Tuesday, August 30, 2005

Well, I'm back in England and have been for a week. Can't seem to shake the jet-lag this time (maybe I'm just lazy and like sleeping late, or maybe I'm just living on the "student" timetable which I didn't do whilst at uni). Ah well. Just means that when I actually go to Russia (yay more travelling east) it'll suck some more... boo.

Did nothing at all last week, it was... quite boring actually. So on Saturday we (my mum, my sister and myself) went to the Tate Liverpool to see an exhibition on psychedelia. It made my head hurt in various different ways... my sister said I blended in. The cheek. My hair's not even that bright at the moment! Then today (all this weekend in fact, but we went today) it was the Matthew St Festival, also in Liverpool - lots of free stages round the city, with various bands and things happening. It was pretty good, and the atmosphere was decent - probably because all the pubs were checking ID, although this did mean that we couldn't go and see any of the bands playing in the pubs (Amy's still underage, awww).

So having not been to Liverpool in a very very long time, I've now been there twice in 3 days, and am going back again on Thursday cos Mindy's coming up! Yay! (Mindy was one of my housemates last year - can't believe that went by so fast - and we were each other's worst influences :) so next year isn't going to be the same without her!)

And on Saturday I'm heading down to London, and then it's off to Russia on Sunday... I'm a little scared.

There'll probably be more later this week when I'm discovering that I'm actually going to Russia. It's still not quite real...

Wednesday, August 17, 2005

Well I think that's enough photos for one day... how am I going to bore you all with slideshows if I show you all the photos now?! And getting them to arrange nicely is really difficult using this little input box that is designed mostly for text, I think. Anyways, more when I can be bothered!







This is at Ingolf, which is where another branch of the family have their cottages. I spent a long time making "'nakes" for Matthew out of PlayDoh. I love PlayDoh.




























Two different views down this lake - one at night as people were leaving, and one the following morning as we set off to find the aliens.

























Hey look it's me! Relaxing on an amazingly comfy wooden chair after a hard evening of PlayDoh 'nake making and blueberry pie eating (the pie was real, not PlayDoh... and soooo good!)
More Lake of the Woods... the one on the left is during an amazing thunderstorm (glad I wasn't at camp trying to entertain kids through that one!)









More thunderstorm. You can actually see the rain in this one... it was fierce!












Another pretty sky shot. This is what evenings at the lake are all about.











The cottage itself, I think with Claire and Brian inside.













Looking down from the cottage towards the lake.

Well, it's the arrival of the much-heralded photos... this is taken from the Tulloch family cabin on Lake of the Woods. Isn't it pretty?

Saturday, August 13, 2005

Oh yeah, and if you haven't seen Charlie and the Chocolate Factory yet, you should. It's possibly the best film I've ever seen (although having seen some illegal photos of it from Andy Kirkpatrick when he was giving a talk at Durham Uni, I wasn't quite as impressed with the river as I should have been!)
It's been a long time since I updated, as my Mum is very good at reminding me... I have an excuse though - I've been on an island in the middle of a lake in the Canadian praries. That's a good enough excuse I think!

My last update was on the way to Winnipeg, I believe. In the three weeks since then (has it really been that long?) I've spent a week at Camp Stephens (where I spent the summer of my gap year in 2003 and have been back every year since... so that's only two years, but it really is in the middle of a lake and I feel that's dedication - www.campstephens.com), and then a week out at Rob's family's cabin two islands away. Then came the sad day when we had to head back down to Chicago (well sad for Rob, since it meant he was going back to work). The border crossing this time took all of about 30 seconds, which was a miracle, but a much appreciated one! Eventually, after a 14 hour drive, we arrived back in Naperville where Rob's brother Ian and his significant other Alison were waiting for us. This week has been much chilling out with Ian and Alison (well, for me - Rob's been working), staying in the condo downtown and eating out a lot, so everyone is now feeling fat and poor. Oops.

I'll put some photos up at some point, Rob has a fancy new camera so there's a LOT of photos knocking around. Just not on this computer yet.

Anyways, it's off to drink beer and watch films for me. What a good Friday night.