Received the certificate of incorporation from Companies House on Monday! As such it went straight into the most expensive Tesco Value frame available – and no, I won’t be claiming that on expenses 😉 .
For the time being I have decided to host the foundation’s blog within my own personal blog, at least until it merits its own blog. As such this is the first of what will hopefully be many posts about the foundation!
For those who are interested you can also keep up to date with the activities of the foundation on Twitter and become a fan on Facebook.
Having secured some time off work I spent last weekend down in Swindon visiting Kieran. While down there we made our way round Stonehenge, Avebury, some kind of castle ruins, a rather enjoyable meal out at the local Italian and a BBQ – as well as plenty of drink and good conversation too. All in all a very enjoyable weekend.
I dabbled for the first time in Yahoo Answers last week.
The concept, for those who haven’t seen it, is that you ask a question and everyone else has the opportunity to answer it. To help keep things balanced there is also a points system where you earn for answering questions and spend by asking questions.
As such I asked can a tree get swine flu? I got a number of answers and when the time had expired picked the best one, which gave me quite a technical answer to the question (it’s no, for those that are wondering).
Good stuff.
Went to The Original Oak for lunch on Friday as usual. But unlike normal, we never came back 😀 .
First off it was a bit of a celebration as Imran is heading off to Egypt today to get married (to a woman he has met before – once 😉 ) to we sent him on his way with a rather nice gift, some champagne flutes that Holly had picked up for him despite the fact he doesn’t drink 😀 .
Secondly, Stu who manages BetOptions which is the Australian office of our company was over on a flying visit so it ended up with almost the entire office heading out to the pub. Our food was a bit delayed too so by the time we had finished eating Rob told us we could take the afternoon off. Fantastic!
I finished moving house on Thursday.
When I say I finished moving, I have now moved everything in to my new place. It isn’t sorted yet, a lot of stuff is still in boxes, I don’t have a bed or a sofa but everything that was in my old place has now been transfered to my new place which hopefully means the hard work is over.
Now I just need to sort everything out in my new place which is looking like it should be coming along – my bed should be arriving today, I have my phone line up and running, the internet has been ordered and should go live on Friday and no doubt a huge council tax bill on the way so things are gradually coming together.
Headed out to the pub on Wednesday with Si and Sarann. Having had a lot (and I mean a lot 😀 ) of mixed grills at various pubs recently I can testify that the Deer Park is really worth the extra cash for their mixed grills. That said the service was a bit shakey all night.
There is just something wrong about everyone driving to the pub though. It seems part of my decent into young adulthood. Still, at least I still managed to spend the evening gossiping about people rather than having productive, mature discussions. Win.
Here’s a few more fun adventures with the new apartment…
We only have one key fob between the three of us. So I asked my letting agent who said I would need to speak to the building management company. I did, they told me I needed to speak to the caretaker. He told me I needed to speak to some guy in Shipley.
I spoke to the guy in Shipley, he said he had some in stock. I tried to order some but apparently they don’t take credit cards. It’s 2009, but they don’t. So I have to mail them payment before they can send them out.
I got a letter through from nPower telling me if I didn’t ring them in the next 14 days they were going to cut my gass off. So I rang them, not really having looked into it, and they told me that the apartment did in fact not actually have a gass connection.
I tried to at least get my electricity sorted but I needed a meter reading for that so I rang my letting agent who said they didn’t have one as they couldn’t get in to wherever the meters are so had had to request one off Accent the building management company who hadn’t got back to them.
The car park permit people are very much like my letting agent – they don’t answer their phones even when I’m trying to give them money.
The repairs division of my letting agent do answer their phones, but not when you press 1 for repairs on the automated voice at the beginning. You have to press 2 for rent payments and then ask to be transfered.
I needed to speak to them however as I would like my door handles to be attached to my doors and screwed in, not simply pushed on as several of them are at the moment. I also need a key to the balcony door, which they don’t have, so they’re probably going to have to drill the lock out and put a new one in.
Good times.
One of the perks of city living is the ability to walk to the pub and home again, finally removing my need to drive to Tuesday night socials.
It’s a bit of a walk up from my apartment though with the way back being down hill it feels a lot shorter at the end of the night which is always a positive. In any case it felt really good not having to worry about how much I was drinking for once, a great improvement on the situation.
I bought a laundry basket tonight.
It’s a wicker basket style one, with a dark brown wood effect which is contrasted by some light linen trim which goes around the top and inside, hence the name “dark lights.” It was kind of a treat for myself, to ease the current stress I’m under with moving and other things though I’m sure there was a day when I would treat myself with someone far more exciting.
In any case, it really got me thinking.
On Monday, as I previously mentioned I went to Ikea with Si as he was buying a screen print. Dropping him off back at his flat he briefly talked me through where on the wall it was going and how he was aiming to achieve a visual separation between kitchen, dining and lounge areas of his living space.
On Tuesday Tom arrived back in Leeds and on showing him around the apartment I explained where I thought the furniture would work best at, how we could have a dining area over the far side, a work area so he could fit a desk in and plans for the entertainment section of the room.
This follows on from last Friday’s visit to Ikea with Rich in which we discussed which sets we thought would work well in his new flat and which of the various items would complement each other well while at the same allow the furniture collection to be built up in stages.
But my question is this. When I did I become the kind of person that discusses interior design with all his other trendy city living friends? Is this what my life is from now on? Have I completed the current level of the game and moved on to the next?
Perhaps I really have become the man in Jack Allsopp’s lyrics as I spent my weekend nights watching what I call Saturday Night Circus, feeling so safe up here in my shrine to Ikea, away from the shouts and the louts and the girls with the over-painted pouts.
Of course, the plan is nothing so mellow. I moved back to the city centre so I could rejoin the action once again – I’m not ready to move to the suburbs so my soon to be arriving family can ride their bikes up and down the street without fear of being taken out by taxi drivers. But time will tell I guess.