Not quite getting it

So I have been riding the muggle wagon to and from work and am actually starting to enjoy the benefits. Not paying for gas, I mean petrol, and to fork out for a parking permit is great. The real benefit is getting exercise in the morning as it is a 45 minute walk to the bus stop. It's not all fun and games as there are some bits that don't have paths, but I figure walking 5 miles a day has to be good for me... I have even lost weight! Well, just a little.

There is a down side to taking the bus. Two words... “Exact change”.
Since now I have been good at looking out for the $1 bills.

I gently strolled over to the stop after work, opened my wallet… and hey presto… empty. Knowing this was the last bus of the day I soon had the feeling of panic rush over me.

I knew that the bus does a loop around ten blocks so I ran past the bus stop in the 29oC heat, lugging my massive laptop bag and a plastic bag with an empty lunch box flapping around, banging on my knee on every alternate step.

I made it to the ATM (cash point). The card readers are slightly different here. You kind of pull the card in then out really quick. I slid my card in and out waited... Nothing.... I try it again and I get "transaction canceled".

Come on, come on. I try again and again. It gave me the "fast cash" option… ironically on the 4th attempt.

I then run 2 blocks in a different direction to get a bag of crisps to break the $20. At this point I have a big beetroot face.

I then run 4 blocks north to get to the next bus stop on the loop.

Made it... Phew! I can even see my bus as a dot on the horizon.

"HEY BUDDY!" - this tattooed guy with two missing front teeth and a scrawny looking stubble, shouts running at me with a "I'm gonna hunt you down" type look.

"er yes" I say in a 'happy to help, please don't kill me' type way.

"I must have been chasing you for 3 blocks. Man you run fast. Didn't you hear me shout? You dropped you wallet!"

"oh thank you" I say, knowing what a pain in the arse it would have been if I did lose it.

"no problem"

"can I have it?" said holding out my hand.

"oh I don't have it - a lady saw you drop it, 2 blocks that way."

"well I was running for that bus, can you run fast to show me this lady? Sorry to do this to you but that is the last bus of the day, so we need to run." - it really didn't matter how positive I wanted to sound to get this guy moving, it is really difficult to motive a toothless guy that looks like he is about to spit blood.

We finally found the lady holding my wallet. She looked like hyacinth bucket (bouquet) from keeping you appearances. I didn't have time to explain, so I took a quick glance in the wallet to check for my cards and then gave her a peck in the cheek to say thanks. It was a split second thing where I thought "Well I am European. "

I ran back to the bus stop. At this point I became aware of a little crowd commentating from the second level of a multistory car park, who had witnessed the whole thing. When the doors of the bus opened a cheer came from above.

I got on the bus and nearly passed out from the running. I told the bus driver I nearly didn't make it.

I found out from my previous journeys that the bus driver is a Brit who lived in Aylesbury called Mick. He married an American and has lived here since 1985. He used to be the sound engineer for Kim Wilde when she was touring. He looks a lot like Bill Nighy but swept back grey hair.

When I told him what I had been through he said, "If you are a regular, I could do you an IOU." I said I would hold him to it.

… the moral of the story is get change!

Our Big St Louis Adventure.

Time for a break me thinks. In the USA you get Holiday time and vacation time. Holidays are what I would have called Bank holidays and Vacation is what I what call Holiday, just so you know the difference. Compared to 22 days vacation I used to get in the UK, I now get just 10. I have started to notice more now than ever how people plan their time so that Holidays are taken side-by-side with vacation so that time off lasts longer. Hopping on the band wagon I booked time off work to spend a long weekend with my family.

I want to see as much of the USA as possible. I’m getting to the stage now where I have seen quite a bit of Indiana, and know my way around Indianapolis without a GPS Sat Nav. Sarah and I looked at a map to find out what was fairly close (within 6 hrs drive) we could take a look at. We finally settled on St Louis, Missouri.

Before we go to St Louis


On our way to St Louis (Sarah driving)


When we finally got to the hotel I was greeted by a warm glowing face saying how can I help you sir….NOT! As I got to the desk I was faced with a girl covered in (what looked like gang) tattoos, chew gum looking at me as if she had no face muscles.

