HUGE update... containing Bats, Hill House, Barcelona, Stratford, Illness and Film Nights!
[Level - Public]
Hi! I’m sorry I’ve been rather rubbish at posting but, well, it’s been a bit hectic of late and I’ve been busy having a wonderful time rather than having the time to write about it. But that isn’t good enough and won’t serve me years down the line where I go ‘I know I had an awesome time, but what did I DO?!?’.
So. Herein is an epic entry of what I’ve been up to since Salon Rouge (21st May), as that was my last entry! Other than film night(s) (being 26th May - Bill Murray - Ghostbusters then Zombieland, 2nd June - Speilberg - Goonies then Jaws, 9th June - Disney Night - Robin Hood then Lilo & Stitch) the main event of the last month or so was my birthday, due to efforts of massiveness made by my bloke and my family.
I had a birthday extravaganza of a month. It started on Friday 10th June...
I got home, got glammed up and was taken into town, not knowing what I was off to do. Alex (metalganjey) walked me along, grinning merrily at me, and we went and sat down at ‘The Anchor’, by the waterside with a glass of cool white wine. We chatted and were just couply and lovely for an hour, then we went…. BAT PUNTING!!! It. Was. Awesome. I got a bat-locator box thingy, we were punting at dusk (with lots of the cute little things swooping over-head) and, having gone along to Granchester Meadows, we punted back in the dark, snuggled under blankets and with a mild drizzle which certainly didn’t dampen spirits. There’s a species of bat which skims the water, and they only come out when it’s properly dark. Watching them dance just above the Cam by torch-light, moving quietly along, was eccentrically beautiful. We walked home, getting chips on the way to warm us up, and curled up on the sofa where a very happy Em started to snooze off.
If you get the chance to go, do it. It’s brill: http://www.scudamores.com/punting/combined/bat.php
Saturday 11th June, I was woken up to fresh coffee, so dove through to the sofa. Alex mysteriously suddenly decided to put some incense on so grabbed a lighter from the lighter box, and disappeared back into the kitchen. He came out with another part of my birthday present: BAT CUP-CAKES. They were ‘red velvet’ with butter-cream on top, hidden by the BLACK icing, red dot (which looked like a sun) and a bat on top (black, of course) with two glittery red eyes. I giggled so much, I nearly fell off the sofa. He’d put two on a plate for me, and put candles in them as I wasn’t going to get birthday cake on Sunday. I can thoroughly recommend them (http://www.themillerscupcakes.co.uk/home or http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.217029848331041.59787.166746293359397 if you’d like to see mine!)
After getting showered and packed, we headed off (leaving at 10.30am) for the train station for the epic journey to Hill House (http://www.thehowlinghillhouse.com/). I’m going to list lots of trains here, just to illustrate the lengths the wonderful Alex had gone to in organising all of this, because quite frankly, he did a brilliant job and deserves lots of praise and thanks and epic amounts of brownie points, but you lot might want to skip it…
10.30 Flat to Train Station on foot, with time to get a train picnic at the station
11.15 Cambridge to Kings Cross
Kings Cross to Paddington via the Underground
Time to purchase Krispy Kreme doughnuts at Paddington (smiley face!)
13.00 Paddington to Swindon
14:14 Swindon to Gloucester
15:03 arrive Gloucester
And then the fun with the taxi(s) began. We were originally going to get a bus from Gloucester to Ross-On-Wye, then a taxi from Ross up to Hill House (on Howle Hill). But by the time we’d been on the move for 4 ½ hours, we were both getting a little travel weary. So Alex bravely and kindly said ‘Stuff it, taxi the rest of the way’. Now, the taxi driver was given an approximate address (Hill House, Howle Hill, near Ross-On-Wye) because that was as much as we had access to (we hadn’t printed directions because there wasn’t originally a need to). After some negotiation (he didn’t really seem to understand our accents and his was quite thick so it was a struggle) we agreed to get to Ross and go from there. So we did. And he totally failed at any point after that to listen to what we were saying, either of us (such as ‘we need to turn left at the church… erm, you just want past it… erm, you’ve just reversed and gone the exact same way again). Tempers were getting rather frayed, and it was clear that the driver was far more clueless than we were, so we headed to a petrol station and I was volunteered to go in and seek directions. The lady in the shop, when I got to the front of the queue, couldn’t have been lovelier, but she did say ‘Oh, you’ve got to go back into Ross and back round the one-way system, then blah blah blah…’ at which point I got her to write things down. I got back into the taxi and relayed the instructions. He decided to pretty much ignore everything I’d said or had written and wanted to go in the opposite direction. In the end, we agreed he’d take us BACK to Ross-On-Wye and we’d get a local taxi from there as it was clear we’d go round in circles for weeks otherwise, all the time the meter was creeping up and up. We’d tried to get through to Hill House a few times during the trip but it was going through to answer phone, when we could even get a signal, so it was a bit tricky.
Anyhow, we finally got into Ross itself around 4pm, give or take. And started to seek out a local taxi. Well, we found the local taxi rank. I doubt it could have been MORE local. The people there were admittedly lovely, but I think the following story illustrates very beautifully the difference between city mentality and country mentality. In Cambridge, the story would have gone: Taxi rank, book taxi / wave one down, takes all of 5 minutes to arrive, straight to destination, job done. Regardless of time of day. Or indeed night. Now, remember, at this point it was Saturday afternoon.
