House!

At last!
We have moved in to our new house!
Many thanks to those who helped, including my parents and two of our friends.
I was going to post some photos of our lovely new house, but the scanner broke and there aren't any online. Poo.
Anyway, the move. We got up at about 7:30 and I wished that I had eaten less curry the night before. I got some breakfast and then we went about packing up the remainder of the things in the house (mostly) My parents arrived in a HUGE blue van from Rhino Car & Van Hire, Brigg Rd Scampton, Lincoln, LN1 2SY - Tel. 01522 537633 (ok, they were fab, so I've plugged their services) Anyway, the van was huge, as I said. We still didn't fit everything in it. Our friends took some stuff (and also my mum) in their car. We then returned for load two. It took until about 3pm to get the last load in the van. All the stuff was inside by about 6pm.
It's on the way to being packed away too. (okay, ish)
We then spent Sunday at Currys, Comet, etc. We finally bought a fridge/freezer and washer/dryer from Powerhouse, and hopefully they will be arriving on Saturday. We have to pay the man who brings them £20 for his time as we wanted delivery on the Saturday and not on Wednesday which is much less convenient.
Thankfully, then my parents went home. Therefore they stopped 'organising' things for me. I love my parents, don't get me wrong. However, when confronted on Sunday morning with them moving the three piece to "Where it obviously has to go" I knew two things:

1. They were annoying me
2. I'd have to move it around, even if the place they put it was perfect.

I don't know if anyone else has that sort of family...
Anyway, I was really glad of their help, even if they annoyed me quite a bit.
After the departure of the parents, we went to the aforementioned friends house as they had offered to cook us dinner, and as we only have pasta and soup, we accepted. Their feeding us was not only much appreciated, but the food was very nice too!
And now we are here, in a house where I have set up the PC but can't find any underwear. A house where we've had to change the loo seat. A house which we will, in 25 years, own.
In case you can't tell - I'm happy.

Camping

Aha! So, I return from a week's camping in the beautiful Dorset countryside!
I have had a wonderful time while I've been away! The weather was lovely, the company was, well - my parents and Dom. No, the company was great. The sights were interesting and I spent a damn fortune.
I enjoyed the amphitheatre in Dorchester, but I also enjoyed the Wine Shop which was huge! Dom bought some random ale (Hardy Ale I think) which was really strong and brew-in-the-bottle. I was nearly sick after a mere sip! So I stuck to my nasty cider instead (I'll mention the nice cider later)
We also went to Maiden Castle. Maiden Castle is not, in fact, a castle. It's a very large hill fort. The sign proclaimed that it is the largest in Europe, if I remember correctly. There were a lot of sheep. Tame sheep, not wild ones. There were also lots of earth-works (mounds and dips in the top of the hill, for none time-teamers). There were further signs on the hill, but they were all too weathered to be read. It was very windy, but also remarkably sunny. I got rather worried by the very long drop at the side of me and the strong winds trying to blow me down it. I did enjoy the walk more than I usually enjoy walks though. I also got rather sunbunrt. Bother.
On a different day of the week we went to Monkey World. It was Fantastic! I particularly liked the Orangutans. I even bought a toy baby orangutan to be friends with my other cuddly toys. It was an thoroughly enjoyable day and well worth the (small) entry fee - if you're ever in the area, take a day there. Or half a day, as we did. However, this isn't a review of the park...
We also went to the Cider Museum That day. That was also cool. They had a whole bunch of cider presses there, they even use some of them still. They also had a metal bath for making Blue Vinney cheese, but apparantly they can't do that now as it's Lead. They still make Blue Vinney cheese there though, so I bought some of that, and we also bought 5 litres of their cider. It was goood. We drank cider on most of the rest of the evenings there, and we also bought more on the way home!
Dom was particularly excited by getting fish and chips from the van on site on Wednesday night. We all had fish and chips and it was very good. The man in the van cooked the fish to order (well, his wife did) and then he tried to be funny while we waited. He wasn't that funny, I had to feed him the line about going to Monkey World so that he could retort with "And they let you out?" hoho.
Thursday while Dom and my Dad went to see Tanks in Action! at the Tank Museum, Mum and I got on the train to Poole. This was exciting, as Mum doesn't often travel on trains. Poole was nice enough, but after a morning of shopping (I bought a top in New Look, some moisturiser in Body Shop and some nail care off a random woman) and lunch at the local Wetherspoons (how exciting?!) We went on a boat trip. It turned out that the boat wasn't a "tour" as we thought, but just the ferry to Brownsea Island. Well, we decided, we're there, we might as well look around. We did look for the red squirrels which they claim live on the island, but we didn't see any. We did see some baby Peacocks which led me to ask: "What do you call a baby peacock?" - No it's not a joke. Any ideas? We thought maybe Pea-baby or Pea-chick. Then my Mum got all silly and started calling them Chick-peas. I did take a photo of them with my phone, but it was rubbish. I also stroked a small duck.
On Friday, our last day, we went back into Dorchester to visit some museums, but first we went to see the Rude Man of Cerne Abbas. He's a big carving in the landscape with a larger than average club. I bought a mug from Cerne Abbas (the town) and we looked round the old Abbey there. We also ate lunch in a pub which was being re-thatched. Then we shipped off to Dorchester to the war museum there. It was surprisingly interesting. They even had a pack of "Iraq most wanted" playing cards there!
So, yes - a fab week. And it didn't rain on us at all.