Thursday, May 08, 2008

Bit amusing!

I was googling the website for the Archdiocese of Westminster today (as I now have a need for it!) and I just typed in Westminster, then thought ... well that was stupid... Westminster is rather broad topic. Then, to my surprise it was fourth on the list AHEAD of Westminster Abby... just thought it was surprising!

Tuesday, May 06, 2008

Wow...
So those 10 points go to Jackie! With her very quick hand on the buzzer! Don't worry Jackie I'll keep score... and you'll end up winning SOMETHING I'm sure!

Hmmm I'm very bored without pictures on here... I'll try and put some up soon.
Steps

David has asked howmany steps exactly there are in the building... Well from my office in the basement to my room in the house there are 67 steps, but to the top of the house there are 87 steps but then that doesn't count the tower steps ...which I haven't even been up yet... so, there's probably something like 100...but I'll give you an update when I go up there!

Monday, May 05, 2008

Hay Fever
 Is truly, highly over-rated... Ah ah ah Choooooooooo!!!!!!!!!! Snif snif snnnnnnnnnnnnif! Am in the most beautiful countryside for my long weekend... but my gosh... rapeseed (Canola in Aussie terms) is KILLING me!!!! Mum, Dad, don't you remember how it used to knock you out for weeks?????

Sunday, May 04, 2008

Books

Books are heavy. Did you know that? I couldn't take a SINGLE book with me to England... :( was heartbreaking. HOWEVER I was telling this to Hannah, the most lovely girl who works across the desk from me..... and SHE told me that there was a Borders around the corner. So this little Monification took her little self down the street and low and behold there it was shinning in all its bright neon glory. OK so as a rule I'm a "cute little bookshop around the corner" (ten points for the movie reference - Meg you can't play, it's not fair to everyone else) kind of girl. But people. Desperate times call for desperate measures. I raided the place good and proper. I bought North and South, Tale of Two Cities, Picture of Dorian Gray (or i it Gray??) , Jesus of Nazareth and Shakespeare, by Bill Bryson. I know that it's kind of a bit of an English theme apart from the Benedict book but it doesn't matter where I am I STILL would have bought those books! Am now very excited. I have reading material!!! And I really don't want to convert all those pounds into dollars... it might make me weep!!! Time for sleep.
Night!

Monica Arrives in London...Pt1 (I think!)

Well so I sat in the airport lounge at Melbourne airport on the 25th of April....yes ANZAC day (which I felt was quite apt) trying to psych myself up for the super long flight I was about to get onto. I was also pinching myself trying to work out if this was really happening or if it was all part of some bizarre dream. But it was true... crazy , but true. While I was trying to carry all my stuff onto the plane I kept on getting calls (THANKS guys...) which caused me to drop just about everything I was carrying  on more than one occasion! I felt like it was some kind of bad omen! Lucky for me I don't believe in omens so I just got on with it! 

First part of the flight was about 8 hours and I was so happy that I was able to sleep though a good proportion of it! My lead up to leaving was so intense and crazy that I was completely exhausted! AND my most wonderful youngest brother Tim let me take his really great pillow with me which made all the difference in the world! You never understand how far away your head is from you shoulder until you have to sleep sitting up without a pillow! 

So we arrived at about 6am into Hong Kong and spent about an hour and a half in the airport. It was SO good to be able to stretch out properly. Things were all running very smoothly so we got back on board and started the longer stretch which was about twelve and a half hours. It was really fascinating to fly over China (yes James you're right, it's even interesting from the sky!) and Russia, Germany. 

Just at the point where I thought I would never be able to watch another movie ever again we started to fly across England. It was super busy at Heathrow (for a change) and we had to circle for a bit first,  even when we did touch down there were no gates free so we had to get out onto the tarmac and catch a bus to the terminal. It too FOREVER!

THEN we had to get through Immigration which just seemed like it would never end. Poor Jeanine who was waiting for me outside was beginning to think she had missed me coming out!  But, yes of course, I did finally come out! We then made our trek on the tube with my massive suitcase... we made a couple of strategic plans " just in case" one of us get held behind because of the massive proportions of this suitcase of mine. But luckily people in the tightly packed tube carriage somehow managed to let us squeeze past. 

I kept on having that weird feeling of  "am I really here" going through my head over and over. But we finally got to St Patrick's in Soho where we climbed the stairs (lots of stairs) to my room! Al I really wanted to do was curl up in a ball and go to sleep. But (and it was a good plan) the girls wouldn't let me and i was shown around the place, and then taken out to dinner. It was a really lovely and absolutely hilarious dinner. But I was beginning to fade rather badly so as son as we got home I climbed (I'm serious... there are a LOT of stairs) up to my room and just fell into bed! 

Ok .... stay tuned for part 2!!!!!

Thursday, May 01, 2008

Ahhhh!

The "@" key is in the wrong place on the keyboard! Really quite annoying! You just don't realise how many times you use it until it's not where you want it to be!
I'm here!

Ok so I am now in London but things are so crazy that I hardly have time to write anything decent here just yet! Give me a couple more days and a few more nights of solid sleep and I'll be much better!