i’ve had such a wonderful life

i have in the past few weeks achieved a new (for me) sense of calm…i am not generally worried..although i did get an end of year evaluation from james school today that put my blood pressure up a little.

i have given up worrying about the future, it doesn’t seem to help…whatever is going to happen is pretty much out of my control. i am looking forward to and filling out the paperwork to send in to get my permanent residency. i have been pushed a lot little in that direction by the home office rules and there are some advantages to having it…

it can all be summed up by one of my first posts way back in march 2007

anyway, i am embarking on one of my most ambitious stained glass projects…it’s just for me and i’ve decided that when it’s done, i will hopefully like it enough to have it properly framed and wherever i hang it will be my home for a very long time

this is the pattern…

from this book

seems kind of appropriate, read here to learn about mandala’s

In the West, mandala is also used to refer to the “personal world” in which one lives, the various elements of the mandala or the activities and interests in which one engages, the most important being at the centre of the mandala and the least important at the periphery. Depicting one’s personal mandala in pictorial form can give one a good indication of the state of one’s spiritual life

i will be agonizing over what colours/type of glass to use where but i would be happy if it came out like this

A contemporary mandala made from a photograph of tree fungus

although i am not using tree fungus

okay this is just how far the internet has gone…while looking for images of mandalas and finding out they are made in lots of different mediums…besides the tree fungus, there was hand coloured, sewn, paper and computer generated like this one

which surprisingly, or not was found on this website

no comment

i pretty much relaxed yesterday, i had an appointment at 12 pm, with my counselor, i have officially declared myself cured! i am, in some ways forced to apply for permanent residency. i was thinking this morning that it’s almost a relief to not have to struggle with the should i? shouldn’t i? question. it has pretty much become a must do….the short explanantion is that james will revert to a visitor’s visa on 7 sept 2008. so my options are to pay to bring his up to mine…feb 2010 or just pay and make us both permanent in one fell swoop…no brainer really!!!

i have my appointment to take the life in the uk test next weds…one step closer…

so what did i do today???

i planned to paint the basecoat in the living room…but i couldn’t find any rollers, had to buy some crappy ones from the former £ store, couldn’t open the can of paint, had to use a screwdriver and hammer to puncture the plastic lid and then there was only enough to cover part of one wall….

i spent about 2-3 hours in the front garden, trimmed the hedges and noticed that they are very uneven…oh, well, i’d like to cut them down completely and expose my garden to more sun…and the looks of passersby. i live on a very quiet road but it is a main pedestrian walk because it curves and serves as kind of a shortcut. i have to admit that i did at one point stand back and wonder if it would be possible to trim the cubs logo in the front….they are still in first place…in july…

the postman and all the people that put flyers through my letterbox will notice that i have trimmed the growth back from the walk…and the very best thing is i have several cherries on my cherry tree…several as in about a dozen and you can see them hanging red and ripe!!!

i was pretty knackered after the front garden so i had a sandwich and a nap…got up and had a cup of coffee and carried on with the back garden…much easier as i keep up with that on a regular basis…i mowed the lawn and this is so weird and trivial…but i used to use two extension cords on my little hover mower…but i noticed one of the extensions has something rattling around so i just used the one good one and lo and behold…the hover mower was actually hovering…it was like a little green bat out of hell!

i did do some weeding and attempted to trim down the overgrowth…where the snails and slugs like to hide!!! cleo hates when i do this because it takes away all her hiding spots…

i walked up to the shops and treated myself to 2 big pots of new plants…lupins

and 2 big peroni

as i write this i am also working on not just dinner for tonight but lunch for the next two days…i’m stuck on a salmon, pea and rice salad…and i’m doing a spicy chicken, peppers and pasta thing

phew…plans for tonight????

i’m going to shortly plop myself in a chair in front of the telly to watch my usual favs of grand designs and hopefully gordon ramsay, eastenders, never mind the buzzcocks…

i will also be working on finishing up a stained glass project for a friend at work..i’m making her two of these little candle holders in red

for those who care, i am working two long days…thurs and friday so don’t expect to hear much!

it’s hard for me to admit, after surviving a 20 year marraige…a roller coaster ride, heavy on the take your breath away decent

but after more than 10 years of separation and divorce i can say that my ex, who took much more than he gave, did give me three things.

undeniably, our three children have given me the greatest pleasure and happiness

second, he gave me an appreciation for obscure rolling stones songs

can you not be amazed at mick’s mouth and lips???

third, is the lessons learned in a movie by robert deniro…a bronx tale

it don’t take much strength to pull a trigger, but try to get up every morning, day after day and work for a living, let’s see him try that…we’ll see who the tough guy is…the working man is tough guy..

they don’t love him….they fear him…

i have been accused (rightly so) for being obsessed with the weather and complaining (rightly so) about it. however, i am not above speaking up when it’s good.

today has been good…. low 70’s, very warm in the city centre and out here in the “country” there’s a nice cool breeze…in fact, i would say today has been very close to perfect!!!!

