Adult Adjacent: Not quite a Grown-Up just yet

This past weekend was shaping up to be a busy one. I had plans every night, with various people. Friday night I went out with Becky and her friend Tammi, as it was a friend of theirs’ birthdays. I brought Kris along and we all went to Karaoke. What’s interesting, is that every time I’ve been to Karaoke here it’s been in the little rooms, where only 10 or so people can fit. It’s not the same as karaoke like I remember it in Edmonton. Where we would all sit at the Windsor watching Angela sing. It does make it less embarrassing to belt out a tune yourself. I treated everyone to my rendition of Justin Bieber’s “Baby”. Harriet accused me of liking him because he was Canadian yesterday. This is not the case. I like him because I think he is incredibly talented.

We had the room booked from 7:30pm to 10:30pm so when it finally shut down it was right at that time between heading off home or going to another bar. I hate partying on Friday nights. I guess I don’t mind if I’ve had the chance to go home and get changed, but this particular evening I had come out straight from work. Kris, Darren, and I met Becky at a pub close to Highbury & Islington Station and had dinner before the girls headed to Soho for some Karaoke at Lucky Voice. Therefore, when 10:30pm rolled around, it was time to go home. Tomorrow night was my big party night.

A while back when I went out for Becky’s birthday I met a few of her friends. An American, from New York - Soo, and a girl from the Netherlands - Illonka. I think they work together. Anyway, it was their joint birthdays on Saturday night, and they were celebrating in Hoxton, or East London. Very Trendy. I went to the gym in the morning, and spent the majority of the day hanging out and watching TV with Kris before heading home to get ready for my very trendy night out. I wore all black, and finally figured out how to sport my strapless little black Esprit dress that I just had darts put in so that it would fit me better. I was quite excited. I double checked the location from Facebook before I left the house, and although try as I might, I wasn’t able to convince anyone to come with me. Either they had their own plans, weren’t in the city or just weren’t interested. I was going solo. This wouldn’t have been such a big deal if I was really good friends with either of them… or had their phone number. Unfortunately, while I like them both very much, and think that we could be quite good friends, we are not quite there yet, and I don’t have their phone number. I arrived at Hoxton Grill, and found myself in a Restaurant/Bar, it was all very strange. I asked at the front, and they didn’t recognize the names. I perched on one of the sofas near the bar and attempted to contact them both via FB, hopeing that they would have smart phones that would vibrate indicating they had a Facebook message. Becky was coming later after her much hyped Jay-Z & Kanye concert at the O2. I did text her to see if she had either of their numbers. Unfortunately I didn’t receive a response within a reasonable period to stick around and ended up taking the bus home. It was quite an anticlimax as I walked through our door less than 2.5 hours after I left. After staying up all night watching the end of season one of The Good Wife, Sunday was dedicated to catching up on stuff that I hadn’t done during the week - laundry, and a whole bunch of finales. I also finally got the chance to catch up with Meaghan after too many months. I plan on talking more about all the finales in my other television-dedicated blog.

Well one thing is for sure, living in London is very rarely boring. After last weekend being somewhat of a downer finding out that I need to have a root canal - then finding out that would cost me about £250 after insurance reimbursement, having almost no plans and hanging out on Saturday night watching TV - as much fun as that was… this week has been completely the opposite. Wednesday night I went for my School Governors evening, and last night I found myself at an Open Evening for Freemasons at the world headquarters.

I attended with a few friends who are Masons themselves, and made sure to bring along one other non-mason. Who knew what could happen. In the end it wasn’t really that exciting. We arrived around 7pm to the headquarters near Holborn. It was a building I had walked past so many times before but I had never thought about. I suppose I always thought it was a church. We got to go inside last night though, and had a bit of a look around. When we entered the main hall it was almost a cross between the House of Commons and a Church. We had to listen to three different speakers, and it became clear that this was very much a recruitment event. Two of the speakers were fund and interesting, and one was a bit of a letch. Eugh. It reminded me of everything that I hate stereotypically about pompous Tories. We listened for a little under an hour before we were sent out to get food. There were only a few times where I had to contain my laughter because there were a chorus of “here here” or a number of people singing together. It reminded me a lot of Catholic church to be honest, and the cultish behaviour that they exhibit. We had a buffett after which was really just some crisps and some grapes, and possibly the best guacamole I’ve ever had. We chatted with mainly our group of four before we were herded out to the ‘after party.’

An appropriate follow up would have been a pub or a lounge where we could all network a little more over a few drinks. Instead, I followed three suited-up gentlemen into a full on club. It was 9:30pm and there were people already drunk, with champagne on ice getting their dance on. It was bizarre. This was blatantly ‘not my scene’ but we stayed until about 11pm.

About a year ago I took out membership in the UK Conservative Party. I did it for a lot of reasons. I had the opportunity to vote in my first UK election in 2010 when I did my research on who I would support. It wasn’t a surprise to me that most of my friends supported the same party as myself. At least in Swansea. Through them I began doing stuff with Conservative Future (the youth branch of the party), to be honest, mainly because there was (and I predict still is) very little else to do in Swansea.

When I got to London I thought this might prove to be a good pathway to meet new friends. It wasn’t. Ok, well that’s not totally true. I have met one or two very nice people who I converse with over coffee or text irregularly. The rest were either students, or not quite people I would normally associate with. Ie: pompous to an extreme degree.

As I attended event after event, mostly in the vein hope that perhaps one of them might contain a male with even a vague hint of attractiveness I became concerned that I wasn’t a real Conservative. I didn’t hold party membership, but I really supported a lot of what they did (read: not all!) and I became increasingly frustrated with the socialist whinging nonsense I read in my morning Metro everyday. (If you are reading this from Canada, please understand how very different the attitudes of the general public are, and what exactly the Conservative policies are before de-friending me on Facebook). So I took out party membership.