Alex went into the rank office for S&R Taxis, and asked for a taxi up to Hill House, Howle Hill. They thankfully did at least know where we wanted to be, but didn’t have a taxi available ‘for a bit’. So we agreed to go for a little wander around and come back. Around 4.20pm, we went into ‘Crows Feet’ (http://www.crowsfeet.net/dpt.php), located a couple of doors down from the rank. I immediately got ‘vibes’ from the place as I struggled to get my suitcase in behind me, hearing ‘careful of the floor’ (wooden floorboards, clearly well worn and tough as boots) as I battled through the narrow door. Charming. Anyway, un-perturbed I continued on through, leaving my case just inside the door in a corner well out of the way. Alex and I had an ongoing joke about Unicorns, so I wanted to try and get something with a Unicorn on it, ideally a card. Having looked around, I decided to ask the lady behind the counter. She couldn’t have been more condescending;
Me: “Excuse me, but do you have anything with a Unicorn on it? It doesn’t need to be…”
Her (interrupting me and using a very irritated ‘put that down now’ sort of tone): “No. We don’t have anything with a Unicorn on it. Or a fairy. Or a dragon. Or a mer-maid. Or a dream catcher. Or ANYthing ELSE like that. And I think you’ll find that there’s no where else locally that sells such things either!”
Me: “Um. Ok….”
So, we left rather abruptly (after I spotted but failed to point out the sterling silver and turquoise beaded dream-catcher earrings she had for sale but hey ho) and continued our adventure in Ross. Walking up the high-street, we spotted the local ‘alternative’ shop, which had, HA, fairy statues and things in the window. Sadly, no Unicorns but the shop assistant couldn’t have been nicer (she offered to order one in for me). A bit more of a mooch, largely to see if we could work out where we should have gone in Taxi No. 1, and to see if we could locate another rank, but we decided nope and headed back to the rank. It was, by the time we got there, very nearly 5pm. I volunteered to talk to the rank bods this time around. There was a rather large, gray-haired, chain-smoking, tea swilling lady behind the desk. I, sounding bright eyed and bushy tailed (but feeling far from it), said ‘any sign of a taxi yet?’…
Her (in a thick country accent… think West Country): “Oh, no love. We’ve not got any drivers working at the moment. Mind, what time is it?”
Cronie: “Coming up for five.”
Her: “Ah, well Blah will be starting his shift at five.”
Me: “Oh, great! So there’ll be one very soon then.” (trying very hard not to bash my head off the desk)
Her: “Oh no love. He’s got a job for him when he gets here.”
Me: “Errr… right. So, what time will he be free then?”
Her: “Well, he’s got to do a trip to the shops, then get such and such… let me see. He should be done around 5.30pm, or thereabouts.”
Me: “So… can we book a taxi for 5.30pm to go from here to Hill House then please?”
Her: “Oh! Yes love, no problem! We’ll see you in about half an hour.”
Me: “Yes. We’ll go to the pub in the meantime. Thanks.”
Because by then, we’d been in the vicinity of Hill House but not close enough for getting on an hour… to be honest, if we’d known how close the place WAS, we’d have been able to walk it, but hey ho. It gets worse…
We went to the pub. The local Wetherspoons pub (can’t go wrong with that, surely?!?). We walked in, and there was an eerie silence…slight exaggeration but honestly, it was mad! The place was clearly for local people and they weren’t used to seeing anyone who wasn’t. The bar staff were all heavily involved in a conversation about one of their co-workers who’d left to have a baby and had brought it in to show it off a little while before we went in. Now, I have no issue with that, but front of house staff are front of house - you ought to be paying attention to your customers first, gossiping and chatting second. It wouldn’t have even been so bad if said co-worker and baby were at the place at the time. But our bar server took around five minutes to pour a glass of wine (stop, start, stop, start) and one pint of lager (after letting us know that some of them weren’t for sale). Finally getting our drinks, we headed to a well-earned seat and flopped. At half past five, we went back to the rank…
Me: “Hi! Is our taxi here?”
Cronie (Aunty who was there earlier had gone home for the day): “Nope.”
Cronie 2 (foreign accent, not quite sure where from but European): “Ah. He is always late. He gets there in the end but he… does take his time and do his own thing. I will do the shop run and be back before he is! I’ll take you when I come back! I won’t be long!”
Me: “We’ll just sit here and wait then…”
Ten minutes pass…
Cronie 2: “Hello! I am back! I beat him, I knew I would, lets get you on your way!”
In fairness, he was (as were all of the taxi rank people) utterly lovely… just a bit eccentric. And given it had been a long day (7 hours by this point of attempting to travel / waiting) we were just spent. Anyhow, he cheerfully asked how we were enjoying our trip and the lovely town of Ross… Alex muttered (politely) and I said we hadn’t had the best of times so far, going into the nightmare taxi ride and the experience in Crows Feet. He said “Ah, you ignore her, she’s a stuck up bitch, no-one likes her, we get stories like that all the time”, and told us the best way to get back to Gloucester if we were taking a taxi again. Anyway, at around 5.50pm, we finally, 7 hours 20 minutes later, arrived at Hill House. And fell immediately in love with the place. It was all worth it when we finally arrived and opened the doors to the North Suite; http://www.thehowlinghillhouse.com/index.php?categoryid=15 or if you’d like to see how it now looks, check the facebook photos here; http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/media/set/?set=a.156107117783318.35509.123459007714796 . I’ve not got access to it at work, but there is a photo of me flopped on the bed which was taken pretty much as soon as we got there. My birthday cards from Mum and Dad had been posted directly to Hill House and were laid out ready for me in the room itself.
I had a very long blissful soak in the HUGE bath-tub after grabbing some cds from the eclectic collection. We freshened up and had supper at 7.30pm - home-made nettle soup, home-made dragon chicken, organic local butter, organic local new potatoes, organic local asparagus, organic (not local… Sainsbury’s!) broccoli, and organic local ice-cream (Rhubarb Crumble for Alex, I had Cinder Toffee) for pudding, washed down with English white wine. We grabbed some dvds from the huge collection, a couple of cds, and flopped in the suite for the evening, with the patio doors open to let feline visitors come say ‘hello’, and had a log-fire in the room along with our red wine. Utter bliss.
