Wednesday, September 13, 2006

Lonfreakingdon

Howdy Howdy Howdy.
 
Yup, I've reached Lonsdale, the city of Lud, capital of England, Londontown.  And by gosh am I happy about it.  I rolled across the tarmac at Gatwick air at 7.05am GMT, 1.05am CST US, and 2.05pm West. Aus.  My Nottingham Ultimate T'shirt attracted the attention of a travelling brother/sister pair, who'd grown up in that delightful town.  They were heading back to University in London after having spent the past 3 months with their mother's family in Bogota, Colombia.  Just to prove how much this terrasphere we call home shrinks daily:  Alan and Elena (the brother and sister) were raised in one of my second homes, are studying in the same city as my friend Yeny, herself from Colombia.  7 degrees of separation my foot.   The world gets this much smaller every day...
 
Any rate, Handy International Travel Tip # 1:  Your best bet for top rate currency exchange is using a debit card in an ATM, and simply drawing cash.  Your bank might charge you a dollar or two, but it beats the middle man fee of Western Union and other similar organisations.  So there you are, don't worry about exchanging money before leaving home, just take care of it yourself with your pocket plastic at the first cash point you see.
 
Handy International Travel Tip # 2:  BEFORE leaving home, be COMPLETELY CERTAIN that your bank has your debit/ATM/credit cards authorized to work PROPERLY!  I was not in the mood after 18 hours of travel, with only $3.28 cents to my name for this sort of rot.  Fortunately, the train company would take my credit card, even if the automated machines wouldn't.  Bothered?  A BIT.
 
And, in an effort to seek to be slightly less self-absorbed, here's some of the more important affairs of folks I know elsewhere on the globe:
Sarah Felts is to become Mrs. Bill (...?....) on Saturday.   Best wishes there...sorry I don't know you're fiance's last name, love...
Jay Phipps will be home from school down in Conway this weekend.  If you see him, tell him hi for me.  Tell him to play you some Skynyrd.
Joy Ward has been in India for about a month, working with the Billy Graham Association, taking the gospel of Jesus Christ to the Hindus.
Juan y Giuliana Hernandez have successfully moved house in Nottingham, and I look forward to seeing them tomorrow.
Allen and Tim Newberry will be having their birthdays in about 2 weeks, on the 26th, and 27th, respectively.
 
Any rate, as you hadn't asked for the piddling bits of random strangers lives, I won't take any more of your time to gossip, but in the event you feel left out, email me any news you'd like included...

Cheers for now...

--
Life is enjoyed most when you're laughing.  Laugh hard, laugh often, and think of me.

2 comments:

Tim said...

it's a small world afterall... live it up.

Allen said...

I found out the other day that I'm like 3 or 4 degrees of seperation from Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. It turns out that a friend of a friends uncle, or was it cousin, was murdered by him.