the sandcastles you built are falling down

It’s Elroy’s birthday today!
I bought him a new silver mouse toy and some cheese flavoured cat treats. He seemed pretty pleased with both, but he’s a cat. he’s pretty easy to please.

14 and 15 September I drove to Hastings to visit Niks and attend the extreme sports festival in Eastboure.
Niks’ league was organising an outdoor roller derby tournament and I went along to volunteer.
I was quite hoping to walk along the beach front and see some of the other sports being played, but there just wasn’t enough time.
We were also really lucky with the weather, it rained the day before and the day after the Sunday.
It’s also one of the few time we’ve seen eachother in our 9 year friendship where we didn’t drink a single alcoholic beverage.

It was my dad’s 60th birthday last month.
He had a big party with lots of family and family friends and we put on a big traditional South African braai. The food seemed to go down well with everyone, especially with people who had never tried South African food, which was pretty cool.
I applied to have the day off work well over a month before the party and even found someone willing to work my shift, and they left it a day (ONE day) before to let me know my swap had been declined and I couldn’t have the day off after all.
I was so pissed off. I thought fuck you and just called in sick, which is very unlike me.
As a result of doing something so out of character I spent the whole day feeling guilty and anxious and totally ruined it for myself. I just couldn’t relax and have a good time. So silly.

Last thursday was date night! We went to the cinema and watched The Lorax. I was so excited to see it, and the trailer made it look so magical. I was disappointed though. It was SO much of a kids movie. I love kids movies laced with lots of adult humour (like Despicable me and UP and Cloudy with a chance of Meatballs) but this had nothing. It got a few laughs out of me, and it was just beautiful to look at, but it was 100% for children. I even felt a little bit bored. And moral of the story?.. Don’t cut down trees.
After the movie we went out for dinner. I had a really rich pasta dish with chicken, bacon, mushrooms and cheese. And we shared a giant pitcher of cocktails. mmm.

On the 10th Ben and I went segway rallying. See my previous entry for pictures.
I bought him a voucher for his birthday last December and it’s taken us this long to use it.
Our session was at 8:30am and it was a 1½ drive to get to the location, so we ended up having to get up at 5:30am on our day off. Luckily Ben and I both work jobs where we have to get up at that sort of time in the morning quite frequently for work, so it wasn’t too much of an ask, just a little sucky to be doing it on a day off.
We re-lived our youth and sang along to limp bizkit in the car. Also stopped at the motorway services for over-priced breakfast.
The segway rally was loads of fun! Something I’d definitely do again. And it was only an hour long, I could have easily doubled it!
After  our segway experience we drove to the nearest town to find some food, but as it was only 11am none of the pubs were open, and the one cafe we found only sold chips and icecream.
We drove around aimlessly for about an hour looking for a restaurant with no luck.
Where did we end up? In a Sainsbury’s car park haha. We just bought sandwiches and juice from the shop and ate in the car and then drove back to Bristol,watching the scenery to a soundtrack of Staind and stopping once again on the motorway for petrol and coffee.

House news: The new house is still a pain in my ass.
Our solicitor is impossible to get hold of and no one is telling us anything.
There is a possibility of us moving on 3 September, but nothing’s been confirmed yet.

I had my annual line check at work last night.
I got an excellent!
Feeling pretty chuffed with myself.
Also got a letter last week saying that my temporary supervisor contract has been extended by 6 months, so it looks like I’ll be supervising flights all through the winter. Not sure how thrilled I am by that thought, but the extra money sure will come in handy once we have a mortgage.

ttfn