But we dance just as good as we walk

Last night I went to a Burns Night celebration. It was a lot of fun. I ate sort of a large lunch that day, I was a bit worried about the whole haggis thing. But it actually went way better than my experience with the fish and chips. I wouldn't go way out of my way to eat it again, but I thought it was actually pretty decent. I'm still in a bit of denial over what it was though. Maybe that helped.

I'm not sure how they decided who would get what. Some people got just scoops of the filling stuff, but I got the whole actual lump thing with the casing. Nervous but I figured I had to experience it, I was there after all. Tatties were pretty average, the neeps I could take or leave those not having a huge love of turnips. The carrots were all gone by the time the dish got to me, but no big loss there.

Then a bit of poetry and song. I've decided that I really need a great accent. My total lack of one, I don't think it serves me well. Gee, you sound like you come from the middle of Kansas maybe or maybe Nebraska or some other desolate state we have never heard of. Many of the women I was there with were just swooning over the Scottish accents as they read the poems, even when they were reading the bawdy parody poems.

The dancing was fun. The Muckers were pleasant enough. I liked them a lot better than the band we saw at another ceilidh last month, that one just sounded like funeral music and was a bit depressing. This was much happier and cheerful. The dances were completely confusing though. We laughed and tried to figure out what to do when she said time to strip the willow or whatever the ones were. Even the people who said they had to learn all of these in P.E. class were a bit confused too. I think I might need to do a bit more homework before the next one.

Like a red rubber ball

It is funny how you never really notice things until they are pointed out. There has been a small bit of controversy here with the post office, the red rubber band problem. Then once I started looking, wow, there really are tons of red rubber bands everywhere.

The postal carriers wrap bundles of mail in them and as they are delivering thing they go flying everywhere. One of the local councils filed a protest with them and it was answered with something like we deliver blah blah million letters a day and want to concentrate on quality service there and blah blah blah. So, basically piss off then.

So, it has sort of become a new pastime of mine, seeing red rubber bands everywhere. Maybe I need to start collecting them all for a huge rubber band ball. But ick, the streets, who knows where those things have been.

Run OJ run

In case you haven't turned on the news in the last few days, we had a whale swimming up and down the Thames River. Most of the action was centered in the Battersea area where it seemed to have mostly hung out and where the news crews were camping out. The hype was enormous. My parents even asked if I had seen it.

But no, I missed it all. Battersea is way on the other side of town. I had been planning on riding down there on my bike on Sunday, but that was too late, it (I guess they figured out it was a she now) had already died by then. Saturday, I was on my way out when I heard they had scooped it up and was on the move. I tried to hurry down to the river, but by the time I got to London Bridge, they had already gone by. I guess I missed it by about 15 minutes.

Oh well. It isn't like it was possible to miss the coverage on tv. BBC24 became the whale channel for a few days there. If only the whale had been driving a white Bronco, just imagine the hype then. I could tell my grandchildren, let me tell you where I was the day the whale swam up the river.

Mid season replacements

With any good New Year's resolution, usually about mid January you start thinking, ok, what was I thinking? So no, my Norwegian death metal resolution isn't going so well. I might need to rethink this whole thing.

I'm liking Immortal pretty well but some of this stuff is just really bad. And I don't mean that in an evil sense. Like this morning, I was listening to, who were they, ok, 1349. I guess the year that the plague made it to Norway. Clever. But they just gave me a headache. And part way through a song I started thinking, hmm, part of that reminds me a bit of M.D.C., hmm, maybe I could find some M.D.C. and listen to that instead. Not a good sign.

Maybe I should listen to only techno then. Or Korean bubblegum pop. Or WWII swing era stuff. Or...

This could be the last time, maybe the last time, I don't know

So, I've lived in England for a year and a half and I haven't had fish and chips yet. There were so many things stopping me. What if I go to somewhere awful, won't that just ruin the whole experience? So, I wanted the first experience to at least be a decent one. And I'm not really a fried food kind of person. Usually it just doesn't agree with me.

So, ok, I took this guy's advice, and assumed that he knew what he was talking about and that it was one of the better ones. How sad is it that it was right across the street from where I work. So the convenience factor was there then. So, I convinced my Canadian coworker who hadn't had any yet either that she had to go with me.

I have nothing to compare it to, I'll assume it was good, but I've gotta say, I'm feeling it now. I suppose it was nice and flaky and crispy and all that. It just seemed kind of bland though. You would think there would be more taste with all that grease and stuff.

I don't know, do you need to grow up eating this stuff? Maybe I don't get it. I suppose it was good but I won't be terribly upset if I go another 18 months without having any. It does feel like I ate a pound of raw cookie dough and now it is expanding in my stomach. It might actually be a lot longer until the next time.

Resolutions

Well, it is a new year, welcome to 2006. My New Year's resolution for this year, in 2006 I will only be listening to Norwegian death metal, and I'm not talking about A-ha. This year is going to rock. Be evil.