Monday, April 11, 2005
Sunday, April 10, 2005
UK Trip (March ?? - April 10)
Well, it's been a very long time since I've had a full post. I guess it's actually been almost a month! I've posted a few pictures to the blog from a trip to Holy Island and a trip to London, but never really wrote about everything that went on in between.
So... let's see... my last post had me returning from Colorado to the land of roundabouts and drunks singing in the street. I've managed to master the art of negotiating a round about without getting killed. I don't think I've had any near misses recently! The week I returned was when I first got the car (March 10). That following weekend (March 12) Sara, Gina, and I drove to Holy Island. The island is only accessible at low tide since the road is under water during high tide. We left Newcastle at around 8:30a and arrived at the island just about 10:00. We walked in the incredibly strong winds to the castle and took a tour. Afterwards, we walked out to the North Sea and took some pictures. Sara and Gina were nearly blown away by the wind and just about froze to death. We had lunch at the local pub around noon and then headed back towards Alnwick (pronounced Onic). There is a castle there but it was closed... the royals were living there for the winter so there weren't any tours and you really couldn't get close to the place. We spent some time at the bookstore in town and then drove out to the east to see if there was anything of much interest. It turned out that there was a nice little church and another castle to see. We started back towards Newcastle around 3:30. Gina and Sara were snoozing by the time we reached the highway. I told them they wouldn't last 1 day with Athena on vacation... "It's only 4:00?!?! We still have 8 hours left in the day!!" :) You can see a picture of the Priory at Holy Island in a previous post.
On the 13th, Sara and I drove down into Gateshead and took some pictures of the Angel of the North. It's a large "sculpture" that can be seen from the highway. It's wing span is the same as a Boeing 767.
Angel of the North
The week of the 14th was rather uneventful. I spent the following weekend in Newcastle. The week of the 21st was filled with back-to-back-to-back meetings. On Thursday, I flew back to DC for a surprise visit. Laurie picked me up at the airport. I arrived back at my parents at about 8:00p. I knocked on the door and heard my dad mumble something about who was at the door. The look on his face when he opened the door was worth the trip! Then to surprise my mom in the kitchen made it doubly worth while. The weekend was very busy, but definitely worth every minute spent on the plane back and forth. I managed to see a number of relatives (Grandma, Kara, Wes), have some really good meals, and get a small amount of actual work done. All-in-all, it was a great trip.
I returned from DC on the 28th (which is a holiday in the UK). Also, the 27th was the start of daylight savings time here in the UK. That threw a few people off for a few days since the UK was now 9 hours ahead of the west coast. Anyway, the week of the 28th was pretty short since a lot of people were on vacation and we had an all-hands meeting in London on Friday, April 1. Gina, Kate, Sara, and I flew down to London Friday morning and went directly to the office. We worked for a few hours and then attended the meeting and social hour afterwards. We all checked into the hotel and then went our separate ways. Kate went to have dinner with a friend while Sara met up with her friend from Germany. Gina and I ended up walking around London for about 5 1/2 hours. We probably walked over 5 miles!! and in uncomfortable shoes no less!! Below is a picture of Piccadilly circus. It was very crowded and noisy. During the day, there is a lot going on with performers and people milling around.
Picadilly Circus
The next day Gina, Kate and I set off to walk some more. We walked down to the London Eye (which is where the Big Ben pictures are from). Below is a picture (it's roughly 400 feet tall). It was $25 to take a ride on the eye so we all decided to go. It took about 25-30 minutes to get through the line, then the ride itself was about 35 minutes. I had talked to Athena's brother (Pete) at about noon and said that we'd meet at Big Ben around 1:00p. We were done at the Eye by 12:30 so we walked up to Big Ben and then up parliament st. We met up with Pete and his friend Brian around 1:00p and had lunch at a little pub nearby. The food was bad, the service was worse, and the prices were high. Other than that, the place was fine. After our "meal", we walked up to Buckingham Palace and took some pictures. We'd wanted to go to Westminster Abby, but it closed at 1:45p that day... we got there at 1:50p. After the Palace, we walked through Green Park and then up to some of the shops. Pete and Brian left to do other things at this point. Kate, Gina and I walked around to some shops... Kate then decided to try on every outfit at the Gap. Gina and I retreated next door to have a beverage and relax our feet... by this point she and I had probably walked 10 miles or more in 2 days.... and in uncomfortable shoes!! Gina and I flew back to Newcastle Saturday evening.
London Eye
On Sunday, April 3rd, I invited Gina, Kate, Sara, and Sandeep (another US Booz Allen employee that I just found out was here), over for dinner. We started the meal with cheese and crackers and then had a luxurious dinner of grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup. Afterwards, we watched Eddie Izzard: Dressed to Kill. It was a fun evening of dairy products and British humor!
Last week was a slower week than normal... We had a going away party for one of the London based staff on Tuesday. He's been working on this project for over a year and is leaving the company to go work for another consulting firm. He's been very helpful since I've been here and we'll definitely miss him.
On Wednesday I had to go to a meeting in Lytham... it was a 3 hour drive from Newcastle. We met at 6:30a to drive down... yuck!! It was made even more difficult by the fact that I had been at the going away party until after 11:00p the night before!! We got to Lytham around 10:00a. Art and I then had to kill three hours until our meeting at 1:00p. We went down early because we rode with two other people that were going to a different meeting at the same location. Originally our meetings were supposed to be at the same time, but one of them got moved at the last minute. So, after a 3 hr drive, and 3 hrs of waiting, we attended a 3 hour meeting. It was not the most productive meeting I've ever been to... it was very difficult to maintain interest and pretend to be awake! We finished the meeting and then got back in the car for the 3 hour drive back.
