sudden change

Usually I have to take time to adjust to changes. I'm a worrier so I am well practised at the art of stressing over possibilities and unknowns. And yet there's a strange part of my character that when hit with a crisis I turn calm and active. It's a splendid quality really.

So on the morning I left for Scotland I was told that my job is no longer available. Since my current occupation is a live-in nanny, that means I have to move out. Thankfully it's not a nasty leaving. They said they've really appreciated my help but a lot of things have changed for them and they just can't keep me employed. Still, it's all so sudden. So jobless and homeless I was and in kicked that calm. Ok, so what do I need to do? I got straight on my computer and emailed Smart Aupairs to get them to start looking for work for me. By the time I trained to London, to Edinburgh, to Glasgow and found the girl I was gonna stay with and got back to her place, I had two family matches and both had written to me saying they were interested in me. Nice start to a sudden crisis-response. My Scotland holiday was interspersed with lots of email checking and writing, phone calls and text messages. Thankfully this did not spoil my holiday. I did what I could and decided to deal with the rest once I got back. Being on a tour in the outer Hebrides helped with that as when I had a chance to pull my phone out I didn't have reception most of the time.
I did however manage to organise an interview for Monday morning (meaning also organising a place to stay in London after my return flight from Scotland). That seemed to go well. I've got a room at a friend's house to live in temporarily though my mobile came with the job so that will be returned and my internet access will be quite limited in the next few weeks. I move out this afternoon so I need to finish up here and get packing.

last minute country hopping

So I was told today that I'll be having a week off in two weeks. Unfortunately because the family I work for are taking a holiday to visit a seriously unwell relative. But on my part there's no point me hanging out at the house by myself with so many other countries at my doorstep.

I was thinking about seeing some of England (though it seems not to be the best time for that) but once I found out I had the whole week off my brain got ticking with another idea. I was able to get straight into some research since I was on a break. I decided I'd put off my intended Iceland weekend till early next year and splash out on Scotland. Scotland is one of the places I wanted to visit but also one of the places I didn't want to go to for just a weekend. Best to snatch an opportunity while you can.

Well I found this awesome tour. Six days with a backpacker style tour group that sounds a bit outdoorsy. Sounds like an interesting experience. The tour visits Isle of Skye, Callanais Standing Stones, lots of old old places and Loch Ness to give you a brief summary. Lots of history and lots of scenery for a pretty good price. So I clicked on the calendar to check the date I'm suddenly available for. Booked out. Damn! That's the trouble with short notice holidays. I looked around at some others but this one was the best so I was a bit disappointed. It was exciting just to skim over the itinery and view the few pictures they had. Oh, what the heck! I'll email them. I wrote that I'd love to go on that particular tour and asked if by any chance there's a cancellation in the next few days could they let me know.

I looked at some other sites too for other tour ideas but soon had to get back to work. Later while upstairs putting something away, I thought I'd just quickly check my email. And what do you know? It was SO WORTH the random asking. They had emailed to say they squeezed in one available space!! How unreal is that!? So I made sure I booked it straight away.

So Scotland it is.

retaking aim

Finally it has arrived!! After a month long drama with the first camera with the first company I ordered from I got a refund and bought this one from another company and a week later it was in my happy little hands.

My very own Canon PowerShot SX210 IS replaces my old pentax camera which I've had for years. About 12 years I think. Wow. It served me well. It's old and decrepit now. It has way too much trouble getting started. (Possibly because I've dropped it too many times. Especially that last major one in Luxembourg. :x ) I couldn't even get it to turn on for a 'new camera' picture. I had to take the above shot using my webcam and skype. Now I have the joy of whipping out my camera, turning it on and taking a shot within seconds again. Oh, and this one's a bit nicer and fancier than the last one too. I went on a shooting spree today to work out how to work it.

Only real downfall I've come across so far is using the flash close range. It leaves a shadow along the edge closest to the lens. That being said, like what I did with my fishbowl vase? Some birthday flowers were delivered to my door and my friend suggested that after the flowers had done their job I could fill it with lollies as I don't receive flowers very often at all. However, it's a big vase and I don't wish to be that round. Macro works nicely. The photos are so nice and crisp. That's the main upgrade I wanted from my old camera. Nice clear rich photos. Canon serves well there.

This camera packs quite a zoom for a point and shoot. At normal view. At full optical zoom. At full optical plus digital zoom. Not bad hey? You wouldn't have known that bridge was there otherwise, would you?

And then there's a bunch of fun features. Fish eye mode. Colour swap. You get to select the colours that you want to switch. Here I switched white for dark blue. It doesn't work so well when there is a varigated colour-shading. If it was a 2D solid colour it wouldwork better.

They have a few colour and lighting functions too. This is an example of using blue colour mode. The first is a normal shot. Makes the sky look lovely and blue.

But by far, this is my favourite feature to play with. Colour accent mode. You select one colour to remain and the rest of the picture is black and white. Lots of fun.

