoo Videos

These are the videos from the Military Tattoo, from my compact camera:

Edinburgh, Day 4!

The final day! In the morning, it was raining again but I'd say we really lucked out with the weather. The 2 full days we were there, it was sunny and a lot of people (hotel staff, waiters, etc) commented on how lucky we got with the weather. The weather tends to be worse the farther north you go so 2 days of sunshine is noteworthy in Scotland! lol.

We visited the Cathedral first but there was some restoration going on and a photography permit costs £2 so I didn't think it was worth it. Hence no photos of the Cathedral.

Lastly before leaving Edinburgh, we stopped at the National Museum of Scotland. By this point, Steve had blisters on his feet and I could barely go up or even down any stairs my legs were so sore, lol. So we only browsed the first and second floor before giving up. We used the audio guide but it was disappointing compared to the one at the Palace. There was only about 6 items on it. At least it was free.

On our way out of Edinbugh, we stopped in the village of Roslin, home to Rosslyn Chapel. It's become more famous for being featured in The Da Vinci Code (both book and movie) but that's not the only reason I wanted to visit it. It's a beautiful chapel in it's own right - there's a reason it was chosen to be featured in the Da Vinci Code.

Unfortunately, there was no photography allowed inside the chapel and outside, the chapel was under extensive restoration so that was disappointing. You can see how difficult it was to get any photos without the restoration showing:





We then grabbed some fish and chips at the restaurant of Roslin Glen Hotel. It was easily the BEST fish and chips I've ever had!



So that's the end of our trip! I think we packed in a lot and both had a great time. I was sad to leave but I am now looking forward to Jamaica! I'm still working on the videos but they will be up soon!

Edinburgh, Day 3!

Our luck held and we had another day of good weather. In the morning, we visited Holyroodhouse Palace (yeah, it's a bit of a mouthful), the Queen's official residence in Scotland. We couldn't take pictures inside but we could take pictures within the entrance, the courtyard, gardens and the Abbey, which is in ruins.



We decided to try the audio guide because it was free. We've never used them before and Steve was really pleased with it. He seemed a bit bored with the castle the day before but he really enjoyed seeing the palace and listening to the audio tour.

After the palace, we saw another comedy show which Steve enjoyed but I definitely did not. The guy was weird and often just not funny. He did some songs and poetry which just doesn't appeal to me.

After that, we headed back to Holyrood Park. We debated climbing the moutain but by that point, our feet and legs were really sore from all the walking we'd be doing in the last few days. Keep in mind we'd been walking almost everywhere and also considering all the walking around the castle and palace, we easily walked 4 miles a day. So we kept the climbing to a minimum and just kind of wandered around while I took pictures. We did climb a little ways up to St Anthony's Chapel, which is also in ruins.





Since it was our actual anniversary this day, we had made reservations at a restaurant called Vittoria. It was a huge restaurant with 3 floors and seated 200 people - and it was PACKED. It was a good thing we made reservations because otherwise, we wouldn't have been seated in time for us to make the show for that night. But even being so busy, the staff did not appear stressed and we didn't have to wait too long for our food. Both and food and the wine was very good - I had the risotto in goats cheese and sun dried tomatoes and Steve had a meat filled pasta in a bolognese sauce.



After dinner it was off to . . . the Ladyboys of Bangkok! We've seen them before in Manchester and Steve is not afraid to admitt it finds it very entertaining, lol. I've said it before but some of those men look more like women than some women do! At one point Steve said to me "That's clearly a woman" and he overheard another guy saying "That's confusing" lol.

So that's the conclusion to day 3. The videos from the Tattoo are still uploading so I'll be back with those, as well as day 4!

Edinburgh, Day 2!

