Crimbo in London

Well I have officially had my first ever Christmas dinner with me being host and cook.

Anne-Marie had a stay over in London on her from from Cape Town to Antigua so I decided to have a Christmas dinner in her honour. Dean and Lee came over for the celebrations and boy did we ever laugh. We laughed till it hurt, and ate till we burst.

On the menu we had the following:

Turkey
String Bean Casserole
Cassava Pie
Sweetcorn Stuffing
Roasted Potatoes
Roasted Sweet Potatoes
Roasted Parsnips
Carrot and Turnip Mash

And of course gravy by the ladle full.

The Cassava Pie went down a treat, so looks like I will be making it every year!

We continued the Bermuda tradition of watching "How The Grinch Stole Christmas" (cartoon) and drank a fair bit of wine. You can see what a good time we had, justcheck out the pics.

Sitges. Our place in the sun

As you may or may not know, we just recently got back from out vacation in the little lovely town of Sitges. Located just south of Barcelona, this town is everything Bermuda is, and so much more. Would love all the politicians in Bermy to visit this town, they would then see how it should be done...those damn fools.

Enough of that though, here are some lovely pics of Sitges:

Some fantastic news from home,

That you can read all about here

My Garden

Well Jeremy likes to sit in it, but he actually has nothing to do with the up keep of it. He is computer and systems guy, and I like it that way very much. Here are just a few shot of what I am growing in my garden....being very 'Bermuda' as you can see!

BBQ

So we had our BBQ last night to celebrate our 8 year anniversary together. You can check out the full photo set here. We had a great time. It was a total success. Loads of our friends showed up and we seemed to eat through a vast amount of food and less so (judging by what's left) the alcohol. My frozen mohitos went down a treat and I ended up using a full bottle of bacardi (oops). Bit of a sore head today. We're already talking about our next party to use up the alcohol that's left :)

Hail! It's summer?

Would you believe it is July the 3rd today and this was a picture taken in South London today. Where is the summer? Freak hail storm hits Michael on his way home tonight. Luckily his belly was warmed by a lovely Morroccan dinner at Kazbah in Clapham for our 8th year anniversary. Awww go us :)

More pictures of the hail here

It is our anniversary...8 years!

No smoking London

So, thankfully, the no-smoking ban took effect this past Sunday in London and the rest of the UK. It is now illegal for anyone to smoke in any public areas. This is a huge welcome to most people here, even the smokers. And although lots of people have whinged about their human rights they will be able to deal with the new law and cope as have many other cities and countries throughout the world. I am curious to see how some of my haunts are going to cope, especially those without patios. I'm telling you, you really do feel it when you go to a smokey pub and get back with smelly clothes and a tight chest so bring it on.

Gay Pride

So despite car bombs and rain it was gay pride today in the nation's capital. I went down to meet the GMFA crew on Baker Street for the march. It was great actually because our group gets a lot of respect from the community. Lots of people cheered and clapped as we marched which was a good feeling. The march took us all along Oxford Street, through Regent's Street, past Trafalgar Square and down to Embankment. The rain did pour unfortunately so it was umbrellas all the way but I got to hand out condoms and hold the banner which was lots of fun. We marched past the usual crowd of National Front idiots (5 of them ha ha ... one holding a placard saying "Barrymore go to hell"...nice) and the Christians (about 20 of them all penned off by the police..... I blew them a kiss). After the march I went to the rally in Trafalgar Square for a bit before heading to Soho to meet Michael and Anne-Marie for drinks and shennanygans. It was a fun day but the rain was cold so we had to head back to Clapham to warm up a bit. Where is the summer?

Here are some pictures from Flickr

lights out london

So it was lights out London on Thursday as Capital Radio raised awareness for energy efficiency on the longest day of the year. Traditional London landmarks turned out their lights and it was the first time since the second world war that the lights at Picadilly Circus had been turned off. Offices were encouraged to do the same and people shut off their computers and lights at home for an hour. The energy saved is supposed to be enough to power 3000 televisions for a year.

We took part by having dinner in the garden with candles all around (Michael's so romantic) and a bottle of wine....heaven :)

Here's the full picture set

We’ve got Pipistrelles!!

Yes indeedy, we have added to our lovely collection of wildlife in our garden.
Squirrels – Check
Robins – Check
Foxes – Check
Snakes – Check
And now Pipistrelles…which for the uninformed are bats!!! Yippee! Kind of excited about this one as I have been spending loads of time planting out aromatic plants and herbs in the garden to attract insects and other wildlife. Little did I know I would get bats!
And they are tiny.
Went to the great garden centre yesterday and bought a ‘Theta’ jasmine, and some tobacco plants as they both have night scenting flowers. Look at me being all green thumby. This is mainly for Rachie as she is the gardener at home.

There are a lot of places that now do a whole rage of wildlife homes and rests, such as bumblebee rests, ladybird homes, various bird houses and now they do bat houses. Will purchase one, so my little friend can have a place to rest.