I woke up on Sunday 12th June (at the ripe old age of 31) to see the sun rising over the mountains, and a rather rain-filled looking sky. Hoping it would clear a bit, I turned over, snuggled into the feather duvet, sinking into the ludicrously comfortable mattress and buried my head in the feather pillows, all grins. An hour or so went past and I reluctantly decided to peek out from the covers. In the window by the bed was a card, obviously from Alex. So I sat up, smiled at him (he needs much less sleep than I do and is often up and reading / gaming / pottering around when I wake up at a weekend), got a smile and happy birthday back, and devoured my card. Not content enough with getting me custom made birthday cup-cakes, he’d organised a custom birthday card too… a three-fold thing so it stands up, with Maleficent (link here if you don’t know who / what she is: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maleficent) on all three sides. I LOVE it, it’s up at the flat beside the figure of Maleficent by the way. And inside, my final birthday present, Lush vouchers. Well, I say final present - final present from Alex! I can honestly say I don’t recall ever being so completely spoiled.
Anyway, we had a very quiet day after the mega breakfast, given the rain. We played Trivial Pursuit, watched a couple of films in the cinema room, then decided to partake in the hot-tub, in the light 7pm rain, drinking English ‘champagne’ (which was utterly delicious) out of metal (so you don’t break them in the hot-tub) goblets. We got dressed again, and headed out to the nearest pub for an evening meal - the nearest pub being The Mill Race (http://www.millrace.info/wb/) (Duncan having phoned ahead and making sure they’d be open, and letting us know about the 10% discount Hill House bods get, he took us down there in the car) which was rather good. Having eaten like kings for the second time that day, we decided to walk it off and head back on foot to Hill House. We made it with little issue, except for the killer hill (soooo steep!) and very light rain and got a ‘well done!’ when we got back. Another night under a very snugly duvet, with films and the promise of a killer breakfast. T’was very yummy (the food too!) and I definitely did not want to leave, and fully intend to go back when we can.
The journey back wasn’t quite as bad as the journey there. We’d a taxi booked for 10.40am, the train left Gloucester at 11.54am, Swindon at 12.59, into Paddington at 14:06, left Kings Cross at 14:53 and into Cambridge again at 15:54 (no time for doughnuts again though sadly). On getting back, we took a detour to The Dev (http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/group.php?gid=483435580216) and a little collapse in the afternoon sunshine before meandering back to the flat.
Then it was back to work for four mega-long days (a normal day is 8.30am - 4.30pm / 7 ½ hours, but Tuesday was 9 hours, Wednesday was 8 ½ hours, Thursday and Friday were 12 hours long each) before my holiday. Which I needed by the end of that lot, especially after working a few hours on Sunday too! But, given what came next, I didn’t mind so much.
Monday 20th June was spent introducing Alex to Mum and Dad (he coped exceptionally well), and going to Bedouin (http://www.bedouin-cambridge.com/ ) via The Earl of Beaconsfield for our evening repast. Very tasty it all was too. None of us slept very well that night, I was too excited, Alex wasn’t feeling great, Dad couldn’t get comfy and poor Mum was on the sofa after we discovered the air bed was busted!
Getting out of bed for the 4.30am start was a major struggle. Ick! But with the promise of Barcelona, I somehow managed. Dad and I headed to the train station and got the 6.21am train to Stansted Airport. We arrived, got bags checked in and hung around for what seemed like hours. The gate opened around 9.10am and we were on and flying at 10.30am with two separate gaggles of loud-mouthed obnoxious ‘first time abroad without parents’ groups of teenagers. They were a total nightmare, but such is the way of things. We hung back and snuck on through the back door of the plane, managing to miss most of their antics. A couple of hours later (three hours due to time differences) we landed in Barcelona, getting off in a wall of heat (28 degrees, but remember, I’m a Goth, I run a little hot anyway and I don’t do heat very well).
We grabbed a taxi to Bonic (http://www.bonic-barcelona.com/en/bed_and_breakfast.php) and flopped out with a beer, then headed up Las Ramblas for a mooch. In fairness, we were both a little travel weary so didn’t ‘do’ much of anything, and I’d have that in mind another time - getting there for the evening is fine but afternoon was rather wasted. Anyway, we got back in, had a little nap, showered, changed and off out for a lovely meal off the tourist trail - the hotel owner had told us the best areas to eat in, and we took his advice with thanks! Lots of gorgeous little tapas bars and restaurants, we finally settled on one and had a few bits, some beer and wine, and back to Las Ramblas for ‘chuff-off’ beers, then back to the hotel for sleeps. Wednesday saw Sagrada Familia and Park Guell on the agenda. We managed to do both. I could go on for ages about them but in honesty, go and see them for yourself, really really do. They were both spectacular. Dad was getting achey and sore so left me to it at the Park Guell and it was great to get some ‘me’ time. We met up in our by then favourite spot on Las Ramblas, had a couple, then off for an afternoon snooze after a detour down the sidestreets in a bid to find a ‘short cut’ back… we got totally lost but found some great little tattoo shops and having magically rediscovered Las Ramblas, went back the way we knew! Whilst Dad was dozing, I got showered and changed, and headed off for a wander around the Gothic quarter, falling utterly in love with the meandering streets and scoffing a huge chocolate ice-cream.
I then took myself off in the direction of the harbour, determined we’d NOT eat on Las Ramblas, and found a boat-restaurant which I knew would appeal to Dad. I carried on around, and had half a San Miguel whilst watching the sun setting over the harbour (after being asked for directions by a Spanish lady who seemed rather bemused that I was a Brit). It was bliss. Heading back to pick up Dad, he seemed surprised we’d been so close to the harbour, and we plumped for the boat restaurant as I hoped. Very nice it was too!
We headed back via a local Rock / Alternative bar called Bollocks (http://www.bollocksbcn.com/), where we met a lovely Aussie couple who live around 20 miles away from where Debi and Tim live. It was rather late before we got to bed!
Thursday there was really just time to get up, packed, eat breakfast and have a quick look at the market which was slowly being set up on Las Ramblas before we got a taxi and headed back to the airport. Much smaller terminal than on the way out, there wasn’t nearly as much to look at but we were both a little zonked from the late night and the heat, truth be told. It took us ages to de- and re-bling ourselves up, it’s a good job the airport crew have a good sense of humour!