In my last post, I forgot to mention that Steve managed to rip his pants (right in the crotch, lol) while getting into the car. By that point, all stores had closed since it was Sunday (in England, there is a law that says shops, excluding restaurants and pubs, can only be only for a certain amount of hours) so first thing on Monday morning, we set out to get him some new ones since he only brought that one pair with him. After that, Steve had been talking about this mini camcorder Paul has and how it'd be great for while we're in Edinburgh so we went to check it out. I was not opposed to such a spontaneous purchase (though it does not compare to Dad's spontaneous Land Rover purchase) because I originally wanted to get a camcorder I first came to England (though I make do with the video clips on my compact camera).

Unfortunately, after purchasing the camcorder (we got the HD version too), we realized it only charges by USB and neither of us brought our laptops. We had a USB charger for the car but we couldn't really drive around aimlessly for hours while it charged! We did manage a slight charge and got a few test videos around the castle but I haven't gotten them onto my PC yet so more on that later.

Anyway, all of that took up the whole morning and we walked everywhere so I was also grabbing pictures along the way. Luckily, the weather was very nice and stayed that way the whole day! By the time we got to the Edinburgh Castle, it was lunch time. So we quickly got a bite to eat at one of the cafes next to the castle before heading in.


Inside the castle was the Scottish Crown Jewels. Unfortunately, they were nowhere near as impressive as the crown jewels at the Tower of London. Oh, and we weren't allowed to take pictures of them. But I did get some of the castle itself. It was crowded so most of the pictures inside are just your usual touristy pictures.

As you can see, the castle is perched on a hill/cliff so I got some pretty good pictures around the outside of it with no people in the way.

After seeing the castle, we went to another comedy show. It was an improv show, like Whose Line Is It Anyway? and a few of the comedians were from the original English version of the show. It was really funny!

We then had dinner at the hotel restaurant, which wasn't great unfortunately but our waiter was really nice.

After dinner, we went to what I felt was the highlight of the whole trip: The Military Tattoo. It was AMAZING. They also had military bands from different countries like China, South Africa and Switzerland. There were also dancers, fireworks, singers, etc. I'm working on getting the videos I took of it on my compact camera on the internet but it's proving near impossible. Apparently, my laptop just HATES the network, I've always had problems with it... so Steve has to upload the videos for me. For some stupid reason, my laptop just refuses to upload them and not only that but when I try to upload them, it causes the whole internet to stop working and I have to disconnect to the router and reconnect. It's not frustrating WHATSOEVER.

So anyway, hopefully I'll be back with the videos that Steve has uploaded.

Edinburgh, Day 1!

Our adventures in Edinburgh were so eventful that I'm going to make an entry for each day! Some of the photos were taken with my compact camera, some with the DSLR. That really depended on whether it was raining or not. I've also abandoned Picasa Galleries and uploading straight to blogspot because the quality is so poor so I created a Photoshop.com account for family/personal photos.

On Sunday, we set off an hour late because the sat nav wouldn't recognize any Edinburgh postcodes so Steve was struggling to get the hotel address up. Eventually, we got on the road and passed the driving time with the book of "If" questions.

Once there, we checked in and then got a Sunday roast at a pub called the Royal McGregor. It was a small place but we got seated right away. The food was pretty good but the gravy a little salty.



Not surprisingly, it was raining! I took some pictures but later got some of the same area when it wasn't raining. We wandered around in the rain and stopped at the "West End Fair" which was a disappointment. It was supposed to be an arts and crafts fair but there was all of about 10 stalls and a kind of creepy street performer, lol.

We then went back to the hotel to relax for a hour or so before going to the "Foodie Tents" - a bunch of stalls of local restaurants, farmers, etc selling products. It was much better than the West End Fair. Mom would have really liked the stall for "The Really Garlicky Company". We tried some "Fruit Ice" which I thought would be like water ice but it was much creamier - which is weird because there was no ice cream in it. It was really good but only available locally: Belhaven Fruit Farm. I don't normally drink hard cider but I tried some from a stall that was really good so I bought a bottle. Lastly, we got some dried apple crisps which are super healthy and apparently sold at Sainsbury's so we'll be looking out for those: Snapz Crisps.