The weather forecast for this weekend was for snow and cold, so everyone decided to just hang out in Newcastle. I ended up going shopping at Costco (yes, they have them here in the UK!) I was then invited to join the "girls night out". Gina, Kate, and Sara were planning to get together for drinks. The drink of the evening for them was the Cosmopolitan. I drank about 12 glasses of water. By 1:00a Sara and Kate had finished 5 cosmos. Sara was unable to form complete sentences... Kate seemed as if she were ready to have 5 more. Gina called it quits after 2 1/2 cosmos and was just hanging out surveying the room and bothering strange men. Today we were all supposed to get together for an early dinner at Gina's at 2:30p. Sara and I had planned to get together in the morning for some tea and possibly go to the gym. At about 11:00 she called and said that she didn't think she could even get out of bed. Every time she stood up she felt horrible. By 2:00p, she was still miserable and decided that she would accept the title of "The Queen of Bad Ideas." She decided that 5 cosmos was probably too many. Somehow she pulled herself together and we made it down to Gina's at about 2:45. Kate, on the other hand, had gotten up at a reasonable time, gone to mass, and then gone to the gym. She was feeling just fine. We've decided it's because Sara is an amateur and Kate is a professional. :-)
Anyway, it's been a nice day here in Newcastle for a change. It's actually been reasonable sunny and warm. We'll see if this lasts more than 1 day though.
Athena now has her tickets booked to come out!! She'll be arriving here on April 21. We'll go to Edinburgh on the 23rd for a couple of days, then come back to Newcastle for a few days. We'll be in London for a long weekend before she heads back to the desert on May 2nd.
Hope all is well in your parts of the world!!
Steve
So... let's see... my last post had me returning from Colorado to the land of roundabouts and drunks singing in the street. I've managed to master the art of negotiating a round about without getting killed. I don't think I've had any near misses recently! The week I returned was when I first got the car (March 10). That following weekend (March 12) Sara, Gina, and I drove to Holy Island. The island is only accessible at low tide since the road is under water during high tide. We left Newcastle at around 8:30a and arrived at the island just about 10:00. We walked in the incredibly strong winds to the castle and took a tour. Afterwards, we walked out to the North Sea and took some pictures. Sara and Gina were nearly blown away by the wind and just about froze to death. We had lunch at the local pub around noon and then headed back towards Alnwick (pronounced Onic). There is a castle there but it was closed... the royals were living there for the winter so there weren't any tours and you really couldn't get close to the place. We spent some time at the bookstore in town and then drove out to the east to see if there was anything of much interest. It turned out that there was a nice little church and another castle to see. We started back towards Newcastle around 3:30. Gina and Sara were snoozing by the time we reached the highway. I told them they wouldn't last 1 day with Athena on vacation... "It's only 4:00?!?! We still have 8 hours left in the day!!" :) You can see a picture of the Priory at Holy Island in a previous post.
On the 13th, Sara and I drove down into Gateshead and took some pictures of the Angel of the North. It's a large "sculpture" that can be seen from the highway. It's wing span is the same as a Boeing 767.
Angel of the North
The week of the 14th was rather uneventful. I spent the following weekend in Newcastle. The week of the 21st was filled with back-to-back-to-back meetings. On Thursday, I flew back to DC for a surprise visit. Laurie picked me up at the airport. I arrived back at my parents at about 8:00p. I knocked on the door and heard my dad mumble something about who was at the door. The look on his face when he opened the door was worth the trip! Then to surprise my mom in the kitchen made it doubly worth while. The weekend was very busy, but definitely worth every minute spent on the plane back and forth. I managed to see a number of relatives (Grandma, Kara, Wes), have some really good meals, and get a small amount of actual work done. All-in-all, it was a great trip.
I returned from DC on the 28th (which is a holiday in the UK). Also, the 27th was the start of daylight savings time here in the UK. That threw a few people off for a few days since the UK was now 9 hours ahead of the west coast. Anyway, the week of the 28th was pretty short since a lot of people were on vacation and we had an all-hands meeting in London on Friday, April 1. Gina, Kate, Sara, and I flew down to London Friday morning and went directly to the office. We worked for a few hours and then attended the meeting and social hour afterwards. We all checked into the hotel and then went our separate ways. Kate went to have dinner with a friend while Sara met up with her friend from Germany. Gina and I ended up walking around London for about 5 1/2 hours. We probably walked over 5 miles!! and in uncomfortable shoes no less!! Below is a picture of Piccadilly circus. It was very crowded and noisy. During the day, there is a lot going on with performers and people milling around.
