Move videos

Here are two videos that I took on our move day. I only took a few movies that day, and nearly all of them contained my family members in them, so therefore most will not be uploaded. These two, however, are safe, and I am sure they will be pleasant enough:

This one shows a brief part of the landscape on the A14 while going from Cambridgeshire to Northamptonshire.

This video shows the flags at The Fox Inn (along the A14) blowing in the wind.

On guest bloggers

I have created a page regarding guest posting to my blog. I have a few rules laid down on that page, and I will most likely tweak them as time goes by.

Move images

Here are three images from the move. I do have a video or two as well, and I will post them at a later date.

Some landscape near The Fox Inn, taken from inside our car.

The three flags at The Fox Inn. Despite there being more clouds in the sky in this image than the first one, they were both taken on the same day, and only within a few minutes of each other!

This was taken in a town called Kettering. The weather changed a lot throughout the day, hence the rain in this image!

My "Recipes": "Andrew's All Chocolate Sandwich"

This is the second episode of the My "Recipes" series: this one is Andrew’s All Chocolate Sandwich: 

2 Slices of chocolate bread.

1 bottle of chocolate syrup.

1 Chocolate Orange.

How to make it:

Get the chocolate bread and spread as much chocolate syrup as you can on it.

Stick the Chocolate Orange in between. (In pieces)

Eat!

My verdict: this sounds even more sickeningly sweet than the first recipe. Chocolate bread, chocolate syrup, and chocolate oranges (I am referring to Terry’s Chocolate Oranges here) are nice on their own, but I really do not think they would be nice as a sandwich, and I most likely not want any more dessert for a week if I did eat it.

The “spread as much chocolate syrup as you can on it” instruction is unhelpful as well: if anything, I would spread the chocolate as thinly as possible on the bread rather than smear half a bottle of it on each slice. However, I should note that I prefer open sandwiches with no spread at all on them, so I likely would not even put syrup on anyway. My recipe also implies the whole chocolate orange should be used, and eating a whole one of those on their own can make you sick. If one of these sandwiches was ever made, I would recommend eating it in bits rather than all at once.

Skype

In the last couple of months, I have been using Skype. The reason for this is because I have a laptop with a built-in webcam and microphone: while I have owned this laptop for a year, it is only recently I have made use of these features. So far I have mainly been using Skype to talk to my grandmother, one of my uncles, occasionally my Dad, and also my brother when we have wanted to test a couple of things on Skype.

If any regular readers/official followers of my blog use Skype themselves, and would like to chat, please let me know and I will send you my Skype details so you can contact me (I would also prefer it if you are a blogger yourself, then we will both sort of know what to expect from one another). Of course, time zones and schedules (I will still be busy with unpacking and all that for the next week at least) will need to be taken into account when talking on Skype, but other than that, I look forward to talking to you!

Heart Northamptonshire

I blogged over two weeks ago that I listened to Heart Cambridge on my radio, and that I would miss the station when I moved. I am pleased to say that the station I am listening to at the moment is Heart Northamptonshire! (I think it is also known as "Heart Home Counties".) As the time of this writing, Harriet Scott is presenting, and it is good to know that I will not have to miss Heart, the presenters I listened to (thanks, Mr. Beale!), or any or its music now that I am living in Northamptonshire!

The move

Note: this is a long post!

As exhausting as moving day was, it went a lot smoother than I had anticipated. We got up at ~6:00 in the morning to put away the things that could only be packed at the last minute (bedding, the inflatable beds, the kettle, etc.), so that we would be ready for when the removal people came at 7:30. We did have everything ready before then, and were well on time, but when Mum phoned the removal company at 8:30, we did appear to fall behind. Worse yet, the weather looked like it was going to throw down a massive amount of rain.

It turned out that one of the removal guys was sick, and he had to be replaced with someone who was on their day off; plus, they had got stuck in traffic. They finally did arrive at 9:20, and when they came, the three guys surveyed all our belongings to figure out the best way to get them all into the truck. In addition, part of our moving package allowed us to have the moving guys disassemble pieces of furniture if we chose to have them do that, and as such, they had to see what they had to take apart.

Fortunately, with two guys taking the furniture out of the house, and then the garage, and the other guy in the truck fitting everything in, we were soon back on schedule. Even better, the rain only came in a few brief bursts, rather than chuck it down, and the guys were able to use the small showers to take breaks. Despite one of guys also having to disassemble a few pieces of furniture, they got the entire job done in about three hours…a far cry from the estimated 4 ½ hours to complete the task. Once they left to go to Northamptonshire, we did a small amount of cleaning in the house, took a few pictures/movies of the place, say goodbye to our next door neighbor, and then left our (now former) home in Littleport, Cambridgeshire.

We stopped off in Ely briefly to hand back the keys to our old place. While my brother and I were waiting in the parking lot, I spotted both an American flag and an English flag on top of a building! (I am not referring to the flag of the United Kingdom here, but rather, the flag of England itself.) I have never seen these two flags together before, and so I took a few pictures of them. We then left Ely and took the A14 to go to Northamptonshire.

