Becca Jane St Clair

Sitting down to do a 2010 review seems so weird….didn’t the year only just start? But then, when I look back on things…wow, January 2010 was so long ago!

We’ll start the year out on December 31, 2009. Tim and I were waiting on my spousal visa to be approved, and I received one of the most important phone calls of my life shortly before midnight GMT. We had been approved and my visa was on it’s way to me! My boxes had already been shipped, so the next three weeks were filled with me trying to pack my remaining suitcases, visit places “one last time”, and see as much of my family as I could. I left the US on January 21, 2010 and entered the UK on January 22. The immigration officer asked me nothing beyond “Where is your husband?” when I went through immigration. He stamped my passport and said “Welcome home, Mrs. Lockley”.

Tim picked me up, and we headed to the hotel he had booked for the previous night. Since my plane was getting in at 6 in the morning, Tim went down the night before, and we had decided he would pick me up and we would go back to the hotel to get more sleep, stay the night again, and begin our trip back home on the 23rd. I remember bits and pieces of the hotel stay. I remember watching an episode of Doctor Who on BBC3 while we sipped champagne and celebrated finally being together.

Tim went back to work and I busied myself unpacking my suitcases and getting things ready for our late Christmas celebration. On the 28th, we had Tim’s parents and sister over to celebrate Christmas…complete with putting up the tree!

My boxes finally arrived in February and it took me a while to get them all emptied….I finally emptied the last book box on our anniversary in November! Tim’s aunt found a local chorus for me to get involved in, and I started volunteering once a week at the Cancer Research UK shop on the high street. I was starting to get myself established!

March was fairly uneventful. Tim had a week of leave and we decided to stay at home and began working on our garden – we were going to try our hand at growing our own vegetables this year. We also began work on extending the garden railway…a project that had a deadline of August 31! I adopted the area under the lilac tree as “mine” and began clearing it of weeds. I soon discovered that there is something wrong with the soil under the tree, as nothing appears to want to grow on the sunny side. 🙁 Oh well, Rock garden for next year!

In April, we held our reception for Tim’s family and our friends in the UK. My mom flew over for it, and he trip was only supposed to be a short one….but due to volcanic ash, we wound up with an extra week!

May brought my first choral competition with Lincoln Sounds…and we came home with a Bronze medal and the highest score the chorus had ever gotten! What a fantastic introduction to the competition.

June and July were both quiet months. Mostly filled with more gardening and garden railway building.

in August, I went with my friend Helen and her son, Mark, to Wales for a week. We spent the week visiting castles and railways, and I had a great time. I loved Wales, and loved being near mountains. The end of August brought my birthday and Tim’s birthday. Tim was hitting a milestone this year, so we decided to have a party and officially open the upper circuit of the garden railway.

September was our big holiday. Honeymoon part 2. Tim had wanted to take me to Germany and Austria for our honeymoon, but it wasn’t going to work out right after we got married, so we decided to take the trip when Tim had his two weeks off. We spent our time camping in Zell am Ziller and Nußdorf, making day trips to castles and railways and Tim took me to see “my castle” – Neuschwanstein. We had a great trip. Blog posts about it are coming, I promise!

in October, I took the train down to Southampton to visit a friend I hadn’t seen since college. We re-connected through Facebook and I found out she had also married a British man and was living in the UK, and she invited me to come for a visit. We had a great time. It was really nice to be around someone who I have known for so long and to catch up with her. We have plans to get together sometime soon.

November marked our one year wedding anniversary and we celebrated it by attending the fireworks at the showgrounds. We also celebrated Thanksgiving and I cooked a full Thanksgiving meal for Tim and my in-laws.

Which brings us to the most recent month past, December. I spent most of the beginning of the month preparing and cleaning because my mom arrived on the 16th! Our plans for Christmas involved going over to Tim’s parents house, so I cooked my Christmas dinner on the 23rd. Unfortunately, my MIL wasn’t feeling well and on the 24th decided to cancel dinner at hers and rescheduled it for the 26th. Tim and I had to brave Tesco on Christmas Eve to get all the fixings for our dinner. I didn’t cook a turkey, but we made do with a nice roast chicken. Mom left on the 30th, and Tim and I watched DVDs last night and flipped to BBC1 about one minute before 12….and went to bed shortly after the fireworks.

Bring on 2011!

