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What's Happening?
We got back from Germany (in Donna's case via 8 weeks in California) and have been in Kent for the summer. Enjoying the weather and were temping while looking for proper work. However, now the long, mild autumn is bringing hints of winter.
After several weeks making sandwiches for a living, some interviews and turning down an offer of 6 months work in Mexico, Conrad began a six month contract with Imperial College at Wye. That is in Wye, Kent, UK and is where I worked before going to Bangladesh. I am working in the group of Murray Grant and investigating the role of the Arabidopsis gene rin12 in disease resistance.
The rest, below, comes in chronical reverse order. Most recent first.
Including a trip to Cadbury World in Birmingham.
Through snowy Kent...
...before heading to mainland Europe on 28th December.
We had a day and night in Brugge before driving onwards to Amsterdam.
And then we were back to UK for New Years Eve in Rye with Bruce and Ann.
Now it's back to work and back to normal awaiting the next adventures.
17th December: Only a week until Christmas now. We had a day trip to France a few days ago, sailing before first light and getting back late evening. Apart from a bit of shopping and buying booze, we visited Lille. It's a nice town, 70 miles inland and a Christmas Market.
Only a month until Christmas. Time really flies!
We have put some extra pictures from Germany onto our Yahoo Photos if you want to look.
Saturday 12th November we went to another bonfire/parade/fireworks, this time in Rye. Unfortunately we began by seeing the aftermath of a hit and run accident with pedestrian victims.
The fire, built to look as a castle, burnt well. The parade was better than last week but the fireworks, although excellent, were short-lived.
As a bonus, the Guy this year was an effigy of The Crazy Frog.
We went to Battle for bonfire night. It is near Hastings and the site of the Battle of Hastings.
There was a procession of people in costumes with burning torches and plenty of loud bangs. There were a lot of people there to watch but it was a little subdued in comparison with the German Karneval we went to in February. The fireworks were, however, excellent.
You can read about the event and its history here.
Both working hard recently but Donna had a whole of the last weekend of September off. On the Sunday we went up to London. Doing nothing in particular but generally walking around and seeing the sights.
Also we became part of the audience as Rolf Harris presented the unveiling of a giant picture of Henry the Eighth live on the BBC.
The weekend of the 10-11th September was a quiet one but we did go to see the Cathedrales en Lumiere show at Canterbury Cathedral. It was a 15 minute light and music show with the cathedral as the backdrop. It was beautiful and worth it even if we did have a 25 mile round trip to drive and over an hour queuing.
We also visited Canterbury Cathedral for an open evening on 4th October. We missed the tickets for the bell tower (that is usually closed) but saw other parts that are usually closed, heard the boy's section of the choir sing and took part in the service for the close of the day.
From the 4th Sept Richard, Josie and Gerrard stayed a couple of days with us in Ashford before flying to Portugal and Philippines.
They visited Wye, Folkestone and Canterbury.
Donna loved the opportunity for gossipping with Josie and it gave me the chance to share a few beers with Richard whilst having our own different conversations.
Gerrard speech and understanding is coming along amazingly and he even knows all the letters of the alphabet.
He can put up a good argument when he is urged to do something he doesn't want to.
Also on the 4th September me and Donna went to the final day of the Kent Music Festival at Port Lympne Wild Animal Park.
We had alook at the animals before the music and Donna didn't leave me with the monkeys.
There was a lot of waiting between occassional support bands during the afternoon but it was worth it for the excellent performances of the main acts, Katherine Jenkins and G4 (the runners up of last year's X-Factor).
Synergy a group from the F-IRE Collective were a good Jazz Band but not to the taste of most of the audience. The humourous and thoughtful music of Luke Smith and the Feelings kept the crowd entertained for a while.
On 27th August was Jason (my brother) and Wendy's wedding.
We went there to celebrate and it was a chance to meet family that I haven't seen for many years and Donna has never met.
On 29th August Jason and Wendy headed to Dubai, Sri Lanka and the Maldives for their honeymoon.
Click here for some pictures from the wedding.
During the weekend we also met up with Richard, Josie and Gerrard, saw Morris Dancing and noisy steam trains in Bridgnorth, and the Notting Hill Carnival
