Patience is a virtue

patience (noun)- the ability to wait calmly; the capacity to accept delay without getting angry

virtue (noun) = a quality or trait that most people consider to be morally good or desirable in a person

Patience is a virtue....while that may be quite true i seem to lack any form of patience.... today me and LP decided to hit the beach as you do.... off we trundled on the bus and all was going well until it was home time. First up we had to walk up a massive hill to the bus stop which is never fun and got there thinking we had ten minutes to spare... now i don't know about you but to me ten minutes standing at a bus stop doing nothing but wait is an eternity but i put a brave face on and said "not too bad" before plonking my butt on the nearest bench.... alas on further inspection of the time table it became clear it was actually a 35 minute wait! Here i tried to inject some humour into the situation "well whats a trip to the Cornish countryside without waiting a million years at the bus stop" at this point i pulled out my book (carried on me at all times for just this purpose) after 40 minutes waiting and watching two buses drive by bound for Truro but the wrong company any tiny ounce of patience was now gone and grumpy Georgia appeared.... for the next ten minutes i issued a tirade of complaints about waiting at bus stops, accumulating piles whilst the world carried on without me..... LP did what he always does in such situations and smiled and nodded as i ranted..... another five minutes went by and the cell phone came out (now let it be said although i am a constant complainer I'm usually to lazy to actually complain to anyone who can help me instead i take my frustrations out on the nearest available person) a phone call to the bus company achieved nothing more then a "the bus should have been there 25minutes ago" (let it also be said i was nothing but sweetness and light on the phone i also deal with customers on a daily basis and despise people blathering on about things beyond my control (and quite often beyond my spectrum of care-as in i don't care what they are whinging about) so after a none to helpful phone call we resumed waiting fingers crossed that it would actually come and we wouldn't be stuck there another hour (at least) until the next scheduled bus of any company arrived. long story short if i did have any Patience it would have been a virtue as within the next ten minutes the bus had appeared and we were on the way home...lesson of the day get some Patience as i can say with all certainty that things are not at all likely to be as "efficient" in Africa as they are here in Blighty....

position vacant

Always forgive your enemies...nothing annoys them more.

-Oscar Wilde.

After watching the new Sherlock last night i have been inspired to get myself an arch enemy... an arch nemesis if you will.... i think it might be somewhat exciting to have someone to fight with one of my many alter egos.

The Crazy Cricketer

the Bra eyed wonder

or.....

Supergangstar

Perhaps in Africa i will ruffle a few feathers and get me an arch enemy! i might even get myself bewitched which really is nothing to joke about in Africa witch craft is still widely believed in and who are we to judge? in some aspects its no different from visiting a herbalist or a faith healer i do however not agree with some practices such sacrifices. i personally wouldn't say its any less believable then something like Christianity.

but back to something a tad lighter....i think I'm changing my mind....the more i think about it i think its an idea that i would like to stay an idea so if any of you out there were hoping to fill the position I've gone off it! from now on I'm all about peace ....(and that includes my alter ego Superganstar).....

Tiny little cute things

Yesterday as we went about our normal business getting some groceries at Sainsburys we were met by a surprise of extremely awesome proportions! now some would say its not much (in fact i would probably retract previous comments and say its not much) ill stop the suspense and tell you what we found.....wait for it.....here it comes.....travel size board games! and not the usual travel scrabble and battleship I'm talking all your favourite Hasbro games in teeny tiny miniature so cute! They had monopoly, connect four, guess who, kerplunk and the one we went for cluedo! (a quick google search also tells me you can get hungry hungry hippos in wee cute travel size just imagine the wee hippos so cute!) well anyway back to it we got cluedo and its the sweetest little thing you ever did see!

I have to say I'm a fan of small things take any everyday normal household item and make it small and suddenly its so much better like travel size shampoo, conditioner or deodorant-almost completely pointless one use and its gone but that's besides the point because its cute (there is an entire website dedicated to small toiletries its amazing www.gotiny.co.uk it even has an amazingly cute name!) other teeny tiny small cute things are mini computers, mini cutlery and crockery (like tiny little tea cups), those really small little self help books (that English folks quite often have in their toilets) all in all things are made better when small i only have one exception to my rambling rant about how i love tiny things and that is small backpacks i have nothing against small bags in fact i carry one on an almost daily basis but i hate with a passion tiny backpacks that look like normal backpacks but are small they jumped on the be small and cute bandwagon and failed!

well back to teeny tiny cluedo it shall come to Africa and is now my favourite game ever....

Famous for.....?

We have a game we like to play entitled "famous for....?" its a quiz game and the rules are simple...step one locate a lonely planet Europe on a shoestring guide step two flip open to any country and on the first page is a fast facts box including what the country is famous for lets see how well you do...... Germany is famous for...? I'm going to say you guessed maybe beer? BMW perhaps? if you did would be correct but there's one more can you guess? do you know? ill tell you Germany is also famous for invading Poland

Lets try another...I'm now randomly flicking through the guide to pick a new country aha here it is.... Norway is famous for.....? well there's the Vikings and (call me stupid but i didn't see this one coming) cod.

Lets try one more just for luck.... Poland is famous for...? BEING INVADED BY GERMANY??? (if that was your answer although correct it is not what lonely planet lists so you would be wrong) Poland is famous for Chopin, Copernicus, Marie Curie solidarity and vodka.

Now I'm sure you are all wondering where is she going with this blather about games in the lonely planet guide but i do actually have a point and that point is this... we recently acquired (when i say acquired i mean Moo extremely kindly sent us in the post and when i say recently i do mean several months back) another lonely planet guide this time for.... can you guess the destination? AFRICA! now with what I've just told you imagine our hugely huge disappointment when we discovered the Africa guide does not have a "famous for...?" section in its fast facts on each country blasphemy i say! so a new game was formed (let me tell you now it is not nearly as edge of your seat nail bitingly gripping as "famous for...?") and it is simply capital cities and borders yeah baby! but aside from being not nearly as exciting it is however a learning tool (man I'm lame and you will soon discover there is more lamenesss to come) and being that my geography is somewhat lacking I'm at a disadvantage so have spent this morning studying the African map i am now able to completely visualise the continent and recall from memory the capital cities and borders (of all 15 countries we are actually going to i have yet to learn the rest told you i was lame!).......

13 weeks

With just 13 weeks to go till we pack up and head off to Africa for half a year i thought it was about time i got back into this thing! so i have given it a new look off we go with being on top of things!

the countdown has now (for me at least) begun and the list of things to do is slowly growing shorter! to catch you up on what we have been doing..... Money situation and bank accounts 100% sorted yeeha! that was the biggest worry really (and our big win £7 in the Euro millions this week is helping)....all gear is now accounted for except for a brand spanking new camera which shall be purchased within the next few weeks (then its off to some zoo to practice our wildlife photography!).....vaccinations are well under way (so far there have been no tears I'm patting myself on the back for that!).....Lucky old LP gets a wee trip home to NZ in November which is all systems go (he better bring me back some pineapple lumps!) ....we have all the Africa books from the library and I'm working my way through them all building up more and more excitement (and mentally planning our next African adventure already!)......