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Yesterday, we had plans for taking my mom to Edinburgh via the train. Tim and I planned on using our staff travel passes, and we had my mom apply for a Senior Rail Card (You are eligible at age 60) so we could save money on her ticket. I booked her ticket last week on the East Coast Trains website.

After getting out of the house a bit later than we had wanted, we managed to get to Newark North Gate with time to spare, as our train had been delayed due to engineering works. Tim explained that the engineering works was probably supposed to have ended prior to the first train of the day, but something must have happened to prevent engineering from giving up the possession (sometimes it helps to have a husband “in the know”!). While we were waiting, my husband was outside on the platform and saw a train go past with blue sparks coming out of the overhead – The trains were having problems with the frosty covered overhead wires and he speculated that was why our train might have been running late.

So we sat and read and kept glancing up at the timetable as our delay changed to being over an hour late….and then was simply replaced by the words “delayed” and an announcement that there were wires down. Tim said that wasn’t good, so I took the opportunity to go speak with someone at the ticket counter.

First, let me say that he was amazing, and I wish I remembered his name. He explained to me that it was looking likely that our train would be cancelled OR the delay would be so fierce that by the time we arrived in Edinburgh, we’d have to turn right back around on the train we had booked Mom’s return ticket on. I asked him what we should do about the fact that her tickets claim it is “non-refundable”, and he explained that he would endorse the tickets and I could go to the website to claim a refund since the train was going to be cancelled and we had day return tickets. He couldn’t offer me the refund right there as the tickets were purchased through the website. He then also validated our parking ticket so we wouldn’t have to pay £9 for day parking. He also told me that if we decided to go to Edinburgh tomorrow (er, today), I could just bring the tickets back to him and he would re-issue them.

So..we left. We salvaged the day slightly by going to Newark Castleand the National Space Centre*, but it was still a disappointing day.

East Coast Trains announced they planned on getting trains running again by 18:30, with one train an hour, but according to their website right now, most services are still suspended, so I don’t think we’ll be attempting Edinburgh today.

But imagine my confusion when I go to the website to put in my claim!

According to their website, we are eligible for a refund, as the site clearly states:

With the following instructions:

But then, when I’m looking at the “Your Account” page, the option to request a refund is blanked out:

I completely undestand that technically the ticket is “Non-refundable”, but both the person we spoke with at Newark North Gate and their own website says I am eligible for a refund regardless because the service was cancelled.

So..now what? I guess my only option is to send the request by post…and given that it is TWO DAYS BEFORE CHRISTMAS and most of the UK is shut down the Monday and Tuesday after to cover the holiday, I don’t think I’ll be seeing this refund anytime soon. Which is quite annoying because if we do decide to go anywhere next week, we’ll have to pay for Mom’s tickets instead of applying the refund.

Of course, this is assuming I ever actually GET the refund, too. Tim and I also each wasted one of our passes, as you can’t amend/cross out anything on the pass and we already had the date written in on it. In the long-run, that’s not as big of an issue as being out £50, though. We probably won’t use all 16 passes before next year’s cards are issued anyway.

And to make things even MORE difficult for us – last night we had a power cut for about an hour and despite having the fire going, it’s been impossible to warm the house up again.

*Also, interesting to note. Day admission to the Space Centre gives you an annual pass.

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I meal plan pretty much every week for Tim and I, but it’s not always on Monday, so this is my first time participating in Menu Planning Monday. I also have meal planned the rest of the month, since my Mom arrives for her visit on Thursday and she leaves on the 30th. I didn’t want to take time away from our visit with meal planning, and I had to get my order into Tesco to ensure delivery next week, too!

So, here is it..

Today – Chicken Pot Pie made with the leftovers from Sunday’s roast
Tuesday – Homemade Fish and Chips
Wednesday – Leftover Pot Pie
Thursday – Mom arrives! Crock Pot Indian from A Year of Slow Cooking
Friday – Toad in the Hole
Saturday – Fish Pie – This is an excellent recipe if you’re just learning. I’ve since modified it to fit our needs, but this was a great recipe to learn from.
Sunday – Kitchen Barbecue
Monday – Sweet and Sour Chicken Stir-Fry (with homemade sweet and sour sauce)
Tuesday – Turkey (yes, even though Christmas is Saturday)
Wednesday – Dinner out – Trip to Edinburgh for the day!
Thursday – Turkey Leftovers (leaning towards tetrazinni)
Friday – Vegetable Soup
Saturday – Crock Pot Breakfast Casserole; snacks for Lunch; Christmas dinner at in-laws
Sunday – Ham and Potatoes
Monday – Captain’s Casserole
Tuesday – Fish and Chips (from the chippy)
Wednesday – Chicken Tacos

I usually try one new recipe a week, but I’m not really experimenting while my mom is here. The Toad in the Hole recipe I’m using will be a new to me recipe, but I have made it before (as mini toad in the hole).
I’ve got a couple of recipes I want to post, too. I’ll see if I have time to post them before Thursday, or at least to schedule them for later posting!