Picadilly Circus
The next day Gina, Kate and I set off to walk some more. We walked down to the London Eye (which is where the Big Ben pictures are from). Below is a picture (it's roughly 400 feet tall). It was $25 to take a ride on the eye so we all decided to go. It took about 25-30 minutes to get through the line, then the ride itself was about 35 minutes. I had talked to Athena's brother (Pete) at about noon and said that we'd meet at Big Ben around 1:00p. We were done at the Eye by 12:30 so we walked up to Big Ben and then up parliament st. We met up with Pete and his friend Brian around 1:00p and had lunch at a little pub nearby. The food was bad, the service was worse, and the prices were high. Other than that, the place was fine. After our "meal", we walked up to Buckingham Palace and took some pictures. We'd wanted to go to Westminster Abby, but it closed at 1:45p that day... we got there at 1:50p. After the Palace, we walked through Green Park and then up to some of the shops. Pete and Brian left to do other things at this point. Kate, Gina and I walked around to some shops... Kate then decided to try on every outfit at the Gap. Gina and I retreated next door to have a beverage and relax our feet... by this point she and I had probably walked 10 miles or more in 2 days.... and in uncomfortable shoes!! Gina and I flew back to Newcastle Saturday evening.
London Eye
On Sunday, April 3rd, I invited Gina, Kate, Sara, and Sandeep (another US Booz Allen employee that I just found out was here), over for dinner. We started the meal with cheese and crackers and then had a luxurious dinner of grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup. Afterwards, we watched Eddie Izzard: Dressed to Kill. It was a fun evening of dairy products and British humor!
Last week was a slower week than normal... We had a going away party for one of the London based staff on Tuesday. He's been working on this project for over a year and is leaving the company to go work for another consulting firm. He's been very helpful since I've been here and we'll definitely miss him.
On Wednesday I had to go to a meeting in Lytham... it was a 3 hour drive from Newcastle. We met at 6:30a to drive down... yuck!! It was made even more difficult by the fact that I had been at the going away party until after 11:00p the night before!! We got to Lytham around 10:00a. Art and I then had to kill three hours until our meeting at 1:00p. We went down early because we rode with two other people that were going to a different meeting at the same location. Originally our meetings were supposed to be at the same time, but one of them got moved at the last minute. So, after a 3 hr drive, and 3 hrs of waiting, we attended a 3 hour meeting. It was not the most productive meeting I've ever been to... it was very difficult to maintain interest and pretend to be awake! We finished the meeting and then got back in the car for the 3 hour drive back.
The weather forecast for this weekend was for snow and cold, so everyone decided to just hang out in Newcastle. I ended up going shopping at Costco (yes, they have them here in the UK!) I was then invited to join the "girls night out". Gina, Kate, and Sara were planning to get together for drinks. The drink of the evening for them was the Cosmopolitan. I drank about 12 glasses of water. By 1:00a Sara and Kate had finished 5 cosmos. Sara was unable to form complete sentences... Kate seemed as if she were ready to have 5 more. Gina called it quits after 2 1/2 cosmos and was just hanging out surveying the room and bothering strange men. Today we were all supposed to get together for an early dinner at Gina's at 2:30p. Sara and I had planned to get together in the morning for some tea and possibly go to the gym. At about 11:00 she called and said that she didn't think she could even get out of bed. Every time she stood up she felt horrible. By 2:00p, she was still miserable and decided that she would accept the title of "The Queen of Bad Ideas." She decided that 5 cosmos was probably too many. Somehow she pulled herself together and we made it down to Gina's at about 2:45. Kate, on the other hand, had gotten up at a reasonable time, gone to mass, and then gone to the gym. She was feeling just fine. We've decided it's because Sara is an amateur and Kate is a professional. :-)
Anyway, it's been a nice day here in Newcastle for a change. It's actually been reasonable sunny and warm. We'll see if this lasts more than 1 day though.
Athena now has her tickets booked to come out!! She'll be arriving here on April 21. We'll go to Edinburgh on the 23rd for a couple of days, then come back to Newcastle for a few days. We'll be in London for a long weekend before she heads back to the desert on May 2nd.
Hope all is well in your parts of the world!!
Steve
Sunday, April 03, 2005
Friday, April 01, 2005
Happy Easter...
A couple of days late :)
I made a surprise visit to DC over this past weekend. I flew in Thursday night. Laurie picked me up at the airport. I knocked on my parents door at about 8:00p. Needless to say, they were very surprised and happy to see me. Over the weekend I visited with Grandma and saw Kara and John for a few minutes when they stopped by. It was a good weekend although too short.
I flew back Sunday night, arrived in Newcastle Monday morning. Since Monday was still a holiday, I relaxed for the day and then headed back to work on Tuesday.
UK Fact: Daylight savings time starts a week early here. So for a few days, we are even further ahead (+9 from west coast!)
I flew down to London this morning to attend a meeting and will hang out in town this evening. I'm planning to meet Pete (Athena's brother) for lunch tomorrow afternoon. Since I missed him in DC, it'll be good to catch up.
Well, that's all for now. I will post more later with some additional pictures.
One last note... I finally have high speed Internet at the apartment!! No more dial-up at home!
Later!
Steve
I made a surprise visit to DC over this past weekend. I flew in Thursday night. Laurie picked me up at the airport. I knocked on my parents door at about 8:00p. Needless to say, they were very surprised and happy to see me. Over the weekend I visited with Grandma and saw Kara and John for a few minutes when they stopped by. It was a good weekend although too short.
I flew back Sunday night, arrived in Newcastle Monday morning. Since Monday was still a holiday, I relaxed for the day and then headed back to work on Tuesday.
UK Fact: Daylight savings time starts a week early here. So for a few days, we are even further ahead (+9 from west coast!)
I flew down to London this morning to attend a meeting and will hang out in town this evening. I'm planning to meet Pete (Athena's brother) for lunch tomorrow afternoon. Since I missed him in DC, it'll be good to catch up.