Rain Factor: off and on by that point. It stopped long enough for me to grap a picture of part of the mountains/park next to the tents (I got more pictures of that another day so this is just a preview).



Later, we saw comedian Jimmy Carr. Steve really likes him, I think he's just okay. He does make me laugh sometimes but I'm not fond of his delivery style. He's big on one liners and I just feel like after every joke there should be cheesy drums going off.

I think I mentioned everything from Sunday. Check out the Photoshop Gallery for more pictures and stay tuned for Day 2! There will be video! Ooooooo!

Edinburgh, here we come!

Last night, we had our second to last game of the season. Although I enjoy doing the sports action photography, I couldn't wait for it to be over because it was the last thing I had to get done before we go off to Edinburgh tomorrow! I can't wait! Edinburgh is supposed to be a great city and we'll be there for the Fringe Festival and our anniversary! And we're seeing the Military Tattoo which will be great but I know I'm going to be wishing I had a press pass for it, lol.

We have so many things planned, we had to make a schedule to fit it all in. We'll only be there for 3 days and now I wish we'd planned for longer. Steve says he'll be able to post blog updates from Edinburgh on his iPhone but that's probably easier said then done, lol.

I just hope the weather is okay. Yesterday, it was sunny when I got up, then it rained, then the sun came out, then it rained again, then sun came out again. I was just grateful it didn't rain during the game, I HATE shooting in the rain! This morning, the sun has been out but the weather gets worse the farther north you go so I don't know what Edinburgh will be like.

Anyway, I should go start packing! I will leave you with my photos from the game last night. Expect lots of pictures from Edinburgh when I come back, although they may not be any good depending on the weather (it certainly didn't cooperate in Wales!)

Surprise! I'm a spider

Last night, after a long day at work (another match), I let out an almighty shriek as I opened the bathroom door, flicked the light switch and there on the floor sat a rather giant spider. Steve rushed to my aid with killer tissues in hand but upon seeing the size of the spider, he said "You know, I think I'll use a shoe instead".

I felt bad about my shriek because it was the kind that might have made Steve think something was actually wrong, not just my freakishly inexplicable fear of spiders. It always reminds me of the story Mom tells about when James was little and started screaming "Mom! Mom! Come quick!" So she rushed outside, thinking something was seriously wrong, maybe he'd even been hurt... only to find him pointing up at the sky and shouting "Look! A plane!" That's me with spiders, except I am actually terrified, not shouting for joy.

I definitely need to buy this shirt that Ange showed me! (To the right).

So, as mentioned, we also had a game last night, which you can see pictures from on my flickr account here. No major incidences like last time, unless you count the fan who tried to throw a bottle at the ref. We could get fined for that but apparently the match official said it was somewhat understandable given the call the ref had just made, lol.

I'm on a roll...

Two posts in two days!

Today, I was woken up by an announcer on a loud speaker outside on the Quays. That was annoying. But then discovered it was for the British National Biathle Championships and realized there was a photo opportunity. You'll be forgiven if you've never heard of the Biathle, Steve and I had never heard of it either. It's a run, swim, run event and had athletes of all ages.

Here's the results!

And more from our boring lives...

It seems the only thing eventful in our lives at the moment is rugby games! Bah! But here's some juicy gossip: last night, one of the "fans" verbally abused our head coach in a very threatening manner. Apparently, Shaun (the coach) was visibly shook up and admitted he should have walked away but was afraid if he turned his back on the guy, he would be physically attacked from behind. Shaun is a pretty tough guy and though he's never shown that side to me, I imagine he can be very intimidating. So for him to be shook up and fearful means this "fan" must have been very aggressive and threatening.

So apparently, despite Salford beating a few of the best teams in the league this season, when we lose, our "fans" are entitled to abuse our head coach. I'd like to blame it on the alcohol but apparently the same guy has since been on the unofficial forum proudly bragging about the altercation.

