Pictures Galore

Ok, I've received some e-mails asking for pictures of our recent travels around Scotland. I've picked some pictures out that show how awesome the country I live in actually is, but still, they don't do it justice. I love it here and am constantly amazed at how beautiful it is. I'm working on my garden this week and will post pictures of that when I'm done. Here goes...

This is Nic and I in front of Loch Ness (no, sadly we did not get to see the Loch Ness Monster. I was calling for Nessy to show up, but no luck.) It was really sunny so we are kind of squinting.
This is Inverness Castle, we didn't get to go inside because it was already closed by the time we got there. We did eat at a cafe across the street from it though (it wasn't that fantastic).
This is the Chapel at Dunottar castle (which is by far my favorite castle so far). It's a ruin basically, but it just has a lot of personality (perhaps because of the number of times it's been attacked, or by the religious persecution that went on there...).
This is a picture of the entrance to Dunottar Castle. I always forget to take a picture of the stairs when I go. They are a bitch to get up, let me tell you. They are definitely worth it though.
This is me in front of the cave that Nic and I found when we were exploring the beach around Dunottar castle. The sun was really bright and makes me look ghostly, but oh well. That thing was deep (we didn't go inside...)
Here's a picture of Dunottar castle from the walk to the entrance. To the left are the afore mentioned stairs (kind of...) you have to walk pretty much to the bottom of the cliff and then up a bit (the walk back to the parking lot is WAY harder than the walk there). Can you tell this is my favorite?
This is Loch Ness. It was so very beautiful. We spent a little while here skipping stones and just looking around. It is a massive lake (I never knew it was so large).
Another view of Dunottar... I love that place.
Here's a view of the peninsula by Dunottar castle. Isn't it beautiful?
Again, but you can see some of the flowers. I could stay there forever and be perfectly happy. It's so amazing.
The barracks at Dunottar. They used to be two story but the roof and floor of the second story are now gone.
This is a picture from one of the windows in Dunottar Castle. This place has amazing views.

Other than that... we have been driving around and setting up house. We did have a bit of excitement the other day because Karin lost her purse in Edinburgh (including her passport), they found it though (but she hasn't gotten it back yet).

Nic just got home for lunch so I'm going to go visit for a bit. I love you all!

Fire and Furniture...

What are neighbors good for? A lot of things... including providing lots of free entertainment and recently, free furniture. Any way you look at it it's a lot of free, especially from Mike (our next door neighbor).

Mike has been great (and Evelyn, which is his lovely wife). He's provided tons of information about the goings on of Aberdeen and the plant life around us (as well as info on helicopters that the RAF uses and places he's been- including Florida and the place they filmed Fried Green Tomatoes). He is a wonderful man full of great stories and lively conversation. Sometimes it's hard to pull yourself away and you can stand there for hours hearing all about whatever he feels like talking about. It's been nice to have someone to talk to. He also makes tons of homemade wine from odd things. He's brought over two bottles for us to try (one strawberry and one blackberry) but he also makes some out of the local flowers (which I'll talk more about and add a picture later..) with lemon and orange, and also he makes some out of dandelions. I'm interested in trying them all and figuring out how to make wine out of weeds. It's pretty interesting.

Anyway... the other day we were bringing Cris and Tony home from the airport and there was a fire in the field across the road in the bush. The road was blocked by the fire truck and the whole street was out and about watching. I'll fill you in on the reason for the fire if you ask (it's pretty funny...) but I can't put it on here- I don't want to get anyone in trouble. The firemen didn't ask any questions about it so all is good.

Then today, we were getting ready to go to Costco to grab a few things and there was a van blocking the road. I walked over to Evelyn and Mike's house to see if they could maybe move it to the side and I found out why it was there. Evelyn's aunt had passed away and her family was delivering her furniture to their house. Evelyn didn't want it (they already have furniture) and was going to chop it all up and put it in the huge pile that we are saving up for Guy Fox day (remember remember the 5th of November). However, I quickly made it clear how crazy it was to do that (there's a lot of older furniture) and they started bringing over stuff to our house. So now we are the proud new owners of a really old wardrobe, vanity table (although they had already broken the mirror so it doesn't have one anymore), twin bed (the kind that moves up and down and vibrates if you want it to- way cool), two small bedside tables (they are in our bathrooms now), and a tv. Tomorrow they are bringing over a settee (think loveseat) and two fireside chairs. Rock on. I love free stuff. We could use the furniture since we had two empty rooms pretty much.

Lets see... tomorrow we are going to some castles I think, who knows what else.

And We're Back!

YEAH!!! BT told us we weren't going to get our broadband back until the 20th, but then randomly we saw that all the lights were all lit and that it was back on. I'll update when I get back from taking Nic to work.

Love you all!

URGH!!!

I'm so frustrated!

We are back at Rose Cottage to do one more quick load to the new house and guess what I found out?! BT hasn't cancelled the phone or the internet yet. I'm hoping that that doesn't mean that they are going to delay the phone/internet at the new house yet. That would really piss me off, since I've been getting that in order for the last two weeks. We got a letter saying they were going to hook up the phone on the 6th (as scheduled), so hopefully that's true.

I don't have a lot of time to respond to everyone but I did get your e-mails and messages, thanks for the support! I'll get back to you when everything is settled and we are done moving.

On a side note, I did get a chance to catch up with Andrea via text messages the other day, that was nice... it's been a while.

We didn't end up having the cinco de mayo/early may day/housewarming party due to the fact that we don't get to move our furniture until WEDNESDAY because that's the earliest we could get a van (the company van was already checked out and the other place wouldn't rent to us because we don't have our UK licenses yet). It's all good... we are sleeping in the new house on air mattresses and I have almost everything except the couches/bed/table/bedroom suite/computer and desk/tv stand over there. Wow... that sounds like a lot (and it is I guess.)

I'll be better about keeping in touch as soon as we have the broadband in the new house! WE LOVE it by the way... it's so stinking nice. I wish you were all here so that we could have a bbq and show it off! I'll post more pictures once we are moved in.

I love you all!