Party Girl

Hello Dear Readers,

April has been a party month, last weekend a friend from work had a duel birthday party with her fiance. They are both from Cyprus so I got to practice my Greek a little bit.

Here I am, sporting my REAL pearls (thank's Mom, I love 'em) and my convertible top/skirt. It isn't quite warm enough here for strapless tops, but I'm gearing up for our trip to Cyprus next week.

This week was the opening of the butterfly exibit at the Natural History Museum. They had face painting there for the Friends and Family event, and Hannah and I had ours done. To my knowledge it was the first time I had it done. We requested ferns, but I think it was a little outside the scope of her expertise....

The best part was going home with it, I haven't had that many looks and double takes on my way home. Of course I would forget that I had it on and think, why is that person looking at me funny? The weather was so lovely and so are we!

Cyprus trip on the 24th, lots of lovely photos promised for that!

Spring is here and weekends are back!

Hello Dear Readers,

Well we changed the clocks this weekend and none too soon, the sun gets up so early it doesn't let us sleep! Last weekend was my last Saturday working at Kew, I finally finished databasing all 5000 Danthonioid grasses, phew! To celebrate Chris came up after I finished and we walked around the gardens.
They were amazing, all the spring flowers in bloom. Behind me is a field of crocus and behind that fields of daffodils. People were out WITHOUT COATS ON. Amazing. I'll still be working at Kew a bit with my job at the Natural History Museum, but thankfully it will be during the week and not on Saturdays!

This weekend was the big Boat Race between Oxford and Cambridge Universities. It's always a big deal, and the best thing is the starting line is just two blocks from my house.
Chris managed to reach up and grab a shot of them as they went by, with a flotilla of camera crews and good old boys (former rowers) following behind. We watched the beginning in person, then walked home and watched the end (Oxford won by about 13 seconds) at home on the tv.

In further celebration of my new found free time, I spent all morning crafting away.
Can you guess what this is? Given my past history, perhaps you can..... it's a pair of underwear made from a really neat gaming t-shirt Patrick handed down to me. This is Prince of Persia in some of his old 8 bit incarnations (Apple II!). Perhaps it will inspire me to jump further and higher at the gym, esp. with Jake Gyllenhaal on my bottom giving me a boost.

I've also been working on some spinning with this lovely silk and alpaca given to me by a friend in my knitting group (she also gave me this awesome spindle to go with it, I love it!) I made another lavender birdie sachet and a fabric flower for some friends who are having a birthday party next weekend.

I'm also working on a small prodded rug for our shoes in the room. I'm running out of fabric for crafts! I'm planning on stocking up again when I visit my sister at the end of May, or maybe Patrick will have a clean-out of his closet. It's such a nice day today I'll probably go out and work on my 'garden' which consists of 2 pots of plants. I got some strawberry seeds from my friends when I left Kew and I'm going to get the soil ready to plant today.

Cheerio!

Last Minute Reprieve

Hello Dear Readers,

As usually seems to happen to me, I've been saved from destitution and poverty at (nearly) the last minute! The guy in charge of the project I've been working on has been able to secure extensions for our team and I'll be working at the museum until next April! This is great news as it's very likely Chris will lose the job he has now with all the government re-structuring they are doing.

Just wanted to pass on the happy news and encourage anyone who wants to get a behind the scenes tour of the Natural History Museum at London do to so before next April!

P.S. Amy, this means it's on! Break out the Krazy Glue...

Happy Birthday....to me!

Hello Dear Readers,

Yesterday was my 29th birthday and what a wonderful day it was! First, unexpectedly, I got a lovely card from all my friends at the Natural History Museum and THEN they sang Happy Birthday To You. In the middle of free tea Fridays in the tea room. Though my back was to the rest of the room, apparently the director of science was there too and joined in. How fantastic! I believe I turned a brilliant shade of crimson, but it was really lovely to see how many friends I've made there in such a short time.

Shortly after my good friend from Graduate School who lives in Cambridge arrived.

Here she is, 9 months along and still has the energy to come down here and celebrate my birthday with me, what a trooper! We had an amazing day, I showed her around the back scenes at the museum (while she checked out every ladies bathroom......;-) ) and then we went up to High Street Kensington for a little Starbucks and some shopping. Later we met up with some friends at the Museum at a pub, but then had to dash off to dinner at a vegan place.

With us were Jess, Patrick, Chris, Molly, and a friend from work, Hannah, who made it all the way out despite having to pop out early because of another engagement (and I forgot to take a photo till after she left). Thanks for coming Hannah!

The food was great but the service extra slow, maybe that was just because we knew there was birthday cake waiting at home! We just made the 74 bus and rode it home and then devoured the extra special Lindon Family Traditional Birthday Cake which I made with ingredients Patrick smuggled in when he went to the US for Thanksgiving (and which I had snuck in last year to surprise Patrick).