We got back to the UK a little later than originally planned (our outgoing flight was delayed), but we were back at the flat by 4pm which all things considered wasn’t bad. Dad had decided on the way over that rather than leave Friday morning for Stratford, we’d get back, do a suit-case transfer, then straight through. Mum had coffee on the go, I chucked a pile of stuff in the washing, left Alex a pressie, and after a sit-down and perk-up, we headed off around 6pm. Chinese take-out for tea when we got there, and an early ish night!
Friday 24th June saw Dad helping to put up some decking, and Mum and me doing tea and supply runs. We were on lunch duty, so headed off to Alcester for a really decent mooch about (I ended up with a full outfit from the various charity shops and spotted a shirt for Alex) first. I love Alcester, it’s such a sweet little town. I spent Friday evening along with Katherine and her buddy, having a much needed catch up.
Saturday saw Dad deciding he’d sit and do little, as he was understandably rather achey, once the finishing off was complete. We went through to Stratford for a few hours (visiting, as ever, The Creaky Cauldron - http://www.seekthemagic.org/online_emporium.html as well as http://www.crystalshop.co.uk/stores/Stratford-upon-Avon-crystal-shop.html, two of my favourite places!). Then it was back and set up for the deck-warming party. This went on until rather late, but I was a wuss and dozed off half way through the evening. I did admittedly get back up again but still, I didn’t stay up for nearly as long as some others did. A good time was had, the fire was lit, and the deck was well and truly warmed.
Sunday involved a quiet day of pottering around the caravan.
I joined Dad on Monday on a trip to get supplies for his fishing, grabbing the shirt for Alex after all (having pondered on it all weekend). We had lunch at the Kings Head (http://www.thekh.co.uk/) with the neighbours, and then I read for most of the afternoon.
Tuesday saw just enough time to get up and breakfasted then off to the station to treck back to Cambridge so I was home in plenty of time for Alex getting in. Which I was!
I spent a few days playing computer games, doing nice food, pootling around shops and doing lots of not huge amounts, grabbing and watching Season 3 of True Blood with Alex in amongst the weekend, and then it was ‘back to normal’.
In theory. I was back to work on Monday 4th July but by Thursday I was feeling rather ill, so had Thursday and Friday off sick.
Alex skipped a large part of Sonisphere (having had a not wonderful time of it one evening) because he wanted to come and look after me. He was there as I woke up on Saturday morning. He made a huge fuss of me, buying me ‘How to Train Your Dragon’ and a gorgeous bunch of white Lillies. Sunday saw an impromptu visit from Fuzzy Dave and I managed to drag myself out for a drink with ‘lex on Sunday evening but Monday I felt utterly awful so had another day off. Last week was a struggle but I managed - coping with a visit to see Allison (akonken) on Thursday for a little while, where I discovered ‘Dead Like Me’. Alex and I had ice-cream on the way home on Friday and popped into the Dev for a pint on the way home but I faded fast, and slept most of this weekend just gone, thanks in no small part to lady-grims. We managed a brief outing on Saturday evening but I couldn’t cope with busy bars or town centres so missed thedinster’s do (looking forward to seeing her on Thursday though) and had a reasonably early night. But we had a lovely dinner last night, and spent yesterday afternoon being creative (him with writing and decluttering his computer, me with fixing jewellery and making plans for new things).
And that brings us totally up to date!
Tonight I’m doing some more jewellery making, Alex is planning on some reading. He’s cooking tomorrow so we’ll see what lovely thing I end up with! We’re on countdown to pay-day so it’s a penny pincher, but Thursday sees me re-starting Film Night with ‘John Hughes’ night (see here if you haven’t heard of film night and want to come; http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/groups/tnfnm?ap=1, the event for John Hughes night is here; http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=253268181356194). I’m broke but have had a super lovely month of doing very nice things with very lovely people. I feel rather spoiled and incredibly loved. Thanks, you lot! :D
Now, speaking of film night, a few announcements.
Firstly, this week, Thursday 21st July, as I’ve mentioned is John Hughes night. This had to be cancelled before I disappeared due to long days at work. Then I was sick and not really up for things when I got back. But it’s on, finally, having been cancelled.
Next week, Thursday 28th July, (http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=210333165680055) is Film Night: Martial Arts Films (the one and only time!!). The title does what it suggests as I am NOT a Martial Arts film fan at all, despite trying a few different types. So, we’ll see…
Thursday 4th August (http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=254012671279598) is Film Night: Gangsters. We’re starting at the MUCH earlier time of 6pm for arrivals, 6.30pm for film start. This is because most Gangster films are… lengthy. If we started as normal, we’d not be able to do two films unless we were all willing to be up until 3am. So do come along earlier and feel free to bring your supper with you!
SPECIAL FILM WEEKEND TO CELEBRATE 1 YEAR AT THE FLAT
Thursday 11th August is Film Night free. We’re giving it a break during the week, but that’s because there is a weekend extravaganza happening on Saturday 13th - Sunday 14th August.
Event is here; http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=162577970480754 and the title is Film Night Special: Weekend Extravaganza LotR Extended Editions. As you might anticipate, we’re showing… the Lord of the Rings extended editions, back to back. It’s been a year since I moved into CotR and what better way to celebrate CotR than with LotR?
The running order will go something like this;
Arrivals from 11am on Saturday 13th August
12 noon - The Fellowship of the Ring (approx. 3 ½ hours)
Break
4.30pm - The Two Towers (approx. 3 ½ hours)
Break
9.30pm - The Return of the King (approx. 4 hours)
Come for part or all of it. As ever, bring self, supplies, friends and if you have them, extended Blu-Ray versions (we have the DVD versions so if no-one has them, no biggie).
