Well I'm now on holiday for Christmas - Yippee!

As the traffic would probably be really bad to travel down to Devon if we left it till after I finished work at lunchtime, so instead we decided to head down to Okehampton early this morning - leaving Portsmouth at 4.30am! This plan worked well as the traffic was fairly sparse on the roads at that time in the morning and we made probably the best time ever for the journey, arriving at about 7.30 in time for coffee and breakfast :). I quite like travelling at the early hours of the morning, but it was surprising today how late it was before it started to get lighter.

So that's the first leg of our mammoth Christmas journey taken care of - the next leg will be on Thursday when we head up to Nottingham to see my family, via Burnham-on-Sea to visit my Grandma on the way.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to anyone who reads this!

Ka Ho sent me this game today - it can get frustrating but it feels quite an achievement when you finally manage! The instructions are as follows:

• Only Mum Dad, or Policeman can operate the raft

• Robber cannot be left alone with family

• Girls cannot be left alone with dad

• Boys cannot be left alone with mum

• Select two people onto the raft, click red lever to operate

Just a quick note about some useful HTML tags that have been around for a long time, but I've found particularly useful recently:

<del cite="url" datetime="YYYY-MM-DDThh:mm:ssTZD>

Mark text that has been deleted, optionally citing a URL for more details and a date and time of change. Useful for marking alterations to posts.

<del>Example deleted text</del>

< ins cite="url" datetime="date of change >

Mark text that has been inserted, optionally citing a URL for more details and a date and time of change. Useful for marking alterations to posts.

Example inserted text

_Term_

_Definition_

Definition list - example is this list of tags

Last week on the vue mailing list, Laura got an invitation for free tickets to the preview of "Kinky Boots", so on Wednesday we both went to see it:

Kinky Boots (12A)

Ricky Moorhouse 22nd September 2005

Rating: 5 out of 5

Brilliant northern comedy based on the true story of a Northampton shoe factory, suffering because of cheap imports from abroad; and their efforts to save the factory by making kinky boots for drag queens.

It was excellent and really funny - well worth watching!

*[22nd September 2005]: 20050922

When we got there, we started off by heading into Le Havre for breakfast, and found a little cafe along the seafront where we had croissant and coffee. We then headed back into town to have a look round but unfortunatly it seemed to be mostly closed at that time in the morning and then it started raining. We headed back to the car (particularly thankful that we'd got it with us) and looked at the map to decide what to do. We then headed to a supermarket so we could dry off and sort something out for lunch - which we ended up having there. In the afternoon we headed across to Rouens which was a lovely place to look round and would be nice to explore a bit more another time - hopefully when it's not raining at all!. In the evening it brightened up though - so we headed up to Etretat and had a picnic overlooking the beach

It's our anniversary! - The last 3 years have past quickly in some ways, but it also seems like we've been together forever! As 3 years is supposed to be leather and Laura had been wanting some boots I decided that I'd get her them as an anniversary present, but when I went to get them I found it would be much easier to go there together and get them after our anniversary. (The boots she got in the end weren't leather, but they're lovely and warm!).

We were going to go away for the weekend up to Essex to see what else we could find for our family history research, but as there was no space in the B&Bs that we phoned, I decided to look to see where else we could go for an anniversary break. In the end we decided to go to France on a special deal that P&O were running that meant we could travel out overnight on Friday, come back on the overnight ferry on Saturday, take the car and have a cabin each way for only £49 (about the price of 1 night in the B&B!) so thats what we did!

I just searched for H&B on google and it gave me this result which appears to have the results in three groups, firstly results for H&B, then for B&H and then at the bottom some others. Is this new?

Once we take off, we'll be heading in a North Easterly direction .. No .. a North Westerly direction - I just got distracted by a plane taking off as you do.

We're now over France and should be coming in in about ... erm ... let me see ...

Both of which we heard on our way back from Kefalonia

We left Shepton Mallett early in the morning as we had to get up to Heathrow 2 hours before our flight at 10. We had quite a good drive up and there wasn't too much traffic. We dropped the car off at the airport parking and were taken by minibus to the airport. Check in was amazingly quick and easy with the e-tickets and we could do it all ourselves on the machine (apart from it failed to print the baggage label for some reason - but it was still quicker than queuing). As we were waiting we heard some other people talking about a Wedding, but didn't realise until we got to Stavanger just how many there were on the same flight going to the same wedding!

