Films I've watched far too often!

Grosse Pointe Blank - I'm not sure why but this is a film I come back to again and again. I think it's because it's such a good combination of drama, comedy, romance and John Cusack! It's got to the stage though where both Mark and I pretty much know the script off by heart though, so maybe it's time to find a new film to take it's place. And even though we've almost worn the DVD out it's the film we've chosen to watch tonight out of the entire selection across all Sky Movies channels... Mmmm.






10 things I hate about you - even less sure why we watch this so often, but it is definitely worthy of mention when talking about DVD's we've nearly worn out. Although it's very much a teen movie, it has sligtly more depth than some as it's adaptation of Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew set in a modern American high school. It's where I first came across Julia Stiles, and I have to admit I've since become a bit of a fan.




Moulin Rouge! - I love this! It's crazy, colourful, vibrant, funny, poignant, and (I think at least) very cleverly written. And stars Ewan McGregor!!!!! Richard Roxburgh is brilliant as The Duke; the 'Like a Virgin' scene cracks me up every time!


Bizarrely, with possibly the exception of Moulin Rouge, these wouldn't make it onto my list of top 5 films (I sense that could be a whole new blog entry sometime). But all are very enjoyable and worth a watch if you've never seen them.

New York part 1!

Mark and I went to New York for a long weekend to celebrate our 5th wedding anniversary, leaving Tulster behind to be spoilt rotten by my parents! As we’d both been before and ‘done’ the main sights it was really lovely to relax and not feel obliged to run around doing lots of official sightseeing. Below is a selection of photos from the weekend!

Our hotel – the Westin New York Times Square – was really good, and in a really good location (until you want to walk about just as all the theatres kick out!)


On Friday evening we went for a wander around Chinatown – neither of us had ventured there before, and it’s definitely an area I’d recommend people go and have a look at. Still, the pre-requisite Starbucks on every corner (albeit in a Chinese style) means you never forget where you are! J



We had fabulous dinner in Joe’s Shanghai on Pell Street (well done to the Rough Guide for another excellent recommendation) – the pork soup dumplings (the house speciality) and the crispy spicy whole yellow fish were particularly good. On the walk back to the Subway we spooted Mark’s shop!


Last time I’d been to New York was prior to 9/11, so going to visit Ground Zero was the only thing on my list of things to do this visit. It’s a very sombre place – hard to believe we caught the subway down there last time…


A couple of the photos from the (very well done) memorial section captured my imagination – the expression on the man’s face in the centre really says it all.


How cool was that?

New York part 2!

It still seems to be messing up so I've published this in two parts to make sure I don't lose it all again!

The Staten Island Ferry - another first and quite frankly tight way to get good views of the harbour and skyline as it's free! We did the 'proper' tour last time of Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty, which was wonderful. I just wanted another look see of the views...


She never fails to impress me. Although I was a little relieved not to take the vertigoiferous traipse up the spiral staircase inside her this time... It did make my tummy go funny...


My favourite bit of Times Square - look at all those kisses! :) Pity Hersheys chocolate is so disgusting. (With the excpetion of cookies and cream, although I've not found it for ages! Does ayone know - have they stopped making it?)


We went for a look around the USS Intrepid - very interesting, but the video in particular was very well done.


Also included in the display is one of the BA concorde to look round - it's tiny inside!


We went for lunch at Katz's Deli - no photo's but it's the place where THAT scene from 'When Harry met Sally' was filmed. Scroll down towards the bottom on this web site - we sat one table to the right, just behind Harry...

Argh!

Just spent ages writing an entry on our trip to New York and it's just vanished for no good reason! I can't be bothered to write it all again now - will maybe have another go tomorrow... Grrrrr.

Maybe leaving Mark in charge of Tully is a bad idea?

So, as I said in my last post I've been away a bit recently with work. I think Mark is getting his revenge though. Whilst I've been away he has taught Tully a new 'What noise do xxx make?' question and answer... Mark says 'Tully, what noise do mummys make?', Tully answers 'Nag nag nag'... Mmmmmmm...

Off again...

As most people'll know I have to travel a reasonable amount for my job, and whilst some trips are better than others I generally enjoy the variety that going out and about brings. (I'm also very lucky that I have a husbad that has never ever grumbled about the fact that he is left at home holding the baby...) And normally traveling for work is within the working week which is fine.

However it feels that work is enchroaching somewhat into my/our family time at the moment. Last Sunday I had to fly to Sweden for 3 days and although the flight was quite late, by the time I'd sorted out getting packed and allowed extra time to check in given current travel restrictions, all of Sunday afternoon had gone. Then in the middle of last week I was instructed to book flights to go to the US office next week, flying on Bank Holiday Monday. So I have to be at the airport for 9 tomorrow morning . Nice.

Ok, grumble over. Especially as I've demanded next Monday off to compensate! :)

Hooray for Boston!

Whilst hanging about at Boston Station yesterday waiting for the (delayed) 16:06 train to Nottingham to arrive I spotted an advert for Stickney Farm Park. Sounds like a possible day out for some time in the future. Blimey, what's Boston coming to having tourist attractions and the like...? It certainly wasn't like that in my day!

As an aside, what does it say about my home town that the station had no shop, no cafe, no snack bar, or indeed anywhere where I might purchase a bottle of drink for the journey. But it did have a pub, which was surprisingly full for a Tuesday afternoon! Nice!

