Turbulence

Changes come and changes go,
some resist and some just flow,
Oh what to do! Should I rejoice?
Or hang my head in deep remorse?

So much to lose, so much to gain,
A brave new world, there might be pain.
It's worth the risk, it's worth the fight,
I might fall down, I might take flight.

And through it all there's someone there,
Who listens out; He knows, He cares.
I think it's time to let you know,
His name is Jesus. With Him; I'll grow.

Getting Married

So, I went to a wedding on Saturday - possibly the coolest wedding in the world! My cousin was getting married to a guy that works for Arsenal, and the reception was held at Highbury (To my American readers: Arsenal is one of the top Soccer teams in the UK). Not only was it really cool to spend time with my dear-departed parents, but I got to see my family too! I don't get to see them much because they mostly live in London, but I do enjoy a good catch-up :-D. When we got there, we found out that the FA Cup would be on display! (To my USA readers: the FA Cup competition is pretty much the UK Soccer equivalent to the Super Bowl). I managed to get my pic taken with it (see above ;-) ).

Cooler still, there was - wait for it - a chocolate fountain!!!! It was sooooo good. No, really...it was amazing. It was about 3ft high and 1-2 ft wide. It had free-flowing, very tasty, chocolate sauce running down it, and was surrounded in abundance by bowls of mini-donuts, strawberries and marshmallows. Plates, napkins and skewer sticks were provided to avoid too much chocolate coverage ;) if I get time I'll upload the video I took of it on my phone *grin*

The wedding was followed by a late-night drive home to Bristol.

Other Happenings
Great news; Lisa is pregnant!! Just joshing. Did I get you? Did you believe me? Shocking? Didn't think so. The great news about Lis is that she's coming on the youth holiday!!! Yay!

Sunday Night
On Sunday we did something we haven't done for ages - about 25 of us invaded a well known Pizza Place! Aaron & Emma are down in Bristol for a while too! Coolness!

T: walks up to greeting-type-person in Pizza Place
Greeting-type-person: "Hi, welcome to [Pizza Place]; how many?"
T: "Hi...uhm...you're going to hate me...there's about 20-25 of us"
G: "You're going to hate me"
T: "Why?"
G: "We're out of pizza!"
T: *double-take* "Ungh?"
G: "We have everything else though!"

So we drove half-way across bristol to a different Pizza Place. This time we phoned ahead.

HP Reading Status - Chapter 22 (page 439 / 607)

Wise They Are

Read it and weep...it's sooo funny.

Oh yeah, it's here

HP Reading Status - Chapter 14 (page 276 / 607)

Suggestions In A Comment...

Right, after months and months, we still don't have a band name. We have had many suggestions, but nothing cuts the mustard (how exactly do you 'cut' mustard anyways. Would you want to!?).

Please; suggestions. The winner will get the supreme honour of being able to say 'I came up with that name'. Apparently Kudos is a good prize...

Gym? What's a Gym?

....ohhhhh, a GYYYM!

Good morning peeps! How are you all!? What've you been up to this week? I started this post a couple of days ago, but completely failed to post it...my apologies. It's not that exciting, so don't hold your breath.

Right, I'm gonna try to give a summary of my week (and a bit);

• Parents Moved Away - my parents selfishly moved to Cambridge this week. You might have guessed that.
• I joined a gym - yep, that's right folks, I've joined a gym. Even used the rowing machine for 1500m *shudder* now, all I need is...willpower!
• I re-wrote my CV - my CV was vastly out of date, and each time I've seen a cool job on a job site, I've never actually applied because I never managed to put the effort into updating my CV. I now have an up-to-date CV. Yay!
• Four Months Passed - not in this week...just the 4-month-stage of Lis & myself had its anniversary this week...yay! We celebrated in style; we went to youth club, LoL.
• Office Move - our long-awaited office move occured on Friday...pretty much no work all day, and now we have an air-conditioned office.....ahhhhhh, sooo good.
• Harry Potter - yup, Harry Potter came out this week on Friday night. I picked up a copy at the supermarket on Saturday while I was buying a tent, a towel and some Passionfruit juice. Mmmmm, Passionfruit juice.
• Band Played - we had our annual Park Event on Saturday (free BBQ, free face-painting, free hair-braiding, free bouncy-castle, free puppet-shows, free entertainment of music). Anyways, our new(ish)ly formed band played 4-5 songs there. It was kinda fun! The PA was an hour late getting set up, so there were some techincal problems, but it was great fun. Bass was up nice and loud for me to hear (which is the most important thing I think ;)). The whole thing was great fun anyways. Even if our band doesn't have a name.
• Office Move - on Friday we moved office - we now have air conditioning! Yay!!!! No more sweltering in the heat! This afternoon there's going to be an opening cerenmony for the new part of the office building that's opening (we're sat in a part of it). This ceremony is closely followed by a hog roast...mmm...hog roast...*dribble*.

I guess that's enough of an update. At work I've actually managed to do some programming this week! It's been cool. Over the past few weeks I've been setting up some automated jobs to keep track of which datbases were up, and when they went down. I've also created some scripts to extract some data. These past couple of days I've been making a snazzy web front-end for the datbases to use...fun I tell ya's (yeah, yeah...I know...I'm sad. But hey..I'm getting paid for it!).

What else? Oh yeah, I found that I can get my contact lenses for half price if I buy them online instead of going to my optician.

Sorry for the boring blog - my brain hasn't really been in blogging mode much recently...silly brain.

HP Reading Status - Chapter 11 (page 205 / 607)

Blog Pending

Reading right now....watch this space...