Well, that's all for now. I will post more later with some additional pictures.
One last note... I finally have high speed Internet at the apartment!! No more dial-up at home!
Later!
Steve
Tuesday, March 15, 2005
Trip to Holy Island (12 Mar 05)
Gina, Sara, and I drove up even further North in England to visit Holy Island. It is only accessible during low tide... at high tide, the ocean covers the road. It's a very neat place. The picture below is the Priory located on the island. It was destroyed by Henry VIII so that he could kill his wife and marry another... he did this a few times. Eddie Izzard talks about his crazy ways...
Picture of the Priory at Holy Island.
Picture of the Priory at Holy Island.
Thursday, March 10, 2005
UK Weeks 3 and 4 (21 Feb-09 Mar)
I finally installed some photo blogging tools... Picasa and Hello. This means that photos will start appearing in blogs again... although the process is somewhat manual...
Frequency of blog posts is inversely proportional to how busy I am...
My last post had me in Cardiff getting ready to head back to Newcastle (Feb 22). I flew back on the UK version of Airtrans... known as Air Wales... or as the locals in Newcastle pronounce it "Air Wheels". My team decided that we should meet in the lobby of the Hilton at 0615 to catch a cab to the airport... our flight was at 750a. It took us 20 minutes to get the airport, then about 10 minutes to check in. We sat down for some breakfast at about 645a and watched the flight status board tell us that our flight was delayed for the next 3 hours. We finally left at about 1000a. We arrived back in Newcastle after 1100a and were back to work by noon. The rest of the week was filled with meetings and other "exciting" work events.
The weekend of Feb 26 and 27 was uneventful. We had a new person join our team here. Gina Turner... not Tina... flew in from California. She's been living in the desert (near Fort Irwin) for the past 18 years and has been working at NASA. She reports to the same boss as me in San Francisco. She's joined us here to help sort out some of the ongoing project and technical issues that continuously surface. Anyway, Gina arrived on the 26th. I was charged with picking her up from the airport and was given the keys to the company sports car... a 1.6L Ford Focus... it's a right hand drive, 5-speed manual... which means shifting with your left hand... more difficult than it sounds. I managed to make it to the airport and back without any major incidents. I handed the keys back to Art the next day and decided that I could live without a car for a bit.
On Tuesday 01 March, our team traveled by train to Scotland for another round of site visits. Our luck with delays continued... our train was delayed by about 30 minutes... when a train showed up, we got on. We learned a few minutes after it departed that it was the wrong train. Our train was actually the next one on the same track. Fortunately, it was easy to fix the situation... we jumped off in Edinburough, Scotland and got on the correct train. We arrived around 9:00 to Dundee. Since we weren't sure where the hotel was, we got in a cab. It took us across the street from the station and dropped us at the Hilton... total fare £3. After checking in (which only took 5 minutes for all of us), we met in the bar to chat... Art ordered a shot of whiskey to sip. The glass they gave him was a standard 6 oz glass with about 4 oz of whiskey... that's the biggest "shot" we'd ever seen! It took him about 2 hours to sip his way through it. Afterwards, he retired to the McDonald suite. The rooms were nicer in Scotland than Swansea, but Art got the giant suite on the top floor. He had a walk-in closet, living room, huge bedroom, and a giant marble covered bathroom... the rest of us had the standard rooms (although I had a bottle of wine, a bottle of Scottish orange marmalade, some truffles, and a few other snacks in mine that nobody else did). I guess they decided to give me some goodies instead of the upgraded room.
We conducted our site visit on the 2nd, then got back on the train for Newcastle. This time we got on the correct train and got back as expected. I spent the evening packing up and getting ready for my trip home. At about 2:30a I was awaken by people making a ton of noise outside. Turns out it was snowing quite a bit. By morning it was pretty messy. My cab was 20 minutes late picking me up... I was starting to get concerned and was about to walk over and jump on the Metro to the airport when the cab finally arrived. I made it to the airport with plenty of time since I wasn't checking any bags. The flight to London was uneventful, as expected. I spent a little time in Heathrow checking e-mail and doing a little shopping. I think it was about a mile from where I came in (Terminal 1) to where my flight left out of (Terminal 4).
I arrived back in Denver around 3:30p on Thursday the 3rd. Russ picked me up and we went directly to ESPNZone where we both had steaks. We stopped into Costco on the way home and picked up a few things, then headed back to the house. I took a short nap until about 2:30a when I had to get up to drive to Co Springs airport to pick up Athena.
I spent a few hours in the office on Friday then we all took off for one of the things I'd been missing while in the UK... Mexican food. There were 3 main food items that I couldn't get here... steak, root beer, and Mexican food. I suppose I could add Chinese food since I have not had any that was any good yet. On Saturday, Athena and I went to the Booz Allen holiday party... Co Springs has their party in the spring because the landlord of the building throws a big party for all of the tenants around the holidays. So, we had a casino night party. Athena and I had a great time. We got to see a bunch of my co-workers that I barely know... I was only there for a total of about 6 weeks since I moved. On Sunday, D. Acton came down to visit. We drove around Co Springs and saw some of the local sights. We tried to go to Seven Falls but were told that it was 75% frozen and that none of the hiking trails were open... it also cost $8.25 per person... we decided that it wasn't worth it.
