Guilty in Design

We've just been to like, the worlds biggest buffet. There is rediculous amounts of food and I am throughly stuffed. So therefore, I can't really write very much.

So instead, here's some photos from our trip to the botanic gardens. It's about 25km outside the side centre, (from our apartment). We were very brave and got on the subway, and then the public bus. It dropped us outside the gardens, but in total  the journey took us about an hour and a half. It was smelly, and wobbly and everything else but fun,

Right, here are some pretty photos. =D
( Lots of Photos, little commentry and a paragraph by Lewis. =D  )

Hello, I'm taking over now (this is Lewis btw) since me and Susie are as full as we've ever been, and I usually just sit and correct grammer and spelling mistakes that she makes due to her dyslexmia. So today it's my turn!

So, After the botanic gardens, we went to the Home Resturant again (not sure if y'all've (is y'all've a word?) been informed in previous entries, but the Home Resturant is an awesome&cheap chinese place near to Dad's flat, where we had the awesome Lemon Chicken) which was awesome. No Lemon Chicken this time, but hopefully we'll have time to go back once more before we leave. As far as I can remember, we had a fairly lazy night after that, which I'm attributing to wine+the aforementioned bus ride.
 
The next day, we were going to the Acrobatics Show in the evening, but to pass the day 'til then, Susie wanted to go order dolls with my Mum, and I planned to go find the 'real' Beijing by myself. So, after some pretty awesome Texas style food for lunch, we went our seperate ways, and I took the subway to the end of the line (heading north-west) and then, finding myself in a bustling, food-cart filled, fake-watch laden neighbourhood with no other westerners in sight, I started walking back towards the city center in a generally south-easterly direction, judging by the sun (thank you boy-scouts!).

After around 15 minutes of walking, i found myself in a market that seemed to be for locals only. It wasn't like the Silk Market, where the sellers grab you and are looking to rip off any unsuspecting white folks, it was quite peaceful, all the sellers just sitting around, smoking, drinking, and having a pretty good time. Again, there was no other westerners in sight, and after 5 minutes of perusing, I found a stall selling jeans, most of which looked pretty crap, but Steve (western name, dunno how to spell or pronounce his actual name) had a few pairs of what looked like real, or at least great copies of black Armani jeans. One of those pairs was my size, so after checking the labels, stitching, and insides, I tried them on, baring my boxers to the rest of the market. Perfect fit, so i started the haggling process...

Now, usually, the seller would start at some rediculous price like £90 or so, and you then retort with an embarrasingly low price like 50p, and ten minutes later, you emerge with a pair of jeans for around £10, after being called a mean, crafty westerner. This time, I was pleasantly surprised to hear him start at a modest £20, and after 10 minutes, we had almost settled on the equivilent of £4, but he wasn't sure about such a low price.

He snapped his fingers in a "Eureka!" type moment, and asked if I was hungry, because his brother ran the kebab cart next door (there were of course no doors between the jeans and the kebabs, and 'cart' is definatly a compliment).

So we settled on £5 for the jeans and snack, which was a pita-type bread filled with spicy meat and gravy. Not sure what the meat was, but I'm not the type to care. It was tastey :)

After that, I continued on my wanderings, and after an hour or so, I hit a subway station, and since it was the first one I'd seen, i got on, not knowing when the next one would be, and I was still a good 7-8km away from home.

I got back to the flat, met my brother in Blenz, the coffeeshop downstairs, and waited for mum and Susie to get back.

The acrobatics show that evening was absolutely AMAZING. Probably the best sight we've seen so far. Every act was top-notch, exciting, and full of prowess. Plus we got VIP 2nd row seats due to a ticket mix up which wasn't our fault. Just before the break there was an act involving 2 big hamster wheels which rotated around a central pivot, which was cool, but during the interval, when it was supposed to rise back up into the ceiling, it didnt quite make it. There was some shouting, worried looks and shaking of heads from performers and technicians alike, as it swayed back and forth, dangling above our heads. The people in the front row got freaked out and legged it to the back (they were French, it's always them who ditch first), as did the airian family occupying the rest of ours, so it was just us left sitting below the half tonne of swaying metal, feeling smug at our bravery. Our thinking being that we're from Scotland, and therefore made of sterner stuff, although presumably we'd be as soft and squishy as the Frenchies in front when confronted with falling steel. Unfortunetly there was no photographs allowed, so we have nothing to show you, but we did buy the dvd.

So that was that really. One of us will continue tomorrow morning, with tales from the great wall of china, and the summer palace. Time to let my stomach settle...

Right. This journal entry will be throughly rubbish, as the order of events are already drifting away from me, and Lewis is staring over my shoulder as he wants the laptop to watch something. ¬.¬

I forgot to mention the rather spectacular banana split I got in a little cafe after the doll shop. =D



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Goodbye Patches. :(


( ... )

Potty training a toddler in China must be interesting.
( In which I babbled about loos, and haircuts.  )

Ok! So today was another very late start. I'm not sure why this morning, but things seemed to just run late., Had a better nights sleep, but I have now woken up with about three extra bites. Totally lost count, and despite the pills and the cream they're getting bigger, But hopefully that'll be them. John successfully killed a flying beastie about an hour ago, so here's hoping that's it away!

So today Lewis, Tina and I went to the Ritan Gardens.



( Gardens! )

Welcome to Day Three!

( There's Pictures In this One! )

Not many of you know (lol) that I've taken a wee trip to China. Beijing, specficially.