Right, that’s my mammoth update finished, you’ll be delighted to hear! I’ll try and keep a bit more up to date next time…
Hi! I’m sorry I’ve been rather rubbish at posting but, well, it’s been a bit hectic of late and I’ve been busy having a wonderful time rather than having the time to write about it. But that isn’t good enough and won’t serve me years down the line where I go ‘I know I had an awesome time, but what did I DO?!?’.
So. Herein is an epic entry of what I’ve been up to since Salon Rouge (21st May), as that was my last entry! Other than film night(s) (being 26th May - Bill Murray - Ghostbusters then Zombieland, 2nd June - Speilberg - Goonies then Jaws, 9th June - Disney Night - Robin Hood then Lilo & Stitch) the main event of the last month or so was my birthday, due to efforts of massiveness made by my bloke and my family.
I had a birthday extravaganza of a month. It started on Friday 10th June...
I got home, got glammed up and was taken into town, not knowing what I was off to do. Alex (metalganjey) walked me along, grinning merrily at me, and we went and sat down at ‘The Anchor’, by the waterside with a glass of cool white wine. We chatted and were just couply and lovely for an hour, then we went…. BAT PUNTING!!! It. Was. Awesome. I got a bat-locator box thingy, we were punting at dusk (with lots of the cute little things swooping over-head) and, having gone along to Granchester Meadows, we punted back in the dark, snuggled under blankets and with a mild drizzle which certainly didn’t dampen spirits. There’s a species of bat which skims the water, and they only come out when it’s properly dark. Watching them dance just above the Cam by torch-light, moving quietly along, was eccentrically beautiful. We walked home, getting chips on the way to warm us up, and curled up on the sofa where a very happy Em started to snooze off.
If you get the chance to go, do it. It’s brill: http://www.scudamores.com/punting/combined/bat.php
Saturday 11th June, I was woken up to fresh coffee, so dove through to the sofa. Alex mysteriously suddenly decided to put some incense on so grabbed a lighter from the lighter box, and disappeared back into the kitchen. He came out with another part of my birthday present: BAT CUP-CAKES. They were ‘red velvet’ with butter-cream on top, hidden by the BLACK icing, red dot (which looked like a sun) and a bat on top (black, of course) with two glittery red eyes. I giggled so much, I nearly fell off the sofa. He’d put two on a plate for me, and put candles in them as I wasn’t going to get birthday cake on Sunday. I can thoroughly recommend them (http://www.themillerscupcakes.co.uk/home or http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.217029848331041.59787.166746293359397 if you’d like to see mine!)
After getting showered and packed, we headed off (leaving at 10.30am) for the train station for the epic journey to Hill House (http://www.thehowlinghillhouse.com/). I’m going to list lots of trains here, just to illustrate the lengths the wonderful Alex had gone to in organising all of this, because quite frankly, he did a brilliant job and deserves lots of praise and thanks and epic amounts of brownie points, but you lot might want to skip it…
10.30 Flat to Train Station on foot, with time to get a train picnic at the station
11.15 Cambridge to Kings Cross
Kings Cross to Paddington via the Underground
Time to purchase Krispy Kreme doughnuts at Paddington (smiley face!)
13.00 Paddington to Swindon
14:14 Swindon to Gloucester
15:03 arrive Gloucester
And then the fun with the taxi(s) began. We were originally going to get a bus from Gloucester to Ross-On-Wye, then a taxi from Ross up to Hill House (on Howle Hill). But by the time we’d been on the move for 4 ½ hours, we were both getting a little travel weary. So Alex bravely and kindly said ‘Stuff it, taxi the rest of the way’. Now, the taxi driver was given an approximate address (Hill House, Howle Hill, near Ross-On-Wye) because that was as much as we had access to (we hadn’t printed directions because there wasn’t originally a need to). After some negotiation (he didn’t really seem to understand our accents and his was quite thick so it was a struggle) we agreed to get to Ross and go from there. So we did. And he totally failed at any point after that to listen to what we were saying, either of us (such as ‘we need to turn left at the church… erm, you just want past it… erm, you’ve just reversed and gone the exact same way again). Tempers were getting rather frayed, and it was clear that the driver was far more clueless than we were, so we headed to a petrol station and I was volunteered to go in and seek directions. The lady in the shop, when I got to the front of the queue, couldn’t have been lovelier, but she did say ‘Oh, you’ve got to go back into Ross and back round the one-way system, then blah blah blah…’ at which point I got her to write things down. I got back into the taxi and relayed the instructions. He decided to pretty much ignore everything I’d said or had written and wanted to go in the opposite direction. In the end, we agreed he’d take us BACK to Ross-On-Wye and we’d get a local taxi from there as it was clear we’d go round in circles for weeks otherwise, all the time the meter was creeping up and up. We’d tried to get through to Hill House a few times during the trip but it was going through to answer phone, when we could even get a signal, so it was a bit tricky.
Anyhow, we finally got into Ross itself around 4pm, give or take. And started to seek out a local taxi. Well, we found the local taxi rank. I doubt it could have been MORE local. The people there were admittedly lovely, but I think the following story illustrates very beautifully the difference between city mentality and country mentality. In Cambridge, the story would have gone: Taxi rank, book taxi / wave one down, takes all of 5 minutes to arrive, straight to destination, job done. Regardless of time of day. Or indeed night. Now, remember, at this point it was Saturday afternoon.