New York, New York!

I'm very excited. Mark and I decided we deserved a treat, so we've booked to go to New York for a long weekend for our wedding anniversary. Luckily Mum and Dad have once again volunteered to look after Tulster for us -I think that in their old age they forget each time the trauma that involves - so we can have a lovely relaxing time. Well, that's what Mark thinks anyway - I've already started planning... :)

We decided to splash out and stay here, which is within a block of Times Square so right in the middle of the action. Woohoo!

Poppy Wardle

Congratulations to Steve and Karen, who now have their very own monster going by the name Poppy! She already has her own blog so we can all keep up with her exploits here...

Oooooops!

I've just noticed how rubbish I've been at keeping my blog updated recently.

Part of the problem is I've been incredibly busy, and with borng things that aren't worth mentioning in the main. I've had several work trips to France, Germany, Ireland and around the UK for example. Dull dull dull...

But I suppose our holiday is worthy of comment. We went to a cottage just outside Robin Hood's Bay. The cottage was lovely, and in a really good little village that has everything we needed - swings, dogs, village shop and pub! What more could you ask for? :)

What else? Well, we've decided that a trip to Cornwall to see Sam, Mark's sister, is long over due so we've booked into a camp site nearby for a long weekend in August. We stayed there once before a couple of years back and it's a lovely site. Not sure if camping with an 18 month old is entirely a good idea though but I'm sure she'll love it. Not looking forward to the journey though - makes me think we should have gone when she was 6 months old and would have slept all the way rather than needing entertaining as she does now... I'll keep you posted on how it goes.

Well, that's it for now. I'll try and be better at posting stuff in future!

Jo and AJ's Wedding

Last night I went to the party bit of Jo's wedding - sadly I never got round to taking ay photo's as I usually seemed to have a G&T in my hand... (If someone has a nice one let me know and I'll put a link to it here...)

Jo's dress was beautiful - she looked gorgeous! I didn't really get chance to talk to Jo much at all though - but I did catch up with lots of people I'd not seen for ages which was lovely, plus some others that I see foten at work but don't get to socialise with much these days.

Brian and Katy's Wedding

Today we had a lovely family day out at Brian and Katy's wedding, both of whom we've worked with for a number of years. As they already have 2 kids of their own the day was organised in a child and family friendly way. After the ceremony the kids had their tea brought out fairly soon after, which was perfect as it meant they all got fed long before anyone started to get grouchy.

Then there was a short time before our dinner, so we all wandered over to the crazy golf. Tully was funny as she didn't quite get why she couldn't go and grab the balls from the 'tee' and run off with them. Stu got quite excited at one point as he thought he'd score a hole in one using Tully power instead of any skill of his own!

Then, whilst the grown ups tea was being served the kids had their own disco downstairs, which seemed to degenerate into mostly chasing each other around. Tulster held her own and Lydia had to watch her back for a while, although I think Lydia came on top in the end! All in all it was a fab day out. I can only wonder at how the evening went when the grown ups disco started - we make a hasty exit before Tully got too tired and fed up...

TV!

I have to say I'm loving the new series of Green Wing. It's just so surreal, cleverly written and very funny. I'm saddened to discover that already we are almost halfway through. Equally the third series of Hustle was as entertaining as the pevious two, and it seems to be over almost before it's begun. It's a shame that our home grown tv series don't manage to produce the long series that seem to get made in the States, although i suppose something can be said for quality rather than quantity in this case.

Having said that, the second series of Desperate Housewives is proving to be as compelling as the first. And I am also enjoying My name is Earl. So maybe I can't criticise US tv too much...

Pie Dinner

I had a very tiring day at work today and just couldn't be bothered to cook. So we decided to have pie dinner! For those of you I've not told this to before our local chippy does pie, chips, peas, fired onions and gravy all for £2.1o! A bargain and very very tasty! Yum!
The only downside is that the pie is a Hollands one as favoured by chippys in the North West, and not a mighty Pukka pie as I was brought up with! Boo!

Easter Weekend

It was lovely to have an extended weekend, and spend some time with Tully and Mark. Everything seems to be a big rush these days, so it was lovely to relax and enjoy life for a change. Tully is starting to be fun now (no offense Tulster), is walking about, loving her new shoes that make a clumping sound as she stomps about, plus they mean we can let her wander round outside more now. She's also beginning to talk and communicate and for it to make some sense(!), and starting to understand us and react to what we say so we can send her off on little missions! Bless her! I was quite sad to have to go back to work :(

The photo was taken whilst we were hunting for eggs in the park, which was actually quite hard - I couldn't find any but luckily Mark managed to find some.

Langoustine

Yum! I forgot to mention that last week whilst in Paris we went out for a very tasty meal on the Wednesday night, and I was very pleased to see langoustine on the menu! I LOVE langoustine, but it's not often I get to eat them. The last time was when Mark ordered me some from www.langoustine.co.uk for my birthday a few years ago - everyone thought it was very funny when a bit freeze/chilled box turned up at work!

Saturday night sadness!

Oh dear. Chris and Chrissy came to stay tonight as they were going to a wedding at Old Trafford. Mark and I stayed at home, and thought we'd be ok to get away with playing a bit of WOW... Unfortunately they were getting a lift with Anna and Jim who wanted to get home to Otley fairly early to relieve their babysitter they got back rather earlier than we imagined. How embarrassed did we feel to be caught out being such saddos!!!! Even worse I was going through an instance with a few people and was on teamspeak at the time too!

