Week(s) In Review

This whole planning-a-last-minute-trip-to-England thing really eats away at one’s time. Namely… MY time. Not that I’m complaining. It’s just that I have a compulsion to explain things unnecessarily. End result: I have been neglecting the poor blog.

I’ll try not to bore you, dear reader, with all the details, but here’s the cliff notes version of July (pre-England). As Inigo said, “Let me explain. No, there is too much. Let me sum up.”

• The World Cup finished with Spain holding the trophy. Not the result I was hoping for, but a well-deserved championship for La Roja. It’s a good thing the greatest month of soccer is over—the dishes and laundry were piling up again and again.
• We didn’t have big 4th of July plans this year, but the holiday weekend managed to fill up anyway. We had our friend Megan and her friend Kristin over for games and dessert on Saturday the 3rd. It was great to meet Kristin, especially because she lives in our neighborhood. We didn’t do anything patriotic on the 4th—just a normal Sunday with church, luggage shopping, and a movie in the evening. We did have a last-minute party at our house on Monday: grilling, games, and hanging out with some church friends. Roper and Lynn even made the drive down from Cedarville.
• We finally took my lappy into the Apple Store (remember my hard drive died?) after unsuccessful attempts to retrieve my data. It completely stinks to lose that much work, but some good things came of it. Namely, Apple replaced my hard drive (which ended up being an upgrade) and the battery for free.
• Saw Toy Story 3 in 3D (for free!) with our good friends, Adam and Mary. And yes, I cried at the end. Great, great movie.
• We celebrated Jeff’s birthday a little early this year since we weren’t going to be together on the actual day. We went to Benihana for dinner (sign up on their web site for a free birthday dinner!). They took our picture and printed it out right on the spot and also gave us a free dessert. After dinner I had a scavenger hunt for Jeff to find his gift hidden around the house: Death Note manga series, 13 volumes in all. We finished the evening by sampling a variety of mochi.



• Saturday the 17th found me driving up to Cedarville to see my good college friend, Megan. And I got to meet her precious baby Bennett, born in March. Megan spent a couple years working in China after graduation and now lives with her husband and son in Texas so it was a special treat to see her while she was visiting in the Midwest. We only got to visit for about an hour—way too short a time—but it was so worth the drive.



• I started a new temp project job on the 20th, just in time to work 3 days and then leave for England. The job is supposed to last 4-6 weeks, which is pushing the limits of how long I want to work a job like this. It’s a bit strange being back in the [very] corporate world, and it’s a bit of a hike from our house, but I’m thankful for a little extra income. This time I’m working in data warehousing and marketing analytics, which is mostly interesting as long as there is actual work for me to do.

Multiple posts on our England trip should start appearing by next week. I have over 900 pictures to sort through and many thoughts, observations, and reflections to record before they start to slip away. Until then, cherrio!