I paid £25 to become a member of the Conservative party. For what though? I got a card in the mail. Ok, it had my name on it, and now I have the pleasure of saying “I’m a card carrying member of the Tories” … but even saying that for a year to everyone I meet would not be worth £25. I didn’t get a discount to any future Tory events. In fact, after I purchased membership I almost stopped going because so many of the events were saturated with students. Hello, my future husband is not going to be 20 year old Politics student from UCL. (Ok, well he may be, but I highly doubt it).

As the year of my jaunt into party membership is coming to a close I was thinking recently if it was worth it to renew. I am not old enough (ie: 30s/40s) to attend the local government meetings, I’m too old to go to the CF stuff, so what’s the point? I’m not going to bother renewing. When I vote, I vote Tory. When I volunteer to leaflet, I volutneer with the Conservatives and give out leaflets on their policies. See, I didn’t even say “our”.

Tonight that all changed however.

A few years ago I guess it was now. Michael Janz an old SU President from the University of Alberta became a member of the Edmonton Public School Board. I remember thinking that was very interesting. He didn’t study Education as an undergrad, and wasn’t a teacher. Yet here he was, representing an area of Edmonton with regards to Public Schools, how does one even get into that? Then a few years later I am now living in London, and my friend Katie mentions that her and a few friends are going to be on the board of the Children’s Hospital Fundraiser or something. I apologize Katie that I don’t remember exactly.

I started to freak out! I was so behind! I wasn’t on the board of anything! I wasn’t even volunteering anymore!! I went to work, I went to the gym, and I hung out with friends. I didn’t do anything for the community. I promptly signed up to volunteer for the Alzheimers’ Society and thought briefly about other things to get involved in, but wasn’t really interested.

Then my friend and I went to dinner at his Club - kind of like a country club, but in the city for those who don’t know what I mean. He mentioned that he was a School Governor. I know it’s not the same thing as Mr. Janz, but immediately I thought of him, and was intregued. I would apply!

I sent my application in, and tonight went to my first meeting to tell us all about the various functions and responsibilities of being a School Governor and sitting on the board. It sounds like exactly what I would be interested in doing. I sat through the presentation, in a room of about 12 to 15 people. 4 were female. 1 was non-white (and female). The majority of people were in their late 30s early 40s, and white male. It was very strange. I didn’t quite (and still don’t) understand why they were there. Unless they have children, but this was not supposed to be a parent meeting. Then I found out.

Each school is within a council, and each council represents a Borough of London. I live in the Borough of Wandsworth which is represented by a Conservative Council. There are 51 Conservatives and 9 (?) Labour members of this Council. This means that each School Board (each school literally has one), gets 3 spots dedicated to nominated Conservatives, 1 to Labour, and then some to parents, teachers, and then the greater community (which was what my meeting was supposed to be representing tonight). A local Councillor was there to take questions and names, and so I signed up to represent the Conservative Party as a School Governor. I was the only female to do so. I was also the only person under 45 I think. It looks like that membership might be worth something after all.

Wandsworth is one of the biggest Boroughs in London, and there are schools very close to me, and obviously ones some miles away. If I get selected then I need to get to and from the meetings quite easily late at night. Therefore I want to be close to my home. This means, that actually the schools that I can volunteer at are already extremely limited to a handful. Those with Conservative openings are even less. The one closest to my house actually only has one spot left and one of the other gentleman there tonight has put his name down. However. I do not believe he knows we are now in competition.

Bring. It. On.

The day after I say I’m going to write in my blog everyday I fail to. I have not been feeling well lately. I went into the dentist back in September and had a filling done. This tooth has been bothering me for some time. I had it filled the previous February (2011) as well, but evidently part of that filling had come out so I had to have it re-done. Luckily I have found a great dentist here in London. They are called Confident-Dental, and are located in the South West, Zone 4 - Raynes Park. What’s nice is unlike a doctor which has to be located close to your home, you can have a dentist located anywhere. Mine is a 10 minute direct train from my house.

Anyway, I had the filling back in September and then I went for my cleaning/check up in March. I told him that I was having some sensitivity, and he took x-rays. He told me at that point that I may need a root canal in the future because of how close the filling was to the nerve. I just hoped this was the same as saying that if my wisdom teeth came in then I’d have to get those taken out. My wisdom teeth have never come in. Fingers crossed that everything would be fine.

Fast forward a few months and I’m having some really bad pain in my teeth, and I came into work on Friday and actually emailed my dentist asking if they had any appointments on Saturday morning or the following Wednesday. By the time I got home that night I was in agony! I’ve never had pain that bad, and this is a girl who has passed out in the middle of the Math Wing at University due to cramps. This is someone who less than a week ago was curled up on the bathroom floor throwing up all night just the week before due to cramps. I know my pain, and this was horrible. I took some extra strength Ibprofin and finally got to sleep.

I thought perhaps I wouldn’t be in pain in the morning. Wrong. I woke up at 5am with even worse pain, and after taking another Ibprofin - 400mg Extra Strength Liquid Gels from WalMart (because I don’t think you can get pain killers like that here in the UK), I actually looked up emergency dentists. I was extremely close to getting up and leaving my house and heading there. Instead the painkillers kicked in and I slept until about 9:30am. As soon as I woke up the first thing I did was call my dentist. They had availability that day for me to come in at 11:30am. Oh thank God.

I headed out to zone four, and arrived just in time. My dentist is this really nice guy - a christian, (he told me so), from Iraq. He had a look, tapped on my teeth, and I was desperately hoping it wouldn’t be anything to do with the filling that had been placed back in September. It was. He told me that I would have to have a root canal. I asked him what is more painful - a root canal or getting your wisdom teeth out? He said it couldn’t be compared. He should have said - wisdom teeth.

