Holy macaroni -- this place is so empty! I suppose I shouldn't be surprised; after all the hard work of the past two weeks -- and especially the past three days -- it would be discouraging if the Event Horizon wasn't empty! Even so, the sound of my voice echoing off the bare walls is still a bit disconcerting. Stumpy and Chirp keep following me around -- they are both very confused and don't know where everything went!

A final post about the end of the Event Horizon is forthcoming. For now, however, I need to make ready for travel. About twelve hours from now, your friendly neighbourhood Nomad will be touching down at Heathrow... and in about fourteen hours, I should be back in Oxford at my remaining home: Chiron Beta Prime.

Astoundingly enough, I have found a phone company more inept, more incompetent, more irritating, and more irresponsible than BT. After the fiasco of July to September 2006, I would not have thought it possible. Yet it is true: TalkTalk takes the metaphoric cake for utter idiocy!

The way that the morons at TalkTalk have handled my request to set up a line in the new flat was shameful enough... and it is the reason why, more than one month after moving, we are still without a landline in our new home. I shall not bore you, gentle readers, with a long and detailed recap of our dealings with these nincompoops. Suffice to say that, after both my beloved cheshcat and I spent several fruitless hours on the phone with various departments, I finally gave up, cancelled my request, and shopped about for a new phone company. With any luck, we should have a landline again come on December 13^th, the morning after my return from Japan.

One could reasonably think that such would be the end of it, yes? One could... but, alas, one would be wrong. Adding the proverbial insult to injury, the person in TalkTalk's cancellations department failed to properly process my request and thus I was recently billed for a month of phone service that we did not receive. Oi! Not only have attempts to obtain a refund been futile, but even our efforts to switch off the account have proven to be beyond the meager capabilities of TalkTalk's staff. Indeed, it seems quite likely that they are all set to bill us again, later in December, for a second month of service not provided! To prevent this, I bypassed their people and had my bank remove their Direct Debit access to my account. I may not be able to procure a refund, but they shall certainly not pull that stunt again!

In the meantime, I find myself wondering if the United Kingdom has any good consumer watchdog organizations equivalent to, say, the Better Business Bureau. Although I hope that I have, at long last, seen the back of those incapable gits, methinks that this may be too much to expect.[*] As such, hoping for the best and preparing for the worst is a worthy paradigm, and I should assemble the requisite knowledge to arm myself if need be.

---

[*] My suspicion is that, after refusing to close the account, they will go after my impeccable credit rating when they find that I have prevented them from collecting monies to pay for service that we do not want and are not receiving.

Slept in the new flat for the first time last night. Very nice, though I did miss our kitties, who will be coming over later in the week. Had a good chat at work today about a new project for the Neutrino Interaction Working Group that I can start sinking my proverbial teeth into. And I've got a twenty-five mile bicycle ride from Banbury to Oxford planned for next weekend, as a good way to kick off my triathlon training. So it looks like my new year is off to a good start, filled with all sorts of beginnings! Huzzah!

Meanwhile, the old year ended on a pretty spiffy note. On Friday night, we broke in the new flat by hosting a Halloween party. Some very lovely people showed up, and we enjoyed gaming, good food, and some great conversations. Special thanks go to my beloved cheshcat, the jolly josington, and the lovely miss_amaranth for helping with set-up in advance and for assisting in hanging the Halloween decorations!

One of the highlights of the evening for me was bobbing for apples. I've not done this in a great many years, probably over a quarter of a century. Maybe that's why I ended up buying an 85 litre bin to put the water and apples in. This may have made things a wee bit tricky... but, in the end, I was able to successfully retrieve two of the apples! Hooray!

This being a Halloween party, there was some most fantabulous costumes on display. In particular, miss_amaranth's devil was soul-seductively fetching. cheshcat's spectre probably was the spookiest! My own costume evolved somewhat over the course of the weekend. Below, please to find a photograph -- taken by the awesometacular darkfloweruk late Friday evening -- of my favourite incarnation:

Don't run away -- it's only me!


When the evening wound down and people had gone to bed, I was happily able to squeeze in some quality alone time with my darling miss_amaranth. Due to my recent travels -- both in Merry Olde England and abroad -- we had not seen each other for a month; it was quite good to reconnect!

Since nearly everyone slept over, we made our way over to Atomic Burger for breakfast on Saturday morning. We semi-took over the restaurant and enjoyed the most important meal of the day in a most delicious way!