Btw, I'm now level 43 which I'm very proud of, and even have a horse!

Paris

So, back from Belfast on Sunday evening, and off the Paris Monday morning. When we booked to go away for the weekend I was meant to be at home this week, but various events meant I switched my work travel around and had to leave again straight away. Poor Tully - she only saw me for a bleary eyed 10 minutes on Monday morning as we'd got home after she was in bed on SUnday, and I had to leave to catch my flight at 7am.

I've come to Paris to help us exhibit at Forum LABO. It's been quiet today - unfortunately for the conference organisers the French decided to strike today so not many punters turned up at all! Oh well, here's looking forwards to a busy day tomorrow.

Belfast

Once again it's been a little while since I posted. Firstly this is because for a while after the last post I had nothing to post about, and then I got busy again and haven't had chance!

So, somehow we managed to persuade Mum and Dad to look after Tully for a couple of days, so Mark and I decided we'd go and have a nice weekend break somewhere. Only we chose Belfast... Only kidding - we did have a nice time, although it has to be said there isn't LOADS to do in Belfast. We mostly just chilled out and did all the things we don't get chance to these days, like go to and sit in the pub for an afternoon, or go to the cinema. Speaking of which I highly recommend Inside Man, and can't discourage you enough from Date Movie...

I can also recommend the Oxford Bar and Grill, up above St Georges Market for a very nice meal indeed. The side order of crispy onions in particular was yum yum yum!!!

I may (or may not) post some photos when I get home again from my next trip away - see above... :)

Busyness!

Blimey, it's been a while since my last post (apologies) but I've been rather hectic for the last couple of weeks...

So, following on from the last post I had a BIG demo on the Wednesday, which went pretty well.

Then last weekend Vics came to stay - it was lovely to see her and we took the chance to leave Tully with Mark for a few hours on Saturday and hit the shops, We were both rather restrained though and didn't buy much too much! (Although we did buy matching tops... Not sure if that's a good thing...?)

Then this week I had a night out with Mel and Mandy on Wednesday - we went to Sokrates, a very good Greek restaurant in Sale, scoffed lots and lots of tasty food and drank much yummy red wine! Mr Goodridge was a star and offered (or was he told) to take Mand and I home too when he came to pick Mel up! So thanks John!!!!

Then last night Stu and Amy came round for tea. For some reason Tully wasn't at all sure about Amy but found Stu very entertaining... Strange child, I'd definitely be the other way round! Anyway, Amy helped bath her, and then we had a very enjoyable evening - although we did seem to watch more televised Poker than could possibly be considered ideal! Ho hum...

House Viewing

We went to look at a new housing development today, which is by the canal in central Sale. The house we looked at was a 4 bed town house, and was actually ok - I especially like the living room and kitchen floor. However the only plots that are left are 2 and 3, both of which have the TINIEST gardens ever, so we've ruled it out as a possibility. Ah well, it passed half an hour on a Sunday afternoon...

Going on holiday!

Yey! We've booked to go away in June for a week to this lovely looking cottage just outside Robin Hood's Bay. I've not been to the area for years so I'm really looking forward to it! Although not looking forward to puching Tully back up the hill on the way back from the beach again... :(

Random rant!

I've just seen an advert for McDonalds and it's reminded me of something I've wanted to rant about for ages but never quite get round to. And given it was McDonalds that sparked the rant I think most people will be surprised by where I go from here!

Why would anyone want to ruin a perfectly tasty burger by putting bacon in it! It's the just wrong and, quite frankly, in my opinion a filthy thing to do! Bleurgh! Yukky! It makes me feel ill just thinking about it. Bacon should be in bacon butties, burgers should be burgers. The 2 should never be combined!!!! So there!

Day out in Cardiff!

Well, what can I say? I had a lovely day on Saturday. Firstly I got up fairly early and drove to Cardiff - and had the most fantastic run ever meaning I got there in time to pop in and see Steph, Tim and Alex for a couple of hours. Alex is such a sweetie - very quiet and well behaved indeed. Here's a picture of him; Steph and Tim avoided the camera as neither were feeling photogenic following quite a rough night with Alex...


Then after a quick change I went to Michelle and Graeme's wedding. It really was very good indeed, and given it was February the sun shone out for them. Kirstie, one of Michelle's chemistry friends from Exeter (who has since had a total change of career into opera singing) sang Panis Angelicus whilst they went to sign the register - it really was very beautiful. Another of the highlights of the day has to be the first dance - they'd put together a full dance routine to a medley of tunes ranging from The Monkees, through The Proclaimers to Doris Day singing 'A guy is a guy'- it truely was a stroke of genius! Here's a selection of some of my favourite pictures from the day.

She'll kill me for this but I just love this is one - it's just sooo Michelle!


The boys, Bouncy (aka Chris) and Paul.


Michelle and Graeme surrounded by all the men! Didn't she do well for herself! ;)


Bouncy and Vicky - despite the rosy cheeks Chris is actually sober as he was acting as chauffeur for us all for the night!


Paul, me and Kirstie, none of whom are remotely sober! ;)

Away to Cardiff

It's been a while since I've posted anything, for a combination of reasons. Firstly I've not had a great deal of interesting things to say, other than the stuff that's been going on Tully's blog anyway about her birthday etc. And also I've been a bit down in the last couple of weeks too and I don't want this to turn into a forum where I grumble about things. This whole being 31 thing has hit me hard - it's defintely not a good age...