Throughout high school and university I saw almost all of my friend get their wisdom teeth out. I also saw most of my friends cheeks puff up like a chipmunk. I was terrified. I didn’t have to get braces, and I didn’t have to get my wisdom teeth out, so I like to think me having to get a root canal at 26 sort of evens out the fact that I didn’t have to get much done when I was little.

He walked me through the procedure. While it seemed scary, the pain is so great that I can’t wait for it to occur and this throbbing dull ache to go away. It’s awful. He put me on two different antibiotics - Amoxicillin and Metronidazole, which I need to take each three times a day for seven days. I also, of course have my prescription for Xanax of which I will take 2000mg before my treatment. It’s a two part procedure. Each part is 90 minutes, and I’ll do the first part on Friday, May 25th in the afternoon, of which my friend Ross kindly will be accompanying me. I need an escort due to all the medication I’ll be on. The second part will happen when I return from my three week holiday in June.

I know I have really let this blog fall apart ever since my trip to Jordan… but as we enter summer(??) it’s just going to get even more manically crazy. I leave for Ontario in less than 34 days! Then, I am out of the country for three weeks, two in Canada and the USA and then one I’m finally off to Spain for work! I’m only back in the country for a week before it’s Canada Day, where of course I’m volunteering and then it’s the Olympics! This year is going to fly by. But I guess that’s enough about the future, what’s been happening lately? Well I went to Gloucester for the weekend. What’s nice about visiting Catherine & Andy, is that it feels like a home away from home away from home. I feel totally comfortable there, and it’s nice to finally relax and have nothing to do. It’s not like I can go shopping, and I don’t feel guilty about watching TV all day. I took the bus up to Gloucester because it was cheaper, and it was direct from Victoria, so I didn’t have to switch halfway, as I would on the train. It was delightful. There were no loud drunk people, there were no babies crying. We had tons of leg room, each person had two seats to themselves, and it was quiet the whole way up, and back. I really do prefer travelling that way I think. Perhaps if the train was much faster it might be worth it, but in this case it would only save me about 30 minutes. I arrived into Gloucester around 10pm on the Friday, and actually on Saturday we had beautiful weather. We went for a hike, and it was sunny out for most of the time. Only once did we have to pull out our rain gear. I also got to wear the new trousers that my Mum sent me from One Tooth in Vancouver (http://www.onetoothyoga.com/Catalogue/ProductDetails.aspx?ProductID=49&CategoryID=10). They were perfect! Exactly what I was looking for. In the past I have used my yoga pants, but because they are flared, even though they are hemmed, get caught underneath the boots and then if the ground is wet they get longer, and everything is super annoying.

After the hike/walk we went out for lunch and a cream tea. It was delicious. Much too much food, but I didn’t eat dinner to make up for it. I don’t think I mentioned, the reason I didn’t eat dinner is because I’m counting calories again. I tried doing the whole 17 day diet, but I just don’t think it worked for me, because I was then gorging myself when I was ‘allowed’ food items again. This way, through counting calories I am allowed a little bit of stuff each day, but hopefully I will restrict the amount of stuff I eat.

….

Ok, so I wrote that almost three weeks ago.

Since then I have been counting my calories, and actually I spoke with a trainer at the gym (for free) and he put together two alternating workouts for me, and I’m supposed to do them three times a week. I’ve done alright. I’ve lost a few inches, and actually since November 2011 I have lost 2.5% Body Fat. I haven’t lost any mass but the fat is smaller, which is good. I guess? I’ve tried to combine it with the regular workouts I’m doing, so I’ll go to Zumba, and Spin still and then try to do these workouts on top of it. It hasn’t been too bad. I’ve officially quit swimming. I know I didn’t last for long, but I just wasn’t going enough, and it didn’t fit in my schedule like the gym can. There are so many classes I can do at the gym, and with these workouts now I can go whenever I have time. I think perhaps when I’m older (with a family, *fingers crossed*) I will get back into swimming, but for now It’s just not feasible, and I’m not using it for the amount I pay. I’ll also have £53 extra a month to play with or save.

It’s less than a month now before I head out to Ontario, Nashville and then Spain! I’m very excited for it, but I need to decide what to wear and pack. I think I’ve decided on no checked luggage as I have less than a 5 hour turn around when I get back to London and have to fly out to Spain from a different airport.

Since I went to Gloucester I went to the NKOTBSB Concert (Which was amazing and probably the second best concert of my life!). I almost got to touch Joey Macintyre, and saw Nick Carter and AJ up close. It was amazing. I got my hair cut - which was the first time since the debacle in January where they massacred my fringe. I complained and got this cut for free. My next appointment will be on the 23rd of June when I get back from Spain, and I actually have a groupon, so I’ll be able to get my hair highlighted as well. I went to Didcot with Katie for the weekend of May 5-7th for the Long Weekend and it was super relaxing. We had planned to go on a hike but it rained so instead we watched some really random movies that she had at her parents’ house. We had our final goodbye farewell for the students on Wednesday. It was such a disaster leading up to the event. Students signed for the wrong names, and then changed their orders etc. Nightmare, so I was glad when it was over. I had the steak, but because I didn’t want to faff around with “medium” or “rare” or whatever, all the steaks were ordered “Medium” and of course it was way too well done which means I’ll have salmon next time.

Anyways, I think this sporadic writing is boring and I’m going to try to go back to writing once a day because to be honest I think my daily life is really interesting, just not necessarily to recount over the period of three weeks….

