September 2009
a day out with my dad
i went to the national space centre with my dad yesterday for a last day out. that’s him in the picture above fiddling with some controls in a mock up version of the actual space station (i think).
i do know he’s not wearing the regulation space suite, but they seemed pretty relaxed about that at the museum
we then went and stood in front of a magical heat detecting camera and turned in to spooky sci-fi bods
here’s my dad by a rocket. he made me take a vertical picture as he was worried by my wonkly ones.
eventually he did put his space suite on.which pleased me no end.
after that we left the paid for museum and went to the free sewage museum next door which was even more fun. pictures of that to follow.
and on the way back home i popped in to see my grandma to say goodbyes too.
it was a day of strange mixed up emotions and memories, all taking place a very short distance from the hospital where i was born. once again, i was surprised by how much it affected me. I’ve now said my last goodbyes to my mum, dad, brother and grandma. gulp.
not long now until 11th October …
british aerospace
doesn’t it make you proud
ease shut the gate
self ageing sign. the rust eats away the pl of please as the gate itself ages and needs more love and attention when opened and closed. lovely.
bed and breakfast (singular)
‘beds and breakfasts’ would perhaps have been too ambiguous, which is probably why the name bed and breakfast stuck.
this sign clarifies it further with its ‘single only’ statement. you can stay there, but only one breakfast for you sir.
places and people we love
we had such a lovely send off at church this morning. but also
quite emotional after our full day of goodbyes yesterday. we might see
many of them again on the morning of our departure at church, but this
was our proper ‘goodbye’
this saying goodbye to people is really hard you know. we’ve
realised how many fantastic friends we have here in the UK who we’re
leaving behind. And saying goodbye is really painful. there have been
much tears inside and outside this weekend.
here’s one of our closest friends. it’s old fish-face ian
He said some lovely words about us after church. And so did Heather in
a talk about our children. And then they presented us with an
incredibly generous present which we shall use wisely
Church feels so much like home. it’s where we got married, where our children came to faith and got baptised, and where we were privileged enough to be part of the music group. we’ll miss the place and miss the people even more.
At the same time, we’re incredibly excited about getting stuck in to a new church over in NZ. but these last few days are all about goodbyes.
my hardest goodbye
here’s my mum in a pub last friday kindly posing for a picture. I like the peacefulness and calm of the picture.
and now i’ve said my final farewells to my mum in person it’s also quite poignant.
We’ll see her in NZ in not too long, and the power of the email / skype means we’ll still be in touch. but still a rather renching thing.
sorry the blog is a little down beat today !
a hard disk to break
i found some more hard drives to destroy sat on our front door step and took them apart before clonking them with a hammer. it really is a joy smashing these things up. you should try it.
and then, when you’ve finished your clonking, you can use them as spooky owl or fish eyes as demonstrated by our good friend ian
our leaving party
here is my mum with jane’s parents and kezia.
we got photos of everyone before they left (well all except one family who did a runner before I had a chance to photo them). not sure if i’ll post them on here, but it was great to see so many friends. although the nature of a 10am to midnight party with friends throughout the day is that you don’t get a huge amount of time to talk to people.
the house was busy during the core party hours of 11am to 11pm. everyone is now tired and speechless. and a litle sad.
unlucky dip
as a family we came up with the fab idea of having an unlucky dip at our goodbye party yesterday (apologies if you weren’t invited, it wasn’t anything personal – we’re just being rather dippy at the moment).
anyway, the unlucky dip was a bit of a tombola, and you got to win something we were just going to throw in the bin. so that was nice.
my mum
here’s my mum !
grey’s court
yesterday afternoon my mum and i went out for lunch then on to grey’s court for a mum and son afterrnoon
i really like grey’s court, and it’s lovely how they have this little labels around the place written by people who work there explaining why that particular area is their favourite corner. the one above was particularly nice – click on it to read it (i won’t spoil it by paraphrasing)
despite visiting 10s of time, i don’t think i’ve ever been at this time of year before when all the veggies in the garden are ready
there was an honesty box if you wanted to buy some of the produce
this sunflower line up must have looked dramatic a few weeks ago
and even the request to return your tray was lovely.
t&t for tea
we went out for a last supper with our lovely friends tony and tanya last night. it was a bit of a last supper, although we’re expecting to see them again before we go. everything we do at the moment seems to end with ‘oh i wish we’d done more of this’.
T&T are among our closest friends and we will miss them.
the picture below is the picture above shown on the back of my camera then photoed by tony’s camera then photoed again on the back of his camera by me. interesting how his camera has turned in to a big eye.
blue velvet trousers
way too tight, but way too cool to chuck away. not sure if i ever actually wore them. definitely gone in the pile marked ‘take’
travel anywhere
this cupboard has appeared in our local train station ticket office area. it claims you can travel anywhere. just step inside i guess.
it’s good the british train system is finally embracing technology advances