But, I'm in a really good mood today as I'm heaading off tomorrow to Michelle's wedding who is one of my friends from Exeter. It's in Cardiff which is even better as it means I'll get chance to pop in and see Steph too, and finally meet her little boy Alex. I'll also get to catch up with a few other friends at the wedding that I've not seen since my wedding, plus a couple of other Exeter people I've not since since even before then. I'm really looking forward to it. The only downside is that because Tully wasn't invited it's meant that Mark has chosen to stay at home and look after her, as it's not long since we both abandoned her for a week when we went skiing. I'll just have to do enough partying for both of us then! :D

Birthday!

Today is my 31st birthday - how old is that? :( I had a fairly quiet day, mainly because we were recovering from our holiday, and having to get up at 3am UK time to come home. Mum and Dad had stayed overnight so I got one last mini lie in. Then Chris and Chrissie popped in to see us in the afternoon, and finally Jon and Mandy came round in the evening for a curry. Yum!

Still, Mandy got all the best presents though - we brought her tinned brussel sprouts (Spar best!) home from Val D'Isere! :D

Val D'Isere

Last week we went skiing in Val D'Isere, although our chalet ended up being in Le Fornet, a couple of km up the road. It was really good fun, and it was quite nice to have a week away from Tully (at least when it came to sleeping!)!!! Anyway, here's a few photo's from the week...

Grenoble Airport - the first time I've had to walk quite so far to the terminal from the plane! (Although it is closely rivalled by Chambery - must be a skiing thing...)


New goggles (very very good - didn't steam up ever, not once!!!!), and my fav skiing hat!


The outside of our chalet.


My only fall of the week! Which given the piste is, well, completely flat, is really rather embarrassing!!!! Oh well... But, as an aside, look how lovely and sunny it was! And it was pretty much like that all week which is a first. Usually there's at least 2 days of grey yukky weather.

How much!!!!

Looking at the state of the house, and the fact I am now working full time, I decided to investigate getting a cleaner today. And my general feelings have been 'How much!?!?!?!?'!

So far the quotes have ranged from £8.25 - £11 an hour. When we used to have a cleaner about 5 years ago we paid £5 an hour - how can it have gone up so much!!!! Everyone I spoke to today though were agencies - maybe I need to find little lady who works for herself instead... Or just give in and get the hoover out myself. Sigh... Actually no, I hate hoovering soooo much it's worth paying someone else, even it means we can't eat! :D

Desperate Housewives

Yey, I nearly forgot about the start of the new series of Desperate Housewives, but luckily happened to be watchng Channel 4 when it started! Phew!

I really enjoyed the last series, so I hope this one proves to be as good!

Home again.

Home again! And I suppose overall the week wasn't too bad. Surprisingly the highlight of the week was the team building event. It was incredibly well done, I felt I knew the people was grouped with much better afterwards, we learned lots of useful concepts, and, most importantly, it was FUN! Blimey!!!

Still, it's definitely good to be home!

In Florida

Ok, well I guess it's not been TOOOOO bad so far. I set off from home at 7am on Wednesday, and 17 hours later I arrived in my hotel room. The journey was pretty uneventful - got through immigration in Newark surprisingly quickly, and even had a friendly immigration officer too!

The highlight of the journey was getting transferred from the airport to the hotel in a super stretch Hummer limo - I haven't got a camera here as left it at home for Tully but Jon took some pictures so look out for some photos fom him at some point.

Overall the agenda has been mostly better than expected. And it's been really lovely to catch up with some people I've not seen for AGES! The lunches have been pretty good, but the rest of the food has been a little disappointing so far. I'm looking forwards to getting home though - I'm missing Tully and Mark loads. Still, only half a day left to go, and then the 17 hour journey home again... Ho hum...

Off to sunnier climes

Tomorrow I'm heading out to Florida for the annual global corporate wide sales meeting, which I managed to avoid last year as I was too pregnant to fly. (How smug was I?!?!?)

Anyway, whilst the hotel looks really nice, the agenda looks really dull, and not only that but it continues through Saturday meaning I don't get home until Sunday morning. I would say at least it'll be sunny and warm, but realistically the chance of us getting any free time to get out the hotel is very slim. Most days there is only a 30 min gap between the end of the meeting and the start of the organised evening entertainment... Oh, and the agenda seems to start at 6:30 in the morning! Oh joy...

Watch this space and I'll let you know if I'm just being a misery or if my doom and gloom is justified... :)

Going Skiing

Well, we've done it! We've been threatening mum that we're going to go skiing and leave Tully with her and dad for the week, and this week we've booked it! We are going to Val D'Isere for the week with Inghams, who are, in my opinion, by far the best ski tour operator of the main few. We know the resort, but as it's a last minute deal we get allocated a chalet on arrival. I'm very excited about it - although slightly worried I'm so unfit I'll be exhausted by the time I've walked to the chairlift! Let's hope we get put in this chalet where we can ski to and from the door! :)

Still, Mum will probably be more broken having to look after our monster for 8 days! I wonder how far through the week she gets before she gives in and sends her to nursery for the day so she can catch up on some sleep! :)

Home alone

This week Mark has gone to the Philly office for the week, so I'm left holding the fort here alone. (I don't feel too badly done to - I'm off to Florida next week and don't get home until Sunday so he has Saturday with her all day! :) ) She's been really good for me so far too which is a definite bonus.