It’s less than eight weeks now until the big holiday of the summer. I am more excited than ever. The weather here in London has turned immensely sour. The past two weeks I have seen some of the strangest weather since I’ve been here. There have been random hail storms, huge thunder booms, and just last night I wasn’t able to get to swimming because of lightening affecting the signal problems on the trains. It’s difficult to decide what to wear in the morning because I packed up most of my winter clothes ages ago - when it was super Hot out in March and February. I had to dig out my boots though because there’s no way I can wear cute flats in downpours the like we have seen.

This week seems like it has dragged on for a million years. I am not sure if this is because we’ve had two short weeks previously or because I’ve been busy every night this week with various things - Pub Quiz Monday, Date on Tuesday, Toby’s Birthday Drinks on Wednesday and then I was supposed to swim last night and tonight I head to Gloucester.

I’m not sure if I mentioned it, but I signed back up for Guardian Soulmates. It’s an online dating service. The reason I chose it is because so many people I know have been successful after using it. Harriet met the boyfriend she currently lives with on Soulmates, Jo (a lady at my office) met her husband who she just married in October though it, a friend’s flatmate met his fiancée on it… also I joined it last summer and had tons of dates that were alright, but I don’t think I was in the right mindset. After the horrid date a few months ago though I signed back on. However, now I seem to be too busy to actually meet up with anyone. I’m never sure if I should include date stories on here or not so I decided that if I like someone and will be seeing them again I won’t be sharing that info, but if it’s just a one off type thing I’ll mention it. The guy I met on Tuesday to be honest I don’t know. He hasn’t been in touch so I can only assume that He’s Just Not That Into Me because it’s been three days.

We met up at Oxford Circus and he sounded well prepared. He had a plan and had scoped out a place that he wanted to take me to, and had a backup plan if that didn’t work. We ended up at a Plan C as it was so incredibly crowded. I’m not sure why the area surrounding Carnaby Street was so busy on a Tuesday. I don’t like drinking on dates, and I’m trying to curb my Diet Coke intake so I opted for soda water and a slice of orange. It was actually deliciously tasty, and will now become my signature drink. It’s much better than lime which is just a bit too sour and lacking in taste. He seemed happy with this, he wasn’t drinking much either because he was training for a double marathon. We found a spot and initially the conversation flowed, but then he seemed in a hurry to tick boxes in his head or something because instead of letting the conversation flow he asked - what I like to do for fun in London. It’s just a bit of an awkward question isn’t it? I do believe that the only time that question should ever be used is in a language class. “Qu’est-ce que vous aimex faire pour vous amuser?” - “J’aime nage, et aller au cinema.” That is reasonable. To be asked it on a date though, it seems a bit forced does it not? It seemed especially awkward as I had already mentioned that I have a Pub Quiz on Monday nights, and I swim and go to the gym. What else is there to do?! There are only 7 days in the week. Obviously socializing with friends takes a few days/nights… or do I have to specifically mention that? We chatted about the theatre for a bit, and when he asked me what I was most looking forward to I immediately without thinking said “Top Hat!” He looked worried that I would judge him because he had never heard of “Top Hat”… and proceeded to make excuses for why he hadn’t heard about it. Relax man, I receive special Theatre bulletins in the post because of my job. He asked me what box sets for TV I owned… but completely out of context. We hadn’t even been talking about TV, and he seemed to want to rush the conversation along. We matched on most TV shows, but then when we began to talk about movies I said that I was preferential to Romantic Comedies, which of course I wouldn’t expect a bloke to like. He said his favourite movies were Lord of the Rings. I rolled my eyes, laughed and told him about how Gillian had dragged me to watch LOTR so often through University, but I still hadn’t managed to find the charm. He seemed, again to think this would mean we shouldn’t hang out, which of course doesn’t make sense because I just said one of my best friends is in love with the movies, and even though I don’t love the movies I still love her. The same thing happened when he went through all his favourite comedy movies. Will Ferrell, Vince Vaughn, Ben Stiller, etc. I’m just not a fan of them anymore. They can be funny sometimes, but I certainly won’t be in the queue for Anchorman 2.

We started talking about the Olympics and he asked me if I was sporty. Another weird question. I suppose I am. Just not as sporty as some of the girls in high school. Turns out he was a PE Teacher. I had to hold back laughter as the irony hit me. I was on a date with a PE teacher. The subject I have vowed eternal war with. The subject that I think is a joke and complete waste of time. Of course I didn’t relay that information to him. Well, until he told me that he thought it was the most important subject. I couldn’t hold it in. I started laughing and had to tell him that I hated PE when I was little. I made sure to preface any criticism with “well in PE in Canada”…so as hopefully not to offend by associating it with PE here in the UK. I told him that I spent most of my energy in high school trying to get out of PE. He then relayed a story about how girls often to stop liking PE because they’re more interested in boys and make up. Fair enough, my answer to that though was “I was hiding my gym strip when I was seven.” I did not share with him my absolute brilliant plan to revamp the entire PE system around the world, and how I’ve got a Board of Governors meeting on May 16 in order to get on the Board in Wandsworth Council in order to begin the steps towards change.

The date was cut short because he had to get home to prepare for class the next day. Even though I have personally waged war on his profession I would definitely still see him again. I thought he was cute, and at the heart of it we have the same value in that we believe in a healthy lifestyle. He hasn’t called though so that’s the end of that.

I thought perhaps my prospects would pick up at Toby’s birthday on Wednesday night. It was at this ‘exclusive’ club in Chelsea called Barts. I asked Kris if she wished to come along with me. So we stopped at my house to get changed first before heading to the party. Of course we couldn’t find the bar and ended up walking around South Kensington for probably about 30 minutes before finally calling Caleb and Toby to be told that it was actually inside an apartment building - Chelsea Cloisters. There was supposedly a password to get in, but we had no problem. It was a cute venue. Small and filled with Americana stuff. We had a table in the corner and I recognized a few people but not many. I was greeted overly friendly by several people which surprised me as I have met these people several times before and the meeting has been less than warm. We had a good time though and Harry baked Toby cupcakes and they were actually quite delicious.