The good news is, Paul witnessed it all, we know who the guy is and we will be banning him for at least the rest of the season. Next season, he can "plead his case" but it's not guaranteed the ban will be lifted next season either. If he attempts to gain entry to one of the games during his ban, it will be extended to a life time ban and Steve will get the police involved. I don't understand people who behave this way to begin with but least of all do I understand how they think they can get away with it, especially when they go bragging about it on the internet.

And in other, slightly related good news, I think I got some really good shots from this game (one of them being to the left). I've set up a flickr account because uploading to blogspot reduces the image quality so much. All my work is up there now, including the rest from the match last night.

Harry Potter!

We saw The Half Blood Prince on Saturday. I don't know why but we booked for the 10:45pm showing, which means it wasn't over until about 1:30am. Normally, I wouldn't mind but I had yet to recover from my 13 hour work day on Friday! And then, this morning, I was woken up by a bunch of Canadian Geese honking like crazy at 5am! It was really weird, they would carry on for a few minutes, then be quiet for a few minutes, just long enough for me to start drifting back to sleep before honking away again! It even woke Steve up and he admitted it was very strange, he said something along the lines of "There must be a tsunami coming". I was too tired to tell him birds would just fly away, not stand there honking. Although geese are pretty dumb...

So needless to say, I haven't had much sleep recently! And you all know how I love my sleep so I have not been a happy camper. Anyway, back to Harry Potter...

I'm ashamed to admit I don't remember much from the book! I'm going to have to reread the last two books. So I was sort of watching it from a non-reader point of view and it was really, really good. Steve hasn't read the books and thought it was the best Harry Potter movie so far. Don't want to give anything away so I won't say much more. But I've heard the last book is actually going be split between two movies and I'm very excited about that because I was disappointed the whole thing is nearly over! Though I'm sure it would seem overwhelming to people who didn't read the books, I honestly think most of the books could have benefited from being split into two movies.

Been a while

Sorry, I haven't posted in so long. I wish I could say we've been really busy but in fact, our lives are just that boring, I had nothing to post about, lol. But now I do.

Last night Salford had a game so it was our usual 13 hour work day and not surprisingly, it was RAINING. And we lost. I haven't processed the photos from it either so that's about it for that topic.

Today, there was a City friendly being played in South Africa and they aired it on a big screen at the City stadium. It was also the opening of the new shop and release of the new shirt. They advertised it as "family fun" and were supposed to have lots of activities there so I went along but the whole thing was very disappointing. In terms of "family fun", they had soccer kick game set up (you know, kick the ball and try to hit a target), a man on stilts making balloon animals and a face painter. I thought it would be more than that - more games or maybe even rides. So we decide to go into the new shop but as we round the corner, there was such a long ling to get in, we decided to skip it. We were hearing some engine noises and wanted to check it out - I think it was a motorbike race - but it was £10 each to get in so we axed that as well, lol. The only thing left was to watch the game on the big screen. Only trouble was, they couldn't get the satellite working! Took them 32 minutes after the game had started to get it working. We stayed until half time but it was threatening to rain so we got out of there. All that to watch 13 minutes of the game! But I did manage to snap some pictures so here they are (Aoife was very grumpy!):

Comedy

Yesterday was the last day for one of the guys from the community department at the Salford City Reds so everyone from work went out to a comedy club to say farewell to him. The comedy club had something of a game where a bunch of amateurs did a few minute stand up bit but 3 members of the audience were given big cards to hold up when they wanted the comedian (or so-called comedian!) to stop. Once all three people put their card up, the comedian had to leave the stage. Those that made it the designated time without getting voted off went into the next round. Sort of like Britain/America's Got Talent.

But before the game started, there were two comedians on that were the winners from previous nights. They were okay but the best comedian was actually the host of the night - the guy who introduced each act, explained how the game worked, talked to people in the crowd inbetween acts, etc.