After we finished up at Atomic, around two o'clock, people began to disperse... including us! We drove on up to Nottingham to set up for our traditional Samhain ritual -- an Ancestor Feast and Toast. We had the same size group as last year, with two new people replacing the two that have left us. The ritual, which is the most intense ritual that I regularly participate in year after year, went well. cheshcat ran it solidly and, from my own perspective, it was interesting to observe how the experience has changed and evolved since I first began doing this WORK in 1994.

The ritual lasted for five hours, covering the time change. Shortly after, I went to bed. Sunday was a much more mellow day, at least in the beginning. I had a lie in, ate a leisurely breakfast, and sat about chatting. In the afternoon, cheshcat and I did a private purification and cleaning ritual -- third in a series of three for this Samhain -- and then we made our way back to Oxford. Once settled in there, I completed the season with the salt circle mentioned in the previous entry.

Definitely a very good weekend... and, it appears, one that has led into a very good week!

Friday / Saturday: Thanksgiving Party
Friday evening, cheshcat and I hopped into Peter, our trusty steed, and drove to SouthEast London to visit with our friends D&J. D&J are fellow Yanks -- brother and sister-in-law to the breathtakingly beautiful pomoloco -- who moved to London just three months before we moved to Oxford. Although we didn't know each other well when we all lived in Lawn Guyland, pomoloco wisely put the four of us in touch soon after we moved.

Since then, it has become tradition for D&J to host a Thanksgiving party each November, on one of the two Saturdays closest to the actual holiday[**], and to invite all of their expatriate friends. This year was the third in the tradition[***]. We went out on Friday to remove the stress of travelling out from Oxford on the day of the party... and also to get a little extra time with D&J, who we had not seen since their housewarming party back in September.

The party was good fun: We got to see people that we don't often spend time with, I have an invitation to go boating down the Thames next Spring with the St. Pancras harbormaster, and the food was excellent! In total, there were twelve of us there -- nine expatriated US-ians and three Brits who came along as partners of the expats. Given the demographics, D&J's flat became a temporarily extension of US soil. In particular, somebody decided to forbid the use of British English -- anyone using "top up" or "queue" or "zed" or "bloody" would be penalized by having to take a drink. It was an amusing suggestion... though I am not certain that it is directly responsible for most people ending the evening quite tipsy!


Sunday:
Sunday was a busy day, filled with a variety of activity -- some social, some productive, some fun! Just the sort of day that I like!

We stayed over at D&J's placeon Saturday night as well and had a nice lay in on Sunday. As if making an enormous Thanksgiving dinner wasn't enough, J prepared a lovely breakfast spread on Sunday at around noon -- fruit, pancakes (with real maple syrup), bacon (for the meat eaters), cheese, scrambled eggs, tea, juice! Yum!

After breakfast, cheshcat and I headed out. Before leaving London, we swung by Imperial College and I showed her the building and office where I now work. Then it was back into London traffic as we made our return to Oxford.

Upon returning to Oxford, I headed to St. Giles Church and rang bells for Sunday evening services. Nothing terribly noteworthy here.

When services ended, I met up with cheshcat at Skullcrusher Mountain. On Tuesday, we had moved the last of our belongings into the [as yet unnamed] new flat. However, before leaving SCM for good, we wanted to do a thorough cleaning and perform ritual to release any of our energy -- or that of our kitties -- that still lingered. It took a couple of hours, but we managed to accomplish this. When we left SCM, it was for the final time. Interestingly enough, I think that this is the first time cheshcat and I have moved house without any help from anyone else or a moving van! We did it all ourselves, using Peter as the only transport vehicle. Admittedly, we moved from a furnished flat to another furnished flat, but still...

Next, I dropped cheshcat (and our cleaning supplies) off at home, picked up my new ice skates, and made my way out to the evening session at the Oxford Ice Rink. There, I debuted my new skates. I learned two things: (1) The blades are so obviously superior to anything that I have previously skated on, and (2) The new skates hurt. A lot. My feet were killing me, and it was all I could do to do some basic forward skating all the way around the rink without stopping! I am not entirely surprised -- the lovely danaeris once warned me that new skates feel like that until you break them in. Still... ouch! It was a bit disappointing to not be able to do much on the ice; still the only way to break them in is to wear the things!

When I got home from the rink, cheshcat and I got takeaway Chinese food for dinner. I walked five minutes to pick it up -- I do enjoy living in a much more active area than we previously did!

Finally, it was getting late so I tucked cheshcat into bed, then wound down my own evening with a phone date with the adorable livetbd. It is always nice to hear her voice and it was good to catch up on each others' lives. We made plans to see each other when I am in the States next month; I am definitely looking forward to spending time with her again in the not too distant future! We also need to find a way to see a Broadway musical together, as we are both huge theatre geeks![****]

As I said -- the sort of active and varied Sunday that I like! When my head finally hit the pillow, I was thoroughly ready for it... and asleep almost immediately!