It also has a wink timer and a face timer. One is a self timer that takes the photo when you wink. The other is when it detects a new face in the shot. You can do lots of things manually like the typical shutter speed but also the flash strength and white balance and focus and more. There's continuous shot and night shots and video (oh you can do colour accent in video mode too) and stitch assistance even blink detection! Loads to play with. Of course there is much still to learn with this camera but I had a fun afternoon to start with. And I'm super happy I have a camera that functions well and as I need it. It's almost an essential item when you're adventuring on the otherside of the planet.

one sunny sunday

I've started going to a home group here in England. A couple from the group invited me to join them and their visiting friends to go to a wildlife park/zoo on Sunday. They picked me up and took me back to their house where they were still slowly getting ready to leave. Just ready to have a big cooked breakfast (11am) I sat down and joined them for my second breakfast. Eventually we did leave and go to Port Lympne--A Wild Experience. It's a big open range zoo. Kinda funny to think of paddocks of English countryside filled with Animals from all over the world. Anyway, we hoped in one of the tour trucks, just the kind I think of when I think of Africa. They were fun. The roads were bumpy and the truck bumbled over them bouncing us around. I was a gleeful little child. ^^

We got to see a number of baby animals too starting with this baby elephant who is 4yrs old. Mostly we rolled past paddocks of animals but there was one section, the African experience, that we went through. They kept a whole bunch of hooved animals plus some ostriches there. All friends of course. No natural preditation taking place there. There was a giraffe that was right by the road unfazed, munching on his lunch. It was great to see one so close up.

When we got off at the first stop we went and looked at the meerkats for a while. They're so cute and there was a little baby one. You can just see him in the pic, furthest to the right. Then we went through a bit of a reptile house with snakes, frogs, icky spiders, lizards...even cockroaches? Then we had icecreams. Yum! Lovely day for it.

We got on a tour truck again after waiting in line for quite a while and stopped off at the carnivores. Most of the cats were in hiding and Emma was sure they had gone off to some Big Cat convention. We did have a pretty good look at the fishing cat though. Then we walked through the primate area and saw some interesting monkeys. My favourite was the colobus monkeys. They have short black hair and long white hair. Remind me a bit of skunks. They have a puff at the end of thier tail and look like they're wearing capes. The looked quite elegant. Never seen them before. The gorilla palace--it certainly was a palace, they had a very impressive playground--had a baby gorilla as well. It was quite useful that we seemed to be following feeding time so all the animals were coming over to the fence as the zoo cars pulled up. We also went to another area and saw some more tigers and lions before we headed home again. Unfortunately my camera played up lots today. I did manage to get some photos but in the end I gave up. So you don't get to see everything.

We sat around and chatted for a while until my friends' friends had to head home. My friends, Bug (childhood nickname that stuck) and Emma, cooked me a yummy tea goatcheese stuffed mushroom and veggies and we ate while we played Settlers of Catan. Unfortunately my set up plan failed me and I struggled to get resources. It would have worked well if the dice would have just been kind enough to roll my numbers. Sigh. It was a fantastic day out. I had lots of fun.

global viewing

I've just done something I may never do again.

I've watched a movie series whilst living in three different countries.

It was while I was living in the USA as an aupair that my friend, SuhRa, got me to watch Harry Potter 1, 2 and 3 on dvd for the first time. We then went with friends to an IMAX theatre and watched HP4.

I returned home to Australia where I saw HP5, 6 and 7p1 as they came out.

Today I went and saw the finale, HP7p2, where I'm living on a working holiday visa in England.

The movie was brilliant! On my way there I was deciding how I wanted it to end. I haven't read the final book yet. Starting with the movies in the USA and reading those movies in their book version back in Australia and discovering more wonderful stories and extras, I decided to wait and see each new movie before reading the next book. So now I finally know how it ends. But like I said, on my way there I was deciding who I wanted to be involved in the final fight and survive and how the baddies were going to roll. Delightfully they performed almost exactly as I'd hoped. I think it was fabulously written, intriguingly interlinked with bits and pieces from the other stories with a lovely settled ending. (Yet to read book 7 though.) It left me very satisfied and happy and peaceful.

It was also my first movie in England. Odd to have to travel to another town to see it but I was pleasantly surprised that it cost me only £9 for the train there and back, my movie ticket AND a coco-cola that was at least 500ml. I never bother buying snacks at the movies back home. It's just a waste of money. It was 80p for my drink! Think I'll see some more movies in the future.

knitting and knights

On Saturday I went on my own day out. The knitting part you can read all about over at my other blog. I'd had my fill there by 2pm and since my bus wasn't leaving until 7pm I opted to check off one of the things on my London to-do list. So I caught the underground and went to the Tower of London. Now I had close to three hours here but I recommend you allow more than that as there's heaps to see. I bought my ticket and waited just inside the first wall with quite a crowd for the next Yeoman Warder tour.

