Happy Halloween!

Seeing as I was recently back from Scotland I didn't do a Halloween party this year. However I did make some purple witches hats that I took to Scotland for us girls to wear. If I can get a nice photo of me wearing my on I will put it up for you to see.

While I was off galavanting in Scotland Rich made me the most fantastic Halloween present ever - an LED pumpkin that he soldered himself! He also bought me some chocolate pumpkins and a Halloween cake (which he was kind enough to help me eat).

Scotland ho!

Ruth and I decided to visit the cold north, where there be kilts, haggis and loch ness monsters. We also thought we should go and say hi to Karen, Sean and little Maia.

Karen and Sean seem to be doing fantastically well with their little Scottish monster (sorry Maia - I didn't mean it really!). Maia is so very cute and well behaved - and she has her parents very well trained. With special permission from her mum and dad I've put up some photos of her here.

Thanks for having us Karen and Sean!

Rich's parents come to stay

Rich's mum and dad (RM and RD) decided it was time to visit and see our new flat so we had the pleasure of their company over this weekend.

Sunday 22nd

We all went off to have a wonder round Greenwich market (I wanted to scope it out for Christmas shopping again as I am starting to go through my usual Christmas panic). I didn't buy much in the end though as it was packed in Greenwich (I think everyone was sheltering from the rain) - but I did get some sweets for Rich and his parents. RM likes a sweet called 'Sasperella' which she let me and Rich try but neither of us liked - must be an 'older generation' thing.

After Greenwich Rich went off to a badminton match leaving me to accompany his parents to Cara and Nick's place. Cara and Nick cooked us a fantastic vegetarian lasagna with a very tasty chocolate croissant desert, yum! We all then played a game called 'Taboo' which is really similar to 'Articulate' - I teamed up with Rich's parents - but the Cara and Nick team was a bit too good for us to beat.

Monday 23rd (21st month anniversary!)

We decided to take Rich's parents into London as we wanted to look at the slides in the Tate modern and Rich's parents wanted to see the wildlife photography at the Natural History Museum. Unfortunately we didn't get to have a go on the slides as they were fully booked all day (everyone must have had the same idea) - they did look like great fun though. The wildlife photos were really good though - so if you have a chance go and take a look. One of our favourites was of three penguins, the two males were fighting over the female - and they do this by slapping each other with their flippers! Makes me think of men slapping each other with gloves to declare a duel in the olden days.

Thanks for coming down RD and RM - but next time you'll have to let Rich and I treat you for a change! Photos to hopefully follow soon.

Fuzzyfelt updates

Some of our more avid readers will have already noticed our exciting new Halloween themed FuzzyFelt banner. Pretty cool huh? I designed it the old fashioned way with pen and paper and then Rich helped to 'digitise' the image and give it that spooky red finish.

I am currently trying to produce the new version of the 'Daftness of Rich' page that you all love so much (especially Dan and Steve). Any suggestions or perhaps even stories of your own experiences with Rich's daftness would be greatfully received :-)

Lastly, take a look at Myfanwy's photo page as I've just put up some lovely new photos.

South East TAGB championships

Today was the long awaited Taekwondo competition that I put myself down for. However it didn't quite work out as I had hoped :-(

First off I had to do my individual pattern that I've been practicing for weeks - but as I was the first one up I was really nervous and don't feel that I did as well as I could. Even so I thought that the judging was poor as there seemed no consistancy in how points were being awarded. When the final trophies were given out the girl who got the most points came second for no apparent reason!

A bit later I went forward for my sparring, only to find that we had to be weighed. I knew I was slightly over the 60 kilogram limit so I wasn't too surprised when I was told that I wouldn't be allowed in the middleweight catagory. What did surprise (and upset) me was that if I wanted to go into the heavy weight section I would have to pay another £10! So a very annoyed Jessica decided not to spar at all.

Not too sure if I will go to another Taekwondo competition after that one, I thought that it would be nice to do it for my taekwondo club, but after today I felt a little cheated.

On a brigher note Rich has been helping with our club website, go and take a look at: www.croydon-taekwondo.co.uk

Skimmington Castle

An ex-collegue decided that we should all have a pub outting one evening to catch up - so tonight we all went down to a pub called Skimmington Castle (skimmingtoncastle.com).

The food was great - very tasty, however the conversation became quite disturbing... the two main topics being about spontaeous human combustion and toliet seat weighing scales. If you are interested in such things then go and have a look at:

Human combustion:

news.bbc.co.uk
en.wikipedia.org

Toliet seat:

v3.espacenet.com
www.wereallneighours.co.uk

Apologies to all who are deeply disturbed by the above - my advice would be not to click on any of the links...