Farewell..?

The problem with having to postpone travel plans at the very last minute means that people change their plans too. When we were due to leave on 20 September, we had arranged to have farewell drinks with friends the night before, a Friday, and had a fair number of people signed up for the occasion. However, due to certain visa issues (not enough time or space to go into them here, and this is also intended to be a profanity-free blog), we were forced to cancel our flights the night before, at around the same time we were scheduled to begin receiving free drinks from friends keen to give us a proper send off.

When the visa came through last Friday (or rather, when G. heard last Friday that his visa had been approved the week before), we hastily rebooked flights for this Sunday, and rescheduled farewell drinks for tonight. This gave people only one week's notice, and many of them already had, understandably, other plans in place for tonight. For this reason, we will have a total of seven confirmed attendees tonight, and another two "maybes", depending on when their first function finishes.

While this situation could be interpreted as us not having many friends, and people not being bothered to get out and see us one last time, I choose to believe that those not in attendance are too utterly devastated by our imminent departure that they prefer to sit alone in their darkened bedrooms, where better to drown their sorrows in a heady mix of alcoholic drinks. It is Halloween, after all.

Besides, as G keeps reminding me, it's the quality people - T&S, E&T, P&G and A - who are showing up tonight and one should always go for quality over quantity. Plus I have a cracker of a headache at the moment, and therefore probably won't be up for anything too exciting anyway.

The upshot is, of course, that we're going to miss the friends left behind, but with the internet being the way it is these days, and with exciting things like Skype and VOIP (not that I understand them, but I know what they are), keeping in touch is just so easy.

Much love

Countdown: six days to go!

The title says it all.

We spent yesterday morning going through the paperwork that we had put off going through while moving out of our house. By lunchtime we had run out of steam, and then C went shopping to buy travel stuff (a pillow for the plane! luggage lock!) while G stayed at home and read. So today is more of the paperwork fun. Yay.

C looked at online train tickets from London to Edinburgh yesterday - they are 105 pounds if bought at the station, and 40 pounds if bought in advance online. The train journey is only four and a half hours, and leaves every half an hour from Kings Cross. Pretty good, really.

Max is currently asleep in an office chair in the study while C writes this entry, and snoring loudly. The world keeps on turning.

Finally it's happenin' to us!

WOOT!!

Today, G found out the fabulous news that his visa has been approved!! Instant celebrations followed, including C screeching "Oh my GOD!" at the top of her voice.

We're trying to not let our euphoria be tainted by the fact that the visa was approved last week and they didn't contact G at all because they never bothered to update his contact details as requested, and that as a result his passport has been sitting in a post office back room since Tuesday. Let's focus on the good instead!

So, flights have been booked for Sunday, 2 November, and research shall be done into accommodation in Edinburgh and snow apparel for dogs. We have nine days before we go, and much to do!

Much love