The first comedian of the game was pretty good but everyone after that was just terrible. No one was laughing and yet 2 of them went through to the next round! I couldn't believe it. The last act was two women and they were the worst - they did a bit where one read from her "diary" while the other acted it out. I guess they were trying to do something like on Whose Line Is It Anyway but it just wasn't funny. No one was laughing and 2 of the 3 card people put theirs up... the third refused to do so! And I remember she really wanted a card so we wondered if she knew the double act and wanted a card so her friends wouldn't get voted off. How annoying.

Happy 4th of July from England!

Tonight, Amanda and I are going to Ladies Night! Another one of the players is celebrating his 10th year with the team and it's customary for him to hold several events for it. There's a fancy dinner dance one, a golf day, a ladies night, etc.

So anyway, I decided to go shopping for something to wear last minute and while at the Trafford Centre, Selfridges (a department store) had a bunch of American food brands you don't normally find over here for the 4th of July! Steve tells me they always have this stuff at Selfridges (they just had it out on the front display for Independence Day) but I'm sure if I'd known that, I would have taken advantage of it before now!

On another happy note, Salford had a surprising win last night against St Helens - haven't had time to process the pics from it yet but for now, here's a picture of all the American foods I got at Selfridges (yes, that's our couch in the background). I'm now off to get ready for Ladies Night - hopefully I'm not too worse for wear tomorrow for webcam! lol

What is going on?

Illness update!

I feel fine now but I still have this cough and it's not getting better.

But Steve is sick yet again! About 5 weeks ago, he got a really bad cold, the week after that he was feeling better but still had a nagging cough (just like where I am now). I bugged him to go to the doctor because with the cough, his cold had lasted more than 2 weeks and you know Mom's 2 week rule (my cold is about a week and a half so I still have some time). But he didn't go until the 3rd week, when he suddenly started feeling sick again. The doctor said he had a chest infection and prescribed him antibiotics. But he finished the antibiotics a week ago so now it's the 5th week and he still has a little bit of a cough and yesterday, suddenly had a sharp pain in his throat. Since it was a game night, the team doctor was there and told Steve his lymph nodes are swollen and his throat is "red raw" - he instructed to see his GP on monday and get a swab of his throat done so that is the plan.

Hopefully, I don't continue to follow Steve's pattern.

We were supposed to babysit Aoife tonight but I don't think that's going to happen. I feel okay but the last thing I want is to give this horrible cold to little Aoife!

As for the game, we lost horribly but I think I got some good pictures, I haven't gone through them yet.

Spiders everywhere!

Why is our balcony like a spider colony? I went out there and saw a few so I got the bug spray but then a few more crawled out nearby so I just started spraying all over the railing and spiders started crawling out everywhere! There was easily 20 of them and one was HUGE, it was a nightmare! I think I got all of them except this one which was hiding on the other side of the railing and I don't want to reach over the edge.

Still sick!

Well, our water came back on around 4pm Friday but I haven't posted about it because I've been sick all weekend. I'm feeling better than I did on Friday but today, I have no voice. Fun stuff.

The building management say there still needs to be repairs done on the pipes but they did not say they'd be shutting off the water again. I have a sneeky suspicion they will though. After all, the ceiling in our hallway where the elevators are has been leaking water all weekend - that can't be a good sign. There's 4 buckets out there to catch it but it's already ruined the carpet and stained the ceiling so I'm sure that will all have to be replaced once the water is finally fixed. There is a lovely damp smell in the hallway, luckily it hasn't reached inside the apartment. Oh, and did I mention we can't use the trash shoot on our floor for some reason? We have to go up to floor six. What a mess this has all caused.

Sill NO Water!

We still have no water in our apartment building and the reception guy is saying it looks like a minimum of another 48 hours with it off! When we walked in and there was water covering the floor in the stairway, I knew they'd tried to turn it on and something leaked or burst. Apparently, so many people were complaining, that they promised they'd switch it back on today "no matter what" but when they did, they blew a pipe. I knew something like that would happen, I told Steve "If they turn it on before it's ready, they'll just make it worse and then how long will it take to fix it?" This is what happens when people have no patience. I admit the lack of water is beyond annoying but sometimes you just have to let people do their job and throwing a tantrum isn't going to make the situation any better.

