Sometimes you are at the airport....

...all day. Well, more than a day actually. Various airports, planes, terminals, in 3 countries. Right now, we are waiting in Chicago for our flight to El Paso.

We left the house at 2am Colchester time, and we are scheduled to get to El Paso at midnight Mountain Time. So that is a total of 29 hours that went something like this: Taxi to Colchester bus station(10 mins) > Coach to London Heathrow Airport(about 2.5 hours) > Baggage Check in, Passport check, Security(2 hours), Plane to Madrid(2 hours) > Passport Check, Security(1hr), Plane to Chicago(9hrs) > Passport Check, Pick up baggage again, go through customs, go through US security(the most intensive!), wait for El Paso plane(8 hours) > Plane to El Paso(3 hours)*...

*times are approximate so yeah....we will be relieved to finally get there!

Sometimes you take a mini tour of the world...

...to get to your destination. We start in Colchester:

Take a coach to London:

Then a plane to Madrid:

Then switch planes to get to Chicago:

Wait in Chicago 8 hours, to then get on a plane to El Paso:

Because we miss you all THAT much! lol On serious note, it would be nice to see more than just the insides of planes and airports on the way. But whatever :) See you all soon!!

Sometimes you clean...

...and then work 4 hours. During your lunch, go to library to print coach tickets to airport, sell TV, donate some stuff to the charity shop. Then work 4 more hours. And then clean some more.

Not our actual cleaning products, or floor. So yeah, not our pic.

Eat some cupcakes. Continue cleaning. Almost done. Must continue...at least we can see the finish line. It looks like the most successful house evacuation so far. So unless tragedy strikes, this shouldn't be so bad.

Sometimes you see the seven sisters...

...the Pleiades I mean. Check them out:

They don't look this awesome through binoculars, but it is still a majestic sight!

Tonight is a very clear night, which is rare here in England. Usually, it is cloudy. And I got some nice views of Jupiter and of the Pleiades, with my binoculars, which was awesome. I showed them to Geli too. This was in the "garden" at the house.

And well, other than that, I just worked again, I can't say I missed it. And also cleaned the house most of the time I wasn't working. So it was really really cool to see Jupiter and the Pleiades before calling it a night :)

Sometimes you are in Ghent...

...Random decision almost. But I am really glad we decided to take a train to Ghent, cuz it was incredibly impressive!! And now, 1 more day to see the rest of Brussels! w00t!

Sometimes you are in Bruges...

and it is awesome!!! It truly is a fairy tale town! I am also extremely tired, so that is all. Good night!

Sometimes you are in Belgium...

We can't talk to anybody, it sucks. And we just freeze when somebody talks to us. We must look so ridiculous! It's been a crazy day! Other than the language barrier and a pee incident, it has been brilliant! I'm dead and we are going to Bruges tomorrow, so good night!

Sometimes there is chaos at the house...

...because we're trying to move out of the country. And there's a trip to Belgium right in the middle of that. Yeah, awesome planning huh?! Either of those is hectic on it's own. So we decided to kick it up a notch, and do both in the same week.

I still find this flyer incredibly amusing. So here is another page:

For $2500 you can get an 810MB Hard Drive, a whopping 8MB RAM, AND a brutal 11" Display!!

And also, I know these news companies have a whole library of images at their disposal. So I think someone hates Torrado. Choosing this pic for this article was totally uncalled for(but funny!):

Sometimes old storeflyers are like time capsules...

...check out this flyer from September 1996!

Isn't it awesome?! And hilarious?!

16 MB RAM!
A MASSIVE 2GB HD!!
For just 2 grand!! hahaha

Sometimes you sign things in MS Paint...

..and it looks the same as your real signature. Apparently my handwriting is so bad, that I can sign things just as well with a mouse in MS paint.

That is exactly what my actual signature looks like! haha I had to sign some paperwork for the HR department, since I am being re-hired at work. And I didn't want to print, sign, and scan so I could send it back. So I decided to take screenshots of the documents, then "sign" them in paint, print to the CutePDF writer, and send them the PDFs...it worked. I also took a picture of a check(since we don't have a scanner), and wrote "VOID" on it in paint, since they needed a copy of a voided check for the direct deposit...so yeah, weird work around, but no paper was wasted and I didn't have to go to the library! w00t!