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I live in a relatively small village. Our village touches the next village over due to housing/businesses spreading out, and so we share a police “force”. I think there are 4 of them, and their office is a little building next to the neighbouring village’s village hall.

A few days ago, we received our village’s monthly newsletter (late, due to the snow!) and I discovered on the Police’s note that they now had a blog set up for the area where they will be posting local crimes, so I added it to my RSS reader, figuring it might be handy to know what’s happened locally.

Today, they posted a ” Persoanl [sic] Safety Warning”. The warning apparently originally came from the Northants Police, but the top of the blog post says it was emailed to the poster “by a member of my family”. The incident supposedly happened along the M3 at the Fleet Services.

I’m reading this warning, and it talks about a woman stopping for petrol and going in to pay and having the clerk tell her there is a man hiding in the backseat of her car.

It made me pause and think hang on, I’m sure I’ve seen this before. I logged into my old email account from before I was married and ran a search, and sure enough, when I still lived in PA, I had received a very similar “warning” via a forwarded email, so I went to snopes.

And, sure enough, the whole thing is made up, and the story is as old as 1967!

It bothers me that our local police force would send out a rumour like this. People will see that post and panic. Way to go, local police.

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I had a few questions about how to upgrade to the newest (secure) version, so here’s easy directions with screenshots:

1. Log into your dashboard with your admin account

2. Look to the left. If it’s not dropped down, click on the word “dashboard”

3. Click “updates”

4. WordPress will tell you what needs updating (WordPress, plug-ins, etc) and all you have to do is click on the upgrade button and WordPress will do everything automatically.

BTW, if you don’t have a dedicated comment spam blocker, I recommend going into the plugins and searching through the available blockers. I added Askimet last night, and it’s already blocked 75 spam comments. My previous spam blocker, WP-SpamFree, blocked some spam, but would have emailed me those 75 spam comments for me to manually mark as spam.

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I sent an email off to Dreamhost complaining about the lack of help I received from their security team. I received a wonderful email from a member of their tech support who went through my entire site and found the malicious code on more pages (that google had not found, as the pages were on plug-ins not currently in use). I was able to completely remove the code, and I have to say, Dreamhost was much better about it this time around!

It took me an hour and a half to remove every last bit of the malicious code, but it’s gone. And hopefully with the new WordPress upgrade, this won’t happen again. Apparently there was a flaw in the previous version that made it easy to hack into. So, if any of you are using WordPress, go upgrade it to the new version that was released on December 1!

Here’s a full list of my posts for November:

Nov 1 – It’s NaBloPoMo
Nov 2 – A Day on the Welshpool and Llanfair
Nov 3 – A Call to NHS Direct
Nov 4 – Last Day in Wales: Ffestiniog Railway
Nov 5 – Happy Anniversary
Nov 6 – A trio of Vlogs
Nov 7 – Lincolnshire Life
Nov 8 – London Transport and War
Nov 9 – A Visit to the Seaside
Nov 10 –York, not to be Confused with New York or York PA
Nov 11 – Safety First
Nov 12 – Building a Railway
Nov 13 – Swagbucks Update
Nov 14 – Why Are You Here?
Nov 15 – Halfway!
Nov 16 – Wildlife in our House
Nov 17 – When Filters Go Bad
Nov 18 – Lincolnshire Sausage Festival
Nov 19 – Bonfire Night!
Nov 20 – Harry Potter and the Chorus Concert
Nov 21 – Wii Socialization
Nov 22 – Filler Post
Nov 23 – I am an Immigrant
Nov 24 – Tattershall Castle
Nov 25 – Abbey in the Backyard, Part 2
Nov 26 – Recipe: Potato Scramble
Nov 27 – Save your Feet
Nov 28 – Thanksgiving
Nov 29 – Warning
Nov 30 – Still Infected

It was fun. I had to put up a filler post on one day because I was sick and didn’t want to skip out on my commitment, and the last two days of the month were not what I had intended to post at all, thanks to a hacker (I had planned on doing this post on November 30), but I think I did good.