There's Like, No Home

Last night was really, really hard. It caught me completely unawares.
I went over to my parents' house at around 8:30pm, expecting to head straight out to the pub for a drink with them; they were still packing along with my bro. I just hung around, generally chatting and helping out. Mum was quite emotional. I don't think I'd realised how hard it was going to be for her; she's moving to Cambridge and losing both sons at once...that's a huge shock to the system. For the first time in their marriage, her and my step-dad aren't going to have us around to look after - they met/got married when I was 4/5!! She told me she'd found it really hard on Saturday night after I'd taken my stuff and moved out.

Owen finished up what he was doing and left the house at about 11pm. That just left me, mum and my step-dad. We chatted for a bit, and I decided to take a last walk around the house.

I've been kindof putting off the emotional side of things. I knew it hadn't hit me yet; not fully. There've been a couple of times when I've started thinking about it all, but I've stopped myself cuz I knew I wouldn't be able to handle it. I guess I just didn't want to face it too soon. When I was wandering through the rooms..BAM; it hit me. I was never going to be spending time in this house again. But, more than that, I wouldn't be spending the same kind of time with my family again. I'd never be able to just wander up to my brother's room and hang out with him. I'd never be able to walk up to mum and hug her and banter with her. I'd never be able to ask my step-dad if he had a few minutes to help me out or give me some advice on something. I'd never live at home again. I got into my brother's empty room, sat in the corner and just cried. I don't think I've cried that much for a long, long time. I didn't want to leave the room; I didn't want to lose the house, my family; my life. I finally managed to walk out of the room and close the door behind me. I went downstairs and, holding back the tears and said my goodbyes to my parents before driving off. Is it legal to drive while sobbing? I dunno. I'm glad nobody was around because I was making noises that I imagine Chewbacca would make if you stamped on his foot. Repeatedly. By the time I made it 'home' I was alright again and sounded vaguely human..just with red, puffy eyes.

I never expected it to be like this; I always thought they'd be there..just a few minutes away. I always thought my bro would be around, and I always thought I'd have them all close. Well, it's time to grow up. I'm so thankful for my parents, so thankful that they're great people, so thankful for my brother; he's a really great guy. I'm so thankful to God for the life I have been given, and the life I've got to lead. It's just really hard letting it go.

There's No Place Like Home

Wow, I really haven't blogged properly in a while - I seem to have been saying that a lot, but I've been busy, so it's okay :-P

This last week has been busy, stressful, tiring and emotionally draining because my parents are moving to Cambridge. By default, that means that I have had to move out and finally live "on my own". I don't think I could hack living exclusively on my own; I'd need to live with other people, but moving away from my parents is something I've never done, and it's not quite hit me in the smacker yet.

I'll do a quick recap; my step-dad got made redundant a couple of years ago and decided to have a go at starting his own business with a couple of his fellow redunantees. They gave it a good go, but it was hard for them to get a contract that would supply money to keep them living; it was going to require them to produce a product and then sell it. That was taking too long. My step-dad managed to get some short-term contracting and then, in January, landed a job in Cambridge. Since then he's been living there in the week and coming home on weekends. The reason my mum didn't move out there straight away was so that my brother could finish his A-Levels. Now my brother has been accepted as a pilot in the RAF, and finished his exams a while ago, so my 'rents are finally moving to Cambridge properly. Whoops - not such a quick re-cap.

It's a bit strange because not only am I moving out, but my parents are moving away. I'd always imagined that when I moved out, I'd be able to just 'drop in' and see my parents whenever I wanted, go out with them now and then, and stuff like that. But I'm going to hardly see them any more, and that's a bit of a shock to the system which hasn't really hit me yet. The actual loss of the house is sad, but I've moved enought times before to know that it's not that big a deal; it's just a house.

And right now I'm a bit in limbo. I've moved out, but I haven't moved into my new place! My contract on my new room doesn't start until August; I'll be sharing a house with Joe and a couple of other random students. Viv and Nathan have very kindly agreed to let me live with them for a few weeks while I wait for my contract to start - thank you guys!

My parents are moving tomorrow, so I'm going to spend the evening with them and my bro tonight, hopefully.

The Week Past
So, last week was spent packing some evenings. Friday afternoon and evening was when I did most of it. I went through my drawers and old papers and stuff, while Lis did loads of work packing my clothes. Thank you soooo much babe - you have no idea how much that helped me :) I missed youth on Friday night but went up at around 10ish to see what they were up to. Late on Friday night I received a text from Tom telling me that he could help at 10:30am if that was alright. This confused me - I hadn't asked Tom to help. Was it alright with me? Huh? Must've been for someone else, so I text him back asking if that text was actually for me, or if it was meant for somebody else. His response? "4 u, u joker!". Tom really was a life-saver. He hung around while I finished packing, helped me carry the Heaviest Chest Of Drawers In The World, and let me fill his car with my junk :-D We filled both of our cars; twice! Then I rushed home for a shower and off to the dedication of a lovely lil girl. The service was great, and the spread of cake and pudding was excellent *grin*

Off to get Lis, and home for more moving! I disassembled my bed, took it to Viv/Nath's, then went back for one more trip. I'd finished moving! Now all I have to do is organise the stuff in Viv's a little bit :-S

Late on Saturday night I went out for a drink with O (my bro), James (His mate) and Lis. We stayed out *much* later than I'd planned, but it was quite cool. I'm going to miss him when he leaves (for the RAF) in November.

Right - work time

Listening to: Franz Ferdinand - "This Fire" (Franz Ferdinand)

PS - about 4 new blogs by my friends have started this weekend!! All at once! Bizzaro! Go visit them... Jen-E, Big Momma, Gemma Norm, MusicMan (almost as beautiful as my bass :-P...he needs to blog for the link to work :-P)

You Know It's A Tough Day When...

...you get into work at 7am, but don't get around to checking your email until 10am

Listening to: Red Hot Chili Peppers - "Breaking the Girl" (Blood Sugar Sex Magik)