Not quite a month yet
Hey, like the title says, it's been not quite a month since the last time I posted. To be fair though, not a whole lot has happened since the last post apart from the simple hustle and bustle of getting on with life and getting ready for Christmas.
We've also been rather sick again the last couple of weeks, and that's always nice. I guess that combining being in a foreign country and a completely different hemisphere, coupled with Willow going to school has introduced our immune systems to a whole new range of nasties.
Speaking of Willow and school, one of the things that has been happening is that Willow has got to go to a couple of birthday parties of her classmates. One was at a home but the other was at the Glasgow Science Centre, which is a rather good venue with educational value galore. Unfortunately it seems that she now thinks that this might be a good place to have her birthday. Not sure that we could afford it but we will just have to see, hopefully she might have forgotten it by then.
The weather in general has been much like a decent Adelaide winter (well decent in my way of thinking) with the temperature tending to sit around the 6ish degree mark. We have had a couple of 0 to -1 days (with icy rain of course) but unfortunately they have been few and far between. Apart from that the weather is Scottish, kinda cold but mostly grey and drizzly. There has not even been that many really rainy days and storms seem to be few and far between (not sure if any days have really qualified as a storm yet). I'm hoping that it will snow this year as they have been predicting it will, that will be nice.
The other thing that has been really nice at the moment is that Glasgow has been hosting a series of European fairs at a spot in the centre of the city called St Enoch's Square (it's right outside a big shopping centre of the same name). The first of that was a continental market, which was mostly populated by French stalls and one solitary German baker. The food there was fantastic. There was cheese, crepes, potatoes provincial, toasted cheesy baguettes, fruits, bakery/patissery, soups, sweets and many other things. I basically could not help popping in to buy lunch or dinner or a snack or anything really. We especially liked getting a nice cup of mulled wine, especially on the colder days. That lasted about a week.
About a week later, the German Christmas Market from Nuremberg (which I have discovered is a sister city of Glasgow) arrived. It has a similar array of foods and other things, and I have been having a hard time staying away to save money. This one will be here more or less until Christmas. And a good thing too.
Anyway, the continental market brings up a subject that many may find rather interesting. Annmarie and I have come to a tentative decision to move to France after having lived here for a while longer. This is part of an extended plan. We are looking to buy a small property here in Scotland to build up some more funds. Also, due to the fact that more than likely I am going to need to work in France, that I am going to need to speak French (oddly enough). There for, I have started to learn French. I have also, of course, now gone French crazy. My current favourite film is Le Fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain, and we have it on DVD along with Delicatessen. Tomorrow we are heading up to Alliance Française to see what the course costs are like and to join their library so we can borrow some French books and films. So it looks like Tokyo and Japanese will have to wait for a while.
Anyway, gotta get off to bed so we can head off nice and early (and maybe drop in on the German market on the way out, and maybe back too). I'll of course try to post more often and keep people up to date.
Bonne nuit et à bientôt.
We've also been rather sick again the last couple of weeks, and that's always nice. I guess that combining being in a foreign country and a completely different hemisphere, coupled with Willow going to school has introduced our immune systems to a whole new range of nasties.
Speaking of Willow and school, one of the things that has been happening is that Willow has got to go to a couple of birthday parties of her classmates. One was at a home but the other was at the Glasgow Science Centre, which is a rather good venue with educational value galore. Unfortunately it seems that she now thinks that this might be a good place to have her birthday. Not sure that we could afford it but we will just have to see, hopefully she might have forgotten it by then.
The weather in general has been much like a decent Adelaide winter (well decent in my way of thinking) with the temperature tending to sit around the 6ish degree mark. We have had a couple of 0 to -1 days (with icy rain of course) but unfortunately they have been few and far between. Apart from that the weather is Scottish, kinda cold but mostly grey and drizzly. There has not even been that many really rainy days and storms seem to be few and far between (not sure if any days have really qualified as a storm yet). I'm hoping that it will snow this year as they have been predicting it will, that will be nice.
The other thing that has been really nice at the moment is that Glasgow has been hosting a series of European fairs at a spot in the centre of the city called St Enoch's Square (it's right outside a big shopping centre of the same name). The first of that was a continental market, which was mostly populated by French stalls and one solitary German baker. The food there was fantastic. There was cheese, crepes, potatoes provincial, toasted cheesy baguettes, fruits, bakery/patissery, soups, sweets and many other things. I basically could not help popping in to buy lunch or dinner or a snack or anything really. We especially liked getting a nice cup of mulled wine, especially on the colder days. That lasted about a week.
About a week later, the German Christmas Market from Nuremberg (which I have discovered is a sister city of Glasgow) arrived. It has a similar array of foods and other things, and I have been having a hard time staying away to save money. This one will be here more or less until Christmas. And a good thing too.
Anyway, the continental market brings up a subject that many may find rather interesting. Annmarie and I have come to a tentative decision to move to France after having lived here for a while longer. This is part of an extended plan. We are looking to buy a small property here in Scotland to build up some more funds. Also, due to the fact that more than likely I am going to need to work in France, that I am going to need to speak French (oddly enough). There for, I have started to learn French. I have also, of course, now gone French crazy. My current favourite film is Le Fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain, and we have it on DVD along with Delicatessen. Tomorrow we are heading up to Alliance Française to see what the course costs are like and to join their library so we can borrow some French books and films. So it looks like Tokyo and Japanese will have to wait for a while.
Anyway, gotta get off to bed so we can head off nice and early (and maybe drop in on the German market on the way out, and maybe back too). I'll of course try to post more often and keep people up to date.
Bonne nuit et à bientôt.
posted by Xavier at 23:28
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