Finally, I got tons of really sweet presents and excellent cards (Patrick and Jeff going the extra mile to personalize the cards for me...)

I love March because it means I get to stop washing my face with Coal Tar soap and start using lovely Lush products again! A friend suggested I have my own Lush spa day and I think that's exactly what I'll do today! Special bath, face mask, moisturize my skin, wash with 9-5 and toner, then finish off with a little massage on my legs which are sore from running to work 3 days last week. Notice the pair of socks I bought yesterday at UniQlo specifically for running in. They have a L and a R! No more aching feet..... I hope.

I have been working Saturdays and Sundays since December, but today I'm taking THE WHOLE WEEKEND OFF which so far has been amazing and it's only 11 am.... beautiful sunny day, I'm going to go hang the laundry out back and perhaps take a walk by the river. I may even have time for TWO posts this weekend!

Thanks for all the lovely birthday wishes everyone, and a special shout out to Susan Clarks's mother who I found out reads this blog! I think that brings the readership up to 5? I'm doing better than Car Talk!

The end is neigh...

Hello Dear Readers,

Riding the bus can be a pretty interesting thing, you see all kinds of people with all kinds of ideas about what is appropriate behaviour in public and what isn't.

There is talk here about putting cell phone signal on the underground. Now for those of you (I am mainly talking to you in the US) that aren't familiar with public transportation, one of the most annoying things is someone speaking loudly into their phone. Overheard in the past month by me alone was a woman who for 20 min kept picking up her phone, yelling "I'm not talking to you, I'm not talking to you, I'm hanging up, I'm hanging up" Hang up. Repeat. A woman with a very strong speech impediment seemingly deliberately choosing to use words she couldn't say properly and the person on the other line couldn't understand, so that she kept saying them over and over, louder and louder, spitting as she spoke. And there was the time I got on the bus and at the next stop a woman got up, turned to the woman behind her and said "If you don't want to hear people talking on their phones then you need to get a car or take a taxi cab because this is public space" and walking off. Apparently she had been loud on her phone and the other woman asked her to tone it down and she offended by that.

My question is, in all the interviews where they ask people their opinions about cell signal on the tube, everyone says they don't want to hear other people talking on their phones, but where are all these people that we hear talking? How come they are never interviewed? I suppose it's only other people's conversations we don't want to hear, not our own.

Finally, yesterday while getting off the bus, I saw a baby in a stroller. The baby was lying down, so she couldn't have been older than a year, but she was holding in her two hands her mommy's iPhone, and watching a movie. I would not have been surprised to see her flick through the YouTube selections with her chubby finger after her video was over......

Doing his mother proud.

Hello Dear Readers,

Been another busy few weeks here across the pond, I've been gymming, knitting, cleaning, digitizing specimens etc. But most of all enjoying the knitting! I have a list twice as long as my arm of projects to do and with the bus rides and knitting groups I've been getting through it. I finally finished both monkeys.

Here they are hanging off Chris who is dressed sharp for his Visa photo to come to the US (yes, everyone needs a visa to visit the US even for vacation, CRAZY!)

Yesterday was Chris's 31'st birthday, as a lovely gift I got him some hair loss tonic. It shows I care! Pat, Chris and I all went to a great little Persian place near our house and had an amazing meal.

Today I did my knitting class in the morning and have been chilling out this evening at home, knitting and cooking. I was in the kitchen when I heard a strange sound, a kind of high buzzing whine, when I went up to investigate I found this:

Patrick doing a serious clean of his room, using the crevice tool and everything! Mom, this photo is for you.

Happy Blogiversary to Me!

Hello Dear Readers,

The 10th of February was a very special day for me. That's right, it marks ONE YEAR since I posted this about my troublesome trip to the UK. Well, I've been here for one year now and what a fun time it's been! It's so nice to be able to look back over my year of posts and pictures and see how far I've come, from no job to my dream of working at Kew to my new position at the British Natural History Museum. I was floored by a cold for the last week so I've been pretty lazy and have no pictures to post but I have been busy having fun and knitting up a storm, so many deadlines to meet. Chris and I went to see Totem which was AMAZING. Really inspiring, makes me want to kick up my yoga a bit. Then we went to a great vegan reesturant in South Kensington, dangerously close to my work..... I'm just relaxing at home today te shake the remnants of my cold, but plan to be back a the gym starting tomorrow.

Hope you guys have enjoyed reading my blog as much as I enjoy writing it, and most of all hearing from you.

Here's to another good year of posting. I managed 67 last year, that's at least once a week, not too bad!