“I have a reservation… here are the details” I say as I hand here a print out

“It not ready until 3pm” as she flicks the paper back to me.

What I didn’t realize is that we crossed a time zone, so everything is off by an hour. We decided to take a drive to the museum to kill some time before our room was ready.

before going to the museum


just visited the museum #1


just visited the museum #2


Our accommodation was bed and breakfast only so we decided to have dinner at the olive garden. I have never been there and the last time Sarah had been, was around 15 years ago.

arrived at the olive garden


After olive garden


Day 2 just getting up before breakfast


Playing with the bug screen after breakfast before the zoo


In the water falls at the zoo


At the zoo - Zack Telling us we have just seen animals and insects

At the zoo - looking at the bear


At the zoo - after the gift shop

Riding with the Muggles

I’m starting on a bit of an adventure today. I’m taking the bus to work. I know this isn’t probably a big deal and loads of people do it, but it is something I am starting to do.

Dan, my co-worker who I catch a lift with has selfishly (kidding) moved out of where he was living to set up a bachelor pad of his own. The result of this being that when the car is needed by Sarah to run errands and scoot kids around etc, I need to find a different way to get to work. I am seriously seeing this as blessing in disguise. I mean, there will be no excuses for doing not doing exercise. It is really easy to fall out of bed into your car, drive up to the office door and do the same in reverse at the end of the day. I have just spoken to the bus driver and he says that it is fine to put a push bike underneath the coach, so I will be able to cycle to the bus stop and then take it from there.

I helped Dan move on Saturday, which was a good laugh. He even bought us lunch to say thanks.

As I write this I am actually on the bus. I love the fact that I can hook my laptop up to my phone and get in the internet while moving. (that said I will need to put it away if anybody come near me… he bus is quite empty just now.
Zack has this box car race today. This is where they have a race wearing cardboard boxes decorated to be like race cars. They called it the kindy500… you know, like the Indy 500 race. I thought I may have over done it in helping him because we sprayed it and did some really cool things we card and hot glue. When I took it in the other day there were some there how had gone all out and put sponsor stickers on them as well. I didn’t feel too bad after that.

Having all this extra glue around gave me an idea. I peeled back all the duct tape that was holding the bumper together and used hot glue. I have to say it worked a treat, and isn’t as ropey looking as the tape. It is really solid now. The down side is that I got bitten by a few bugs while I was fixing it.

It is sooooooo hot here just now, with high humidity. You know when you go on holiday and they open the doors of the plane, and it feels like an over door opening… well that what happens each time you go out of an air conditions shop door (I love it).

Our air conditioning is out at the moment. Apparently the kids stuck a stick in the fan and a puff of smoke came out. Sarah was very cross with the kids as they have been told hundreds of times not to go near it. The guy came out to look at it, but I’m sure I will find out what the upshot of that is sometime today.

We are off to St Louis on Friday and I am really looking forward to having a break from work. Its good and all that but it I looking forward to seeing a bit more of the country/culture and spending time with the family away from the damn TV. It is quite a long journey but I got some of those DVD players that strap to the back of the head rests (that I fully Intend on taking back when I done with them).

One thing that is really good here, is that if you pay by card and you return the goods in “original packaging for resale” they will take it back now questions asked. Result!

changing my vocabulary

I am sure that this wouldn’t be a problem in most professions, but when you are an interactive developer (or at least that’s what it says on my business card) there are certain things you are used to that suddenly become, well, different. The first shock is the keyboard. The pound sterling sign is gone, the@ sign is now above the 2 and the enter key is half the size as there is a button with a \ on it just above it!

OK, I get it. A mountain out of a mole hill right? I’m just moaning about a stupid keyboard… I have managed to get used to the keyboard is not the main problem.

When I worked in the UK I knew that:

• # is called a hash
• ( ) are called brackets
• { } are called curly bracket
• [ ] are called square brackets
• ! is called an exclamation mark
• . is called a full stop

The first time this came to bite me in the arse was when I was setting up my phone. “When you have entered you 4 digit code press the pound key” came the automated voice. I go looking for £, but see nothing. I ended up googling what a pound looked like to find out it is the # sign.

