Friday, July 25, 2008

Trips and Chips

Hey, it's been awhile. Well let's see... we are now more or less completely settled into the flat, aside from our washing machine that still has not been re-paired/-placed despite reminders to the landlord and the rental agency. But that's boring.

Interesting: We went to Oban for Fraser's birthday. By the way, Fraser's birthday- I didn't write about any of my plans because they were surprises and it doesn't make sense to write about surprises on a blob. At any rate, he knew for awhile I was planning a trip for him. He had to know that because he needed to not make plans or go to work during those 3 days, but I didn't tell him where and stealthily made plans for us to go stay at a bed and breakfast in Oban on the west coast of Scotland, somewhere we've been wanting to go for awhile. So he knew I was up to something, and on Saturday I told him where we were going since it did involve him driving there (kind of cheapens the deal, I know, but whaddya gonna do).

What I didn't tell him was at that very moment about 8 of his closest friends were gathering at the bar just over the road from us, to surprise him with beer and presents. Aha! Zing! He was surprised to see everyone and I was proud to have pulled it off :o) I told him we were just meeting Emma and her friends and we should come up with a secret "time-to-go" word in case the bar was manky. It's actually pretty nice, the Roseburn Bar. I think we will probably go again more than once.

After the big hoorah people came to see the flat and eat the carrot cake that I somehow made using grams and milliliters. (Damn you other system, whatever you be named! I like the metric system. It makes sense, I think, once you get the hang of it. I should get KHDMDCM tattooed on my hand though because it takes too long to recite "King Henry Danced Merrily Down Central Main" all the time. But I digress.)

Once cake and yelling the word cake (as shown in this video) had been put away, we went uptown and witnessed skanky hen parties, aka bachelorette parties. HEY, my spellcheck says bachelorette is spelled wrong. Spellcheck is also spelled wrong. Well. I'm leavin' em. At about 2 am we walked home and konked out, then got up in the morning to head to Oban. It's a beautiful ride, even if you get carsick. I would open my eyes to say "ooh pretty" and then shut them. I've never been on such a long, narrow, windy road-- and all of this goes by at least 60 mph. I kept telling Fraser like an old lady to slow down and he said he was only going the speed limit. On the ride back I had some strong ginger ale, so all was good in the hood.

Oban is nice though not what I had exactly hoped for. You couldn't beat the view from our room really, it looked right out over the water to the different isles. Very nice. All in all, it felt like November, was cloudy for all but 5 hours, and we ate some food that made us feel really bad, but we truly made the most of it and had a good time. We went to see the old Inverary jail and some old piles of rocks. Yeah, it may be ignorant of us to not appreciate ancient history but neither one of us can get revved up about what appears to be, literally, a pile of white stones. I understand they hold greater significance than that, but when you're carsick and/or not feeling good in general, it's hard to dig up an appetite for learning. That night we saw Wall-E in a tiny theater. Fraser really liked it. I did too but I already knew this (I saw it when it came out in the states).

The next day, after check out, we went to the sea life sanctuary to see seals and an otter and other things, and I felt like learning all about them thanks to the ginger ale. Well, to be honest, they're animals and not rocks, so that might be why I was much more interested, but that's beside the point. My favorite part was the seals. They're so cute and call me crazy, but they made me miss my dog. I e-mailed the shelter here in Edinburgh to see if they take volunteer help but I haven't heard back yet.

After sea life, we went to Crieff, birthplace of Ewan MacGregor, as well as, and more importantly, Fraser's mum. Gaggy (grandma) and Bud (grandpa) live there, so we had tea (what they call dinner/supper here) with them in the garden, because while it was cloudy in Oban, it was gorgeous everywhere else! It was a nice afternoon :o)

That more or less brings us up to now. Fraser and I have joined another gym called the David Lloyd, one that I can get to by bus since I can't get out to where he works unless someone brings me, and I can't always count on that. In fact I'm going to head over there in an hour or two. After that, we're getting Indian from this place nearby that's supposed to be very good and then seeing the Dark Knight, which, by the way is ranked #1 on IMDB as the best movie of all time- above The Godfather. See for yoself.

That's that... sorry for writing a novelette but it wath very nethethary-- that's a wonderful SNL reference to Philip the Hyper Hypo, by the way.

I want, once again, to throw out a small plea/invite to anyone who wants to come visit- we have the spare room, we're in walking distance to uptown, all of that good stuff. If you want to visit the UK and save some ££/$$, now's really the time. And hey, I stayed with friends over here once and it was the best choice I ever made ;o)

No promises on that, but I promise to be happy to have you, and if you can make it before I start Uni or get a job (or before YOU get a job), even better. Miss you all.

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