---

[*] One hundred points to the first person that identifies the source of my subject line!

[**] As none of us actually get Thanksgiving Day off here!

[***] Interestingly enough, each year they are living in a different flat from the previous November!

[****] Unless you compare to the spectacular squeektoy42, who is the Queen of Musical Theatre. Even if she cannot identify Into The Woods quotes.

The past thirty-six hours -- from Monday evening until this morning -- have been really good! There hasn't been any one single Major Good Thing... but there have been loads of little things conspiring to put me in an excellent mood!

It started with quite a nice ice skating lesson on Monday evening. I had a couple of breakthrough moments where various and sundry maneuvers seemed to click into place. I still can't reliably do an inside three-turn[*], but my backwards crossovers are looking good and my continuous curves -- both inside and outside edge -- are nice, too!

After skating on Monday, I had a lovely phone date with the even lovelier tawneypup! It is always good to hear her voice... and it will be even better to see here again next month! It was also a good way to end my evening; after getting off the phone, I collapsed into bed with cheshcat.

Tuesday began with the perfect commute, as I wrote about yesterday... and the day just got better from there. Apparently, I was right about the perfect commute being a good omen![**] For one thing, the weather was clear and sunny -- at this time of year, I will take all the daylight that I can get! Also, over the course of Tuesday, I received word of various and sundry bits of good news -- much of it I cannot repeat in the public domain -- which left me feeling bouncy and happy. Indeed, the bouncy happiness threatened to bubble over... so I went up to the level eight terrace and had a phone chat with Darelle so that I could bounce at her from the roof for a bit!

Tuesday evening was bell ringing practice with the OUSCR at Mary Mag. The return commute was nearly as smooth as the morning's -- only a three minute wait for the Oxford Tube -- and the ringing was quite nice. In particular, I fell into a groove whilst ringing the treble to St. Simons Triples and was ringing impressively well (for me)! These days, I am working on improving my ropesight and my listening skills. Also my bell handling, so that I can make more natural distinctions between a slow stroke, a steady stroke, and a quick stroke.

When practice ended, I picked up noodles for cheshcat and I for dinner, then met her at Skullcrusher Mountain. We ate, then removed the last bits of our things from the old flat. With all of our stuff gone, the last task was to get the kitties moved. We had left them to the end, visiting daily with food when we came to pack. The idea -- which seems to have worked -- was to set the new place up reasonably well before unleashing them to destroy it! Before moving the kitties, we bathed them. We do this once or twice a year with our cats, using baby shampoo with conditioner to clean them up. So long as you start them on it young, they tolerate it. They never like it... but they tolerate it. For Giles, who was six months old yesterday, this was his first bath ever! He squirms like a wild thing when we so much as try to clip his claws... so both Chesh and I had anticipated the bath as being quite a challenge. Giles surprised us by taking it remarkably well -- mainly he just went limp and let us get on with it! Good kitty!

Once Giles and The Boy were clean, we put them in the car and left Skullcrusher Mountain. We need to return for cleaning and to do a farewell ritual for the space... but we are now officially moved out! Nice! Indeed, this has been one of the easiest moves I have ever done[***]. We did it all in eleven days, all by ourselves[****] and using only my Red Rover for transport. The new place is not fully set up set... but by spreading the packing over eleven days, we have had time to get a good fraction of our things into place as we went along.[*****]

The poor kitties didn't quite know what hit them! First, Mommy and Daddy take away all the things that they are used to! And go away each night! Then they get shoved into water!! And put in a carrier!! In the car!!! Then taken to a strange place!!!! Poor The Boy, he was very clingy and vocal as he explored the new place -- I made sure to lavish tonnes of attention on him! Giles, being a kitten, was less traumatised and happily explored his new home. Even though it was late, cheshcat and I stayed up with them for some time, helping to acclimate them.

Finally, Chesh fell into bed and I hopped into the shower to wash the yuck of the old flat off of me. Then a "quick" hop online to check for mail from one or two certain someones... and into bed myself!

All in all, quite a nice day and a half!

The one downside to it all has been that, amongst all the activity of the past few days, I really have not enjoyed a full night's sleep since Saturday! I will endeavour to rectify this tonight. This evening, cheshcat and I have theatre plans at the Oxford Playhouse. I don't know what show we are seeing yet -- this is the second-to-last of the "surprise theatre" tickets that she bought back in August -- but their shows usually let out shortly after ten pm. With any luck, I can grab a quick dinner and be in bed by shortly after eleven o'clock, thus luxuriating in the luxury of eight hours rest!