We checked into the hotel, which was a really nice balance between modern and traditional. It even had it's own bakery and coffee bean roaster. We had a fresh orange juice at the bar and were suddenly hit by how expensive things in Norway are as it cost us about £8 for the two drinks. We then went for a look round the town to see what food we could find for lunch and to see where the church was. Sandnes itself seemed very laid back and pleasant and it was easy to find the church, although for finding food we initially went the wrong way for find supermarkets but eventually we came across the shopping centre and supermarket.

This year we went to New Wine for the first time as we were invited to go and help man the SAMS stand in the marketplace there. We went up to Bath and West on the Friday before things started in order to get the tent up and meet up with Richard. It was surprising how many people there were there already especially as it was only exhibitors and people working there at that point.

We had a good week there despite the weather (lots of rain and towards the end of the week high winds, not the best when you're camping but we survived). My particular favourites were the morning series on Ezekiel (which have prompted me to read through the book fully) and the evening talks in 'Venue 2' by Matt Redman and David & Carrie Grant.

I also enjoyed the manning of the stand much more than I had anticipated, as it was interesting speaking to the different people who came to the stand and watching our neighbours stand grow as they added more balloons to it throughout the week. Although unfortunatley we missed their balloon stomp on the Friday as we had to leave for Norway.

Firstly we started to look at possible property to buy just to see what we could get and where - mainly on rightmove, but we also arranged a viewing. After the viewing, we both liked the house so decided we should start looking at things more seriously.

Then we spoke to a few of estate agents and a mortgage advisor - to see what the possibilities for the flat were. We looked at both selling the flat and letting it out again, but in the end we decided that we couldn't really afford to keep the flat to let out and buy a new house. Both of the estate agents we spoke to about selling the flat valued it at the same amount, but one of them charged more commision than the other (also conveniently the one that charged the lower commision seemed more trustworhty). So finally we decided to put the flat on the market with Cubitt and West. (If you're interested it's on rightmove)

In the mean time while we were looking at the options, the first house we'd seen was sold, so we continued to look around and see what else we could find. In all We've probably looked at about 10 different houses in various places around Eastleigh, Chandlers Ford and Southampton. With the first house, I had also contacted our existing mortgage lender to see what we could do for a mortgage with them, and they'd agreed to lend the amount we needed and sent me an application form - so we were in a good place as far as the finance was concerned too.

Last week the house we'd originally looked at came back on the market, but at the same time the tenants moved out of another house in the same road, which I'd tried to go and see before, but the estate agent hadn't managed to get in as the tenants were out. This time we got in no problem and the house was really nice. It was a very similar house to the first one, but in much better condition throughout. So we decided to go back together at the weekend to have another look. On Saturday, we went up there together and both really liked the house, so decided that we'd put an offer in on Monday. So over the weekend we got the mortgage application sent off, so that everything will be in place ready.

Yesterday we put in our first offer which was declined, but then tried with an in between price which was accepted, and the owner has agreed to take the house off the market for a couple of weeks to give us a chance to sell our flat!

Last week, the Solent became the destination for many boats from around the world for the International Fleet Review and the International Festival of the Sea (there was even one from Uruguay there!). This was part of the SeaBritain 2005 celebrations and particularly to celebrate 200 years since the battle of Trafalgar. It was expected that on Tuesday the city would be in deadlock with people travelling to the fleet review - so all the schools were closed and I decided to work from home to avoid the raffic. Also, Laura's mum and brother came down to watch and they all went down to the beach to watch from first thing in the morning - I managed to join them briefly at lunchtime and then again for the evenings events once I'd finished work.

As soon as I got there after work, however, it poured down with rain but fortunatley I was prepared with raincoats as Laura had warned me when they saw the clouds heading towards them. The rain didn't last too long however - it slowed down just as we were considering heading back home - so we stayed down there and were able to watch the Red Arrows before getting something to eat. Once we'd got our food - it rained again, but thankfully we were able to shelter in the programme sellers marquee. Once the rain stopped, we then headed back to the seafront to watch the helicopter display team, which was quite different as I'd never seen helicopters go upside down before! After the helicopters, the evening re-enactment started - quite slowly at first, but it was great to watch the tall ships sailing past as the sun was going down. After the first half of the re-enactment, there was a break to let the ferrys through, and we decided to move to see if we could find anywhere we could sit down and watch the rest, as our legs were getting tired. Everywhere was packed however, so we ended up watching the second half on the big screens instead - which probably meant we got more of a close up anyway!