November is out

So everything in our flat got fixed but the roof issue. Thankfully it's not raining that much at the moment so it only leaked once more. Apparently today people will be climbing up the roof today with fancy new electronic equipment to find the leak. Uhm, ok whatever they say. Just fixed the damn leak. Honestly, I don't see how this has priority. It's raining into your building. The ceiling has water marks now and is wet. I'm no builder, but clearly that can't be good.

Anyway, on to nicer things. The month of November is over now. The boys at work did all grew moustaches and had us sponsor them. We all met up for a last great group photo and us girls put on some fake staches as well. Mine can be seen below. Sorry, no on the face shot, I looked like an idiot. Maybe for the Christmas party where I plan to wear it again as I am going as an old man...

The weekend was great. I went out for breakfast with the bf. We actually had a pre-breakfast breakfast as he forced me to leave the house so early that our chosen place was still closed. So we went into Paul's and had a croissant and mocha.

After that we went over to a lovely breakfast place and I had the Lumberjack Stack: pancake, French toast and waffles served with maple syrup. Delicious! But definitely sugar overload. Then we went to see 50/50. Oh boy, I thought I went to see a comedy. The film was brilliant, but made me cry all over the place. 

After that I headed to lunch with a friend at a fancy Japanese place. And by fancy I mean they had projectors on top of the tables and you had to order from a projected menu. The food was actually shown on your plate. It was cool, but also overpriced. 

And then stupid us went to Oxford Street. Which was packed! I took some photos of the Christmas decorations, but they are really blurry. Will do better next time!

And now it's back to working. Boo. I wish weekends were longer... Maybe one more day, that's all I'm asking...

Morning Rant

Argh, I am so annoyed at the moment (and freezing cold, why? later). Yesterday I got into work late because I had the plumber and construction people come into our flat to fix things. The central heating didn't work, water leaked through the ceiling in the bathroom and the cold water pipe in the shower was leaking. Plus our chain at the front door is broken and should have been fixed weeks ago, but it never happened.

So yesterday they showed up at 7.30am. Which was fine. But then they stayed way too long to get everything done and I left late for work. Which already annoyed me a bit, because it should not be my responsibility to give them access to the flat. The landlord or building manager should provide that. But anyway, the guys made a big mess in my bathroom. Took down all the shower fixings, messed about with the heaters and the boiler. And when they left they said it was fixed. The heaters were heating etc.

But big surprise this morning, the boiling had shut off again, this time with a different error message. And this time we could not restart it. It seems dead in the water. So now I had to take a shower with cold water. Shit, was that cold. I am still freezing. I kept blow drying my hair and my body afterwards, but I am still COLD! Bf will call the landlord/building manager and yell at them. Honestly if this is not fixed soon and the boiler keeps breaking I am considering not paying rent until it is fixed. This is now becoming ridiculous. It's almost winter, and there is NO way I am going through that without heating and hot water. NO WAY!

Plus of course I won't know if they fixed the leak on the roof until it rains heavily the next time. Oh, and contractor guy said that it's leaking in our neighbours flat too. Great, that does not make me feel any better. Au contraire, does that mean the whole roof is shit and we will have MORE leaks? Thank god I am only renting this place. Can move out whenever I want to (but I do like it. I want to use the balcony in the summer). Damn. 

Ok gotta go to work. Will walk at an extra quick pace to finally get some warmth back into my feet. COLD!

End rant.

Leaking ceiling

So I am back from Germany. I had a great time. On the weekends I was at my sister's place in Hamburg. And I met my nephews. They are both adorable! Though very different. One of them is pretty big, has red/blonde hair. You can hardly see his eyebrows and lashes. But his head is so big! The other one is tiny. Had full black hair and long eyelashes. His face and everything is really tiny. Both of them were pretty much eating, sleeping, crying. Maybe next time when I see them, around Easter, they will be more aware of their environment. So excited!

During the week I was at my parents place. Went to the dentist. All is well. Yay! And I met up with a lot of friends from high school. We will have our 10th year reunion next year. Originally I couldn't care less about it. But now it seems like one of my friends will be organising it, and most of my friends will attend. So I might go after all. Just because it would be such a great opportunity to meet them all at the same time. This might mean that I will be going back to Germany three times in three months next year. Easter in April, a friends wedding in May and the reunion in June. Uh oh. That will blow a whole into my bank account. Thank god for Ryanair. So I guess the Japan trip will have to be in the Fall. No way I can squeeze that into spring as well. And I want to avoid going in the summer. I don't much enjoy the summer heat. But we will see. I just found out about the reunion and the wedding in the last week. Will have a think about it over Christmas.