I still have to blog about Austria, and I will do my best to get those done before my mom arrives on December 16th! I will be most likely taking off from the 15th to 31st so I can spend time with my mom, and then start my new goals in the new year!

And I promise, this is my last blog post for today!

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I know I promised not to post twice in one day, but I needed to post this….and I’ll likely be posting a third post with all the NaBloPoMo links later today, too.

So, I generally love my hosting company (Dreamhost), but I have to say, I’m really kind of annoyed with them right now.

When this mess started Monday morning (GMT), they sent my problem to one of their specialists. I didn’t hear back until Tuesday afternoon (GMT), and most of what they told me to do had nothing to do with my problem – For example, I got told to update software on other domains and sub-domains when the ONLY sub having any issue at all was blog.beccajanestclair.com. So, I turned to google (via Swagbucks*) for help.

I tried the Google Webmaster Tools, and Google pinpointed three files as being “infected” – my about this blog page, a photo page from an August blog, and I forget the third. I deleted those three pages and the photos that had been displayed on those pages, and will need to re-write an about this blog page tomorrow. Dreamhost had not mentioned these files, only 2 files that were buried deep within 6 folders of a theme I hadn’t even ever used, which I also deleted. I then decided if the themes really were the problem, I had better go through and remove all the wordpress themes I wasn’t using. Dreamhost suggested re-installing my current theme, but unfortunately download links to it no longer exist. I had decided I would search for a similar looking theme, and take my css sheet from the current theme to make a new theme look like the current theme if I had to.

I had about 10 help sites open by this point, so I can’t tell you which site it was that actually gave me this idea, but I went into the WordPress theme editor and opened all the php files for my current them and really looked at them. My coding skills aren’t super or anything, but I was confident I would notice something off, as I have modified most of the php files marginally to achieve my custom theme. Sure enough, at the top of every single php page was a random string of code. Please note, Dreamhost did not suggest doing this. Dreamhost did not even tell me what string of code to look for, and did NOT detect the string of code in all my php files when they looked. The files they had told me to delete had been css files, but the css file for my current theme was the only part of my theme that was clean! I removed the string of code from all the files, and then went into FileZilla and checked all the other php files on my server. Nothing else was infected. I also took this time to remove lots of old files, and to remove previous incarnations of my website, including the very first version using frames and a version using python. I don’t think I needed to remove these files, but I figured I might as well start to clean up my stuff, since I have now held my domain for nearly 10 years. The me of 10 years ago (age 21!) is very different than the me I am now, and while I had the old pages buried deep in random folders, I really don’t think I want anyone finding them.

And good news from google, too – I just checked the webmaster tools and it says:

Status of the latest badware review for this site: A review for this site has finished. The site was found clean. The badware warnings from web search are being removed. Please note that it can take some time for this change to propagate.

Woot.

So. Rebecca: 1 Dreamhost: 0

*Oh, and when I started googling with Swagbucks yesterday, my points count was 649. As of right now, I have 721 swagbucks, a little over a 100 to go for another £5 Amazon voucher!

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Oh the weather outside is frightful

Saturday:

Sunday:

Monday:
No pic of my house, but here’s one I took in Lincoln

Tuesday:

10AM:

2PM:

9PM:

11PM:

But the fire is so delightful

And since we’ve no place to go…Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow

And the most recent, taken at 1AM on Wednesday:

It doesn’t show signs of stopping….:

And just for good measure, the snowperson my sister-in-law and I made this afternoon:

The village shop has run out of the 4 pint size bottle (half gallonish) of milk and no longer has bread, but we’ve got the bread machine for bread, and worst case scenario, we’ll buy smaller milk if we run out (just opened a 4 pt bottle Tuesday afternoon). Worst, worst case scenario, I have a canister of powdered milk in my baking supplies we can raid for tea. We stopped at Morrison’s on Monday and bought a few “basics”, not our weekly shop, but I think I can cobble together some meals for a few days. Tim and I can also always go to the CostCutter or the Co-Op, though those are longer walks (about a mile RT to CostCutter and 2 miles RT to the Co-Op) and today when we went to the Spar shop (literally, 5 houses down from us) I got soaked by a passing car, so I really don’t want to walk near the road right now!