And you want to know what caused all this in the first place? Well, I don't know the technicalities but several months ago, they warned residents that they'd be shutting off the water for a day for mandatory maintenance. But so many people complained that they cancelled it! Steve and I thought "so does that mean they're just going to wait until something goes seriously wrong?" Which is exactly what happened. If people had just accepted ONE day without water, this would have been resolved long ago. But now we're all suffering 3+ days without water because some spoiled brats decided they were too important to go one day without it!

The management has supplied us with as many free bottles of water we want though and also with buckets to flush the toilet (and a hose out back to fill it with). The poor reception guy looks extremely stressed out, he's probably getting all the harassment even though he can't do anything but offer updates about the situation.

And to top it off... I have Steve's cold so I don't even have the energy to go to the health club to shower (the showers there have been open to residents in light of the situation). Ugh, what a crappy day!

My Birthday!

As you may have noticed, my birthday is tomorrow and originally, Steve and I were just going to go out to dinner tomorrow night. But apparently our building is shutting off our water tomorrow! It sounds like it will be off all day since they say the Lowry Outlets next door will remain open late so that we can use the bathrooms there. But it's still ridiculously inconvenient (remember when our water shut off while Ange and James were here?!), not only for the bathroom usage (imperative for Crohn's!) but it also means I won't be able to shower tomorrow. It's just typical for this to happen on my birthday!

So, just like when Ange and James were here, we've decided to stay at a hotel tomorrow night. Between the water being off and it being my birthday, why not? I originally suggested just staying in the new Etap down the road because it's cheap but then Steve had the brilliant idea of using the Marriott gift card from Ange and James we got for Christmas! Yay! So thank you guys, your Christmas gift is now also serving as a birthday gift to me, lol. We're staying at the Marriott Renaissance in Manchester. So the water being turned off is kind of a blessing in disguise!

On another note about my birthday, one of my presents from Steve is driving lessons! (Not from him, with a driving company, lol). I've been talking about wanting to drive over here but between driving on the left and learning stick shift, it's been a daunting idea. So I'm basically just going to start from scratch.

Mystery Movie Walk Out!

Tonight we went to another "mystery movie" (last time we saw the monthly mystery movie, it turned out to be Star Trek). Well, this time it was a movie called "Looking For Eric" which is sort of but not really about a former Manchester United player (reminder for Mom, United BAD, City GOOD, lol). Apparently, it's about some delusional guy who thinks the former player is his guardian angel. Not sure why anyone outside a United fan would be interested in this but stranger movies have been made.

Anyway, needless to say, Steve refused to watch anything even remotely related to United so we left ASAP and got a refund since we left within 20 minutes. But surprisingly, so did almost everyone else! I'd say about 90% of the viewers left, much to Steve's delight, lol.

Oasis Yesterday

Yesterday, we (Paul, Jodie, Steve and I) went to see Oasis in Heaton Park. Luckily, it wasn't as muddy as we thought it would be. It was the third show at this location and it'd been raining most of the weekend. I specifically went out and bought cheap shoes in preparation for having to throw them out from all the mud afterwards. But didn't need to so now I have a new pair of shoes! lol

Musically, Oasis were excellent - as were one of the support acts, Kasabian, who I also love. The sound was really good so that helped but they were also both on top form. I wish I could say the same for the fans though. What I'm about to tell you will probably put all you off from ever visiting England again, lol. But here it goes.

English Oasis fans (they don't do this in the US) are seemingly incapable of using a toilet at a concert. I realize a lot of them are so drunk that they can't make it to the porta-potties or wait in the lines for their turn. Especially when you're near the front and it takes half an hour to get through the crowd. You know what it's like when you break the seal! So many of them wind up (cringe) peeing in their empty beer cups. This itself is crude but we haven't reached the worst part yet. For some inexplicable and downright disgusting reason, they then decide that instead of just dumping the urine onto the ground (which is gross but what else are you going to do with it at that point)..... that throwing it into the crowd is a much better solution for getting rid of it.