---

[*] But that's okay as the term is only half over. I have three more weeks to learn how!

[**] Certain good wishes from certain special people probably didn't hurt with this, either!

[***] Not counting those rare times that we have had professional movers, like when I moved from Arizona to Chicago to start work at Fermilab and the lab paid for the relocation costs.

[****] I believe that this alone is a first!

[*****] We were also able to re-use boxes after unpacking them, which is a nice eco-bonus!

Hurm. I have been informed by Secret LJ Gnomes^TM that it has been too long since I posted an entry to journal my life. Well, gentle readers, I'm afraid that you all know what this means! That's right -- it's the Return Of The Return Of The Week In Review Post! In fact, it has been so long since I made a proper journal entry that this becomes the Extended Edition of the RotRotWiRP!

( So what has your Friendly Neighborhood Nomad has been up to? )

Our lease on the new flat began on Friday. We are currently in the process of moving from the old place to the new one, and expect to be entirely out of the old apartment by the end of this coming weekend. In the meantime, here are so initial thoughts on the new space:

Cons (major):

• Size: New flat is definitely smaller than the old flat. Which is saying something!

Cons (minor):

• Location: New flat is further from the Oxford city centre (about two miles, compared with our previous flat which was about one mile away).
  
• Management: New flat is run by a professional company, meaning more interference into our lives.
  
• Rent: New flat is £45/month more expensive than the old flat.
  
• Showers: Thus far, water pressure is not impressive. Nor is the hot water supply. We shall see if something can be done about this.

Pros (major):

• Location: New flat is much closer to the Oxford Tube stop (a five minute walk, or three minute run, compared to a fifteen minute drive). This will also make it easier to take my bicycle on the coach, helping to shorten the London side of the commute.
  
• Location: New flat is also on a bus route that brings cheshcat directly to work.
  
• Location: New flat is in an active neighborhood -- directly above shops -- so there is life outside my apartment. And I can see it just by looking outside of my living room window!
  
• Condition: New flat is in much better condition than the old flat! Much!! (For one thing, there doesn't seem to be rampant mould growth, which the old flat suffered from -- due to insufficient insulation -- every winter!)
  
• Dishwasher: We have one now!

Pros (minor):

• Facilities: Two full bathrooms! Excellent!
  
• Management: New flat is run by a professional company, so any problems that we have will hopefully be tended to. (As opposed to the last landlady who did absolutely nothing ever about anything -- not even returning letters, calls, or e-mail)
  
• Neighbors: I live next to the Shark House! How bloody cool is that??

In short, the new place[**] is not perfect... but it is an improvement, especially given the location of our current jobs.[***] These are just the initial impressions. It will be interesting[****] to see how they evolve as time goes on.

---

[*] Apologies to the Barenaked Ladies for my subject line...

[**] Which still has not officially been christened. Chesh favours calling it "Skullcrusher Mountain II", whilst I tend to favour an original name.

[***] In all fairness, the old flat was much better suited to the location of our previous jobs, for both of us. Had we lived at the new place whilst working at those jobs, it would have been very inconvenient.

[****] At least to me.

Been a tad busy these past few days. Instead of saving everything up for one big post -- which, due to time constraints, may never get written -- I may just put out a series of small entries today.

Although we took possession of the new flat on Friday, we are still in the process of moving into it. We slept in the old flat on Friday and Saturday, then slept in the new one for the first time on Sunday. Thus, my first commute to London from the new place happened yesterday.

The living room in the new flat looks out on the London Road -- the main road in East Oxford[*]. Yesterday, as I was coming home from London to the new flat, I sent a text message to cheshcat letting her know when the coach had arrived at the outskirts of Oxford. Six minutes later, I was walking up to our building when I heard a loud "BEEP" from above. I looked up and saw cheshcat there -- smiling and waving at me! After receiving my text, she had gone to the window and leaned out to greet me as I returned to our new home for the first time. That was very sweet of her, and a most pleasant welcome home! I was grinning for much of the rest of the evening after that...

---

[*] Others may disagree with me on this, citing the Cowley Road and the Iffley Road. However, I consider the London Road to be the main road in East Oxford, while the Cowley and Iffley Roads are the main roads in SouthEast Oxford. The Abingdon Road is clearly the main road in South Oxford and the Botley road is just as obviously the main road in West Oxford. North Oxford, like SouthEast Oxford, has two main roads -- the Woodstock Road and the Banbury Road, though the Banbury Road -- where we have been living -- is clearly the "main-er" of the two.

