Only EYE could do such a thing

So I was shuffling papers at work and somehow I managed to shuffle a piece of paper straight into my eye. I paper cut the inside of my eye. Tell me who else on earth could manage such a thing?! Oi vey!

Random shot of mischief

This was taken last night ... There's too much innocence in that face - I must have been up to mischief!

Easter Weekend

So yesterday's mass blogging was to catch up so that I could post my Easter weekend pictures (as my mother correctly commented - it's only been 2 days and she's already bugging me to post them - sheesh woman give a girl a break! only joking!) This weekend I went with my friend James to Winchester.

Meet James. This is just after we arrived in Winchester Friday afternoon. The scary looking face I'm pulling is due to standing on my tippy toes to attempt this self portrait. (James is quite a bit taller than I am.)

After a bit of exploring we headed to an old church that had been converted into a cinema to see The Boat that Rocked

pretty cool, eh?
Ok, not really. This is the actual church that had been converted, the one above was just a really cool church next door to this one that had been converted to a cinema.

I've never been to a cinema like this and it was a neat experience. I was especially intrigued by the ice cream selling steward after the previews before the movie started.

Saturday morning I was running late (as per normal) and we didn't have enough time to eat breakfast at the hotel (which was included in the price, oops!) But in my opinion it turned out to be a good thing that we missed the hotel breakfast, because we ended up eating at this really cool American diner. Good old American breakfast - scrummy!

A cheesy photo for your entertainment

James had to do a bit of work while we were in Winchester (such is life) but it was only for a couple hours Saturday morning. Afterwards we walked over to Winchester Cathedral. A pretty spectacular cathedral.

Check out the detail on the ceiling. Wow!

Mandatory self portrait

Just amazing!

These are some of the original painting in the cathedral, I think from the 1300s (but I'd have to double check that date)

More details that make you just gape and say wow

Jane Austen's grave (famous British author of Sense and Sensibility & Pride and Prejudice to name a couple)

After a tour of the cathedral we walked down to the old school to tour around it (but it wasn't open - scuppered!).

Just a few pretty good shots of the area. So scenic!

Then we went to the castle ruins

Self portrait attempts amuse me!

We stopped by Jane Austin's home (last home before she died) on the way back

We then headed up to The Great Hall.

Winchester Castle dates from the reign of William the Conqueror (1066-1087). By
the end of King John's reign in 1216 the castle and its royal palace needed
extensive repair. Between 1222 and 1235 the Castle's hall was replaced by the
building which stands today. ... The Hall was the heart of the Castle. When in
residence the King dined here, discussed affairs of State with his barons and
clergy and sat in court to administer justice.

Did you know King Arthur's famous round table was in Winchester? I didn't!

Although now known to have been constructed in the 14th Century, and repainted
in its present form for King Henry VIII, the table has for centuries been
venerated by generations of tourists as the mysterious table of the 'Once and
Future King' Arthur.
The names of the 24 knights are written around the edge
of the 5.5 metre diameter table, weighing 1200kg, surmounted by King Arthur on
his throne.

S(ir) galahallt Sir Galahad
S(ir) launcelot deulake Sir Lancelot
S(ir) gauen Sir Gawaine
S(ir) p(er)cyvale Sir Percival
S(ir) Iyonell Sir Lionel
S(ir) trystram delyens Sir Tristan
S(ir) garethe Sir Gareth
S(ir) bedwere Sir Bedivere
S(ir) blubrys Sir Blioberis
S(ir) lacotemale tayle Sir La cotemal tail
S(ir) lucane Sir Lucan
S(ir) plomyd Sir Palamedes
S(ir) lamorak Sir Lamorak
S(ir) born de ganys Sir Bors
S(ir) safer Sir Saphar
S(ir) pelleus Sir Pellinore
S(ir) kay Sir Kay
S(ir) Ectorde marys Sir Ector
S(ir) dagonet Sir Dagonet
S(ir) degore Sir Degore
S(ir) brumear Sir Brunar
S(ir) lybyus dyscovy(us) Sir Guinglain
S(ir) Alynore Sir Alymore
S(ir) mordrede Sir Modred

Attempt 1: Round table, check. Faces, nope.

Attempt 2 & 3 looked like this. Faces, check. Round table, nope.

Attempt 4 - success!

