Sorry for the delay, there’s no internet access where we’re staying at the moment. We’re here, safe and sound. It took longer than we thought - the ferry was late and the roads were bad. We arrived at about 11:40pm. The house is beautiful, Helen and MJ are lovely, the dogs are all good friends and the cats haven’t disappeared yet.

It was Helen and MJ’s house-warming on Saturday, and they rented a bar! Much beer (and vodka, and wine) was had by all, and I had a veeery bad head on Sunday - so much so I ended up going back to bed for the afternoon! I was fine when I got up at around 5pm though. We Wii’d all night last night - great fun!

Today we were up and out bright and early to sort out our PPS numbers - same sort of thing as a NI number. The place was closed until 2pm today for some reason, so we’re going back tomorrow. Also went in to see about a bank account - no can do until we get our PPS number. Oh well, we had thought that might be the case anyway.

We did a bit of tentative job-hunting too. We can’t really start work until we have a PPS number, but we should be able to attend interviews and such. We’ve been looking in shop windows and making enquiries, I’ve emailed my CV to an agency, and we’re going to print a load of copies off and drop them into places tomorrow. There’s quite a lot in the local paper too.

We’re going with MJ to pick up Helen from work in a while, and then to the beach with the dogs.

I’ll write more soon, but at least you know what we’re up to! I’ll post some pics soon too.

Am very busy and important.

Bridget Jones quote over and done with, I shall tell you I've just popped in to tell you that I am packing like a mad packing thing, and promise to catch up on the gabillions of blog posts you lot have posted since I finished work on Thursday.

Just not exactly sure when yet. Or from where.

And happy fisting birthday Abi! x

(Soy, I'm with you - I HATE PACKING!)

Got home around 4pm, which is quite late really considering it was supposed to be last night. Fill you in later on the goings-on, and it seems like people have been posting none-stop since we left, so it may take me some time to catch up!

Really not looking forward to driving to Birmingham. Not least because I just downed half a pint of orange juice and it's swishing around in my tummy.

Bleugh.

...that in about 20 mintues it's ONE WEEK TIL WE MOVE!

I finished work today, which makes me unemployed!

This is my sister with her new baby!

No idea when he was due cos she kept changing the dates when it suited her, but here he is at last, a home birth, weighing in at 7lb 3oz.

(p.s. it's pronounced "Lewis" not "Louie"!)

So, I was sort of right.

Apple today announced not one, not two, not three, but FOUR new iPods.

Well, three new iPods and a new colour Shuffle, really. They have released a Shuffle in red (or RED) to raise money for charity.

First up, and least interstingly as far as I am concerned, is the new Nano. It's now sort of square, with a bigger screen and video capability. They've also created a new UI - you can now use Coverflow (browse your music by flicking through your album covers) on your Nano - albeit a bit jerkily by all accounts. Good stuff, but too weeny for me. It's very thin. 4GB for £99, 8GB for £129.

Next up is the iPod Classic - the old iPod with a new name to distinguish it properly from the other products in the iPod range.

It's now all metal - no white plastic on the front face - and the smallest size is now 80GB. You can get a 160GB iPod! That's up to 40,000 songs! Or, of course, 160GB of portable HDD space, less however much music you have. Amazing. Also with added Coverflow. 80GB for £159, or 160GB £229.

Finally, the biggy. The iPod Touch.

Basically, this thing is an iPhone without the phone. Which is perfect for me, cos it would take a lot to get me away from my Nokia.

It has a touch screen, the same interface as the iPhone, it's thinner than the iPhone, it's wi-fi enabled and Apple are launching a wi-fi version of iTunes music store to enable you to download music directly to your iPod.

Downsides? The bloody memory. I know it has to be flash memory to be thin, but a choice of 8GB or 16GB is awful when I like to have all of my music with me - over 30Gb. I would love one of these, but I'd have to be pretty strict with my playlists.

Having said that, I don't listen to the vast majority of my music - but I like to have it available if I need it. Hmmmm some thinking to be done. 8GB for £199, or 16GB for £269.

*sigh*

Who will pay me for sex?

My sister sent me this by email, so I thought I'd start one going for once!

Gwaaaaarn, have a go!

