And So September Ends

The last day of September 2014. Tomorrow we roll into October hooray! Which means 5 days until my birthday and lectures start - bad crossover. But it's five days until my birthday. Maybe this year I will feel more grown up because my 18th didn't seem to do the job.

Today involved a lovely lie in followed by a trip to uni to get my course induction which basically involved picking up my id card and picking up a course handbook and information. Met another girl who was on my course so we went round the freshers fair together basically picking up more dominos vouchers and free stuff. They don't seem to even mind that they have given you it before they just keep giving you it. The free sweets and bags were the best pick ups.

After that I went home dropped all the stuff off had some lunch and then planned to go out to the New Walk museum in Leicester. Got on the bus okay, got off at the right stop. Then here comes the bit that went wrong. There is a museum called New Walk and there is a museum called Newarke. The bus stop was inbetween them both. Instead of turning left to New Walk I went right following signs for Newarke, having never seen the name written down having only heard it, it was an easy mistake to make. Luckily google maps helped me out and I managed to get there.

 

It's a little embarrassing how I managed to get lost seen as I have been to it several times before - though in those instances I have always been with relatives who know Leicester. Had a little nosy around the displays it was quite empty and some of them had changed since the last time I was there. It's nice because it is free though they ask for donations suggested at £3 but being a poor student I just slipped £1 in hopefully that will do something.

After that I walked back into the centre and popped into the tourist information centre to pick up some leaflets and also to ask them where the nearest argos was turned out to be about another two minutes down the road. Spent £9.99 on an airer only to find that when I got back the guy whose house it is had found me one out, so i'll be taking it back to argos tomorrow! Saves me some money.

Annoyance with the banks today. Wanted to cancel my switchover to Santander because they were taking so long about it and I needed to have access to my student loan. Found out that I had had a letter posted from my current account saying with switchover details except the name of the account holder was definitnely not my name. Luckily they sorted everything out for when I rang up, so I rang up Santander and got them to cancel everything. I'll be sticking with Barclays I think.

Cooked pasta/tomato passata/tuna/onion thing for tea. Boiled the water then added pasta, chopped some onion, drained a tin of tuna, salt, pepper and herbs. When the pasta was cooked I drained it and added the passata and tuna and other stuff. That was the point at which I realised I was pouring my onion in raw! Silly me forgot to fry it first. So that made for quite a spicy tea with the black pepper I had put in as well. To make matters worse? I made too much so half of it is in a tub for another day. Well played Maria. On the plus side I get to have a free pizza with one of the vouchers I got, only valid until Sunday so maybe I'll have that for Saturday tea. I can't remember if it was pizza hut or dominos I got so many.

On the 85 bus today I did notes on where all the stops lead. So now I know that stop 4 is a tesco express and stop 6 is pizza hut and stop 7 is Aldi - hang on these all sounds like food? YUMMY.

Walking around trying to find New Walk I found some cute little places, all the streets lined with Narnia lamposts as well!

Funny thing today, on the bus on the way back form argos a woman got on and sat next to me. About halfway through the bus ride she pointed at my airer and said "I should get one of those". Then she proceeded to have a full on conversation with me about why she needed an airer, her relatives, her son at univeristy, her boyfriend in France who wont talk to her and pretty much everything else. It was weird because I've never met a random stranger before who pretty much tells me their whole life story but maybe she needed to get something off her chest. As it happened the bus ride was more enjoyable for it!

I've moved in!

Week one in the new house.

So I moved in on Saturday morning and the first thing I discovered was that I had been giving people the wrong address. Noooo. I had been telling people I lived at number 27 instead of 127. Mad panic that all my letters and things will be going to a different house. So we took a trip to number 27 but no one was in. We picked up a card from a newsagents wrote a message inside explaining the mistake and left my email so they could let me know if any post came. Then we popped back later in the evening to see if they were in, they were and they were really nice about it all! Though as it turns out, the post came to this house anyway. Although number 27 was on the same road it fell under a different village/town thing so my birthday cards still managed to get to me :) Now I have four cards waiting to be opened! Roll on Monday 6th.

Saturday after unpacking we spent at my aunt Natalie and uncle Nathan's house. I have some family over from Australia so we had a big meet up with all of which was fantastic to see them all again. They had a big bouncy castle in the garden (with no age limit) so that kept us busy alongside entertaining the smaller cousins. It was just so good to see everyone again. Then had first night at the new place, couldn't sleep so I watched the lego movie.

Early start. We were all going to my grandparents church which started at 9.30am and was a 15 minute drive from where I was living and where my family where staying. Fun fun fun, I got picked up at 8.30am. Way to early, so we got a tour of the pork pie libraries in Leicester to burn some time.



Definitely looks like a pork pie. And one of them is on a roundabout called Pork Pie roundabout.