i haven’t been checking this blog, someone asked me if i missed it and i said no…but i was in the middle of working 3 night shifts and was enjoying not blogging…

but seeing the weather pixies back gives me new inspiration…maybe down but not out…and as usual the birmingham weather pixie is lying…it is fairly warm and balmy but you have to be under 20 to walk around in an outfit like that.

my garden is blooming nicely….roses, daisies, lavender, hollyhocks…i’m planning to cut myself a nice bouquet for my own selfish enjoyment on my few days off this week.

i like these

thanks to everyone who has read this blog but i’ve decided not to continue….personal reasons.

i may delete it at some point in the future but not right now. i was looking through some old posts and apologize for any pics that have disappeared.

and those blasted weather pixies have let me down again!!! i’ll blame it on them….

i may start a new blog so for anyone who might want to continue…leave a comment…it’ll go to my email and and i’ll let you know where you can find me….

the coach ride down to london was great, no stops, sunny, nice scenery of the english countryside and a nice slow winding route through some nice areas of london…the journey back was not…

i was nearly last in line but was able to snag the last empty seat alone…but of course there was a girl who boarded at the last second and where does she decide to sit??? next to me of course!! and after she pulls no less than 4 packs of crispy crunchy snacks out of her bag~~~ what’s the first thing she does??? starts chatting away at full volume on her mobile phone!!!

now i’m being sarcastic calling her my new friend but…..after listenly to her story about how she was seeing this guy, terry, for a year and a half…everything was great, no break ups, no big fights, really”blissful” and one day steph’s girlfriend rings and asks her to describe him…by the way, she is a blinging black girl, very pretty and he is white. steph describes him to her girlfriend and asks why and she says well, i go to school with a girl who has a white boyfriend named terry and fits his description….so steph thinks well, must be a coincidence they have a boyfriend with the same name…but thinks maybe he is cheating on her so she tells the girl he has a scar and she should find out if this other guy has a scar in the same place and OMG! he does and so steph confronts him and he starts crying saying he’s so sorry he just didn’t know what to do….so steph thinks he is cheating on her but then she finds out that actually he was seeing this other girl for 2 years before he even met steph!! i’ll spare you the part about the dance, the complimenting suit/dress, the other girl shows up, can’t we just be friends, she waited 6 months then dumped him…she’s still in shock!

and here’s what you can learn on a coach ride back from london…he is the cheater, steph is the cheatee and the other girl is the cheat on….

now this is the first 20 minutes of what will be a 3 hours coach ride…i don’t think the man in the row in front of us or the chap across the aisle (who farted very loudly while we were waiting to board the coach) really enjoyed that story either…

she went on to talk to another friend where i found out steph is on facebook!! oh boy! she has a really good pic and she has 1300 friends!!! imagine my luck sitting next to someone who has 1300 friends on facebook!?! but then she does do a lot of “activities”

thank god, soon after that her battery went dead or she ran out of minutes and couldn’t recount anymore personal details…did i mention she had her period??? day 3!!! i wish i was making all this up!!

she fell asleep for the rest of the trip and we all enjoyed ourselves~~~

i think i could be supporting something like this

the interview was interesting, a good old fashioned american interview…3 people, 2 american nurses and one british doctor. the job is for a discharge planner at my hospital!!! the NHS is looking at ways to move people out of the hospital the american way!! i’ve given up thinking about how i did, i am not a perfect match but i do have some special qualifications…..like a blue passport! just kidding, once again this position is awaiting final contract signing…it’s looking very “promising” but not official…but on the good side they are looking at sept to start and that conveniently will be after i could be holding a permanent resident visa.

not to visit the queen…i have a job interview of sorts. i applied for a position and was contacted about some other vague “exciting opportunity in birmingham”. it turns out it’s with Aetna insurance…didn’t know they were in the UK and i only got the details of the time, place and job description last night….it’s weird because everything is in dollars, the salary ranges etc. and when i click on the benefits section it’s totally american. instead of annual leave it has PTO…paid time off!

oh well, there is really no way for me to prepare for this (unlike the last time) so i just booked a coach ticket for £13 and it’s off to london for the day!!! it’s sunny and warm…it’s kind of like my adventure on the number 11 last week.

it’s been dry here, no rain….but that hasn’t stopped the slugs and/or snails from devouring the little parsley plant i bought and the marigolds…and i mean down to the stems in one night!!! it’s weird because i had a really big parsley plant that i pulled up last year and they never seemed interested in that….? but last year they ate my basil, so this year i have gone to extremes with the basil, put it in a tall pot and surrounded it with branches off the mint and chives….to disguise the scent? so far so good…

also, i am amazed at my inability to grow lavender in england…i grew lavender in chicago but all my plants here seem to die! and just to add to my frustration, when i walk to the shop i pass a house with a nice garden that has a lavender plant (bush) at least 3 feet in diameter!!!!! so i don’t know what the problem is~~~

time to load up my ipod for the coach, ta ta!