5 to go...

Only 5 more post to 300.

Anyway, last week/end was interesting. My car broke down. Disturbingly, it was the brakes that failed, and the only reason I didn't hit anything was that I was in a traffic jam at the time. Luckily they did fail where they did, and I managed to limp round the corner and into a driveway at very slow speed. The RAC were kind enough to tow me home, so I need to upgrade my membership level as a thank you. It was hinted at that that would be very nice, and I like to pick up on these hints when I can.

So as it's not going anywhere, the mobile mechanic is coming out tomorrow to fix the brakes and also get an MOT done. An MOT (for those back home) is where they check it every year to make sure it's still road worthy. Apart from the brakes, I know it will fail on the fact that one of my parking lights doesn't work. Everything else seems to be fine, so that should be it. Besides, if it does fail miserably it didn't cost me much and I know a guy selling his car in the next couple of months so if it is riddled with termites I can downgrade to an old Fiesta. Exciting times....

Anyway, last weekend was a stag doo. As it was during the day calling it a bucks night seems wrong. We went white water rafting in north Wales, and I have to say that I think I spent more time out of the raft then in. This part of the Welsh river (I have no idea of it's name, but I can pronounce Llangollen in Welsh now (ghan-gok-lin), or at least close enough that people know what I'm trying to say. Great fun, apart from the time I got dumped out and came up underneath the raft. After a very brief panic, I'm glad to say I decided to go back down and come up again further down river, which worked. If it hadn't, then there was going to be a more extensive panic, followed by learning for just how long I can hold my breath. I'm glad I still haven't been forced to find that piece of information out. Great fun, and it was the best weather in weeks so it was actually warm enough in the water to get by. The wetsuit obviously helped, but for once I wasn't actually cold.

The rest of that night is a bit of a drunken haze, but I have a much better understanding of just exactly what a large bunch of bored teenagers in small country towns get up to. That's all I'm going to say about that.

So as a result of my car being off the road, I haven't been able to get out of the house this week. Which has resulted in me being slightly bored, but also more productive on the German learning front. When I say more productive, I mean I've started again. I've decided I need to look at it as real study, and actually sit down and spend a couple of hours a week on it. Otherwise it just won't get done. Now that I have done an entire lesson and concentrated on it, I feel like it's coming to me again. But I have had several weeks off, so you never know. I did manage to watch the entire extended series of Lord of the Rings, so it wasn't a complete waste :)

Work is good, I'm forcing myself to be productive there as well. I'm eating healthy (for me) so I'm trying to be a better person. I would just like to point out though that on the 4th day of Spring I could already see my breath in the air. And that I'm thinking about getting the thermals out. Hopefully it's just a passing cold snap (ha!), and the fact England only had 56 hours of sunshine during August was an aberration. I fear not though, and I look forward to the symptoms of SAD with great enthusiasm. Bring on December when I go home for 6 weeks I say! Before that Rome of course, and as soon as I've paid for my car I will buy my tickets there and back.

As for Fathers day, I've lost track of time. Somewhere in my room is my present, which obviously won't make it on time. So I now need to investigate alternatives, as if I can sort something out I can make that the present for his Birthday and get something else for Father's day. Unlikely, so I better have a look before heading to work tomorrow.

That's a pretty long update...I guess it might have something to do with the fact I'm in bed and the laptop is working as a hot water bottle (or in this case, hot plastic box) making me not want to switch it off.

Photos from various places are up, on both Flickr and Facebook. I'm not too sure about this Flickr, they want me to upgrade to a Pro account to see my early photos, and as I'm anti-imperialist I refuse to give money to Flickr. It may not be anti-imperialism as much as just not wanting to pay and dressing it up as a big word (which deserves a word of its own if it doesn't already have one). Much more likely, I've never really got out of the idea that everything on the Internet should be free.

That's all for tonight I think, time for some sleep. Hope you all have a good weekend, all 3 readers :)