Tonight I head to Gloucester for a weekend break until Sunday. I haven’t seen Catherine & Andy since Christmas, and it’s always nice to get out of the city for a small amount of time. I think we’re going to try to go on a walk. I have packed my awesome beautiful hiking boots as well as my brand new OneTooth Hiking Trousers that my mum sent me. It’ll give me a chance to try them out. Although I forgot to pack my charger, I have my Macbook loaded with this week’s TV shows ready to blog about them in my new sister blog which will be solely for my thoughts on television: http://miraclepietv.tumblr.com/

The weekend is finally winding down and I’m about to head to the pool for the first swim practice in ages. I just called my mum to tell her I’m currently in two minds about swimming at the moment. I thought I had found a great team. It was exactly what I was looking for and I have a good time when I’m there, but the times are so inconvenient. Practices are as follows:

Tuesday: 8-9:30pm
Wednesday: 8:30 - 10pm
Thursday: 7:30 - 9pm
Sunday: 5:30 - 7:00pm

I haven’t made any friends yet, and I’m struggling between lanes four and five. I’m going to give it until I head to the USA in June in order to see if it’s something that I want to stick with or not. Maybe the swimming part of my life has just come to an end. I still enjoy going to the gym, and finally after two weeks went back to the gym this morning. It was an aerobics class and I didn’t feel quite as bad as I thought I might. Things might be different tomorrow. I have definitely put on some weight mainly because I haven’t stuck to the Cycles and as I was hiking 8/9 miles a day over the Easter break felt I could put tons of junk in my body. I only have 8 weeks to go until I fly off to Canada though and I’m going to make those eight weeks count. I’m not sure about the cycles anymore because actually 17 days is a long time.

However, I do think I am going to stick with eating just veggies and protein, no starches during the week for sure, and just try to do that for as long as I can. I’m also not going to drink until summer. However, I doubt this will make very much of a difference at all because I don’t drink as it is except for the odd party. This rule might be revoked. I might also consider buying Bob Harper’s new book: The Skinny Rules.

Luckily on Saturday I did a fair bit of walking because I was out in Chingford with Conservative Futures campaigning for Boris Johnson for the London Mayoral election on May 3rd. I actually have not done any campaigning or anything for a number of months, and it wasn’t until a friend, who I actually met last year at the Back Boris Bootcamp texted me and asked if I’d like to go. I’m glad he did because it turned out to be a great time. The people, who so often at CF events are sometimes irritating were totally normal. Interestingly enough there were two Canadians there as well. Both from BC, and one of them was actually from Victoria and after I stalkingly found them on FB, I found out that we have two mutual friends. In actuality we have a few more, but I have chosen not to be FB friends with some of them. So perhaps not mutal friends but mutal acquaintances.

It’s one minute until I have to get my things together for swimming, and I’m still debating going. However, my alarm has just popped up to tell me “Swimming - Stop being so LAZY & FAT!”… so I guess I’ll go.

I have really failed on updating this daily. As soon as I hit Jordan it was really a lost cause. I started working part time in International Admissions, which I’m really liking. Like I said, I am enjoying learning new skills, and being on the other side of the office allows me to meet and get to know the people over there. It may sound a bit weird, but our office is quite big, and if you don’t eat lunch with people, it seems that we don’t really socialize. I have now learned not only how to upload peoples’ documents to their university file, but I can now send out Conditional Offers and Rejections. I said the other day on Twitter that Rejections are my favourite. A friend called me “Harsh” but these people are applying to do PG degrees and certificates but don’t have the qualifications, or have submitted a one sentence personal statement. It’s a joke, and they think that they’re going to be admitted? I don’t think so. It’s not like these are students who have worked hard their whole life, have obviously poured their life and soul into their personal statement, have glowing references and then *wicked laugh* REJECTED. Actually many of them have their Mums write their reference or they write it themselves, I do not feel bad. Also there is less typing involved with a Rejection Letter.

Most days I have been doing all the emails and stuff with Study Abroad and then in the afternoon I head to the other side of the office and try to complete a stack of papers on my desk. It’s exciting, getting through a pile of papers. It’s also nice to get to know the different academics that we work with. The people who make the decisions. As well the past month has been manic. We got home from Jordan and the first weekend back was St. Patrick’s Day. I went over to a BBQ during the day, and then headed to Vanessa’s for a party that evening.

The BBQ was good. I learned that a friend is moving back to Canada this summer. I’m not sure if she’s upset with me or not, but she seemed quite distant at the BBQ and it’s actually been that way for a while. She was always quite a private person so I never thought much about it, but Caleb asked me once ‘does she even like you?’ … I’m not sure. It’s hit and miss, but as I went through a horrible friend loss less than two years ago, I don’t have the energy to broach the subject or go through something like that again. I figure if she’s not interested in being my friend, it’s unfortunate and I have no idea why, but I’d prefer to just let it fade away instead of bringing it to the forefront. It was good to see everyone else though. Over the years since I’ve been allowed to stay at their house on London visits, or for interviews I’ve got to know quite a few people, and it’s always at these BBQs and parties that I get to see them and catch up.

I left the BBQ at around 9pm to head to Vanessa’s House Party near Borough/London Bridge. I met Vanessa through the Canadian Meet Up, and actually it’s been great. She’s the only fellow British Columbian I’ve met during my time here in London. I saw Becky & Tammi, and the other girls that I met at Becky’s Birthday the month before. They had delicious Guinness cupcakes, however unfortunately Vanessa informed us that there were no single straight guys at the party. I managed to find one though, and we tried to meet up several times after the party but we were both way too busy. Conflicting schedules. I have since signed up for Guardian Soulmates again. I’m not sure it was the right decision. I was signed up last year for three months, and nothing came of it, except for one ‘friendship’ where we have each other on Facebook and invite each other to parties, but do not speak beyond that. I didn’t think I was ready for it last year, because I hadn’t been on a date in so long, I still had very romantic notions. Then I experienced the horridness that was the disaster in February with the arrogant PhD Doctor and I thought an internet date can’t be much worse than that organic date. However, it is becoming apparent that perhaps I am too busy?