Monday we finished up our taxes... ouch! Russ and I dropped Athena off at the airport Monday evening, then went to Red Robin for dinner. On Tuesday, Russ drove me to the airport and I hopped back on a plane for the UK. I arrived back into Newcastle at about 2:00p local time.
Today, it was back to work as usual... I decided that I needed to get a car so that I could do some sight seeing this weekend, so I called up and ordered one. They (Budget) dropped the car off at the office at 3:00p. I came home and cooked my first full meal here at the apartment... pasta with tomato sauce and bread. Very exciting :-)
The latest and greatest counts and such:
Well, that about wraps everything up. Several people have asked for pictures of my apartment... I have attached 2 of the living room and 1 of the kitchen. These rooms are on the first floor along with a small dining room (behind the red walls on the right side in the living room), the foyer, and a powder room. The "laundry" is under the cabinet in the kitchen. The spiral staircase leads upstairs to the 3 bedrooms and the 2 bathrooms... sorry no pictures. I'm still waiting for the phone line in the master bedroom to be hooked up so I can use my computer up at my desk.... another "delay".
I hope all is well in your parts of the world! If anyone wants to visit the UK, just let me know! I have plenty of room for guests!!
Steve
New Living Room 1
New Living Room 2
New Kitchen
Frequency of blog posts is inversely proportional to how busy I am...
My last post had me in Cardiff getting ready to head back to Newcastle (Feb 22). I flew back on the UK version of Airtrans... known as Air Wales... or as the locals in Newcastle pronounce it "Air Wheels". My team decided that we should meet in the lobby of the Hilton at 0615 to catch a cab to the airport... our flight was at 750a. It took us 20 minutes to get the airport, then about 10 minutes to check in. We sat down for some breakfast at about 645a and watched the flight status board tell us that our flight was delayed for the next 3 hours. We finally left at about 1000a. We arrived back in Newcastle after 1100a and were back to work by noon. The rest of the week was filled with meetings and other "exciting" work events.
The weekend of Feb 26 and 27 was uneventful. We had a new person join our team here. Gina Turner... not Tina... flew in from California. She's been living in the desert (near Fort Irwin) for the past 18 years and has been working at NASA. She reports to the same boss as me in San Francisco. She's joined us here to help sort out some of the ongoing project and technical issues that continuously surface. Anyway, Gina arrived on the 26th. I was charged with picking her up from the airport and was given the keys to the company sports car... a 1.6L Ford Focus... it's a right hand drive, 5-speed manual... which means shifting with your left hand... more difficult than it sounds. I managed to make it to the airport and back without any major incidents. I handed the keys back to Art the next day and decided that I could live without a car for a bit.
On Tuesday 01 March, our team traveled by train to Scotland for another round of site visits. Our luck with delays continued... our train was delayed by about 30 minutes... when a train showed up, we got on. We learned a few minutes after it departed that it was the wrong train. Our train was actually the next one on the same track. Fortunately, it was easy to fix the situation... we jumped off in Edinburough, Scotland and got on the correct train. We arrived around 9:00 to Dundee. Since we weren't sure where the hotel was, we got in a cab. It took us across the street from the station and dropped us at the Hilton... total fare £3. After checking in (which only took 5 minutes for all of us), we met in the bar to chat... Art ordered a shot of whiskey to sip. The glass they gave him was a standard 6 oz glass with about 4 oz of whiskey... that's the biggest "shot" we'd ever seen! It took him about 2 hours to sip his way through it. Afterwards, he retired to the McDonald suite. The rooms were nicer in Scotland than Swansea, but Art got the giant suite on the top floor. He had a walk-in closet, living room, huge bedroom, and a giant marble covered bathroom... the rest of us had the standard rooms (although I had a bottle of wine, a bottle of Scottish orange marmalade, some truffles, and a few other snacks in mine that nobody else did). I guess they decided to give me some goodies instead of the upgraded room.
We conducted our site visit on the 2nd, then got back on the train for Newcastle. This time we got on the correct train and got back as expected. I spent the evening packing up and getting ready for my trip home. At about 2:30a I was awaken by people making a ton of noise outside. Turns out it was snowing quite a bit. By morning it was pretty messy. My cab was 20 minutes late picking me up... I was starting to get concerned and was about to walk over and jump on the Metro to the airport when the cab finally arrived. I made it to the airport with plenty of time since I wasn't checking any bags. The flight to London was uneventful, as expected. I spent a little time in Heathrow checking e-mail and doing a little shopping. I think it was about a mile from where I came in (Terminal 1) to where my flight left out of (Terminal 4).
I arrived back in Denver around 3:30p on Thursday the 3rd. Russ picked me up and we went directly to ESPNZone where we both had steaks. We stopped into Costco on the way home and picked up a few things, then headed back to the house. I took a short nap until about 2:30a when I had to get up to drive to Co Springs airport to pick up Athena.
I spent a few hours in the office on Friday then we all took off for one of the things I'd been missing while in the UK... Mexican food. There were 3 main food items that I couldn't get here... steak, root beer, and Mexican food. I suppose I could add Chinese food since I have not had any that was any good yet. On Saturday, Athena and I went to the Booz Allen holiday party... Co Springs has their party in the spring because the landlord of the building throws a big party for all of the tenants around the holidays. So, we had a casino night party. Athena and I had a great time. We got to see a bunch of my co-workers that I barely know... I was only there for a total of about 6 weeks since I moved. On Sunday, D. Acton came down to visit. We drove around Co Springs and saw some of the local sights. We tried to go to Seven Falls but were told that it was 75% frozen and that none of the hiking trails were open... it also cost $8.25 per person... we decided that it wasn't worth it.