Alex went into the rank office for S&R Taxis, and asked for a taxi up to Hill House, Howle Hill. They thankfully did at least know where we wanted to be, but didn’t have a taxi available ‘for a bit’. So we agreed to go for a little wander around and come back. Around 4.20pm, we went into ‘Crows Feet’ (http://www.crowsfeet.net/dpt.php), located a couple of doors down from the rank. I immediately got ‘vibes’ from the place as I struggled to get my suitcase in behind me, hearing ‘careful of the floor’ (wooden floorboards, clearly well worn and tough as boots) as I battled through the narrow door. Charming. Anyway, un-perturbed I continued on through, leaving my case just inside the door in a corner well out of the way. Alex and I had an ongoing joke about Unicorns, so I wanted to try and get something with a Unicorn on it, ideally a card. Having looked around, I decided to ask the lady behind the counter. She couldn’t have been more condescending;
Me: “Excuse me, but do you have anything with a Unicorn on it? It doesn’t need to be…”
Her (interrupting me and using a very irritated ‘put that down now’ sort of tone): “No. We don’t have anything with a Unicorn on it. Or a fairy. Or a dragon. Or a mer-maid. Or a dream catcher. Or ANYthing ELSE like that. And I think you’ll find that there’s no where else locally that sells such things either!”
Me: “Um. Ok….”
So, we left rather abruptly (after I spotted but failed to point out the sterling silver and turquoise beaded dream-catcher earrings she had for sale but hey ho) and continued our adventure in Ross. Walking up the high-street, we spotted the local ‘alternative’ shop, which had, HA, fairy statues and things in the window. Sadly, no Unicorns but the shop assistant couldn’t have been nicer (she offered to order one in for me). A bit more of a mooch, largely to see if we could work out where we should have gone in Taxi No. 1, and to see if we could locate another rank, but we decided nope and headed back to the rank. It was, by the time we got there, very nearly 5pm. I volunteered to talk to the rank bods this time around. There was a rather large, gray-haired, chain-smoking, tea swilling lady behind the desk. I, sounding bright eyed and bushy tailed (but feeling far from it), said ‘any sign of a taxi yet?’…
Her (in a thick country accent… think West Country): “Oh, no love. We’ve not got any drivers working at the moment. Mind, what time is it?”
Cronie: “Coming up for five.”
Her: “Ah, well Blah will be starting his shift at five.”
Me: “Oh, great! So there’ll be one very soon then.” (trying very hard not to bash my head off the desk)
Her: “Oh no love. He’s got a job for him when he gets here.”
Me: “Errr… right. So, what time will he be free then?”
Her: “Well, he’s got to do a trip to the shops, then get such and such… let me see. He should be done around 5.30pm, or thereabouts.”
Me: “So… can we book a taxi for 5.30pm to go from here to Hill House then please?”
Her: “Oh! Yes love, no problem! We’ll see you in about half an hour.”
Me: “Yes. We’ll go to the pub in the meantime. Thanks.”
Because by then, we’d been in the vicinity of Hill House but not close enough for getting on an hour… to be honest, if we’d known how close the place WAS, we’d have been able to walk it, but hey ho. It gets worse…
We went to the pub. The local Wetherspoons pub (can’t go wrong with that, surely?!?). We walked in, and there was an eerie silence…slight exaggeration but honestly, it was mad! The place was clearly for local people and they weren’t used to seeing anyone who wasn’t. The bar staff were all heavily involved in a conversation about one of their co-workers who’d left to have a baby and had brought it in to show it off a little while before we went in. Now, I have no issue with that, but front of house staff are front of house - you ought to be paying attention to your customers first, gossiping and chatting second. It wouldn’t have even been so bad if said co-worker and baby were at the place at the time. But our bar server took around five minutes to pour a glass of wine (stop, start, stop, start) and one pint of lager (after letting us know that some of them weren’t for sale). Finally getting our drinks, we headed to a well-earned seat and flopped. At half past five, we went back to the rank…
Me: “Hi! Is our taxi here?”
Cronie (Aunty who was there earlier had gone home for the day): “Nope.”
Cronie 2 (foreign accent, not quite sure where from but European): “Ah. He is always late. He gets there in the end but he… does take his time and do his own thing. I will do the shop run and be back before he is! I’ll take you when I come back! I won’t be long!”
Me: “We’ll just sit here and wait then…”
Ten minutes pass…
Cronie 2: “Hello! I am back! I beat him, I knew I would, lets get you on your way!”
In fairness, he was (as were all of the taxi rank people) utterly lovely… just a bit eccentric. And given it had been a long day (7 hours by this point of attempting to travel / waiting) we were just spent. Anyhow, he cheerfully asked how we were enjoying our trip and the lovely town of Ross… Alex muttered (politely) and I said we hadn’t had the best of times so far, going into the nightmare taxi ride and the experience in Crows Feet. He said “Ah, you ignore her, she’s a stuck up bitch, no-one likes her, we get stories like that all the time”, and told us the best way to get back to Gloucester if we were taking a taxi again. Anyway, at around 5.50pm, we finally, 7 hours 20 minutes later, arrived at Hill House. And fell immediately in love with the place. It was all worth it when we finally arrived and opened the doors to the North Suite; http://www.thehowlinghillhouse.com/index.php?categoryid=15 or if you’d like to see how it now looks, check the facebook photos here; http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/media/set/?set=a.156107117783318.35509.123459007714796 . I’ve not got access to it at work, but there is a photo of me flopped on the bed which was taken pretty much as soon as we got there. My birthday cards from Mum and Dad had been posted directly to Hill House and were laid out ready for me in the room itself.
I had a very long blissful soak in the HUGE bath-tub after grabbing some cds from the eclectic collection. We freshened up and had supper at 7.30pm - home-made nettle soup, home-made dragon chicken, organic local butter, organic local new potatoes, organic local asparagus, organic (not local… Sainsbury’s!) broccoli, and organic local ice-cream (Rhubarb Crumble for Alex, I had Cinder Toffee) for pudding, washed down with English white wine. We grabbed some dvds from the huge collection, a couple of cds, and flopped in the suite for the evening, with the patio doors open to let feline visitors come say ‘hello’, and had a log-fire in the room along with our red wine. Utter bliss.
