Zion 100 75k

Quite a day for Londoners yesterday. The coverage ranged from ITV’s tell-us-what-you-felt-like-when-the-bomb-ripped-through-your-carriage to BBC’s “fair and balanced” without-wanting-to-speculate-about-the-motives-of-the-bombers,-which-muslim-extremists-do-you-blame? I initially thought that Tavistock Square was in Tavistock in Devon, which unsettled me a lot. Anyroad, me thoughts are with the deafened London masses and I’m v. glad we didn’t get caught up in it all. I couldn’t get through to Bert’s mobile, but his Dad says he’s fine…

We’re off to Brecon where I doubt there’ll be much blogging action, then Ashton Court Festival next weekend. So there’ll be a bumper crop of photos to slog through once we get back.

Judith & Arturo, if you’re reading this, I got your emails and am glad to hear things are going fine at PAPAS “so far”. Sounds like what needed doing’s been done and things are on the right track. Aguanten! I hope they get the ABC person in before Anna leaves for the North, she could write a 500 page manual on the place…

I’m booking tickets to Prague this morning with Sita, Beth and Ali. One possibility is a Boatel (Boat + Hotel= Boatel) sounds better than a Hoat. It’ll be the first time in a while that I go somewhere I don’t speak the language, but I have 13 days to become fluent in Czech. Otra cerveza por favor, probably won’t quite cut it there. Cheers y’all. Take care out there

Yesterday’s attempt to escape heat: pic.twitter.com/YxakzB7CrU

— Gwyn (@gwynf) July 16, 2018

In other news, Maxie P.’s had a haircut:

Am now officially knackered after my 3am drain unblocking, computer unplugging, sandwich eating antics last night… Couldn’t sleep even with gentle music in my earphones and my eyes covered by the sheets… So apparently, the rainy season has started…

I used to be vegetarian, but those days are long gone. The BBQ’s back in action in our back garden, we brought it out of hibernation when bert and his dad, David, arrived last saturday. Tasty. I’m going to use Flickr to host my pictures for a while and talking of which, I have one more Pro account to give away. I signed up before they got taken over by Yahoo and slashed their prices and increased their services, so they’re giving me 2 free accounts. I’ve offered one to me Dad, still waiting for him to accept. The other’s for the next guest mappee to add themself. Don’t forget to include your email address. If you’re already on there, just email me asking nicely. First come, first served.

Fruitful, sleepy day today. Am now 95% officially a US permanent resident, just have to wait for me green card to arrive. They stamped me passport in the meantime. It’s a much more efficient system now, instead of queuing up at 5am and hoping to get in, they’ve got an automated online appt system. I was in and out within 15 minutes. It would have been less but I had to go back to the car to leave my PDA there cos it can take photos which could be disastrous for homeland security apparently.

anyroad, below is a 9.5 second file of Monday evening in Ciao bella with Bert, his Dad, Sita and me. In the clip it’s just bert looking suspicious then the camera panning up to see the ring of redwoods which the outside dining area’s in. It’s a bit dark and as ever, dial up users may feel a little dissappointed. Bert and co headed south yesterday, you may see them keeping well within the speed limit in one of the following places in the next few days: Monterey, Big Sur, Hearst Castle, Santa Barbara, L.A., Palm Springs, Las Vegas. It was grand to see them, I just wish I could have taken some time of work to spend relaxing with them. But that will come soon. He blogged cryptically…

CiaoBellawithBertandRedwoods.asf (585k file) I think ASF is fairly universally recognised. Comment me if not. Cheers- gwyn

and it turns out there’s a freeware application that stitches together your photos in minutes. Expect lots more photos like this one…

Typical that a mountain of work falls on my lap just before making plans to go sightseeing this weekend. I stayed late yesterday doing as much as I could for various people. There’s graphic design, websites and translations all on the go and today we’re driving to Zacatecas. We’ve got someone looking after the house though. With a big stick. All you English-speaking, net-savvy burlgars. So there… Posts and pictures will be forthcoming but there may well be blog silence for a while… We haven’t got any decent road maps of the area north of Guad, so we may end up in Aguascalientes if the navegation doesn’t go to plan. Anyway, as per usual, you’ll read all about it here. Have a lovely weekend all : )

Oh and Feliz Cinco de Mayo if you’re in the States right now. It’s not a big deal in Mexico itself. Wait for September…

Aldo’s photos from Tuesday coming soon…