Monday we finished up our taxes... ouch! Russ and I dropped Athena off at the airport Monday evening, then went to Red Robin for dinner. On Tuesday, Russ drove me to the airport and I hopped back on a plane for the UK. I arrived back into Newcastle at about 2:00p local time.
Today, it was back to work as usual... I decided that I needed to get a car so that I could do some sight seeing this weekend, so I called up and ordered one. They (Budget) dropped the car off at the office at 3:00p. I came home and cooked my first full meal here at the apartment... pasta with tomato sauce and bread. Very exciting :-)
The latest and greatest counts and such:
- Drunk English men peeing on walls, cars, or in the middle of street in Newcastle - 7
- Times I've been told high-speed Internet will be available at my apartment "in a couple of days" - 5
- Days of actual high-speed service - 0
- Number of accidents narrowly avoided at annoying traffic circles - 2
Well, that about wraps everything up. Several people have asked for pictures of my apartment... I have attached 2 of the living room and 1 of the kitchen. These rooms are on the first floor along with a small dining room (behind the red walls on the right side in the living room), the foyer, and a powder room. The "laundry" is under the cabinet in the kitchen. The spiral staircase leads upstairs to the 3 bedrooms and the 2 bathrooms... sorry no pictures. I'm still waiting for the phone line in the master bedroom to be hooked up so I can use my computer up at my desk.... another "delay".
I hope all is well in your parts of the world! If anyone wants to visit the UK, just let me know! I have plenty of room for guests!!
Steve
New Living Room 1
New Living Room 2
New Kitchen
Wednesday, February 23, 2005
UK Week 2 (12 Feb-20 Feb) Part 1/2
Please note that part 2 is below... I put them in order for easy reading...
I've been busy/lazy... whichever. I've visited the log and seen some info, but have not had time to type much or post more pictures. I'm very sorry!!
I've been busy/lazy... whichever. I've visited the log and seen some info, but have not had time to type much or post more pictures. I'm very sorry!!
I guess two full weekends have passed since my last post and I've seen a good number of things.
Current counts:
The weekend of Feb 12-13 was spent wandering the countryside. I spent Saturday walking around Newcastle and looked at a bunch of shops. The original plan had been to visit York, but my coworker (Sara) was as punctual as usual... around noon she was having coffee and wanted to work out before leaving... that mean, not going to York :) Anyway, it worked out that I got some shopping done and it was a nice day in Newcastle. On Sunday, the weather turned colder and there were some snow flurries in Newcastle. Sara and I departed by train at about 11:00a for York. It was about an hour ride down on the "local" train. It made about 5 stops along the way but was not very crowded. We got to York around noon and walked from the station towards our goal, York Minster. York Minster has a very interesting history. In the 1960's, it was found that the foundation was sinking and the cathedral was starting to fall apart. If left to it's own weight it would soon crash into pieces. Many people donated millions of pounds to save the York Minster. When the foundation was excavated, they found the remains of an older Norman church... the Normans ruled the north of England about a thousand years ago... give or take a century. Anyway, they kept digging and soon found that the Norman church had been built on top of an old Roman fort that had been built almost 2000 years ago. The drainage system that the Romans had put in was (and is) still functioning. It actually still drains excess water from the site and takes it all the way to the nearby river (about 1/2 mile). The Minster now has an underground tour that shows you the history of the site as well as allows you to see how they fixed the sinking foundation, which is also amazing. Unfortunately, you can't take any pictures down there. I have attached two pictures of the Minster, one outside and one inside. There are lots more at http://www.yorkminster.org/
Last week was pretty busy... I spent a lot of time in meetings and sorting through loads of documents. In truth, this is the most true engineering work I've done in the past four years and it is REALLY refreshing. I've asked Russ to ship me some of my engineering books since I really need them over here. On Friday we visited one of our first sites... it was all the way across town!! It took us about 15 minutes to get there :-) We met our Mike Meyer's impersonator on our site visit.
This past weekend was all kinds of fun. I had originally planned on taking a trip out of the country this past weekend, but there has been some confusion about immigration laws possibly changing in the UK. I have mentioned that in order to get my work visa officially activated, I must leave the UK and re-enter. Well, a couple of weeks ago another coworker (Art) left the country for a meeting. Upon returning, he was told that he could not re-enter with his work visa. He was told that the rules state that once your work visa is activated, leaving the country will void the work visa. This is obviously news to everyone since everyone here has been traveling around Europe for work and pleasure for the past 6 months without any issues. Anyway, the issue is still being investigated so I didn't want to risk anything and go anywhere just yet. It looks like I will be activating my work visa when I return from my trip to the US in a couple of weeks. The whole issue is just really confusing... it really doesn't make sense that if you activate your visa your aren't allowed to leave during the 5 months it is active. Hopefully we will get an answer back soon.
