February 2009 & a special treat as both of us have written! Starting with Mr. Blackler!
Well I hate to start with my car but it seems to be the bane of my life since coming here. I think Dee has mentioned that I normally get bored of things quite quickly and so the fact that I like to change my car frequently, you think would bring great joy to me. But 7 cars (yes SEVEN!) in three months is extreme even by my standards! Yes I did actually pick up MY car but as previously mentioned it went back to the garage after one day on the back of a lorry and Yes, I did get it back the same day repaired, but unfortunately it only lasted another couple of days before it wouldn’t start! Apparently, it didn’t like the extreme cold! It’s a bleeding car, not a Jacuzzi! Well it turns out it’s a known problem for VW and typical of the way things are progressing it is a known problem and there is a backlog of the part across the world and will take about 3 weeks… hence another rental car!.. oh, and did I mention they found another problem that they will try and fix at the same time!! 3 weeks later. I got it back and it’s still working! It’s been 3 days now and so far so good J
I know its winter and you don’t see many people about (even we slink between our house and the car a shop or the office) but when we do meet anyone, they seem very friendly. Now take the time we picked Nyah up from her party (Rock climbing) and a mother of one of the other children said hello. I don’t think the conversation lasted much longer than the ‘hello’ either, but never the less, within a few days of going by we got a phone call inviting the kids over for a play date and us for some food and wine! Can you really tell if you like someone enough to invite them over with their brood for tea and biscuits after a simple hello? That’s friendly in my books! Well we turned up at the allotted time to find a warm welcome, introductions (hello still isn’t enough to know each other) and the offer of a glass of wine. Well as it turns out, it was a very social evening and we all got on very well.. Now we were only expecting a few nibbles, but there was a full spread of Pizza, dips, nachos, more dips, ice cream cake, fruit salad, etc.. All I can say is, it was a good job they didn’t come to us first as we would only have had a few nibbles!! All very nice and now we know the standard we have to reach when entertaining! The one thing I would say that separates us English from the Americans is the fact we walked the 10 minutes between our houses. Yes it was very cold (-15) and dark, but we had hats, coats and gloves and we were happy to wander back using our legs as the main mode of transport (apart from Nyah who used my legs!). However, by the time we had got home, there was a message waiting for us asking if we had made it back safely, were we still alive and if they had known we were walking would have given us a ride home!
Talking of friends, it has been good that the Clarke family (minus the kids) have moved up from Orlando to St Louis (well good for us, maybe not so good for the Clarkes coming from 80 degree temperatures!) as it has given us a chance to start the first St Louis Brit community.. well sort of as they still live about 25 miles from us. Still we meet up regularly and speak English (of sorts) to each other and talk all things English (Football, rugby, the weather, the price of petrol, etc) and swap Sunday lunches. The Clarkes for some strange reason seem to have taken a liking to our children which is very strange in an English sort of way and have even taken them off our hands for an afternoon taking them ‘Eagle’ watching, bowling and feeding them! They treat them better than we do, but still very nice for me and Dee to spend some time together shopping, eating and drinking coffee and iced tea (Yuk!!) and just spending some personal time together. It just shows you that spending all that time priming your kids to be nice to strangers, draw pictures of them to give as presents pay off in the end! Oh, also I find it very important that Mr. Clarke has a full size American pool table (it’s bigger!) and is happy to play a few frames over a beer.. mainly winning them as well, but I say it’s the participation that counts and not the winning.. well unless I win of course!
We are still all having fun, but can’t wait for the warm weather (65 degrees yesterday and 60 degrees today), work is still busy but getting better as things moving forward, although the prospect of a pay rise not looking so good. I’m back in the UK at the end of Feb and plan to see friends and family.. well both of them, drink a few beers and have breakfast with the in-laws in our house (that’ll be strange).. Oh and I will have to do some work as well!
Well enough of me and over to Dee for her more entertaining log!!
Thanks G! So what’s happening here? It’s been snowing (you fed up with your snow yet?!) & I’ve had a bit of a brush with the law! It’s sunny here as I type & going to be in the low 60’s today…but & they are bizarrely accurate with their forecast as I’ve said before, we have rain on the way & some storms to look forward to later in the week! We’ve hardly had any rain since we’ve been here & it’ll be weird as we’ve forgotten what it’s like to get wet… it’s definitely out of sight out of mind with the rain!