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No signs of the problems with my website being fixed. Dreamhost sent me an email yesterday to tell me they had forwarded my issue to a “specialist” and the email said that because it was being sent to a specialist, they couldn’t guarantee their usual 24 hour turnaround, which is really usually about 5 hours or so. So….I wait. And meanwhile, worry about my site. I had a great end of NaBloPoMo post planned with links back to every entry for the month, but I don’t want anyone clicking on my website until things get fixed.

Even odder is I tried using the google webmaster tools to figure out what was wrong, and it tells me nothing, but still says my site is infected with malware, so I’m really confused. The pages it pointed to as being “infected” were my about this site page (which I’ve now deleted) and a page that displayed a photo from an entry back in August (which I’ve also deleted). Google claims that going to those pages doesn’t direct to those pages but goes to a malware website, but I’ve checked things out and there is nothing there at all. I’ve looked in all the source files, I’ve checked every file in my ftp directory, I’ve reviewed the htaccess file…and I can’t figure it out.

So I’m going to cross my fingers that Dreamhost can fix it soon for me and that it won’t be too hard to get google to stop listing my site as being infected. I don’t get a whole lot of google hits, but I still enjoy seeing the traffic.

Other steps I’ve taken:

-If you’ve commented on my blog in the past week and I did not know who you were, your comment was deleted. I do apologize, but since I couldn’t track the source of the problem anything unknown got canned. If you previously left me comments, I kept it. If you want to leave your comment again, feel free but also let me know who you are. I also deleted comments left by fake email addresses or listing fake URLs. I consider an email address to be fake if it’s just a string of random letters. Again, if I’ve deleted a legitimate comment, I apologize and ask that you re-post it.

-Blocked All IPs of potential spam comments. I have a really good spam filter, but some comments still get through. I blacklisted every IP address that was attached to recent spam comments. Spam comments are comments that don’t make any sense, aren’t relevant to my post, contain links to sites that are not personal webpages. If I have accidentally blacklisted your IP, you will not be able to leave comments. If you want to be taken off the blacklist, just send me an email and let me know your IP and who you are.

-All user accounts at the “subscriber” level have been deleted and the ability to create your own account has been removed.

And that’s about it. I HAVE managed to post every day for the month of November, I just can’t post links to all the entries yet. 🙁

My webpage is popping up as being blocked by both firefox and AVG. I’m looking into it.

If anyone else is getting the same issues, please let me know.

(this will have to be my filler post for today. And I really hope I don’t miss tomorrow’s last post of NaBloPoMo!)

Today is my family’s big Thanksgiving dinner, and only the second one I’ve ever missed. I sent my mom some photos to take along, and I’ve also written a letter to my family. Here is a copy of the letter, which is basically a run-down of 2010:

Dear Family,

Rebecca & Tim

I bought a new pair of HIGH heeled boots a few months back…and when I say high, I mean high.

See?

(pardon the pasty legs, the flash went off and I was wearing nude tights!)

The heel on those is about 3 inches. And these are for a person who never wears heels. I mean, I do on occasion, but my usual heels are only about an inch or so. But I loved these boots!

I wore them a lot to try to break them in, and I moved the insoles out of a different pair of heels to try to make them more comfortable. Tim bought me these thick heel wedges at Pound Stretcher to try to help…but always, after an hour or so, the balls of my feet would be in terrible pain from all the strain/pressure.

It really upset me, because these were NOT cheap boots (though I did score them on a sale!). I figured I would just have to suffer through it until my feet got used to the height of the heel, but then I was in Boots a few days ago and I found these. Ball of Foot cushions. They don’t go in your shoe, it has a loop for your second toe and then you position it under your tights/sock/whatever. And my feet felt so good! The only weird thing is getting used to the toe loop, but honestly, after about 10 minutes I forgot it was there. The pads are washable, too, so if they start to get funky you can just wash them in the sink. I’m so happy. Now I can wear my fantastic boots all day, everyday.

I also like that since it doesn’t stick to a shoe, I can use them in other pairs of shoes. Maybe my chorus shoes won’t be so painful any more!

[Please note: I am not being compensated by Evans, Scholl, or Boots to advertise their products. It’s just a product that works for me!]

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This is an adaptation of a crock pot breakfast recipe my mom and I always make for Christmas morning, only made in a frying pan in about 20 minutes.