--------------------------------------------------------------

Two Names You Go By:
1 Brad
2 Bradley

Two Things You Are Wearing Right Now:
1 Funky blue short sleeved shirt
2 Grey jeans

Two Things You Would Want (or have) in a Relationship:
1 Love
2 Trust

Two Things You Should Do:
1 Some packing
2 Some washing up

Two Things You Want Very Badly At The Moment:
1 Someone to pack for me
2 Some money

Two Things You Did Last Night:
1 Packing
2 Cooked lovely food

Two Things You Hated Today:
1 Getting up
2 Having to turn the car round at the bottom of the road to go back for Paddy's phone

Two People You Last Talked To:
1 Paddy
2 Vicky at work

Two Things You're doing tomorrow:
1 Packing (can you see a pattern developing here?)
2 Going out for a leaving drink with people that can't make it on Friday

Two longest recent car rides:
1 Birmingham
2 Pendine

Two Favourite Holidays:
1 Gran Canaria
2 Dunster

Two Favourite Beverages:
1 Coke! Real Coca-cola. Not diet, not zero. But cherry is allowed.
2 Fruit juice

Two Things That Would Surprise You About Me:
1 I am quite glad we are having a break from fostering
2 I used to have long hair and lots of piercings

Two Jobs I Have Had In My Life:
1 Barman
2 Technical Support type person

Two Movies I would watch over and over:
1 Heathers
2 Labyrinth

Two Places I have lived:
1 Sheldon
2 Woking

Two Favourite kinds of foods:
1 Indian
2 Italian

Two Places I'd rather be right now:
1 Ireland
2 Visiting friends in Birmingham

My friend's Facebook status is set as "...is wishing she had known the window cleaner was coming today."

I'll tell you more as soon as I know.

...even I think it's sad, how excited I get over an Apple event.

And if I'm this excited today, imagine what I'll be like tomorrow!

If you are ever in the Ammanford area, avoid the Perrivale Inn.

We have eaten there before, but this weekend we had a very bad experience. It's under new management and they don't have a clue. The food was awful, but the customer service was even worse.

Half the beer was not available, the wine was either red or white, no choice, and the coke came out of a 1.5 litre bottle.

Reheated boiled-to-death mushy vegies, miserly meat portions, watery gravy, ONE roast potato per plate(!), complaints ignored by waiters and when I spoke to the person in charge who happened to be the chef, I was told to pay the bill and leave the premises! My complaints were not rude, I was straightforward and explained that we thought he needed to know in order to improve things. His reaction completely threw me - he was obviously offended that I didn’t like his slop food.

We were a party of 11, and he said he had served 23 covers and nobody else had complained - our party made up almost half of his covers! A 50% complaint ratio! I had made it clear that I knew the roaster thing was silly, but on top of everything else I thought it was worth mentioning. He told me it was ridiculous to complain about only getting one roaster and he had worked in many pubs and the portions we received were standard.

I told him that we have eaten in many pubs, and the portions were always much better. My sister literally had a sliver of beef on her plate - her daughter’s “kiddies” portion was bigger. We had told the waiter and he did nothing.

The chef’s reaction made me react angrily - I expected an apology at least - so I said there was no way I was paying full price for a few mouthfulls of meat, a yorkshire pudding and a manky roaster.

I got picky. There was a big sign advertising home-made desserts. We had been offered chocolate fudge cake which was patently out of a box, and fruit cocktail out of a tin - which none of us were inclined to try. When I asked the chef where the “home-made” desserts were, he said the chocolate fudge cake and fruit cocktail were home-made. He wouldn’t fetch me a sample though. I told him I hadn’t had a pudding, and I wanted the fruit cocktail please as it was included in my meal. He pointed at the microscopic writing at the bottom of the sign - “offer applies to starter and main course”. I was gobsmacked - every other pub I’ve been to that offers two courses gives you the choice of started or dessert.

Eventually, he gave us a 10% discount (big deal) to get rid of us and we left, with a sarcastic “thank you” from behind the bar.

To make matters worse, on the way home, I did a quick sum in my head - even with the discount the bastard had overcharged us! 11 people, £6 per head assuming he charged the kids meals at full price, plus a round of drinks at around £15 adds up to less than we paid. Bunch of arse!