So what was the snow like…it was great! I like how it looks through the window the best of all! I did go out for a quick 5 minute play but its cold when you touch it you know! They are very efficient at clearing the roads, even the side roads & as soon as it starts snowing, just after midnight the snow ploughs are out & they are everywhere & I mean everywhere! The only problem was they kept waking me up…can’t they plough a bit quieter maybe? So the roads are clear & everything still operates pretty much as normal but there’s still snow to play on which is good. It wasn’t great snow for making snowmen or snowballs & I now understand why you ‘snow aficionados’ call it ‘powder’, it was fluffy & fab & like icing sugar …we can relate pretty much anything to a cake ingredient in our house you know! We bought the girls snow suits as I got fed up with all the clothes changing/drying etc…so we do hope we have at least one more decent snow fall before the end of winter!
They like to be prepared in full for any eventuality over here or maybe it’s just us?! They seem to have things tucked away for a variety of situations…for just in case! Even the scrapers for the cars are different here, they are long handled so you don’t have to walk round to the other side of the car….because they are lazy & don’t want to walk or an ingenious idea? You decide! I had to borrow a snow shovel after G disappeared off to work (the cheek of it!) & left me with a snowy drive that was very hard to get off of unless you were prepared to ski off it! Off I went to the neighbours as we were the only house in the street to not have a special shovel…the babysitter was home & thought I was the lady who was coming to clean….”errrmmmmm nope I’m the English neighbour, can I borrow your shovel please” it took just one look after the cleaner assumption for her to scuttle off & try & figure out what the hell I was saying…I got the shovel! I did a splendid job…ask anyone as I went on about it for days…well I’ve never shoveled snow in my life…I was a kid the last time we had snow deep enough to shovel! It took hours but I did it! Then the machines started appearing …it sounded like people were mowing their lawns….what on earth are they doing….I casually leant on my shovel in the garage to quietly observe the goings on! They were not little lawn mowers & they were not mad mowing in the snow…they were snow blowers!!!!! Little machines that you wave at your drive & path & the snow magically disappears…much easier than shoveling but not as satisfying I decided…seeing as I’d just finished the job! I waited to see if anything else came out…what on earth next?? That was it…show was over…for now anyway! But we now have a snow shovel & a long handled scraper lying in wait in our garage (couldn’t convince G to buy a snow blower) & what’s the betting the only flake of snow we ever see again while we’re here is on facebook!
Enough with the snow now eh? Why are we talking about snow when we could be talking about getting arrested instead!?
Ok…so I’ve figured out that they have dogs for different reasons over here… they are either to have instead of a cat i.e as small & silly looking as possible or to have barking in the house. They don’t really let them out to run about like we do in the UK or at least not round here! They have ‘Dog Parks’ in STL where you can go & as long as they are vaccinated etc etc they can be let off the lead & are free to run about in the fenced off park…it seems they don’t like the dogs mixing with the people! We haven’t got a dog park near us however & after seeing everyone else (well the odd person I came across!) with their dog firmly attached to a lead I started to ask around where people took their dogs to play off lead…surely you can’t keep a dog on the lead at all times for ever, can you? It’s not as if they all have the type of gardens we have back in the UK all fenced in. Anyway the general consensus was that when you’re out with your dog you find a quiet spot & you let if off the lead for a play…so even tho it took a bit of getting used to (for Yoji!) I was walking her (much to the amusement of the locals in their cars giving me their ‘what are you doing strange lady out walking when you could be in the car’ looks!?) I’d found a little field where no one else seems to go so I let her off….throw the ball for her a few times so she can run, run, run, then she goes back on the lead & we go home, job done! This had been working perfectly well thank you very much…up until I got invited out by a local for a walk with her & her dog…yes please we said, we’d love to we said! We had a fab time… dogs ran & played; we walked & talked…perfect! We were also on a different field, one I hadn’t been to before but she had & no one else was there just us! On the way out there was a police car & we honestly didn't think anything of it....but the police lady came up to us & asked us why the dogs were off their leads & wanted to take all our details...I was really scared, I find all ‘officials’ scary …you remember the driving test with the policeman & my tongue being stuck to the roof of mouth incident right?! Luckily the other lady did all the talking....at first she said we'd probably just get a warning, but we both have to go to the local court (!!!) in March to plead guilty & we'll be fined then!!!!!!!! Can you believe that?! ?! OH…MY…GOD…speechless me. My fault probably…I said I wanted to experience everything…but I even I draw the line at the local jail!!!! Pray for leniency & a dog loving judge you lovely readers!!!
This week I’m loving… my freedom!
This week I’m not loving… dog walking!!