UK Week 2 - Part 2
So... this past weekend was another ad-hoc weekend. I had not made any plans to do anything Saturday and figured I'd do some more shopping or sight seeing around Newcastle... I hear they have the biggest Mall in Europe just a couple of miles away! As it turned out, Sara called me with a plan. She wanted to rent bikes and ride out to the coast. It seemed like a nice day and that sounded like fun. The catch was that she first wanted to go by a new museum with the history of Newcastle... also something that sounded like a good idea. Once we reached the museum (about 11:30), she mentioned that she wanted to wait until 1:00 before leaving so that she could pick up some pictures from the photo shop... she had about 200 digital pictures printed... it cost about $32. By my calculations, it gets dark here about 4:30. If we didn't leave until 1:30, that didn't leave much time to ride 8 miles out to the coast, see much, and get back. As it turned out, the museum took quite a bit of time and we didn't even get over to the photo store until almost 2:00... NO WAY we were heading out to the coast at that point. I thought it would be a good idea to at least figure out the details of renting bikes and then try for another day. We walked down to central station where the bike rental shop was supposed to be. We finally found it and were told that it cost £10 per day to rent and a £50 ($100).... and they only accept cash for both. I didn't even have £50 in cash left and didn't plan on handing someone that much money as a deposit for a junky bike... anyway, other factors also determined that riding a bike this past weekend wouldn't happen....
On Sunday, my cell phone rang at 0830... I figured it had to be Athena calling... it turned out to be Sara. She simply said, "Look outside." I opened the window to find that there was quite a blizzard going on in Newcastle. I told her that she could go pick up a bike and ride to the coast if she wanted... I was going to stay inside where it was warm. It probably snowed about two inches total by about 9:30 or so. Then, all of the sudden, it stopped... the clouds parted, and there was blue sky. The snow melted by about 1:00 when I got a call from my real estate agent telling me that the apartment was ready. I tried to call a taxi and was told they couldn't get me until 5:00... "there is a football game today." The game started at 4:00... I don't understand why that should be such a big deal. Anyway, I ended up getting a ride from the handy man that works for the property management company. I got moved in and settled and was thinking of walking down to the market to grab some food when Sara (queen of bright ideas) called me again. Since the weather was nice again (there was blue sky and sun) she thought it would be a good time to take the metro out and see the coast. Since the weather looked stable, I agreed... big mistake. We got on the metro and went 2 or 3 stops to Whitley Bay which is supposed to be a nice town on the North Sea... the walk from the station to the actual Sea went from bad to worse... it was sleeting and the wind was blowing about 30 mph by the time we actually got down to the sea. It was MISERABLE!! Sara took a picture of the North Sea and we got back to the station as fast as we could. We got back on Metro and rode up to North Shields... which is also supposed to be really nice. On Sunday's, everything is closed though... therefore, it wasn't so great. We ended up sitting in McDonald's drinking warm tea and trying to get warm enough to feel our toes again... that took about 40 minutes. On a NORMAL day, the metro is great... one of the stops takes you to Wallsend, which, as the name implies sits at the end of a wall known as Hadrian's Wall. It was build around 200-300 AD by the Romans and still exists in some areas today. It runs from coast to coast and was designed to keep the Scots out... guess it only worked for a while :)
Let's see, that pretty much brings me close to current events... I froze my ass off this weekend, which was bad since I had a sore throat. I now have an annoying head cold. My ears are pretty clogged up, which is bad since I will be flying tomorrow. Where in the world am I flying??? Well, back to Newcastle. Our team flew down to Cardiff last night and then drove out to Swansea.... where is that you ask??? Wales. South Wales to be exact. The drive from the airport took about an hour. We arrived at the Ramada Inn Swansea at about 8:40. It took 20 minutes to check in 5 people.... Wales is known for efficiency!! We had dinner at the Ramada which wasn't bad... again, efficiency wasn't the best though. The rooms were about what I'd expect from a Ramada Inn... not as good as where I am now :) We spent the day talking to people in Swansea and got to hear someone speak Welsh (hence the count above). We finished around 4:00 this afternoon and then drove back to Swansea where we checked into the Hilton... quite a step up from Ramada. The view from the hotel is quite nice.... see attached pics. We can see the HUGE castle here in Cardiff from the rooms and the lounge upstairs. VERY nice.
Anyway... it's about 11:40p here and I need to get to sleep. I have a 7:50a flight and have to meet our team in the lobby at 6:15a. I will try to post more pictures of the apartment when I'm back in it. The property manager had it repainted and put up new curtains. They are supposed to have my high-speed internet turned on this week and 2 new leather sofas delivered next week. If anyone wants to visit Newcastle, now would be the time... I have a huge 3 bedroom flat that is open for business!! You have until May 3 to drop in!!! Actually, my stay may extend until May 30 at this point... so book now!
Take care!