On Thursday last week I was (nerd alert) shouting across the room what code needs to be written. “You need to type this dot that open then close brackets.” What was written was “this.that{}” when what I was meaning is “this.that()”.

It turns out that in America:

• # is called a pound
• ( ) are called parentheses
• { } are called curly brackets
• [ ] are called square brackets
• ! is called a bang
• . is called a period

I think I have got my head around it now, but I does catch me off guard every once in a while. I was told a password the other day that was something along the lines of “wi!!son” but as I wrote what was being said it came out as “wibangbangson”.

I’m getting it now… It only took six months! (bang)

DQ Fun

So today I thought I would give myself a little treat. I have been working on two projects that went live this week. The Tropicana mobile site (seen by going to Tropicana.com using an iPhone, or similar) and the rice-a-roni.com website.

There is a Dairy queen just at the top of the street where we live. I guess you would describe dairy queen a bit like McDonalds, but instead of a large selection of burgers, there is a selection of ice cream. They have savory stuff too but it is mainly ice cream.

As I came home today I could see it was busy, and thought to myself I might pop in there and have an ice cream…. But I’ll do this after dinner. Doing it that way I will only go if I am not full. I love the idea of going out for ice-cream. It is not something you generally do in there UK, but it is quite a common occurrence here. My rule of thumb is this: If you are willing to walk (not drive) the ice cream place you can have it. If you’re not you don’t. At the very least, doing it this way you force yourself to do some exercise to get it.

When I got in the there it was heaving! There was a line of about 10 people in front of me, as well as the people who had ordered and where waiting for the food to be prepared to take it away… Not to mention the line of car circling the building waiting at the drive thru window to get served. The way it generally works is that one person takes the order and the cash and somebody else preps the food.

It was really loud in there and the lady taking my order could hardly hear was I was saying.

“I really sorry, I don’t hear so well. I’m Sikh so it is difficult to understand” she says.

“Don’t worry about it, I’m British and nobody understands what I say either. It sounds like we have a common problem” I say as she is taking my order.

“I much prefer your voice to the yap yap of….”

“CAN I HAVE THE ONE WITH THE ORIO TOPPING” I say, interrupting her before she gets a chance to finish her sentence since we were stood in a full restaurant.

The next thing I do is pay. Let me introduce you to a very childish game I like to play in take away restaurants. When you pay the cashier asks you your name. The first time this happened to me I though the girl was being a bit forward, but then I realized that it was to call it out when my food was ready. OK, so here are the rules of the game:

1. Pay cash. If you have a credit card they can read your name right off it, and it can cause problems (trust me on this, I learnt the hard way)

2. Make sure the restaurant is busy

3. Say it quickly, but spell it slowly.

When you food is ready they call out your name. So far I have got away with the posh English double barreled name of “Harry bool-larks” but bollocks doesn’t mean much here (made me laugh though) and “Paul Mikeoc” that a few people looked up at.

I’m going to up my game and give a Russian name of “Oliver Clothsof”.

Louisville Kentucky Trip.

I want to take advantage of seeing as much of the states as I can. So far we have been to Illinois, Ohio and of course Indiana. Today I wanted to head south to Kentucky! Home of the… well… colonel sanders and KFC (although technically he was from Indiana, but they don’t shout about that much).

We went to a place called Louisville which is right on the other side of the Indiana/Kentucky border. Once we got there we headed for the Louisville Science Center where they had a robots exhibit. Zack loved it.

It was a nice sunny day with an experience at a place called white castle that left me thinking we really were the other side of the tracks.

Gradually and gradually we are going further out to experience the different parts of America. We have booked for a holiday in North Carolina, so I think it will be a real challenge entertaining the kids for more than 10 hours of sitting in the back seat of the car.

Dora The Explorer... Bullets... Dora the Explorer... Bullets

This is what happened in WalMart yesterday.