Mondays have now been allocated to Pub Quiz with the house-mates + Ross. The quiz starts at 8pm at our local and goes to 10:30pm. It’s quite fun, and I’ve started looking forward to it. I suppose I could meet up with someone before, as I did last week at the Canadian Meetup, I was able to stay for one and a quarter hour before I left. Usually I would head to the gym for 1800 to do a Body Pump class followed by an Aerobics class until 1915 and then would head straight to the Quiz.

Tuesdays I try to go to Spin in the mornings. This week has been a bit of a fail on the exercise front because I am feeling a little ‘cold’ sick since returning from the Lake District. I hate going to the gym Tuesday nights because the choice is either another Spin class at 1830 or a Tone class. The lady that runs the Tone Class I’m convinced hates me. Or she just hates her job. It’s horrible though. They do have swimming Tuesday nights at London Bridge but it doesn’t start until 8pm, which seems just a bit too late. However If I went to the Fitness First by London Bridge I might be able to go straight after. The alternative is sitting at home… Actually a few weeks ago at the end of March we went to see Singin’ in the Rain on Tuesday, March 20th. It was absolutely brilliant! I had a great time, and it actually RAINED on stage, and they kicked water into the audience. We had brilliant seats.

Wednesday I try to take the day off in order to go to the cinema if I can find anyone to go with. It’s Orange Wednesday, which means that if you are with Orange - a phone provider you can text and get a code and then get 2 for 1 at the cinema. I tend to end up at a Spin class instead. Also the final Wednesday of each month is Science Lates at the Science Museum. Basically it’s an Adults Only evening where they have various bars set up in the Science Museum, and you don’t have to deal with little kids running around, so mainly 20-30somethings can try their hand at the various experiments etc. They also have speed dating. Patrick’s flatmate Anna and I went with her friend Bharat. We are convinced we got the dud group. I had started chatting with this guy at the beginning, and I was hoping that he was in our group. Alas, he was not. I went and spoke to him after though, however he didn’t ask for my number. This of course elicited a colourful conversation between everyone who was at the Science Museum afterwards in the pub - there was a large group of us at the Museum, but only three of us did the Speed Dating - about the idea behind “He’s Just Not that into You” and how if he was interested he would have asked for my number. It’s always a fun debate to have.

I spin Thursday mornings - well mostly. I didn’t this morning, but like I said, I am getting a sore throat. I have become pretty regular at Swimming on Thursday nights. Last month the debate was whether I should be in Lanes 5 & 6 or if I should move into Lane 4. I am too fast for lanes 5 & 6, which I have trouble accepting seeing as the people were going just as fast as me on dive 50s. However, I have been relegated into Lane 4 and it was chaos! No one was following the rules, or the set on the board. They were swimming when it said kick, doing free when it said fly. Including the fact that I wasn’t making any of the times. I couldn’t handle it. I missed the order of lanes 5 & 6. I need to get faster I suppose in order to get into lane 3 where hopefully this chaos isn’t tolerated.

Fridays I have tried to reserve for works drinks. As I’ve said ever since I started working over in Admissions I am actually starting to enjoy hanging out socially with those I work with - mainly because I know them all better. However since coming to terms with the fact that I not only will tolerate, but actually like hanging out with work people there haven’t been as many work drinks evenings as there seem to have been in the past. In order to book on to classes at the gym you literally need to do it the moment you wake up in the morning. I call at 7am on Friday for Saturday morning and the classes are all full. However, I try to get in one or two classes on Saturday morning. Apparently there is also swimming on Saturday but so few and far between that I’m not sure exactly when they go and it’s quite far away - at Crystal Palace. This past month was also Kris’ Birthday Party. It was her 30th, so it was quite a big deal. She had been talking about it for ages, and I hadn’t been out on a ‘night out’ in forever. I had gone to parties, but I hadn’t been dancing or out on the town since Becky’s birthday.

In my bid to become an adult I have purchased two or three canvas pictures - that I can have my own photos put on and blown up into 12x16” pictures. I think it will look better than photos stuck to the wall with blue tac. I also have recently taken several items in to get hemmed and altered. I took my strapless black dress from Esprit and got darts put in, I got a skirt taken in, and I got shoulder pads taken out of a blazer from Esprit. Next month I’m going to get new glasses and get my hair cut. Perhaps I’ll get those plastic frames that are ever so popular at the moment. I’ll be on trend for a change.

This past weekend was Easter. I had forgot of course that I was headed to the Lake District and was actually excited about watching the 10 Commandments. Especially after my recent trip near enough to the Holy Land. However, on Thursday I was all packed in a car on my way up north to Cumbria to the Lake District. It was about a 5 hour drive north of Manchester and Liverpool, close to Carlisle and just under 100miles east of Newcastle. I had subscribed to the London Adventure Group emails a while ago, but they tended to do a lot of weekend trips, and I of course didn’t want to go alone. Luckily Patrick was interested so we booked our Lake District weekend the same day we booked our car hire for Jordan. Four nights, five days 3 walks fully guided, and travel there and back for £125. Not bad. The lodge itself was self catering and by looking at the map I would have thought the closest city - Ambleside was near on 30 minutes drive away. Therefore, Patrick and I stocked up and bought all our food before we left, and brought up two big bags of pasta, sauce, stirfry chicken, chorizo, vegetables, granola bars, yogurt, bread, and various fruits. It turns out the town was a 20 minute walk. Good thing as well, because we forgot the milk & tea!