It's bad enough when they start off throwing their beer into the crowd. The idiocy of this is abounding and what possesses people to waste the money they spent on their beer by throwing it on other people is beyond me. But to then progress to throwing your urine on dozens of people.... I swear, if I ever get my hands on someone who does this, they will live to regret it. But I promise this kind of dispicable behavior only happens at concerts so just don't go a large, popular concert over here and you'll be fine!

That was the worst of the day. We also had to walk about a mile to the location because they only had one entrance to the park open which was about a mile from the stage setup. And then on the way home, stopping at the Subway drive through because the store was closed, a bunch of Oasis fans on foot decided they could cut in front of us because we were in a car.

I hate people. Well, I hate Oasis fans but there are times I hate people in general too.

The only saving grace of the whole day was the music.

On another note, Paul and Jodie told us that Aoife has entered into her terrible two's a bit early and is throwing horrible tantrums if she doesn't get her way. At the food store, she tries to knock everything over and if you try to pick her up, she drops to her knees and screams bloody murder. Paul then asked if we could babysit at the end of June and Steve said "Not if she's behaving like that!" LOL

Summer was nice while it lasted....

From Friday to Tuesday, the weather here has been unusually nice - sunny and highs in the 70s (80s in the sun!). I even got a brief tan over the weekend by lounging on the balcony (and cleaning it). But the next 10 days are forecast for highs in the high 50s, low 60s. Steve kept saying "they" predicted a hot summer but I didn't realize summer was only going to be 5 days long.

Robin Gets Hit by a Ball

That's right, last night I got hit by my first ball. After narrowly escaping being hit from the front thanks to my quick reflexes, it bounced off the boards behind me and hit me in the back. Luckily, by that point it had lost much of it's momentum and didn't hurt. But the fact that it came inches from hitting my camera, which would have then hit me in the face, did shake me up a bit. As I result, anytime the action got anywhere near me again, I was too busy making sure the ball wasn't coming my way to take any pictures!

That, combined with the fact that Salford played poorly and were defending more than they were on the offense (which meant they were all the way at the other end of the field where even a 300mm lens can't reach) meant I did not come away with many photos.

But here they are - this was an away game so that's why Salford are in black instead of red.





And now, I'm off to lounge in the rare English sunshine!

Ugh, they're SO grainy!

Well, the last two games before last night were on saturdays so I stupidly got used to the daylight meaning lower ISO, meaning little to no noise/grain.

Last night, I had to bump up to 3200 which is BAD because the noise is so terrible, my camera doesn't even like to go into ISO 3200. I have to set it through the custom functions, otherwise it will only go up to 1600. It's like the camera saying "Noooo, don't do it! You really don't want to use 3200 so I'll make sure you can't ever accidentally choose it, I'll make you work to set it that high!"

It makes me want the 1D Mark III even more *sniff*. Not only the fastest camera on the market but also handles noise at high ISO's like no other *cry*. It's only the greatest sports camera ever made *sob!*. And only about £3,000 *wail!* Okay, tantrum over.






I can't leave it on that grainy note so I will instead leave you with a picture of Paul and a Miss England Hopeful who was apparently so drunk she could not stand on her own like this for more than 30 seconds (very professional, no doubt she'll win Miss England).

My photo featured in national newspaper!

I've had some of my photos featured in the local magazine, Manchester Evening News, which was exciting but still on a local level. Yesterday, my photo was featured in The Sun, a national newspaper. Unfortunately, we got confused and thought it was going to be in todays paper so I missed seeing it BUT it is available online:

Paul's beef to settle with Bulls

This is how depressing it is to live in England...

Let's not forget it's the middle of MAY!