...and the wind is buffeting my spare room curtains, thanks to the thoughtful air vent that a former resident / landlord thought might be a useful feature in a bedroom window. No way of closing it, so if you're thinking of coming and spending a weekend as my house guest, probably best to hold off until spring.
Another month-long gap between posts suggests that life has once again been too busy and interesting to bother writing about.
I'm happy to say that both I and the rest of the family made it to the top of Ben Nevis back in September; I'll stick a couple of pics on the blog once I've got them onto Flickr (because you can never pollute the internet too much with duplicate uploads). The mountain's pretty high - higher than I was expecting in all honesty. Yes, it's the tallest point in the UK, but I'd been led to believe it wouldn't be too much of a mission getting up there. There was something other-worldly about walking inside a cloud across the crushed rock that forms the summit - but the trek was definitely worth it.
Whilst halfway up, I learned that Ireland had defeated Australia in the Rugby World Cup, which is currently nearing its denouement as the hosts prepare for what should surely be a walkover against an under par and extremely fortunate French team, who were aided by some shocking refereeing in the semi final which saw Wales - the best team to watch in the whole tournament - play for 3/4 of the game with only 14 men after their captain and best player, Sam Warburton, was sent off for an over-exuberant tackle. Letter of the law 1, Spirit of the game 0. As it transpired, had Wales nailed any one of the 4 kicks they missed during the match, they'd be preparing for the biggest game of their lives now, but it wasn't to be. Ireland, alas, didn't reach the heady heights of their upset in Auckland again, and were comprehensively dispatched by the Welsh in the Quarter Finals. Still, the boys can hold their heads high.
Besides that, our flat was completely redecorated whilst we continued living in it, which was a logistical nightmare of epic proportions but has been well worth it, in that we can now have showers without soaking the plaster on the wall (amazing invention, tiles), although the effect of all the fresh paint is somewhat detracted by the carpets, which were shoddy to begin with but now bear the scars of flamboyant painting by Martin the decorator, who didn't bother covering them as he was told they were being replaced. That, I fear, has been put on ice by our landlord who seemed to baulk at the cost the rest of the decorating amounted to.
At least the place was looking good for the arrival of J's parents on their first trip to see where their daughter hangs out. They seemed to enjoy London town, and seemed happy enough with where we're living - although given I still don't speak Polish, they could have been slagging me off for the whole week for making her live in a squat for all I know. Grasping some basic sentences is back on my list of 'things to do this winter', although yet again is just below 'sit in the pub all weekend'. We'll see how that goes.