The first day of actual walking was Friday, April 6th and I chose the ‘easy’ option. I didn’t want to be stuck up a mountain in the rain with four more hours to go when the ‘easy’ group was already at the lodge sipping hot chocolate. Turns out, while our walk was technically ‘shorter’ we ended up getting a bit lost, and coming down was a pain due to how slippery it was. Saturday was a completely different day. It was sunny out, and I was able to hike up the hill in capris & a t-shirt. I had shown Katie the walks before I went up to the Lakes and she forbade me from doing the car option on Saturday as the walk that was suggested was too nice. I’m glad I listened to her. It was very pretty. The whole of the UK in the countryside is like a storybook or fairytale. Rolling meadows, small hedges, glistening brooks and streams, and perfectly grown trees. It’s nothing like the awe inspiring mountains and oceans of Canada, but it’s quaint, and pretty and magical. Sunday it rained again, and although I picked the ‘easier’ option again, we all ended up walking together. Half the group turned back as the wind increased and the rain. I had learned from Friday to keep my hoodie tucked inside my Marmot shell, but it was Sunday that I decided if I’m going to continue with this madness of hiking and walking through the UK, I should get some proper gear, therefore that will be my main aim this summer while shopping in Buffalo - hopefully at the outlet stores.

We left Monday morning with the intention to do a small walk by a lake, but the weather was such that we sat and ate cake and hot chocolate instead. This also meant that we didn’t leave until 1:15pm. I didn’t walk into my house until 10pm, and wasn’t in bed until 10:38pm. Showered of course. It was quite a journey and the roads were terribly slow because of course everyone was returning after a bank holiday weekend.

It was quite exhausting weekend. We were walking about 8 miles a day with a heigh of about 900m. Patrick and I had booked into the cheap 5 person room where there were only mattresses, no beds, and we shared with a German girl and two Aussies. We became quite good friends with both Aussies and bonded with them over the weekend. I hope that we keep in touch in the future. We cooked together, slept together, travelled together, and even for someone who hates being alone all the together time was a bit too much, and I am spending most of this week at home in the evenings, alone trying to recoup. The end of the Easter weekend also marks the last holiday I’ll have before the big one this summer in June.

We have one more Bank Holiday coming up in May, and I’m going to try to convince Katie to take me out to her village just to get out of the city. otherwise I’m not sure where I might go. If Ross is heading back to Newport, I might see if I can catch a lift with him and head to Swansea/Bridgend etc to visit with some people. But then it’s the Diamond Jubilee and I head off to Canada. Whew! That is going to be so thrilling, I can’t wait.

Starting next Monday I’m thinking I’ll start cycle 1 again… as I haven’t been exactly following it since I was hiking up mountains all weekend. I might alter it so that I do cycle 1 during the week and then instead of gorging I just allow myself whatever during the weekends. I’m not sure but it will be exactly 8 weeks until I leave for Canada and I want to be in tip top shape before dancing the night away in Nashville & laying by the lake in Ottawa. I will also make the effort over the next eight weeks to not leave it so long between posts.

It had originally been the plan to update this daily but after going to Jordan it sort of fell by the wayside as I have been so completely flat out since I returned. I’ll try to catch everything up, but I’ll undoubtedly leave things out.

Right before I left for Jordan Meaghan told me that she was going to apply for an Accounting course at Camosun. This seemed strange to me at first, but then I started getting jealous. I was jealous that she was going to be doing something new and interesting. Something challenging. I thought that after my time at the UofA I had enough challenge to last me a lifetime. I think crying in every single final exam in the subject of your major could do that, but after working in the same job for a year, where now the largest challenge is to make sure you type things correctly it’s worn a bit thin. I love my job, but I started thinking that maybe I would have a better time if I was in engineering, should I go back and do more training? That was quickly suppressed.

While I was away grades were released, which meant the Monday I was back in the office I was on my feet printing and sending transcripts and chasing grades. I’m still chasing grades, but it’s not quite to the same extent. I was still thinking about how it was the same stuff over and over again in the job, when the head of our office came over to ask if I’d like to do some work in Admissions. The Admissions team is made up theoretically of four people, two undergraduate and two postgraduate. The postgraduate admissions officer recently got a new job across the street back in (domestic) Admissions, and the undergraduate officer broke his ribs and was out of the office for a week or so. I took Darren’s seat and was immediately transported to another side of the office. A side I really enjoyed.

Our manager took me through the basics for the first three days, and that Friday ended on a high when a colleague of mine. The lady who looks after European exchange told me she would take me through all the Erasmus information at some point when it slowed down, and send me the information about this training week she did in Copenhagen last year. I was ready for the weekend, and actually looking forward to the upcoming week of work.

The following week was much more of the same. Each morning I would finish up any Study Abroad stuff and then in the afternoon head over to the other side of the office to do some admissions work. I got to know the Admissions people and actually because it split up my day the weeks flew by. The past two weeks however I have been back in my section because we have been trying to deal with everything regarding modules for next semester. I have asked my Manager who has been on Annual Leave the past three weeks if I can go to training in Europe. Hopefully the response is positive.

Today was our last day in Jordan, but our flight wasn’t out of Amman’s Queen Atalia Airport until 9pm. We had planned out our day last night, and we were finally going to the place I was most excited about: Bethany Beyond the Jordan.