That's right! It's time for the dreaded "Week In Review" post![*] What has your Friendly Neighbourhood Nomad been up to this week?

Monday: After work, I had a tight commute, but got back into Oxford just in time for my ice skating lesson. Actually, I had thought that I would be late for the first time ever -- very glad to have been wrong on that count! This was the first week of the Level Seven class. We are learning inside edge three-turns[**], backwards crossovers, continuous circles on the inside edges, and continuous circles on the outside edges. The first two seem a bit tricky, but I have a fair bit of confidence that I can manage to learn them all in the remaining five weeks of the class. Eventually, I know that I will have to re-take a Level... but it hasn't happened yet, and I'd like to put that off for as long as possible!

Tuesday: Missed the Oxford Tube in the evening by about two minutes, so I had to wait fifteen for the next one. This made me late for bell ringing practice with the OUSCR at Mary Mag. Thankfully, I was only seven minutes late to a seventy-five minute practice, so it all worked out. Indeed, it is quite likely that I didn't actually miss out on any ringing. There were twenty-two people there, so I only rang every third or fourth go. I also stayed up far too late watching the election results come in.

Wednesday: This was a free evening -- a rarity during term time. Since I skate on Mondays and ring on Tuesdays and Thursdays, Wednesday evening is the only one that is potentially open... and often cheshcat and I fill it with theatre dates (like we did last week and like we will do in two and three weeks time). I used the opportunity stay late at Imperial College. This seemed like a good idea, especially since I had arrived late, thanks to the long election night on Tuesday. Once I arrived home, I ate dinner quickly, then had a phone date with the tremendously terrific tawneypup! It had only been about a week since we had last talked -- which is normal for us -- but it was still quite lovely to hear her voice! Before the evening was out, I also got to catch up with frogcastle for the first time in awhile, and speak to the delightfully delicious Darelle, too.

Thursday: Today has turned out to be very different than planned. In fact, it has been a bit of an annoying day. Nothing serious has gone wrong, but I am non-plussed. I'm going to rant about my day, just to get the annoyance off of my chest. However, it really is just griping, so I will ( place it behind a cut, and please feel free to skip it! )

Friday: Tomorrow, we pick up the keys to our new flat! At which point, we officially start moving! Looking forward to this -- I like the new place, and it will make the commute a bit easier in a couple of different ways! Then there is a very busy weekend ahead... but I will write about that as it unfolds.

---

[*] Or, to be more specific, the slightly-less dreaded "Week In Review So Far" post.

[**] These involve skating forward, then pivoting on one foot, and ending up backward in a one-foot glide. We did them on the outside edge of our skates in Level Six.

[***] As anyone who knows me will attest, waiting is not my strong suit.

[****] Three cheers for mobile broadband!

It is Tuesday afternoon. This morning, I took a short trip to the United States.

Yes, gentle readers, you heard right. I needed to visit the U.S. Embassy here in London to get some papers notarized for the refinancing of the Event Horizon. It was weird to walk off the streets of London and be back in the United States again, including paying for things in dollars (and needing my passport to get in!). I took the underground from Imperial College to the Embassy, but walked back. Oddly enough, the return trip, on foot, was shorter than the outbound one!

It is Tuesday afternoon. Since Monday morning, I have:

• Found a new flat for cheshcat and I to move into
• Had a follow-up meeting at the hospital with cheshcat's surgeon[*]
• Gotten Peter the Red Rover through his MOT, making him legal to drive for another year
• Gone ice skating
• Visited the Embassy to finish the final (?) papers needed for refinancing the house
• lots of other little niggly bits, like arranging cat care for our upcoming trip to the States, that I won't bore anyone with here[**]

Whew! Good thing for those super powers, or I might be feeling a bit worn out after all that!

Right. Back to work then. Let's see if we can't get some physics done before it is time to pack up for the day and head back to Oxford for tonight's ice skating lesson...

---

[*] There was some good news to be had there! I won't discuss it, as it is Chesh's to tell, but good news should be acknowledged!

[**] I realise that this journal is boring enough of late already, seeing as I have not jumped out of any planes, walked on hot coals, climbed the ruins of a Norman castle, witnessed any exploding Time Machines, danced round any seven story bonfires, visited any extreme geographic locations, attended any historic concerts, or mudwrestled since the end of August. [Note to new readers: The above paragraph is the summary version of my July and August] Ah, Summer, old friend! How I do miss thee!