On the way to Northamptonshire, we stopped off at a pub on the way called The Fox Inn to have lunch. At this pub I had a burger, and I have to say that it was the best burger I have ever had. In fact, it was so nice I shared a little bit of with my family (except for Mum, who was already having a burger) so they could try it too (if I think something is really tasty, rather than have it all to myself I prefer to share a little bit of it so others can see how good it is too). Outside the pub, three flags were being flown: the pub’s personal flag, the UK flag, and the US flag!

Our next stop was the agents’ place to pick up the keys for our new home, and once we had done that, we went to our new home in Northamptonshire. The removal guys were waiting for us there, but they had not been waiting long, and besides, our scheduled time to arrive at the place was about 5:00, and we were there before that time. It took an hour to unload the truck (my brother and I helped with this) and for one of the guys to re-assemble the furniture he had taken apart back in Littleport. They left once they were done.

As for the evening, Mum, Dad, and my brother went out to buy some sandwiches for dinner while I stayed to sort a few things out in my new room (I have my own room again now, for the first time in over a year!). After dinner, we got a load of unpacking done, despite the long day, and Dad even got the internet up and running (hence the brief post from yesterday). Not surprisingly, the house is a mess, and it will take time to sort it all out, but we are getting it done. I am glad we are living in a bigger house now, and there are more people around here. At least this was also a short move in camparison to moving halfway around the world last year!

Finally, I do have a few pictures and movies of the trip to Northamptonshire. When the equipment to transfer pictures from my camera to my computer is unpacked, I shall upload them!

Back quicker than expected

That was certainly an exhausting day! I will blog about the move later, but for now I just want to say that I am back, and quicker than expected. We carried our modem with us in the car, and since internet is available at our new house, I can log on! More to come once I have slept and there is some time available from all the unpacking we now have to do. In the meantime, I am off to bed!

Here comes the move

The move is taking place tomorrow, and I have limited time to blog about anything with all the last-minute packing we have to do today. I will be taking a brief break from blogging, as I will not have any time to post anything for a few days or so due to the move (plus I probably will not have any internet access for a couple of days at first too), but I promise that I will be back soon though!

Now, we are off to Northamptonshire! Thanks everyone, and see you all soon!

Fireworks! (again)

As promised, here is a video of the Fourth of July fireworks. Unfortunately, I could not see the fireworks very easily from my window, but they could clearly be heard (I was also in a hurry trying to find my camera to record what was going on). As such, the video is mainly sound rather than effects, but some small flashes of light can be seen.

It may not seem like much, but I am pleased that I did get to hear fireworks and see a little bit of them!

Fireworks!

Well this was unexpected: in my last post I mentioned about a lack of fireworks, and just now from my bedroom window I listened to and watched a small Fourth of July fireworks display! I do not have any time at the moment to post a video of it, but tomorrow I will get one up. This is both exciting and a nice surprise!

Independence Day

I would like to wish a happy Fourth of July to my American friends and followers, as well as to anyone else happy to join in! Yes, I still do celebrate the Fourth of July, regardless of the change in country, as it was something we celebrated for so long. Of course, today has not been that exciting here, as it is only days to our next move, but there has still been time to celebrate. Sadly, I do not have any fireworks, but coincidentally, "Firework" by Katy Perry has been playing on my radio while I have been typing this up, so that is something then!

Happy Independence Day everyone!

Ouse riverbank

Another walk today, this time all of us going out. We took a walk down the riverbank by the Ouse, and followed it quite a way down before we turned around and headed back home. I took a load more pictures, including the following. I hope you like them!

The above is a picture of the part of the Ouse near where we live.

Ely Cathedral, taken from far away with my camera on maximum zoom.

There you go trolls, trolling the Ouse is banned: you could get a fine!

Finally, the Littleport sign itself!

Wheat fields

I went out for a walk this afternoon, as it was a very beautiful day and it was a good idea to get a last walk in before we move. When going down the road we normally like to walk on, the nearby fields were filled with wheat, and I took a large amount of pictures. Here is one that I took:

As I said, a beautiful day. Seeing the wheat fields in bloom added to that.

Local cats (again)

The ginger and black cat with the ginger pattern on her eye that I blogged about yesterday outdid herself today: while we were in the living room sorting a few things out, Mum heard something from the kitchen, and when she looked over she spotted the cat coming in through the open window! My brother and I merely watched the cat as she noticed that we were looking at her, and after looking at us for a few seconds, she slowly turned herself around and went back out of the window.

That was not the last of it though: I went to the kitchen window to watch her walk slowly away, but then, another cat jumped up onto the window ledge and attempted to come in, this cat being black with white feet. It took two seconds for this one to notice that I was there, and it jumped back down almost immediately after that.

Both of these occasions were times when I wished I had one of my cameras on hand!