( China - in which I Babble about Food.  )an. :)

For the last year I've been working on my disseration. And on Monday, I finally handed it in. WOOP! A whole year of examining the same reports about the same boring old bones is finally done. All handed in and while I still wasn't satisfied with it (seriously though, I could've picked at that thing forever).

In general, not very much was learnt in regards to violence in the Bronze Age of Scotland. I looked at over a hundred reports and out of them only 7 people (bare in mind this was over a giagantic time period of about 1500-2000 years) had trauma. Not even violent trauma, just regular breaks and snaps. The coolest was someone displaying trepanning holes. A practice still done today where your skull is literally bored into (or back before drilling, scraped away at) to release pressure build up in the brain. It used to be a cure for scruvy. Surprisingly, most people survived the procedure, which goes to show people were a hell of a lot tougher than we ever were. When I was learning all about bones I saw some really awesome pathology that made you realise what massive wimps we are. Not to mention a large percentage of the bronze age population all had some form of osteoporosis, probably through poor diet. Tough old beans they certainly were. If anyone wants a copy of my disseration feel free to drop a comment and I'll email it to you. The actual bulk about the reports is very boring, but the sections in regard to identifying warfare and interpersonal violence in the archaeological record are totally bitchining. Did you know that in sever cases of drowing the water can actually be absorbed into the marrow of the bone? It's early days yet, but thats a bitchin' fact.

Anyway, I don't have any fancy pictures because archaeologists are stingy and printing pictures in reports cost a lot of money. :( But I have decided to go back to SHARP (despite creepy stalker David) to do a week of identifying disarticulated human remains. Bits of people pop up out the graves from time to time, for a variety of reasons. Mostly because of moles. It's a strange feeling stepping outside your tent in the morning to a little mole hill in front of you with a nice little child's humerus sat on top of it. xD

Got a doll meet coming up this weekend - really looking forward to it depsite the fact a lot of people haven't actually got back to me yet as to whether or not they're coming. Decided not going to chase anyone up - they don't bother their arse, why should I?

Any other updates? No, not really. The piggies are getting to go outside everyday because of this glorious weather, and I did some corss country on Flame the other day. We managed a coffin jump (a big solid wooden jump, a canter stride, a ditch jump, another stride and then another solid jump) without any hesitation from her part or mine (last year I fell off her for the first time as she dodged the ditch). Next step - the steps! A series of big massive steps downhill. Flame goes backwards at these jumps....xD I have also been riding Monty, Flame's son with Reba as well. Despite being a big monster that likes to rear, Monty is actually a joy to ride and errs on the lazy side. He's going to be top-notch once he's all trained up.

Uuuuuumm. Yea. First exam is on the 29th, so I better crack on with the studying. No word from the SSPCA job yet, but still hoping.

No picture rewards for people that made it to the end of my boring life gibberish today. Just the satsisfaction of knowing how quiet my life really is. Hee hee.

I totally just applied for the job of a "temporary relief kennel person" at the SSPCA's border's station, near gordon.

It would probably be just for the summer, and will likely involve cleaning up lots, and lots, and lots of poo. But. It would be so totally awesome if I got it. I could well be on my way to becoming an Inspector! OMG! 

Wish me luck! =D

It's a sunny afternoon and I completely, and utterly, procrastinating. I should be writing the theory chapter for my disseration, but I'm actually taking the time out of my busy day to sit and write an entry on LJ cos i really, really don't have anything better to do. I also have nothing terribly exciting to update with either. Things are the same old same old, for I am an incerdibly boring person.

( Personal Dribble, But there are piggy & dollie pictures inside )

Isn't my life thrilling? xD Yes, Photostory coming soon. Maybe later today if I'm in the mood.

Also, make sure to check out Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog. I am *obbsessed* with it. Obbsessed.

~xXx~

As many of you know, I've been getting involved in Guinea Pig Rescuing. I've been dealing with some really gorgeous guinea pigs. In our last rescue there was a lovely, very skinny girl that we took in. She's been living with my friend Helen in Gretna, putting on weight and doing quite well. Sadly, however, I found out that Helen came downstairs this morning to find that little Janeway, as I had dubbed her, had passed away. :( I was going to be picking her up next weekend - but sadly that's not going to happen anymore. My poor beautiful girlie.




Goodbye my little darling, I never got to know you as well as I would've liked.

~xXx~

( Warning, personal and probably unwarrented whinge within )
So sorry, anyway, here is a picture of a cute baby pig I rescued. He's so sweet and naughty. I think he's my favourite, because he's so tiny I worry he's getting enough food. He is, just fine. and when I pick him up often, his wee toeseys are cold. Not to mention the first night he was here he kept trying to squeeze out from between the bars of the cage and escape. Soooo cute! And he has a worrying habit of trying to eat the blanket they all sleep on...



What a wee monster.

I also miss my laptop. It is getting a good going through by the boy, who is embarrssed by the state it is in. Apparently riddled with spyware, or adware. I dunno. I am a bad laptop mummy.

Hey guys! Remember me? XD I'm sure you don't, I've been obscenely quiet on all fronts. This is terrible. I should change that, and probably will with the enroaching winter months, if my dissertation and Uni work doesn't overwhelm me and suck me into that world. =( (Although my dissertation is made of coolness and awesomeness, even if it does involve piles and piles of boring article reading.)

So.., to intice you into the boring real life entry underneath, here's a picture of my latest accomplishment...
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I passed my exams, I'm going into fourth year! YAAAAY!