I just have one question though. All week last week when we were on holiday she woke up ridiculously early each day and wanted nothing other than to play. Yet now I'm back at work all she wants to do is sleep in! Very annoying!

Happy New Year

Well, another year is over with. And another New Years Eve, which has always rated high in my list of the worst night of the year. And once again it proved to be somewhat of a washout last night...

Firstly we had forgotten that other people still have some form of social life and by the time we remembered to make plans everyone we knew already had social engagements. So we were going to make the best of it and had plans for having a fun if rather quiet evening in alone. However, for reasons I won't go into, both Mark and I were totally exhausted so the lovely meal I had planned to cook is now going to be today's lunch (we had the easy option of fish and chips last night), and we were in bed before 10pm...

Still, I thought I could reply to everyone's texts of happy New Year this morning. I was rather chuffed to see I had 4 messages when I woke up - how popular I thought! Imagine my disappointment to see that most people had indeed forgotten us - 3 were from the same person who had clearly had one too many vodka's!!! :) Ho hum...

Memories...

On Christmas Eve we needed Tully to have a nice long sleep, so decided to go for a bit of a tour! Mark had never been to Norfolk so we headed in that general direction. Not far from Kings Lynn, which is just over the border from Lincolnshire, is Sandringham so we decided that was as good a place as any to go to. I'd forgotten how lovely it was there. But it also reminded me of something from my childhood.

As some of you might know, Sandringham is where the Royal family spend their Christmas. On the Sunday they all walk down from the house to the church, and the general public are (were? not sure if this still happens...) allowed to go and join in the service by virtue of it being transmitted outside. Then afterwards the police gather the children and there is opportunity to give flowers / gifts to the family.

One of the last years we did this I had 2 bunches of flowers, and really wanted to give them to Di and Fergie. But how soft am I??? When I got there everyone was giving their gifts the the 2 'young' ones, and the Queen and Queen mum were stood there looking a bit like spare parts so I felt sorry for them and decided to give mine up to them instead! Ho hum...

Night out

Last night Liz and Alison came to look after Tully, so Mark and I decided to go to the cinema for a change. Rather stupidly I'd not thought through the whole mad last minute Christmas shopping thing and had decided that the best venue was the cinema at the Trafford Centre as it had better show times than the cinema we normally go to in Manchester. However because of the traffic jams to get in, and then parking at the far end of the car park about 10m from our front door, we missed the one we wanted anyway and had to go and see a later showing! Ho hum...

Anyway, we went to see Harry Potter, and I have to say I really really enjoyed it. Rather bizarrely I think it's one of the worst books in the series, and yet this film I think was the best so far. I'm sure lots of people have alreayd written reviews so I won't bore you here, but needless to say I really enjoyed myself.

Phew, I've calmed down at last!

APologies in advance, this is going to be a dull dull diddly dull blog entry... But still, here goes!

I had a very grumpy Wednesday and Thursday this week for worky reasons I won't go into here. But on Friday I was back in Birmingham again, and it made me remember why I do actually love my job and made me get over my crossness with the internal politcal bobbins we have to put up these days. As sad as it sounds I love being on site and working with our customers / prospects and showing how I/we can help make their day to day working life so much easier. It was a bug I caught all those yaers back when I first started out in implementation, and still get now I work in technical sales, even though the customer interaction is at a totally different level.

I have to go back on Monday and present to a large audience (~40 which is far more than the average for such a demo) and I'm really looking forward to it! (You watch now - I'll probably end up posting some woeful tale on Monday now about how disaterous it was to serve me right for being so cocky!) My only worry is that the podium stand I'll be presenting from has the most unusable mouse in the world ever. Still, I suppose that'll just make me think of innovative ways to show the software with the fewest possible mouseclicks - something that's meant to be a good thing - or so I learnt in my training last week...

Mad Week!

I have to apologise on both mine and Tully's behalf for lack of blogging this week. It's all been a bit crazy!

Saturday was mad busy what with taking Tully swimming in the morning, then getting stuff ready before going out obscenely early (5:45) for the Christmas party. Sadly Mark had caught Tully's tummy bug from the week before so we ended up cancelling Mum and Dad who were due to baby sit overnight and he stayed in with her.
The party was everything you'd expect it to be, with maybe slightly better food than usual. There were cocktails, wine, gin, some food, some more wine, and dancing! Perfect! I staggered home at a relatively respectable time a bit before midnight - but mostly as I was sharing a taxi home with Jon and Mandy and Jon had got to the stage where he wasn't much use to mankind! :) He has managed to post some very embarrassing photos if you are really that interested!

Sunday was generally spent recovering from the night before, although I was surprisingly well - I really shouldn't have been! We did all manage to go out for a walk to the park though and put Tulster on the swings for a bit.

Then I had to come to work on Monday and Tuesday for a training course - typically as it was run by am american trainer it started at 8:30 in the morning, didn't finish until 5:30 at night as we didn't really have anything that you could call a break in the meantime - working lunches / coffee breaks etc - the only time I left the taining room was for a 'bio-break' as americans seem to say! As you can imagine I was a bit tired after all this to do blogging when I got home. And yesterday I was in a bad mood so went straight to playing some World of Warcraft to cheer myself up! Looking forward to a quiet weekend, and a mostly non-working week next week.