And I leave you with a black and white version of a picture I took in Bath. It was a mall....

Sometimes your senator is incompetent...

...don't believe me? See for yourself:

 

On another note, apparently people take vacations to go shopping. This was an ad when I was buying train tickets:

 

Sometimes you listen to Cicatriz...

...on a loop. Because this song is just that amazing!!!
I can seriously loop this song for days. This whole album is amazing, but this specific song really stands out for me. Beautiful, powerful, just amazing...

Sometimes you watch turtles...

...the Ninja Turtles that is! And with sophie and Geli :)

I didn't have a pic of the movies, and plus, this is way cooler! haha let's make it! Who's down?!

We are always at a loss as to what movies to watch with Sophie, since we don't like watching the same movies she likes over and over with her. And well, our collections isn't exactly for children. So I remembered we have the TMNT movies!(all 3!) So we watched the first one earlier in the week. I had low expectations, since re-watching childhood things is usually disappointing for me(DBZ, for example). So I was not expecting much, but I really liked it. I am sure part was nostalgia, but overall, it wasn't terrible, or bad at all really, I enjoyed it. So did Sophie. So that was really cool :) Today we watched part II, and I also liked it, and Geli didn't hate them either, so that was cool!

Sometimes you get free shoes...

...thanks to Geli!

 

We ordered a pair of shoes for Sophie since she destroyed her previous ones right away. But they took 40 days to get them to us, and sent the wrong size. Not only that, but we ordered them for £30 and by now, they were on sale for £10. Since it was one size too big, I was just going to keep them and order another pair. But Geli wrote them an email demanding they send the right size for free, since they took forever and messed up the order.

I think they sent two pairs for Sophie because they weren't sure if we ordered low tops or high tops, so they just sent both.

They agreed to do that and asked for my shoe size so they could send us an adult pair free for the inconvenience. Since Geli goes through her shoes almost as fast as Sophie, we gave them Geli's size. To our surprise, 3 pair of shoes arrived instead of 2. And this is the story of how we got 4 pairs of shoes for the price of one.

Sometimes pictures get left behind...

not all of them can be winners. These didn't make the cut...(to the FB album, which still hasn't been posted because Geli didn't give me enough time to edit the captions haha)


This guy for example, I didn't think was cool enough to put in the album... poor dude.

This one, just got lost amongst the hundreds of street art photos...you'll see

And this one, I had better shots of this strangely plain church...

So there you go. Not all pics can be winners kids...

Sometimes you're still processing pics...

...although barely. Today I had no time to do much. Just convert the already processed ones to JPEGs. I didn't get to do any new ones. After work, Geli takes over the PC, and during work, well, the Photo program is too memory and CPU intensive to use while working with my 10+ apps that I have running while working...so for now, here are a few:

Just a steel cable from a bridge at a train station...

A sign inside a church in Bristol! lol

And one of the most impressive murals we saw in Nelson Street in Bristol(imo):

Sophie said this happened to him because he didn't brush his teeth! LOL

Sometimes you process RAW files...

...with Geli, and it is awesome :)

I know I keep talking about RAW files, but they really are awesome. Check out these before/after shots: 

Detail on a church in Bristol. You have a lot of control over the color temperature(warmer on the right).

This one was a disaster, as you can see on the left. I don't know what happened! haha but it's nothing RAW can't handle apparently!

So yeah, a few hours so far, and we're only done with Bristol(initially 500 pics, got it) down to under 300). Still need to do Bath, and the panoramics from the top of the cabot tower in Bristol....

Sometimes you eat a different melon...

...and it is good! This one is called 'piel de sapo' for obvious reasons (unless you don't speak Spanish). It is from Spain, and this is what it looks like:

It tasted kind of like a honeydew melon and Geli didn't hate it, so it must have not been very similar to cantaloupe.

Sometimes FB tells you to add yourself...

...and I totally didn't! haha

 

I made an account for work, because they had an initiative to have everyone on it, and I try not to mix the two, because well, much of what I say is not exactly work friendly....except no one uses it, so it just sits there. Which is fine...