I woke up on Sunday 12th June (at the ripe old age of 31) to see the sun rising over the mountains, and a rather rain-filled looking sky. Hoping it would clear a bit, I turned over, snuggled into the feather duvet, sinking into the ludicrously comfortable mattress and buried my head in the feather pillows, all grins. An hour or so went past and I reluctantly decided to peek out from the covers. In the window by the bed was a card, obviously from Alex. So I sat up, smiled at him (he needs much less sleep than I do and is often up and reading / gaming / pottering around when I wake up at a weekend), got a smile and happy birthday back, and devoured my card. Not content enough with getting me custom made birthday cup-cakes, he’d organised a custom birthday card too… a three-fold thing so it stands up, with Maleficent (link here if you don’t know who / what she is: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maleficent) on all three sides. I LOVE it, it’s up at the flat beside the figure of Maleficent by the way. And inside, my final birthday present, Lush vouchers. Well, I say final present - final present from Alex! I can honestly say I don’t recall ever being so completely spoiled.
Anyway, we had a very quiet day after the mega breakfast, given the rain. We played Trivial Pursuit, watched a couple of films in the cinema room, then decided to partake in the hot-tub, in the light 7pm rain, drinking English ‘champagne’ (which was utterly delicious) out of metal (so you don’t break them in the hot-tub) goblets. We got dressed again, and headed out to the nearest pub for an evening meal - the nearest pub being The Mill Race (http://www.millrace.info/wb/) (Duncan having phoned ahead and making sure they’d be open, and letting us know about the 10% discount Hill House bods get, he took us down there in the car) which was rather good. Having eaten like kings for the second time that day, we decided to walk it off and head back on foot to Hill House. We made it with little issue, except for the killer hill (soooo steep!) and very light rain and got a ‘well done!’ when we got back. Another night under a very snugly duvet, with films and the promise of a killer breakfast. T’was very yummy (the food too!) and I definitely did not want to leave, and fully intend to go back when we can.
The journey back wasn’t quite as bad as the journey there. We’d a taxi booked for 10.40am, the train left Gloucester at 11.54am, Swindon at 12.59, into Paddington at 14:06, left Kings Cross at 14:53 and into Cambridge again at 15:54 (no time for doughnuts again though sadly). On getting back, we took a detour to The Dev (http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/group.php?gid=483435580216) and a little collapse in the afternoon sunshine before meandering back to the flat.
Then it was back to work for four mega-long days (a normal day is 8.30am - 4.30pm / 7 ½ hours, but Tuesday was 9 hours, Wednesday was 8 ½ hours, Thursday and Friday were 12 hours long each) before my holiday. Which I needed by the end of that lot, especially after working a few hours on Sunday too! But, given what came next, I didn’t mind so much.
Monday 20th June was spent introducing Alex to Mum and Dad (he coped exceptionally well), and going to Bedouin (http://www.bedouin-cambridge.com/ ) via The Earl of Beaconsfield for our evening repast. Very tasty it all was too. None of us slept very well that night, I was too excited, Alex wasn’t feeling great, Dad couldn’t get comfy and poor Mum was on the sofa after we discovered the air bed was busted!
Getting out of bed for the 4.30am start was a major struggle. Ick! But with the promise of Barcelona, I somehow managed. Dad and I headed to the train station and got the 6.21am train to Stansted Airport. We arrived, got bags checked in and hung around for what seemed like hours. The gate opened around 9.10am and we were on and flying at 10.30am with two separate gaggles of loud-mouthed obnoxious ‘first time abroad without parents’ groups of teenagers. They were a total nightmare, but such is the way of things. We hung back and snuck on through the back door of the plane, managing to miss most of their antics. A couple of hours later (three hours due to time differences) we landed in Barcelona, getting off in a wall of heat (28 degrees, but remember, I’m a Goth, I run a little hot anyway and I don’t do heat very well).
We grabbed a taxi to Bonic (http://www.bonic-barcelona.com/en/bed_and_breakfast.php) and flopped out with a beer, then headed up Las Ramblas for a mooch. In fairness, we were both a little travel weary so didn’t ‘do’ much of anything, and I’d have that in mind another time - getting there for the evening is fine but afternoon was rather wasted. Anyway, we got back in, had a little nap, showered, changed and off out for a lovely meal off the tourist trail - the hotel owner had told us the best areas to eat in, and we took his advice with thanks! Lots of gorgeous little tapas bars and restaurants, we finally settled on one and had a few bits, some beer and wine, and back to Las Ramblas for ‘chuff-off’ beers, then back to the hotel for sleeps. Wednesday saw Sagrada Familia and Park Guell on the agenda. We managed to do both. I could go on for ages about them but in honesty, go and see them for yourself, really really do. They were both spectacular. Dad was getting achey and sore so left me to it at the Park Guell and it was great to get some ‘me’ time. We met up in our by then favourite spot on Las Ramblas, had a couple, then off for an afternoon snooze after a detour down the sidestreets in a bid to find a ‘short cut’ back… we got totally lost but found some great little tattoo shops and having magically rediscovered Las Ramblas, went back the way we knew! Whilst Dad was dozing, I got showered and changed, and headed off for a wander around the Gothic quarter, falling utterly in love with the meandering streets and scoffing a huge chocolate ice-cream.
I then took myself off in the direction of the harbour, determined we’d NOT eat on Las Ramblas, and found a boat-restaurant which I knew would appeal to Dad. I carried on around, and had half a San Miguel whilst watching the sun setting over the harbour (after being asked for directions by a Spanish lady who seemed rather bemused that I was a Brit). It was bliss. Heading back to pick up Dad, he seemed surprised we’d been so close to the harbour, and we plumped for the boat restaurant as I hoped. Very nice it was too!
We headed back via a local Rock / Alternative bar called Bollocks (http://www.bollocksbcn.com/), where we met a lovely Aussie couple who live around 20 miles away from where Debi and Tim live. It was rather late before we got to bed!
Thursday there was really just time to get up, packed, eat breakfast and have a quick look at the market which was slowly being set up on Las Ramblas before we got a taxi and headed back to the airport. Much smaller terminal than on the way out, there wasn’t nearly as much to look at but we were both a little zonked from the late night and the heat, truth be told. It took us ages to de- and re-bling ourselves up, it’s a good job the airport crew have a good sense of humour!