Sorry!

It's been a long time since I posted anything (again)... So, what have I been up to?

Well, last Saturday I went skiing at Xscape in Leeds again. I was meant to be meeting Stu and Amy there, but Stu had dropped a radiator on his foot in the morning and was in no fit state to be on the slope. Since I'd got there I thought I might as well ski on my own though. I had quite a lot of fun, but it's surprising how many runs you get in when you don't wait at all for your mate to get on / off the lift! One thing that did keep me entertained was watching the people tobogganing! It looked like loads of fun and kids and grown ups alike were screaming and chortling in equal measure as they went down! Definitely something to do with Tully as soon as she is old enough!

On a duller note I've been spending more time in Birmingham with work than strictly ideal. We are putting a pilot trial system in at a lab at one of the hospitals there, so I've been down for the odd day over the last couple of weeks helping to get the system configured, and then spent 3 days there this week running 'drop in' sessions, which basically involved people from around the lab coming to see what we'd done. Harder work than it sounds (honest)!

I've also been using up some of my holidays. Not done a great deal really - spent some quiet time at home, caught up on the housework a bit (although that was a couple of weeks ago and you'd not know I'd done anything at all again now :( ), went in Manchester and started the Christmas shopping etc.

And that's it! Not very exciting I'm afraid to say. Still, it's our work Christmas party tomorrow night so maybe there'll be some debauched stories to tell soon! :)

No sleep in the Evans House

Oh dear. For some reason the last few nights Tully has gone to sleep absolutely fine when we've put her to bed, but she's then woken up and is wide awake at about 3-4 in the morning and nothing we do seems to make her sleepy again for a couple of hours. Mark and I are both absolutely knackered! I think her gums are hurting her, as she's generally more restless too the rest of the night. Any advice gratefully received - we're both getting rather broken. She's gone off the Dentinox stuff I've been using - she used to love it but now it seems to make her cry more. Last night we resorted to Infant Nurofen, but not sure that's good for a longer term solution :(

Visit to London

Last weekend we went to London to see Vics and Ben. You can read more about it on Tully's blog here and here. Anyway, there wasn't a good photo of them together there so thought I'd put this one on my blog. Oh, and in case anyone is feel adventurous and wants to go on an activity holiday Ben has started up his own travel company so I'm sure he'd be pleased to hear from you!

X Factor

I'm mildly embarrassed to admit that I've got really hooked to the X factor this year. I didn't really see it last time, but I'm loving it this year. I'm outraged that Maria got kicked off on Saturday too! She's loads better than the Conway Sisters! Grrrr....

it's been a while...

Ooops, just realised I've not posted anything for a couple of weeks. So, what's been happening? Well, last week I headed back to mum and dad's for a few days - I'm owed so much holiday from work and I'm trying to use them up before Christmas... I took Tully to see my grandparents whilst I was there as I'd not gone the last couple of times. It was really good to see them, and I think they enjoyed seeing their first great grandchild.
I didn't do much else when i was there, just chilled out really. But I ended up staying one night longer than expected. I got everything ready to come home on Thursday, but for some reason Tully just screamed when we were in the car so I headed back to try and settle her before I got too far away and was stuck miles from wither house with a screaming baby. I planned to set off again, but in the end decided to stay as it was getting really late, and I didn't fancy being in a lay-by on the Woodhead pass on my own if she woke up and got stressed out again. Poor mum - she just thought she'd got her house back to it's normal quiet self too :)

Busy Weekend

This weekend has been quite hectic. Firstly we had a night out on friday, which I talked about in my last post.

Then, on Saturday, I went to see the group of people that had been thrown together when we went skiing for the 2004 New Year in La Plagne. We all got on really well and have net up since, and lots of them got a chalet together last New Year too, which sadly we had to miss as I was too pregnant to be able to go :( This time John was hosting the reunion in Hyde, which is just a few minutes round the motorway from us.
I forgot to take my camera, but here's a couple of snaps that we took during the ski holiday to show who everyone is. This first one was taken in the chalet and shows (from left to right) Amy & Stuart, Mark & Caroline, Becky the chalet maid in front, Sally & Scott, John, me and finally Mark. The onyl people missing this weekend was Becky (poor girl, tried really hard while we were there but was a little scatty. Not 'bad' as such, but certainly one of the least organised chalet hosts we've stayed with), and Mark, who had stayed at home to look after Tully. In addition this weekend was Alex, Mark and Caroline's 6 week old son...

This next one shows a subset of us out on the 'piste'! (Me, Mark, mark, Sally, John and Scott) I know it doesn't add much to this post, but I just saw it and it made me have really itchy feet to go skiing again so thought I'd put it up. Spot Scott though as the odd one out for being a boarder, although apparently John got converted to the dark side of snow sports last year...


Finally, today we all went over to Yeadon to see Chris and Chrissy. It was really really good to see them - we should definitely make an effort to see them more often! Tulster was on fine form too - sometimes I'm just so amazed that I'm mum to such a fab little girl. She's really well behaved and just makes me laugh so much sometimes. It was really funny today to see how she reacted to their cats - although I'm not sure who was most freaked out - I think the cats were most perturbed by Tully than she was of them!