So after church we all went back to my grandparents and had another family day which was nice. Then my family dropped me off at my house before driving back to Wakefield.

Today was a bit of a mad day. Exploring Leicester centre and seeing where the buses go. Went in for the freshers fair got some freebies and signed up to a load of societies - most of which I can't remember and will probably not carry on with. Oh well. So that was one bus to uni and then a walk. Then another bus into the centre. Had a walk around the shops to see what was there. Then another bus to Fosse Park where they have a giant Asda picked up some chicken for my tea on Wednesday and apples and chocolate. Then another bus back to the bus station and another back to home. I figured there must be an easier way to get around so I asked the lady at the bus station and she gave me a load of bus timetables and told me which ones to get so hopefully it'll take quicker the next time I go - tomorrow morning.

Cleaned out the oven when I got back as I wanted Jacket potato for tea and it looked like it hadn't been cleaned in a very very very long time. Took a while but it's in pretty good condition now. Cooked jacket potato and beans for tea. Then sat back a bit after being on my feet for most the day and watched some tv.

Tomorrow I think that I have to be in for 9 so that'll be an early start. But it is departmental induction so I should hopefully get my ID card and timetable which will be good.

Preparation is key.

This week has been a handful. Many postal deliveries bringing me course texts and a laptop to food shopping and picking up other general bits and pieces to send me on my way.

Packing is the worst. I'm not taking everything with me but with the giant pile of stuff I am I wonder how I ever managed to fit it all in my room? Three suitcases and about a several more large bags of stuff as well as three banana boxes of books/food and I think I have everything I need. Of course, they key now is to fit it into my new room.

Luckily for me, or so I consider, I am not having to stay in university accommodation. Not that I have anything against it - I actually didn't even look around Leicester's options - but I feel I have the better deal. Renting out a room in the house of a family friend. Not only will I have a much better chance of feeling like living at home, but I just imagine it being so much more comfortable and a better atmosphere, undisturbed nights and a lot more freedom. Though of course there are trade offs. I have had to purchase a bus pass to cover travel but I'll take that.

Next step is to find a job, I have found one I want to apply for but I have to wait until I get my timetable so I can put down my available hours of work so that is on hold until next week! It's close by and would give me discounts which is fantastic fingers crossed when I apply next week I'll be able to get it.

Tomorrow is packing the car day, which basically involves hauling everything from my room down two flights of stairs and trying to fit it in the car. Hooray. That promises to be a fun morning/afternoon.

But despite the hiccoughs I am really excited to be finally going to the University of Leicester to study Ancient History and Archaeology! Roll on Monday for day 1.

Mixed Week.

Ups and downs but overall it has been a pretty good week! Came back from Italy, got my hair cut. I now have a fringe again!
Then on the saturday I got to see one of my oldest friends get married :) Such a beautiful day, it was really lovely to see her getting hitched.

So nice to see everyone again and have a good catch up! Congratulations Mr and Mrs Garland!

This week has been good so far.

On sunday I had church, nice to see everyone I hadn't for the whole summer. Said my testimony in testimony meeting. Very scary as I hadn't said it for so long but it was good to say what I felt! After I went to a friend's surprise leaving party for university. It was really good fun, we had a nice afternoon laughing with all of his friends.

On Monday I sorted out some more stuff for university found out that a bus pass is going to cost me £360 for a year and will cover the immediate Leicester area. Also tried to sign up for an nus card. Finished my application for Leicester University. So much to do!

Tuesday I took William to the library he was very excited about it. Unfortunately I asked him at 9.40 if he wanted to go he then zoomed off to get his shoes before I got told that it didn't open until 10 so I had to distract him for twenty minutes. We went and I got a book out to read also, William decided to unstack all the kids chairs, choose every book in the tub. I had to sneak some back into the box when he wasn't looking. Then he dragged me to tescos where he picked up some milky buttons and I got some flowers for my mum and dad as a late anniversary present. Went into town to deposit my savings from Italy and had a look round the shops. Nothing tempted me to buy though. Why is it when you have money to buy things there is never anything to buy? Actually that is a slight lie I bought a DVD. The Help. I bought and read the book in Italy and it was so good so I can't wait to watch that!

Wednesday I woke up with a list of jobs for me to do, looks like these three weeks are going to be busy! So I hoovered and washed up and tidied up the car which looks like it hadn't been cleaned the whole time I had been away and had an impressive collection of chocolate wrappers. In the afternoon I took off to see a friend of mine who is leaving tomorrow for university in Newcastle. We had a nice afternoon, played mario kart on the wii at which I got sorely thrashed by both him and his sister. I was shockingly bad! Then I got a really nice treat! He took me to his dad's house and I got to play on the drum kit! It had been so long since I played so he had to show me the basics again but it was so nice to play on them. I hadn't realised how much I missed playing them! After that we went into town to the DVD/CD shop. I managed to pick up a TingTings album for 99p and an Arctic Monkeys for £3.99 so that was good! Then we took a grind. I had never had a grind before and it was actually really nice. I got a sherbert milkshake the flavour wasn't particularly strong but it was nice! Unluckily we hit the traffic on the way back but it didn't slow us down too much. Also he let me borrow The Hobbit part 2 so I am looking forward to seeing that as I missed it in the cinemas last year and the last part is coming out this year!