I’m not really that religious, and actually growing up in Victoria it didn’t really matter. It was more when I moved to Alberta and people seemed to put so much emphasis on what religion you were - Catholic, Presbyterian, Morman… that I really started to think about it. I lived with Charissa, whom I considered to be extremely religious based on what she told us, and the fact that she not only went to church every Sunday but she also went to Bible Study on Wednesday nights. I also lived with Marsali and Erin, two people who seemed like they couldn’t be anymore atheist. It was an interesting dynamic. I think living with this combination in addition to dating someone who I thought was crazy for almost missing a friend’s birthday party in order to carry the cross down the aisle on Easter?! Why would you miss Chinese food & country line dancing for that? It was definitely this combination that I started to think about religion more, but it was in my final two years when I became closer to other Math students, and in particular began to hang out with one: Ian Bushfield. Well I think “hang out” is quite strong considering we were on peripheral groups. Anyway, he was the president of the Atheists & Agnostics club at the UofA and I found it beyong frustrating how he seemed to shove non-religion on us, and how he seemed to think everyone secretly was atheist and just wanted to let us know that it was alright to come out. This sent me in the other direction, allowing me to fully decide that I do believe in God, but perhaps not everything written literally in the Bible.

With this, I was extremely excited to see some of the sites of the Bible, including Bethany and Mt. Nebo. After waking again to the sound of the Call to Prayer at 4:30 in the morning, we eventually got up for real and had breakfast and left Madaba headed to Mt. Nebo. Mt. Nebo is the location according to Deuteronomy that Moses was shown the Land of Caanan or the Promised Land by God, and then subsequently died. On our way to the summit we saw a sign for Moses’ Spring, so naturally we drove the 2km down to an abandoned water treatment centre and braved the extreme winds to decide that a particular set of rocks was probably his spring. This is the location where Moses used his staff in the last days of Exodus to turn a rock to water. It was because of this that he was not allowed to enter the lands of Caanan. We grabbed some photos & I attempted to take a video of the location, but even though I’m speaking into the camera the wind is so strong you can barely hear me.

By the time we reached Bethany we were about 30 minutes behind schedule. We didn’t really have a super tight schedule, we just wanted to time out how long it would take us to do each thing we wanted to do, and be back at the airport to drop off the car by 6:30pm. Our flight was at 8:55pm. We drove to Bethany and picked up our tickets along with our audio guides. The zone itself is 10km2 and is a military zone bordering Israel. We weren’t allowed to go wandering off by ourselves and had to stick within the group. We saw a few things pertaining to Elijah, and then the actual site where John the Baptist babtized Jesus all those years ago. The final and longest stop was actually at the Jordan River. There was a soldier guarding it, but you could go down and touch the water or walk in it. No one from our group walked in it, but I went and touched it. I’m not going to go all the way to Jordan and NOT put my hand in the river that is responsible for babtizing Jesus Christ! The river itself was only about 50m across, and you could clearly see the Israeli side. There were massive amounts of people wading into the water, and filling their waterbottles. The entire trip I was so excited that we were so close to Israel, and now I could literally see it, with clearly defined people.

We finished up our tour and were on the road again. The last stop before returning to the airport was going to be the Eastern Desert Castles. Theoretically according to the map we could stay on highway 40 heading east - the highway that then continues on to Iraq, and we wouldn’t have to go into the city of Amman and it would lead us right to al-Azraq. This was the castle that TE Lawrence used as a stronghold during the Arab Revolt in 1916-18. All we had to do was stay on the highway straight.

The closer we got to Amman the more the English signs disappeared replaced wholly with Arabic signs. No matter how hard we tried we could not sort out the letters. It’s no Cyrillic. Highways were merging, there were overpasses, and arrows, and random exits. We began to felt that we might (a) not be on Highway 40 anymore, and (b) probably were no longer even heading East. The most confusing bit was that when there was a sign in English the spelling never corresponded to our map. Not even close. We eventually pulled out Patrick’s iPhone and used the compass app to find out which direction we were heading. Although you could almost tell. I suggested we just try to head East on any random road. My idea was not embraced. Finally after doing a full circle of the city we decided we needed to stop and ask for directions.

We pulled into quite a nice gas station and picked up a few snacks and some bottles of water. We pointed to our map and asked the lady who was the cashier if she could direct us. There were two routes to the Eastern Desert Castles. One was a northern route through Zarqa, and one was a southern route. We wanted to go the southern route as it seemed more direct, and less faffy in terms of driving the streets of Amman again. There was a lot of construction around the southern entrances to Amman, so when she told us we couldn’t take that route my first thought was because of all the construction. She told us we could only take the Northern route and unfortunately this was just not going to happen. We headed back to the car to decide what to do.

As we were sat in our car sorting out papers about Madaba or Amman, we had a knock on our window. The guy who was behind us in line had overheard our conversation and told us that his friend and him would lead us to the Eastern Desert Castles if we liked. We thought why not and headed out behind them. At one point we weren’t sure if they were beckoning for us to follow them, but they were right as we saw the exit for the southern route we did a U turn. Finally confused we both pulled to the side of the road. The guys came over to the car and confessed that they actually didn’t know where they were going either and so we showed them our map. They also said we couldn’t take the southern route. This time they elaborated - “It’s dangerous!” … Obviously we were intrigued now because I was told that Jordan wasn’t dangerous at all. Although I suppose it could be like going into Brixton, or East Hastings… they wouldn’t elaborate more than the fact that there were people who didn’t speak English and who were dangerous. Deflated we headed back to Madaba to look at the mosaics.

We had our final meal and headed to the airport rolling up about 5:30pm. When we were finally assisted by the man at Thrifty, we finally got the answer about why that southern route was dangerous. Apparently there are/were Bedouin tribes who are bandits and steal all your stuff. Good thing we didn’t venture down that road. We had a bit of time before the flight and as expected we saw many of the people we had met throughout our travels in Jordan, all on the same flight as us. When we got home, Patrick and I raced from Gatwick home, calling it a draw as I walked into my door at 1:55am Monday, March 12th. Ready for work that day.