Anyway, I came back Sunday late evening. That was a bad idea. I was so tired all week at work. But I made it through somehow. Was super busy catching up on last week. But wasn't really motivated. Especially because next week a lot of my colleagues will be either on holiday or work trips and I have to take care of their emails. Boo. On top of catching up. Well, it's Christmas soon(ish) and I will be off for almost two weeks then. Cannot wait!

In other news... There are really no other news. I still love our new flat. Though we discovered a few problems that we have to call our landlord about next week. It rained heavily tonight and in the morning we discovered that some water had leaked through the bathroom ceiling. Not a lot. But they better check that out (since it NEVER rains in England I am sure it won't be a problem). The other thing is our boiler. So far we only had the hot water on. But now it's gotten colder so I switched the central heating on. But then the boiler heats for about ten minutes and then shuts down with an error message saying it's over heating. That can't be good. Let's hope someone can fix that before it gets really cold. The other thing is that one of the pipes in the shower is leaking. Not a lot, but still I want to get that fixed before it turns into a bigger problem.

Even though those problems are annoying I think they can be forgiven. It's a new place so there are bound to be things that are not working. But eventually everything will be tuned and then it will be a gorgeous flat.

Which is why I will leave you with photos taken from my balcony yesterday. Enjoy the London dusk:

 

New place

We are in our new flat! And the internet/phone/TV situation is sorted. Was actually very quick and efficient. I am mighty impressed.

I managed to take some pictures. They are not the greatest quality, but here it goes:

Our kitchen. I tried not to take a picture of the counters because they are still packed with stuff.

Our bathroom. It's an actual room!

Bedroom. Messy, but I cleaned it up after this.

View of the balcony. It was pouring down rain when I took the pic.

Living room. The kitchen and living room are actually the same room, but it's really long.

So there you have it. Nothing spectacular, but I love it! Have been in it for only a few days now, but it is already home. I love all the space we have. The first night was a bit weird, but now it's all good.

Where is my free time?

I am free!!! Or so I thought when I handed in my thesis at the end of September. I spent most of September, especially my precious weekends, polishing the thesis of (well writing it) and handed it in on the 30th. I took the day off work because the uni office opening hours didn't allow me to pop in before and after. So I spent my day picking up the thesis from the printer, together with another girl from my course. We ended up returning all our library books (yay) and then turning in the diss. Finally!!! It was actually pretty unspectacular. We didn't even get a receipt. Nothing. Ah well, it's gone, that's all that matters.

Then we went for a nice lunch with another friend who we met at the office. I guess we weren't the only once turning in our papers on the last possible day. We went to a nice Japanese place and had a lunch set. After we went for ice cream and some shopping.

I had to leave them for a bit then because I had an appointment at a real estate agent. We finally found a flat to rent we liked and went in to sign the contract! So that has been eating up my 'free' weekends. We have been moving stuff the last couple of weeks. This weekend we are taking a break (bf has to work). But next weekend we will properly move. We will have to bring over the rest of our stuff and properly set up. I took of a day to get the BT and Virgin Media guys into the flat to get connected to phone/broadband/TV.

I am VERY excited about this flat. It is new (the whole building is). So nobody has lived there before us. We have a proper sized bathroom with a bathtub (I don't really like to take baths, but am excited nonetheless). We have a balcony, a proper sized bedroom. We have double-glazed windows (score), we have a couch! The kitchen/living room is one big living space. But I love that. Makes the flat look much bigger than it is. Plus, it means bf cannot hide away in one room. We still get to spend time together.

We still have to buy some shelves for my massive book collection. Though I am getting rid of about half of them (breaks my heart, but what can you do). This also made the need for an ebook reader much more apparent. Though I still cannot decide which one I want. Well, don't have money at the moment anyway, so I guess I will figure it out later.

Anyway, just wanted to write this quick update. I am not dead, just massively busy. But hopefully in two weeks that will all stop and I will be settling into a brand new flat with free weekends (soooooooooooooo excited!).

Until then... Let's pack some more boxes!