Night out

Alison and Liz had offered to baby sit again, so last night we went out with Jon and Mandy to celebrate (belatedly) Jon's birthday. First we stopped off for a swift G&T in the Hog's Head, and then headed across the road to Jitrada, a very good Thai restaurant. We ordered loads of food (we were actually slightly embarrassed as we felt we were really over ordering), but we managed to clear all 3 courses without too much effort (mixed starter, soup, main) It really was incredibly tasty! Afterwards we wandered back to the Hill's house to try out their new sofa and have another bottle of wine... Yum!

Quiet weekend

We didn't get up to much this weekend. On Saturday we had grand plans for a nice day out, but coldn't think of anywhere to go so just ended up walking to the park. Again... Then on Saturday night Tully was a nightmare and decided not to sleep from the hours of 3-6, so we were all broken on Sunday.

Luckily for me, Markie was nice and took her out for a really long walk so I could get a bit of sleep and peace for a couple of hours. Thank goodness she slept really well last night, otherwise I think she'd have been out in the wheelie bin! (When I say she slept well I mean I only had to get out of bed for her twice, which is good for her!) I can't wait for her to start crawling / walking in some ways so she can use up some energy! Although I suspect looking after her will become exponentially more tricky once she's mobile. Oh well. I guess it's all downhill from here...

Poor Markie

I had to go to Teddington (a London suburb) yesterday to give a demo, which meant driving south on Wednesday, so Markie had to look after Tully solo again. Wednesday night was fine, but poor lad - on Thursday the nursery phoned him up at 10 in the morning to get Tully as she had a bad tummy... So he had to have her all day too, and then my demo ran late which meant I didn't get home til about 9!

Orchid revisited

You might remember a while back I was gibbering on about how chuffed I was at having not killed my birthday orchid... Well, it appears I spoke too soon! :)
All the flowers fell off about 3 weeks ago but I was too embarrassed to confess to you all about it. But, I noticed this morning that a new shoot is growing at the bottom, so maybe I haven't killed it after all!!!! Woohoo!

MIL

Mark's mum, June, came to stay this weekend. She lives out in Tenerife so it's not easy for her to pop to see us. It was her first visit to see Tully and they seemed to get on pretty well. it was a shame the weather wasn't very good as it meant we were a bit limited in what we could do on the entertainment front, but she seemed to have fun! She's now gone up to Oswaldtwistle to stay with her brother for the rest of her holiday.

Tatton Park

It was such a lovely day we took Tully out for a wander round Tatton Park to get some fresh air. It's one of my favourite places to go for a walk, but I rarely go there as it annoys me that I have to pay for parking even though it's part National Trust (of which I'm a fully paid up member!)... Anyway, I thought these snaps were quite good so thought I'd share them with you here.

Come dine with me

'Come Dine with me' is back on again! I wrote about it back when I was waiting for Tully to arrive, but I think this series is even better! It's on at 4pm every week day on Channel 4, so I accept it's not ideal viewing time for most people, but it's something I'd say was definitely worth setting the video for.

Another New Arrival

Congratulations to Katy and Brian for the birth of their baby daughter Daisy earlier today. She weighed in at a respectable 7lb 3oz, but arrived at the incredibly anti-sociable time of 2:21am!

Week in Miami

Well, I've just got back today from a 4 day sales meeting in Miami. Very nice I hear you cry! Actually no.

Firstly we were staying in the Miami Airport Marriott, which whilst nice wasn't quite up the standard of most Marriott's I've stayed in, especially the conference facilities (there were 2 big light fittings with large glass cylinders that hung down, but they airpcon made them move enough to hit against each other so there a constant, very annoying, background jingling going on, which'd drive even the most sane person round the bend! Grrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!!)

Secondly, the length of the conference meant I didn't get home until this morning (Saturday), which is never ideal. Also, bad weather meant we had lots of delays on the way home...

Finally we had organised events every evening we were there, so the only time I left the vicinity of the airport was on a bus to a generic American Mall to go 'competitve team bowling', or to a restaurant that could have been anywhere! I know Miami airport is a bit away from the touristy places, but it'd be really nice for the organisers to recognise that some people have travelled a long way and it might be nice to see something relevant of the place we are visiting...

Ok, rant over! It was actually relatively useful, and really good to see lots of people that I've not seen for ages. I'm pleased to be home though!

Alex Knight

Here's a photo of Steph's son at just over 4 months. How cute is he?

Steve and Karen's Wedding

After a HUGE breakfast we drove down the New Forest for Steve and Karen's wedding, held at the Balmer Lawn Hotel. The wedding was lovely - Karen looked beautiful and Steve, well, he scrubs up quite well it seems! ;-)

After the ceremony and the photo shoot things went the way they usually do at most weddings I attend - gin, confetti on the face and a sweepstake on the length of the best man's speech!!! The main break from the norm was when the groom, best mand and father of the bride dressed up in drag and fluroesent glitter wigs and pranced about on the dance floor for 10 mins! Highly amusing and a shock to everyone else concerned. We had a really really good time - thanks for inviting us!

Cirencester

We were lucky with the journey south, and arrived at our hotel in Cirencester at about 6:30. After uickly phoning home we went for a walk round whilst it was still light. It was quite a pretty town. When it started to go dark we thought we'd go into the nearest pub for a quick pint before going in search of food! Big mistake!!! It's a while since I've been heckled in the localest of local pubs, but it happened here.