Queen Victoria Sculpture

The sculpture was made by Alfred Gilbert and was presented by William Ingham
Whitaker, High Sheriff of Hampshire in 1887 to celebrate the golden jubilee
memorial.

Easter Sunday we went to service at the Cathedral. It was a very traditional service, I'd never been to anything like it before, but it was pretty neat to go to a service in such an old cathedral!

On the drive to Winchester Friday, we passed a village called Gilbert Street. Being my mother's daughter I had to stop and get a picture!!! James kindly obliged and took a detour on the way home Sunday afternoon so I could get this picture. Thanks James!!!

(dress look familiar?)

We also detoured a bit to get a glimpse of this steam train. James grew up in this area and (if memory serves) his parents took him on this train a couple times. Pretty cool!

Even the conductors had dressed the part!

It even has a Thomas the Tank Engine face - what kid wouldn't be in love?!

Monday I went into the city with James for a spot of shopping and lunch. A nice lazy bank holiday Monday to finish out the weekend.

James at Giraffe (the restaurant). Notice the giraffe figurine in his smoothie?

James took most of the pictures on this post, so I have to say a HUGE thank you! I was very lazy with my photo taking this past weekend!!

Quoted text from website: http://www.hants.gov.uk/greathall/index.html

Look at me go!

6 posts in one day! (7 if you count this one, but I don't) Didn't want you to see the first one and stop, so be prepared - lost of Karen-isms ahead from the last week or so. Make sure and read them all.

The Magic Man

...aka Alex. I met Alex in 2005 at TGI Fridays - he used to work for TGI Fridays doing close up magic at tables as restauranters eat their dinner. I was out with some girlie mates enjoying a fine evening of girlie fun (as you do) when Alex popped by the table and wowed us all! We exchanged details and became fast friends. At one point he was probably my closest friend, we even spent a very fun Christmas together that year. Time moves on as do relationships / friendships. Sadly we've lost touch as our lives moved away from each other (he's now engaged - congrats!!! and I live in London, so meeting up isn't the easiest of things to do). But the week before last he was down in London preforming magic for a company and had a spare hour to kill so we met up for dinner. It'd been over a year since I last saw him, so I was extremely chuffed when he called to let me know he was in town. It was so great to catch up! I love old friends!

Hard Rock Cafe number 5

So I've become an accidental collector of Hard Rock Cafe (HRC) hurricane glasses (as pictured above). It all started in 1999 while on a trip to Mexico City: I'd never been to a HRC before and it was a neat experience, so I got a drink in a souvenir glass. Four years later Jake, a former AIM* student, came to visit and stayed with at my house. He wanted to check out the new HRC in Nottingham so I gladly obliged and went along with him. As I had a glass from my last visit to the HRC, of course I needed to get one from Nottingham! Fast forward to Easter break of 2008. Cate and I travelled to Oslo on some penny flights we found and low and behold there was a HRC that had a pretty cheap lunch deal (Oslo is a flipping expensive place! Any offer was a good offer!), and as it was HRC, I of course had to get my third hurricane glasses to add to what was slowly forming my collection. Skip forward to December of last year I went to Paris with Matt. This trip was fast and furious, but I had seen an advert for HRC and I was determined to get there. Unfortunately we only managed to stop long enough to rush out of the taxi, buy a glass (and a hat for my cousin's Christmas present) and back into the taxi to catch the train home. It still counts though - I went, I bought, I have my fourth glass for my collection. Matt at one point or another had asked me if there were things in London that I'd wanted to do and hadn't. (One of the things I wanted to do was go on on of the docked boats on the Thames for a drink / dinner. Oddly enough we walked by one that day and decided to tick that off my list of things to do - I barely lasted 60 seconds before I was nauseous and wanted to get off!) Going to the London Hard Rock Cafe was on my list of "things to do in London" as well. The week before last Matt and I ventured out to the London HRC and ticked that off my things to do in London list. So now I have quite a collection of glasses from the HRC I've visited. Where will my next glass come from - only time will tell!