Steve
Monday, February 14, 2005
UK Days 5-7 (8 Feb - 10 Feb)
In my previous post, I mentioned that I would be looking for an apartment... On Tuesday Sara (Booz Allen - Mclean) and I were taken to some apartments by a solicitor (real estate agent) named Terri. The first location we saw was St. Anne's Quay (pronounced "key"). There were two apartments available, one on the 6th floor and one on the 5th. When we all entered the first, I headed for the balcony to see the view... both Terri and Sara backed away since they are both afraid of heights. Anyway, the view looks out over the Tyne river at the Millennium Bridge, the Sage, and the Tyne River Bridge... not a bad view! (see attached night photo) The apartment itself is about 700 square feet and has 2 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms. The kitchen is not too big and the living room (lounge) is also rather small. (see attached pictures) After seeing St. Anne's, I asked Terri if she had anything else. Evidentially she had a 2 bedroom off Grey Street. Once we drove there, I knew exactly where it was... I had walked right by it last Saturday and had stopped at the bakery that it is attached to. Anyway, after walking into the building I said, "I like it already." It has a nice lobby. Once we reached the apartment, I decided it was the place to go... it is 2 floors and has a nice kitchen, dining area, and living room. It also had 2 1/2 bathrooms, 2 full upstairs and 1/2 on the main floor. Obviously Sara liked it as well... Terri offered that she could probably make a deal if Sara took the 2 bdrm and I could be patient for a 3 bedroom that was being remodeled next week. I decided that I needed to see it first. We walked down the hall to the end and checked it out. Turns out it is about 2200 sq. ft. It has a very nice kitchen, 3 good size bedrooms upstairs, 2 full baths (one with a huge tub) upstairs, and a 1/2 bath down. The living room has a curved wall that has windows looking out over the shopping square outside. The location is perfect as well... there is a Starbucks downstairs (which I just learned about tonight) and there are tons of restaurants, markets, and stores all around. The only downside (if there is one) is that parking is limited. That just means I'll have to continue taking taxis to and from work.
Anyway, because the rental company is having the apartment repainted and new furniture installed, I can't move in just yet. In the meantime, I am at the 6th floor apartment at St. Anne's. The downside of St. Anne's is that it isn't near much and it is significantly smaller... but it does have a nice view. Anyway, I'm told that the new apt. will be ready by next Sunday. Seems reasonable to me. Hopefully when I move over to Grey St. I will have Internet access and a telephone line to accept incoming calls (which will be cheaper than calls to my cell phone).
I couldn't stay at the Hilton because Tony Blair (British PM) was coming to town for the Labor Party National Convention. He rented out the entire Hilton for the weekend. There are 1000's of police running around and traffic is crazy.
On the work front, things have been fairly busy. My work permit has been approved. This means I have to leave the country and come back in to have it stamped into my visa. Strange, but true. My plan is to take a trip next weekend... probably to Prague, which I hear is nice. There is one direct flight per day from Newcastle to Prague. It will cost about 100 GBP or so, but Booz Allen pays for it since it is required for me to work here. I'm told that Prague is one of the only cities that was not bombed back to the stone age in WWII. It was left virtually untouched by everyone. Hopefully I will have 100's of pictures to share after next weekend.
And now an update on the latest counts:
Update on the "how-to-call-UK" instructions... Athena and I learned that to call my cell phone you don't need the first zero in the number... therefore, you would dial 011+44+7979+680604... if you add all that up, you get a very large number ;-) As previously mentioned, calls to a UK cell are based on "calling party pays" rules. That means that incoming calls to my cell phone don't cost me... although the rates may be higher for the calling party.
Well, it is the end of the day for me here... I'm headed out after a long and interesting week! I'm planning to head to York this weekend to see some of the sights there. There's supposed to be a nice museum and a beautiful cathedral that was built on top of an old Roman building with some really nice fresco's. My next post should have some pictures of that!
Hope all is well on the home front!
Take care!
Steve
I put the pictures where they belong... more to come in the future...)
Living Room
Living Room 2
Kitchen
Anyway, because the rental company is having the apartment repainted and new furniture installed, I can't move in just yet. In the meantime, I am at the 6th floor apartment at St. Anne's. The downside of St. Anne's is that it isn't near much and it is significantly smaller... but it does have a nice view. Anyway, I'm told that the new apt. will be ready by next Sunday. Seems reasonable to me. Hopefully when I move over to Grey St. I will have Internet access and a telephone line to accept incoming calls (which will be cheaper than calls to my cell phone).
I couldn't stay at the Hilton because Tony Blair (British PM) was coming to town for the Labor Party National Convention. He rented out the entire Hilton for the weekend. There are 1000's of police running around and traffic is crazy.
On the work front, things have been fairly busy. My work permit has been approved. This means I have to leave the country and come back in to have it stamped into my visa. Strange, but true. My plan is to take a trip next weekend... probably to Prague, which I hear is nice. There is one direct flight per day from Newcastle to Prague. It will cost about 100 GBP or so, but Booz Allen pays for it since it is required for me to work here. I'm told that Prague is one of the only cities that was not bombed back to the stone age in WWII. It was left virtually untouched by everyone. Hopefully I will have 100's of pictures to share after next weekend.
And now an update on the latest counts:
- British men on BBC news saying "Huge tracts of land" - 1
- Micro-mini skirts in 33 degree (F) weather - 3
- Honda S2000's - 3
- Times offered a "cup o' tea" - 35
- Brits friendly to Americans - LOTS!!
Update on the "how-to-call-UK" instructions... Athena and I learned that to call my cell phone you don't need the first zero in the number... therefore, you would dial 011+44+7979+680604... if you add all that up, you get a very large number ;-) As previously mentioned, calls to a UK cell are based on "calling party pays" rules. That means that incoming calls to my cell phone don't cost me... although the rates may be higher for the calling party.
Well, it is the end of the day for me here... I'm headed out after a long and interesting week! I'm planning to head to York this weekend to see some of the sights there. There's supposed to be a nice museum and a beautiful cathedral that was built on top of an old Roman building with some really nice fresco's. My next post should have some pictures of that!
Hope all is well on the home front!
Take care!
Steve
I put the pictures where they belong... more to come in the future...)
Living Room
Living Room 2
Kitchen
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