One very swiftly drunk pint later we headed out for a curry. Not the best curry I've ever had but still perfectly acceptable, really it was just let down by the bhaji's! Curry scoffed, we headed back to the hotel with a bottle of (screwtop) wine - classy!!! :-)

Tully Free Weekend!

Hurrah! Mark and I are escaping this weekend to go to Steve and Karen's wedding. Tonight we are going to Cirencester, and then heading down to the New Forest tomorrow. I'm really looking forward to it. Mum and Dad have come to look after Tully - I just hope she bahaves otherwise they'll be so exhausted. And will never volunteer to do it again ;-)...

Darren and Jo on the road!!!

I've been meaning to add a link to Darren and Jo's blog for a while. Darren used to work with us, but he and Jo have both given up their day jobs and are about to embark on an amazing adventure. It's worth checking this out - I can't imagine the amount of planning it took to come up with such a detailed itinerary for a 4 year period!!! Have a fab time and I'm really looking forward to following your travels!

Wedding Anniversary

Today is our anniversary, so are leaving Tully in the capable hands of Liz and Alison for the evening whilst we escape to The Saffron Lounge for a meal. Yum!

New Arrival

Congratulations to Emma and Peter for the birth of their (as yet unamed) baby daughter earlier today. She weighed in at a massive 9lb 4oz, but at least arrived at the very sociable time of 18:35! I'll post a photo when I have one...

Bedroom

Ok, fair point Markie, I did get a bit behind...

I've been meaning to post pictures of the bedroom since Mum and Dad brought over the curtains last week but I kept forgetting to take the camera upstairs to take the photos. They still aren't very good - I couldn't work out how to get more than about 10% of the room in shot at any one time... Oh well, you get the general idea - which is mainly beige! I must go and buy some bright pictures to liven it up a bit!

Mark's gone away

Mark has gone to Philadelphia this week, leaving me home alone with Tulster. Given he managed so well when I went just puts the pressure on me now! Although he had it easier as he got to put her in nursery every day. I wonder if I'll still be as coping by the end of tomorrow?

Week off!

I started to use up some of my holidays and took this week off. Tully still went to nursery though, so I had some time to myself! Bliss!

Wednesday was taken up with a well overdue freshen up of our bedroom. It's now painted the same colour as the rest of the house. The carpet is turning up on Tuesday, and Mum's bringing the curtains next weekend, so I'll post a picture once it's all completed.
Thursday was a general potter day, finishing off bits of the bedroom and just having a general chill out.
Then on Friday I went into Manchester for a major shopping sess! (It's just such hard work going round the shops with a buggy, I felt very liberated being able to wander round without it.) My main mission was to get an outfit for Steve and Karens wedding in 4 weeks time, but also to get some shoes for work. Kew (one of my fav shops since Vics introduced me to it in April) sorted me out for the wedding outfit, but I gave up on the shoe aspect of the trip! I HATE shoe shoppping and just wussed out from the mission after spending less than 2 minutes in Schuh. Why is it that still nobody seems to stock enough shoes for large footed people, that's if they even make them big enough? It's SOOOOO annoying. I met up with Mandy for lunch for a well earned break from the trauma of shopping - we went to Tampopo which is one of my fav places to eat, especially if you want the food served up relatively quickly.

Classy tea

Stu and Amy came round tonight. Stu had demanded fish fingers, mash and beans for tea, followed by jelly and ice cream. I decided to go up market for the dessert aspect and provided raspberry jelly and raspberry ripple ice cream. It seemed to go down well...

Some Sale history

I've lived in or near Sale for over 8 years, and only found out today that the physicist James Joule both lived and was buried here. Given I'm a phyisics graduate I feel I should have worked this out previously, particularly as I've spent several evenings drinking in the J.P.Joule pub in the past! Duh!!!!

Gnome

Markie persuaded me to have a go at playing an on line game s I couldo see what all the fuss is about, and why he gets so addicted. I wasn't convinced I'd get into it, but thought I should give it a go. He set me up with playing World of Warcraft, which he described as on line gaming for your mum! Anyway, guess what? I'm hooked! My character is a little gnome called marrowina. She's a mage, and I'm particualrly proud of her fireball spell!

Philadelphia

So, I was in the Philly office last week for the Global Product Specialist Meeting, which, in case anyone was wondering, is my rather meaningless job title. Anyway, the work was as expected, the social aspect of the meeting better than expected (the baseball was lots of fun!), and the amount of sleep I got was fantastic. And, luckily Tully kept her blog updated so I could see how she was getting on without me... Which was actually far too well. She seemed to have far more fun with her dad than she ever does with me. Oh well...

Orchid

I'm quite proud of myself. Normally, as most people know, I kill any houseplant within a couple of months, but look at the orchid that Liz got me for my birthday. It's got flowers and everything!

No more purple bathroom!

I know mum's going to be unimpressed by me posting these pictures of her bathroom, especially as it's looking such a mess as she's already taken down all the cabinets, mirrors etc, but I had to mention that demise of the purple bathroom! Mum's wanted to get rid of it for years, but I always persuaded her not to because I thought the purple was so different from anything I've ever seen anywhere else. I still remember walking in fofr the first time when we looked round the house when I was just 9. She's finally got her way though and it's going this week. It's being totally changed round and refitted to include a super big shower - how jealous am I? I think very is the answer.