This grassy area (which is at least twice the width you can see or more) was originally the moat. It served the city well for centuries until London grew and the sewerage system set up ran into it. Then it was turned into grass. The Yeoman Warder tour guide was fantastic. A real character cracking jokes and getting away with sly comments. Very entertaining. Did you know that people still live in the houses within in the Tower of London? Me neither.

Here's some of the houses that are rented out. Except the one with the guard at the door. That's the queen's house. Here is where the tour ended half an hour short. Unfortunately for us tourist someone was getting married shortly in the chapel there so we couldn't have the full tour. And there's me outside the Waterloo block where the crown jewels are kept. I did go through but you can't take photos in there. Guess that makes sense since you have to enter and exit the volt through massive doors. They were interesting to see. Quite extravagant and quite a lot there. More than I had expected. I guess each royalty had their own crown made for their coronation. Anyway, the line was massive once the tour was over so I went into the White Tower first.

Lots to see in there. It's full of armoury mostly. Look, even a toddler sized suit. And check out the sword. It's huge. I keep thinking it would be interesting to put a suit on to see what it felt like. Some suits were complete cover and others were just the major areas with leather for the less vital areas.

This dragon was pretty cool. You walk up some stairs to the next level and it's the first thing you see. Made of armoury pieces and such. They had a section that was hands on. This display you put your face in a helmet shape hole and they had a war playing on a tv screen behind it so you could experience how much a knights sight was impaired. You really can't see a lot through two small splits. I'd never thought about that before.

These here are old time mortar shells. They would be filled with tar and gunpowder and stuff, even greased rags for the horses' hooves, and then wrapped in linen to be catapulted into the gathered enemy. And there's me outside the White Tower. I decided to then go see the crown jewels because the line wasn't so packed and I really did want to see them. I got in and through in plenty of time before the tower closed. In fact, I still had some time to wander a section of the wall.

Inside the towers along the walls there were more displays. It would have been good to explore properly. Here's an old time crossbow in one. The writing on the walls were written like you were reading the latest news which made it feel like you were a part of the adventure. In one of the towers they had some crowns that had been stripped of their jewels. I only got this photo coz I hadn't seen any sign saying I couldn't. But I got told off for taking it so perhaps I just missed the sign.

And then I got to christen my new umbrella. It was raining on and off all day, even pouring at times. But it wasn't until just as the Tower of London was closing for the day that I was actually outside in it. I was happy to be though just so I could use my umbrella. On my way out of the White Tower I went through a gift shop. It had some great stuff in there as far as gift shops go. I was heavily drawn to the calligraphy pen set that had a lovely wooden pen with two nibs and about 6 pots of different colours. But in the end I opted for the fantastical quill with a pot of red ink for half the price of the other. How fun is it!?

I may just have to go back again some day and see the rest of it. I did come across the Tower of Torture as I was heading out which had already closed for the day. That would have been interesting...? I did see one display of a chopping block and whilst there overheard a guide telling a story. A beheading that needed a fill-in executioner so they called on the butcher. (If you're a easily quesy you may want to skip over this paragraph.) Now he said that people would often pay quite a chunk of money to the executioner to make sure the job was done well. If it was it was painless aparantly. He did comment executioners being quite well off because of these tips. But this butcher, well he hadn't chopped human before and he was nervous. First swing and he missed only scratching the neck. The one on the chopping block apparently made some comment--something like "Is that the best you've got?". I think the second swing was similar. Third swing got half the neck at which point the nervous, sweating butcher pulled out his butcher's knife and hacked the rest off to finish the job. Shockingly gross, I know. No wonder people paid the executioner for a good clean lop.

We were also told on our tour that during the time of the Tower of London there were a LOT of beheadings but most happened outside on Tower Hill. There were only a few beheadings inside the Tower of London. The Yeoman Warder said you had to be a "friend" of the king to be beheaded within the walls. It was a bit strange to walk around a place with so much history in it.

So that was my day out in London.

falling... ♥

Read a mini article about "Falling in Love" that is published in full in RELEVANT Magazine.

There's nothing wrong with falling in love, being caught up in all the emotion of it. It happens and it's a wonderful thing but I do believe there is simply more to it. If you want a good lasting relationship that is. Emotions can be amazing but they are also the bane of my existance. They are certainly fickle. It's no hidden truth that no matter how passionate and vibrant the emotions attached to love are, they don't stay that way forever. We don't live in a fairytale.

The above mentioned article says, "Feelings are an incredible resource--but they were not meant to stand alone." This accounts for many emotions I think. We choose how we live and respond. To ourselves, to God, to the world around us.

Love, as God created it, was always meant to be associated with action. A verb. It is something we do. A choice. Emotionally supported or not. It's a truth I need to constantly remind myself of. All too easily forgotten in my humanness. This truth goes for any kind of relationship too. How we love our family, our friends, our neighbours, our local strangers, our enemies is just as much a choice as any romantic relationship.

As one who still dreams of "falling in love" (and I am such a dreamer), it is actually a good term to keep in mind. "Falling" is always temporary. The question is will I choose to love beyond the thud when the falling is over?