Potato Scramble

This recipe can easily be scaled up or down, depending on how many people you are serving

You will need:

3 slices of bacon per person, diced
1 potato per person, diced
1 small tomato per person, diced
25g frozen peas per person (optional, I really only added it for colour!)
handful of shredded cheese per person
2 eggs per person
splash of milk
oil

I used my wok because it was the largest frying pan I had.

heat oil in a large frying pan. When oil is hot, add potatoes and fry for about 5 minutes.
add diced bacon, fry for an additional 5 minutes, longer if you want crispy bacon (or do in reverse order)
add peas, fry for 5 minutes
add tomato
whisk eggs and milk, add to fry pan and continually stir to scramble egg, about 5 minutes
top with cheese, cook until cheese melts.

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In March 2010, I blogged about Barlings Abbey, an abbey ruin located not far from Tim’s grandad’s house. In April 2010, we were to find another random abbey ruin while driving with my mom.

We had discovered the remains of Tupholme Abbey.

Tupholme Abbey was founded between 1155 and 1165. The area was picked primarily for it’s location to the River Witham, and was expected to do well. However, this was not to be the case at all. While it was operational, the abbey suffered many debts. In 1347, an abbot was accused of “forgery and counterfeiting of the coin of the realm”. In 1482, the canons were forbidden to leave the abbey due to unruly behavior, and in 1497, an abbot was banished to Leicester for having a child with a local woman.

Tupholme Abbey was dissolved in 1536 under King Henry VIII.

The land and abbey changed hands many times, becoming part of a mansion and later a manor house. In the 1970s, the site was even used for a music festival. Finally, in 1988, the National Trust took over the property.

You can visit the ruins for free – but you might want to make sure you have your Wellies when you go! We had to walk through sheep grazing to get to the ruins. The pasture was rather squishy with what I hoped was mud, but I fear wasn’t!

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With my mom’s December visit less than a month away, I thought it was time to finally blog about a place we took her while she had her “extended” visit (thanks to volcanic ash) in April. My friend Lynne had invited us over to her house, and so we decided to go to Tattershall Castle in the morning.

Tattershall Castle has six floors to explore, and you can go out on the roof to look at the spectacular views of the area. Tattershall Castle was built between 1430 and 1450, and despite there being plenty of stone available, the owner decided he wanted to build his castle out of brick, making it look more modern than being built in the 15th century!

We enjoyed a walk around the grounds, and then explored the lower levels. Tattershall Castle has 150 steps up to the battlements, so Mom decided to sit on a bench and enjoy the sunshine while I bravely accompanied Tim up the steps….and then he bravely went out on to the roof with me!

The walls and stairwells of Tattershall Castle are littered with etchings of people’s names and dates – going back as far as the 1800s!

Tattershall Castle is open from 15 March to 31 October Saturday – Wednesday, and on Saturday and Sunday only the rest of the year. Admission is £5.30 for adults, and members of the National Trust get in for free with their membership card.

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Apparently, there is going to be a speech made today (or maybe it has been made already) about more changes to the UK immigration system. My reliable source told me not to worry, and it looks like by “cutting family visas”, they mean more restrictions on people who come over as dependants of people here on work visas. Not family visas where you’ve moved to the UK to live with your family. Whew. My friend also pointed out to me that they already did put restrictions on the family based visa, based on the new English test, which isn’t aimed at people from English speaking countries anyway. The government scrapped the “Earned Citizenship” route as well, which affects my permanent residency, because it now looks like I am back to applying for Indefinite Leave to Remain in December 2011 instead of the new Probationary Citizenship that was to go into effect in July 2011.

But all the talk lately about immigration rules changing, caps being made, and fees raising reminded me of a conversation I had with my friend Erin a few weeks back. It was right around US election day and I mentioned to her that I hadn’t registered for an absentee ballot. My reasoning behind this was that I felt since I no longer lived in Lancaster/Pennsylvania/the United States, I really shouldn’t be making decisions on how things are run. I’m not there every day to experience life under [insert name of politician], and being in the UK means I only get exposed to print media, which as we all know, can be biased. I don’t think not voting made me a “bad American”, either.

I can’t vote in the UK, either. I am an immigrant, and even with permanent residency, I still can’t vote. In order to vote in the UK, you need to have citizenship. I have every intention on gaining UK citizenship when I am eligible (should be January 2013, if my calculations are right) because I feel that since I plan on spending the rest of my life here, I should be able to state my views on the government and be able to vote. It killed me not being able to vote in the May election.