We got back to the UK a little later than originally planned (our outgoing flight was delayed), but we were back at the flat by 4pm which all things considered wasn’t bad. Dad had decided on the way over that rather than leave Friday morning for Stratford, we’d get back, do a suit-case transfer, then straight through. Mum had coffee on the go, I chucked a pile of stuff in the washing, left Alex a pressie, and after a sit-down and perk-up, we headed off around 6pm. Chinese take-out for tea when we got there, and an early ish night!
Friday 24th June saw Dad helping to put up some decking, and Mum and me doing tea and supply runs. We were on lunch duty, so headed off to Alcester for a really decent mooch about (I ended up with a full outfit from the various charity shops and spotted a shirt for Alex) first. I love Alcester, it’s such a sweet little town. I spent Friday evening along with Katherine and her buddy, having a much needed catch up.
Saturday saw Dad deciding he’d sit and do little, as he was understandably rather achey, once the finishing off was complete. We went through to Stratford for a few hours (visiting, as ever, The Creaky Cauldron - http://www.seekthemagic.org/online_emporium.html as well as http://www.crystalshop.co.uk/stores/Stratford-upon-Avon-crystal-shop.html, two of my favourite places!). Then it was back and set up for the deck-warming party. This went on until rather late, but I was a wuss and dozed off half way through the evening. I did admittedly get back up again but still, I didn’t stay up for nearly as long as some others did. A good time was had, the fire was lit, and the deck was well and truly warmed.
Sunday involved a quiet day of pottering around the caravan.
I joined Dad on Monday on a trip to get supplies for his fishing, grabbing the shirt for Alex after all (having pondered on it all weekend). We had lunch at the Kings Head (http://www.thekh.co.uk/) with the neighbours, and then I read for most of the afternoon.
Tuesday saw just enough time to get up and breakfasted then off to the station to treck back to Cambridge so I was home in plenty of time for Alex getting in. Which I was!
I spent a few days playing computer games, doing nice food, pootling around shops and doing lots of not huge amounts, grabbing and watching Season 3 of True Blood with Alex in amongst the weekend, and then it was ‘back to normal’.
In theory. I was back to work on Monday 4th July but by Thursday I was feeling rather ill, so had Thursday and Friday off sick.
Alex skipped a large part of Sonisphere (having had a not wonderful time of it one evening) because he wanted to come and look after me. He was there as I woke up on Saturday morning. He made a huge fuss of me, buying me ‘How to Train Your Dragon’ and a gorgeous bunch of white Lillies. Sunday saw an impromptu visit from Fuzzy Dave and I managed to drag myself out for a drink with ‘lex on Sunday evening but Monday I felt utterly awful so had another day off. Last week was a struggle but I managed - coping with a visit to see Allison (akonken) on Thursday for a little while, where I discovered ‘Dead Like Me’. Alex and I had ice-cream on the way home on Friday and popped into the Dev for a pint on the way home but I faded fast, and slept most of this weekend just gone, thanks in no small part to lady-grims. We managed a brief outing on Saturday evening but I couldn’t cope with busy bars or town centres so missed thedinster’s do (looking forward to seeing her on Thursday though) and had a reasonably early night. But we had a lovely dinner last night, and spent yesterday afternoon being creative (him with writing and decluttering his computer, me with fixing jewellery and making plans for new things).
And that brings us totally up to date!
Tonight I’m doing some more jewellery making, Alex is planning on some reading. He’s cooking tomorrow so we’ll see what lovely thing I end up with! We’re on countdown to pay-day so it’s a penny pincher, but Thursday sees me re-starting Film Night with ‘John Hughes’ night (see here if you haven’t heard of film night and want to come; http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/groups/tnfnm?ap=1, the event for John Hughes night is here; http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=253268181356194). I’m broke but have had a super lovely month of doing very nice things with very lovely people. I feel rather spoiled and incredibly loved. Thanks, you lot! :D
Now, speaking of film night, a few announcements.
Firstly, this week, Thursday 21st July, as I’ve mentioned is John Hughes night. This had to be cancelled before I disappeared due to long days at work. Then I was sick and not really up for things when I got back. But it’s on, finally, having been cancelled.
Next week, Thursday 28th July, (http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=210333165680055) is Film Night: Martial Arts Films (the one and only time!!). The title does what it suggests as I am NOT a Martial Arts film fan at all, despite trying a few different types. So, we’ll see…
Thursday 4th August (http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=254012671279598) is Film Night: Gangsters. We’re starting at the MUCH earlier time of 6pm for arrivals, 6.30pm for film start. This is because most Gangster films are… lengthy. If we started as normal, we’d not be able to do two films unless we were all willing to be up until 3am. So do come along earlier and feel free to bring your supper with you!
SPECIAL FILM WEEKEND TO CELEBRATE 1 YEAR AT THE FLAT
Thursday 11th August is Film Night free. We’re giving it a break during the week, but that’s because there is a weekend extravaganza happening on Saturday 13th - Sunday 14th August.
Event is here; http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=162577970480754 and the title is Film Night Special: Weekend Extravaganza LotR Extended Editions. As you might anticipate, we’re showing… the Lord of the Rings extended editions, back to back. It’s been a year since I moved into CotR and what better way to celebrate CotR than with LotR?
The running order will go something like this;
Arrivals from 11am on Saturday 13th August
12 noon - The Fellowship of the Ring (approx. 3 ½ hours)
Break
4.30pm - The Two Towers (approx. 3 ½ hours)
Break
9.30pm - The Return of the King (approx. 4 hours)
Come for part or all of it. As ever, bring self, supplies, friends and if you have them, extended Blu-Ray versions (we have the DVD versions so if no-one has them, no biggie).
Right, that’s my mammoth update finished, you’ll be delighted to hear! I’ll try and keep a bit more up to date next time…