Sometimes the old people have to pay...

...full price for their buses and trains. It seems conservatives are the same just about everywhere. They're taking away the half price discount that over 60's and disabled people have here in the UK...so yeah, same rhetoric as in the US. Take away from the most vulnerable, because they see them as free-loaders, as pests, as a nuisance, that needs to be removed from the budget at the first opportunity...let the market sort them out. They're not our responsibility...

I would love to hear a good reason why the UK can't afford the half price fares for over 60's, but they can continue to have troops fighting in Iraq, Afghanistan(and even Lybia, I think). Priorities, priorities, priorities....I guess if you are over 60, and in the UK, you better take half as many coach/train trips as you did before...

Minor thing, I know. Especially when compared to the US, there they are cutting Medicare, Medicaid, and looking to gut Social Security. But it just aggravates me to no end to see these these things happen, when so much more money is being poured into destruction and death...

Sometimes you eat puttanesca...

...and it is delicious! Apparently, it has something to do with whores in Italy luring people in with food. This is what it looks like:

It has olives, parsley, garlic, capers, tomatoes, black beans and seasonings. It was so, so good!

And here are the beautiful tomatoes that became puttanesca:

Sometimes you just can't get used to your name...

..it is just weird to me, when an IM at work ends in what most people would consider a prayer.

I just can't get used to it. An IM, or an email ending with "Thank you Jesus" is just weird to me haha. Also, when I sign emails, I have to add at least an "R" after my name, else it just looks like Jesus wrote to you(funny when an IT helpdesk email replies that your issue is fixed and signed "Jesus" though lol)...it is a much bigger issue in English(in Spanish it isn't an issue actually, since it is a common name). So yeah...

Sometimes you go to a robot arena...

I know this entry is like a month after I went to the robot arena, but I figured it is better late than never, so here it goes.

We walked to school, so I got to see Geli's usual route, which was cool. I saw the window guy that Geli thinks is Russian, and it is pretty odd. The funny part, is i didn't see the window or the guy there until we were right in front of it, and we were talking about religion and as I passed his window I said something like "at least he isn't catholic" or something like that haha so he must have thought we hated catholics or something(if he understands English, which Geli thinks that he does not!).

Anyway, we saw this on the way to the school: 

And also, in case you were wondering, this is what the sky looked like on this day:

Also, we encountered a humped zebra crossing! But no zebras were crossing at the time:

This is the building the arena was in:

And in case you find yourself at this building, it is beyond this door, as explained on the sign:

This was the first robot I encountered. Although it was not in the arena:

Geli, at her workstation:

There is the wheelchair that can be driven with your face, thanks to Geli:

The arena!

Geli couldn't keep her eyes off of me while working. I don't blame her.

Apparently, this robot charges by humping the charger:

Geli, demonstrating how to drive with your face!

This robot was amazed, that you can drive a wheelchair with your face!

This one, not so much, it has seen a lot of things it said.

There are also videos, but there is no time to upload them right now. So it will have to wait until later. So there will be a robot arena update blog entry later :)

Sometimes you eat homemade ice cream...

...and it is delicious! Yesterday, we went to have some afternoon tea with some friends.  This was the bonus, after the meal:

It was a peanut butter cashew ice cream with chocolate, cream and sprinkles!!!

Check out the super cute calendar that Geli made Sophie:

Today we were supposed to go to the beach, hence the water and sun symbol.  But as we got to the bus stop, it started raining, so we cancelled that. Can you figure out the other symbols?

Sometimes it is 4:30am....

And I got nothing....it is very late. But I really like this picture. The London Eye. So enjoy? Maybe it is just for me :) lol

Sometimes you fix timeclocks...

These things:

People use them for clocking in and out of the facilities. They decided to re-IP like a hundred buildings(due to running out of IP addresses, so they had to assign then a larger subnet) and so the financial team(us) has had to call the buildings and reprogram the clocks(they can't be done remotely), one by one. So yeah, it's been going on for the last couple weeks or so. I don't mind it actually, it is time consuming though. So yeah, that's all I got to say. That and I really like playing super mario world(SNES) with Sophie :)