I was discussing things over with Erin, and I proposed to her my idea — You should be able to vote where you live, regardless of immigration status. Obviously, some rules would need to be made to keep people from moving just for an election, but why shouldn’t you be able to vote where you live and vote for the candidates that you support?

I’m also in favour of “world citizenship” and having it not matter where you wish to live. Ever notice on a sci-fi show how they almost always refer to the government as “earth” or “world”? Why can’t we have that now*? Yes, I know. Overpopulation. If we had world citizenship, then everyone might move towards the “desirable” places to live, and places that were “undesirable”, like deserts where you can’t grow anything, would soon become abandoned. But it’s a nice thought, isn’t it?

I never thought I would become an immigrant. Immigrants were my dad’s parents, and my mom’s great-great-grandparents. Not me. But, here we are. I am an immigrant. And I’m happy.

*Okay, so it’s been pointed out that a government controlling the world isn’t such a hot idea…but that’s not really what I meant. I’m more for the “world citizenship”, not world government!

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I don’t want to shirk on my NaBloPoMo commitment, but today I’m not feeling very well. So, this will have to do for a post. If I’m feeling better later, I will post a regular entry. But right now? I just want to curl up on the sofa with my snuggie and a book.

It’s funny how social you become when you have a Wii. Last night, we hosted our second Wii Party. I love it. Tim and I scored a great deal on the Wii. For those of you who didn’t see me gush about it on facebook or LJ, we paid one of his co-workers £165 for a Wii, 2 motion plus controllers w/nunchucks, Wii Fit Plus, the balance board, an old school controller, Mario Kart (with wheel), Wii Sports, Wii Sports Resort, Ledgend of Zelda, Super Smash Brothers Brawl, and one other game we haven’t looked at yet. Amazon prices say we should have paid nearly £400 for everything, and a trip to a local gaming store gave us a price of over £500. Wooo.

Tim and I wanted a Wii for Christmas last year, but we just couldn’t swing it financially, so when his co-worker was talking about getting rid of his, Tim jumped on it. We both want to use the Wii Fit. We set it up and played for about 20 minutes each on Tuesday, but then we haven’t had time to get on it at all since then. We also love the bowling, swordfighting, and frisbee. Tim’s rather attached to Mario Kart, but I discovered watching it gives me motion sickness!

I don’t want to give out our Wii number publicly, but if you’d like to be Wii friends, let me know and I’ll give you the number. We still don’t really know how it works, other than how to send messages to other people, but we’re learning!

I love how the Wii has made video gaming a social thing. And an active thing. No more couch potatoes!

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Yesterday, I met up with two of my friends and we went and saw the new Harry Potter film. Loved it! I won’t spoil it for anyone, but despite it being a dark film, I found myself laughing a lot. What I didn’t like was the film was set to start at 1, but at 1 they started the commercials and previews and the actual film didn’t start until 1:30. But, I found the Odeon staff very friendly, and they even offered to put my big bag behind the box office so I didn’t have to find a place to put it in the theatre.

After the film, I met some of my friends from chorus for Tea and we headed over to the Drill Hall for our concert last night. Our concert was a 70s and 80s theme, so it was lots of fun dressing up. We had several people dressed up like Olivia Newton-John from her Physical video, punk rockers, hippie chicks, and several ladies wore their own clothing they still had hanging in their wardrobes! We had loads of wigs, too. I didn’t wear a wig. After wearing my hair piece for the first half (a ponytail on a clip), I put my hair into two pigtails for the second half, since that’s how I wore my hair in the 80s! I didn’t wear clothing I still owned. I probably DO still have some of the clothing I wore in the 80s at my mom’s house, but it would all be too small as I was a child in the 80s.

Our show was a great success. We shared the stage with the Foss Dyke Band, and at the end had a sing-a-long. The band director picked war-time songs, so we sang “White Cliffs of Dover”, “We’ll Meet Again”, and “The Army and the Navy and the Air Force”…..songs I had never heard before, but many of the chorus members and audience members recognized them. I think it would have been like ending a concert in the US with “Grand old Flag” or “Yankee Doodle”.

And I’m off again today! Seeing Harry Potter for the second time, this time with my husband, brother-in-law, and BIL’s girlfriend.

Pictures and hopefully video to follow!

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