Downer on the week - my iPhone broke. In short terms: 1. I took it to Italy and used an italian sim. 2. I put an english sim in when I got home. 3. It wouldn't let me update my apps. 4. I reset it. 5. It won't let me reactivate it. Guess who is back on their tocco lite! Thank goodness I kept it. Apple is so good when it works but it is a nightmare when it doesn't. Made an appointment to go into the apple store on Tuesday so will see if they are able to do anything! Hopefully it can get sorted without too much cost.

Day 81: Ciao Italia

Today is the day. Day number 81. The last.

Alessandra woke me up at 7am and then we were all ready to go to the airport. Arrived in plenty of time checked in okay and they didn't charge me extra even though my bag was overweight hooray! Said goodbye to all of them, Bea cried which made me feel very loved :). 

Got through to the duty free. No magazines in English :/. To then find out that my flight has been delayed by an hour. Nooo. Why Ryanair? There isn't even a burgerking or McDonald's to waste my time in. Plus the wifi sucks it doesn't work properly.

Got on the plane okay. Nice flight! Excited to be back in England hopefully these next three weeks in Wakefield will be good :) last minute shopping for Lizi's wedding tomorrow and an early night! 

Week 12: Ultimate Week

Sunday:

No church today as no way of getting there instead I went with the family to watch Fede participate in his first moto race. They took his older motorbike but then found out it wasn't powerful enough to take him up the hills so they had to drive back to take his other one. It takes about an hour to drive to the race place. He did okay, stalled the bike a lot but he isn't as used to it as the other one. But he managed a lap of 7 minutes which was good. It started to rain later in the afternoon surprise surprise. Last day in Rovescala tomorrow morning we go back to Milan. 

Monday:

Left Rovescala at 10 they were all sad to leave but I'm glad to be back in the city I prefer it there. It's busier and more alive, peace and quiet is nice but after a while I longed for a noisier place. The kids don't understand why I prefer Milan and Fede said as much that I must be stupid to prefer the city. I don't think they realise that not everyone has the same opinion as them. I half unpacked and then repack my big suitcase so the things I use I can just throw into my small one. Took Fede to the park most of his friends are back from holiday now so he had people to play with. 

Tuesday:

Didn't get much sleep, I think because I changed beds hopefully tonight will be better. Bit of a slow morning as Bea and Fede did their own things homework etc so I just had to supervise. Fede was making a book that he had written gluing various pieces of paper etc together. Bea was translating songs for me from Italian to English and English to Italian. She was very good. When she wants to she can speak English well...she just often does not want to. Fede loves the 'What does the fox say?' song and keeps asking to replay it he likes the video too. Went our to the park and took an ice cream at Massimo's as he was back open. 

I found Rebecca the cat sat on my bed.  

Wednesday: 

Early awakening. I go to bed too hot so I sleep without the covers but then when morning comes I'm cold so I wake up tired. Today is colder, yesterday was very warm even too hot and the all the mosquitos come out so the cool is better. 

In the morning I did English with Fede then tired him out by walking to Porta Romana to see the hole made by all the rain but we couldn't find it. Then we walked into the centre and I picked up some final gifts for family. I read the map wrong at one point and we ended up going the long way round Fede wasn't impressed and we took the tram back. 

After lunch we went to see some friends of theirs. They live in Porta Romana near the hole so we got to see it after all. 

It was bigger before but they have already stated repairing it. All the heavy rain washed the ground away because underneath it is hollow where all the underground parking is for the flats. 

Another ice cream from Massimo's. I had salter caramel and passion fruit. The caramel was nice not too salty and not too sweet. 

Thursday:

Last full day. In the morning went out to the centre. I picked up some more bits and bobs. Gifts for the kids to say thank for the summer. Alessadra bought me a book, it's cool because on one side of the page it is in English and on the other side it's the same page but in Italian! I choose A Midsummer Nights Dream. After lunch I finished packing had a dilemma run out of weight space. Why I brought so much stuff with me is beyond me I didn't use half of it. They gave me a load of pasta to take back but I don't know if I can because of the weight. When I weigh it in at the airport tomorrow fingers crosse there will be enough room. Had a last last ice cream at Massimo's. Mandarin and Passionfruit the two best flavours. 

Built a race track with Fede out of kapla - jenga bricks. And we raced ball bearings down it. 

For my last dinner Alessandra made Lasagna yum!