No, not the comfy chair!

Oy vey. So, we've been looking at places to live. Just had our second weekend of looking at houses. Avoid anything that is "cute", "quirky", "good condition", "cozy", "can be expanded", etc... Utter and total crap. Very expensive utter and total crap. The funny thing is, the places we have been looking at are all quite small - around 1100 ft2, and obviously designed as the "affordable housing" of 100 years ago. Not affordable anymore! I suppose there is a small part of me that is vaguely curious to go into other people's houses and see how they live, but mostly, I find the whole process depressing - it's amazing how a tiny little shithole nothing of a place can be made to look magnificent through the power of a fisheye lens. But, we knew this was going to happen - London is just about the most expensive city in the world. Blah.

Not a lot else really - I didn't manage a bike ride this weekend, as there was no time, and my bike had yet another problem. Once I get that fixed, the front derailleur, the handlebars, and the pedal cranks will be the only original parts left on the bike. Frankenbike. I did go for a very nice bike ride last weekend though (pics below). And we went to Avi's garden party today - 50 or so people - about 1/2 gay. Funny thing is, quite a number of them are in a gay motorcycle club, so, of course, they were all there in their leathers. What a bunch of queens! David and I chatted with this one guy (who seemed to have a bit of a thing for me (blush!)). Anyway, he was trying very hard to give off as butch of an image as possible, but they he started talking about his bike, and how his gear has to match his bike - even his earplugs match the colour of his bike. Oh dear.

Back to work tomorrow - yuck. Still no hint of another job - stupid crappy economy! And Tuesday is the new national budget, so if things are looking bad now, I don't think they are going to look any better after that. Sigh.

A valley in Kent, just on the southeastern outskirts of London...



Now here's something you don't see very often... The funny thing here about flags is they only tend to appear around sporting events (such as the World Cup) - for the most part, people don't give a ratcrap about the flag, or American-style patriotism, but get a sports event involved, and the flags appear everywhere and people suddenly get very nationalistic. Not sure if that's better or worse - but, they do say that sports are ritualised warfare, so maybe it's one and the same... Hmm. So, with this jerry-rigged flagpole, one might assume that it related to their choice of teams, but as the American flag was flying on top - you just never know.



The view from the North Downs - I would have gotten a slightly bigger view, but there was a couple dry-humping on the other side of the trees, so I thought that might have spoiled my view a bit... Blech.



Hydroponic strawberries. Never seen hydroponic strawberries before...



Wheat fields of Kent... They do grow a lot of wheat these parts...



You just can't make up some of these names...



Bike plus phone box... Is it art, or kitsch? Not sure.




You just can't complain about roads like this - perfect cycling road...



The slightly depressing thing about this ride was that I took the entire afternoon to cycle the 70 miles out to Ashford, and then the shiny new, 140mph train gets be back to town in 38 minutes. Maybe I should cycle faster? Hmm.

Flibble...

Well, I had a lovely walk today, pushing along my bike, which I just spent £500 fixing up. The cable to the rear derailleur slipped a little bit, then went 'dink!' in, of course, one of the less salubrious parts of East London. For want of a screw... Anyway, the bike is locked up inside London Bridge Stations (next to the bike store, which had better fix the problem for free) and I took the train the rest of the way home.

And breathe...

Mildly stressful thing - our landlady just announced she is going to sell, which means we have to find a new place to live, after three years here. Well that's a fun thing to do this summer! David has decided that it is the time to buy, which means, since I'm the one that knows London, that I'm going to find us a place to live. No stress...

(Where did I put the bubble wrap? MUST SQUISH BUBBLE WRAP!)

I had my job appraisal today. You've not lived until you've had a local government job appraisal. First you get to fill out a 10 page form, where you discuss all your targets, learning goals, etc (many short essays), and then you have a 2.5 hour meeting with your manager to discuss the same. Wee fun! Still though, for whatever reason my manager seems to like me. Suppose it's b/c 'im just such a cutie wootie! ;-)

Some random pics:

A rather precarious chair on a debris pile in Hackney:



This is the kind of fun and excitement we have on a Friday night 'round here. This is David and Robin on the way home from the supermarket. (We're not Dutch enough to actually cycle home with the heavy bags hanging from the handlebars - we just push the bikes).



And isn't this just always the way? ;-) Saw this sign on my bike ride last weekend. It did occur to me as I cycled around on the little dinky 1-lane backroads of rural Essex that, in fact, the fact that the English took down all the direction signs at these intersections to fool the Germans (who would never know the way to such places as Upper Dicker or Cockfosters) must have been terribly confusing for the locals as well!



Here is the trusty steed (before the gear cable incident!)



Here's a thunderstorm picking up steam. A hedge and a wall proved decent shelter from the rain!




One shudders to think...



A wheat field in Essex. Essex has a bad name, given that the towns are full of chavs but the countryside is actually quite pretty - almost Midwestern feeling.



This is the huge metropolis of Coggeshall.



Ooh, is it Kansas, or is it England? (Hint, the wheat grows on the left... ;-)



You can just about see the Olympic stadium in the distance. This is taken from the 23rd floor of the Olympic Delivery Authority, where I went to a very boring meeting in a room with very big windows. Not suprisingly, I spent a lot of time looking out the window.




And finally, what does this package say about the general intelligence level of people who eat Tesco Organic Porridge? Hmmm...