*AIM is the program I originally came to England with to work with the church in Nottingham

Sunday lunch with friends

Got to love sunny Sundays with friends. Last Sunday (not Easter Sunday, the one before that) I arranged to meet up with Clare and Ed, friends I work with. Clare's a new friend, what a find she is. We've worked together for since September but it wasn't till recently that we've gotten to go out and I realised what a great and fun person she is! You should be familiar with Ed - he's been on my blog several time, most recently on my Valentine's blog. Anyway, back to Sunday... Clare and I made plans a couple weeks back to meet up for Sunday lunch; Ed and my plans the previous week had to be postponed, but luckily Ed was free for Sunday lunch too. Perfect says my brain, lunch with two good friends - lovely.

This is my only picture of Clare, she'll probably hurt me for posting it - but it's all I got! (It's from Clare's - the history teacher Clare - that left the week before, this Clare just happened to be in the picture ... that's so confusing it doesn't even make sense to me!)

So after church Sunday at 1 I went down to the train station to meet Clare and Ed. Clare texted to say she'd missed her train and would be there at 1:45. Ed showed up a mere 5 minutes late (which is really good for meeting up with Ed - we're usually both quite fashionably late!). It turned out Ed wasn't so free for a lazy Sunday afternoon lunch and had to meet someone else at 2:30. Bummer. Ed and I walked across the road to a pub unknown to us that turned out to be a good find. Ed had to eat before Clare joined us and we got some food, but all in all it was a great afternoon. Lots of laughter and chit chat, just what Sunday afternoons are made for!

Clare was rather amused by a particular face I pulled while recanting a story... so she decided to snap a picture of it. Not only did she take a picture of it, she added it to my contact details on her phone so that every time I call her, she gets greeted by the picture.

Scary eh?!

A random Saturday in April

After my "telling off" for my middle aged woman's wardrobe by Tesca, I decided to go shopping last Saturday afternoon. I hate shopping, always have (just ask my mother). I either go shopping and I love everything and want to buy everything (which I can't because it's too expensive) or I like nothing, nothing fits and I feel ugly and depressed and have wasted my time and had to put up with crowds of irritating people. My shopping trips are usually the later of the two, and Saturday was no exception. 5 hours of crowds of rude people, disorganised sale racks, unhelpful sale assistants and too many changing rooms, I purchased out with 2 dresses (I refused to come back empty handed!

Dress number 1, I really liked the pattern on this dress, but the top of it fits funny. It's actually being taken back to the shop and exchanged for a skirt of the same material.

Dress number two, I really like this dress, but of course it was the most expensive item of clothing I tried on that day. Why can't I ever fall in love with items from the sales racks!

Saturday night Meghan (my flatmate) and I headed to Becky's birthday party across town. It'd been a couple months since we'd last seen each other so it was very good to get to see this gal again!

Somehow she ended up modeling the ribbon that I wrapped her present in. Crazy gal!

Farewell to Clare

Last week we sadly bid farewell to Clare who left the school and will be traveling around for 6 months - how jealous am I?! Clare's a very special friend and I love her to bits, we were even flat mates for a couple of months last year. I'm very sad to see her go!

Clare listening to the head teacher wishing her well in her future

Clare saying goodbye, explaining she decided to leave her History teaching post "because there was no future in it" (Think about it - quite funny.)

After school broke up for the two week Easter break the staff went out on the town to see Clare out in style.

Tesca came to my flat so we could car share across London but wasn't satisfied with the outfit I picked out, apparently I looked 20 years older than I am in my outfit. Friends always know how to make you feel good about yourself :-) So Tesca redressed me ...

...in a dress! (The picture's not great, but you can see the evidence of my in a dress and some cute shoes thanks to a good sale my sister found)

Tesca and I tried to get a picture while we were out, but the lighting wasn't so great

...so we took one when we got back to my house at 3am, hence the very tired eyes in this picture!

Let me tell you getting up for work the next day was not a fun event. Oh how tired we all were for our inset day!

My new accessory

It finally happened, the police caught up with me. (My shirt choice that day was quite ironic wouldn't you say?!)

Handcuffs hurt! I was marked!

A small explanation: There is a police officer that comes into school and he was in on the last day of term the week before last. He's a pretty fun guy and we often find ourselves in banter of some sort. Somehow I ended up smarting off to him (in a joking manner obviously) and found myself in his handcuffs. This all happened right outside the head teacher's office and the commotion brought the head teacher out to investigate. Of course I'd be the one making all the ruckus and in handcuffs outside his office. He laughed.