Sorry this blog has been oddly quiet, it’s been very busy and I’ll do a proper catch-up in a couple of days but I thought it important to get this post in, to mark the day in cyberspace as well.

What can I say?

I’m ridiculously excited and yet my stomachs doing laps as well. There’s three things I’m dreading and it’s not going to take a genius to guess them. Dreading that I’ll muck them up.

Other than that though I’ve the feeling in me like I’m 7 again and it’s Christmas morning. Hopefully that sentence sums it up, I’m sooo excited, I can’t wait to come out the Church with Mrs Hadland holding my hand.

That’s all I’ve time for really. Time to shower and shave. See you on the other side.

Dan

Whilst the invites have been going along at a snails pace I’m pleased to say that most of the other stuff is getting there and today I got the call saying our rings are ready and would I like to pay for them? So they’ll be with us on Saturday.

I’m sure they’ll look great and having the mental age that I do I’m sure the first thing I’ll say is “Ooh, shiny!”. Having said that there is a pause for some thought.

A pair of jeans lasts perhaps a couple of years, a watch a fair few more but a ring… for the rest of my life, crikey!

I wonder what it will look like when life’s taken all it’s twists and turns and it gets taken off of me. Personally I hope it’s dulled down, scratched here and there and looks well worn. I’ve no desire to wear bright ‘blingy’ jewellery and to me a ring that looks like the one I described sounds to me like a ring that was worn everyday, for a long time, no matter what.

Of course life has many twists and turns, some that you don’t come round but if I do make it to old age, well I know who I want to make it there with.

Dan

The video doesn’t quite do the show justice but still thought I’d share it and remember it.

Dan

Friday evening Ben, Kita, Mum (thanks Mum) and I set about cleaning our old house, working pretty much straight through the evening with all manner of cloth and chemical. Come about 11pm the old house was in a pretty good state. Clean, tidy and ready to be given back.

Saturday morning Ben and I went in the house about 9am and the first thing I said was “Where’s the post?” shortly followed by “Why’s the bed been pulled out?”. From that moment on I had a feeling in the pit of my stomach it wasn’t going to be quite as good a day as the glorious sunshine would suggest it should be.

We’d arranged for the landlady to go through the checking out process at 10am and sure enough she was there promptly on time. The first thing she produced was a letter addressed to the occupier of our Reading place from Thames Water. She thought it was evidence we’d not paid the water bill. In truth it’s a fairly harmless letter, just asking for the new occupier to set-up a new account as I’d cancelled ours. I know, I’d opened it a couple of days ago and left it in the house for the new tenants.

A part of me wishes I’d been a lot less tired and a bit sharper witted. Our landlady had been in our property after we’d left Friday night and picked up the post. That’s a breach of contract, entering the property without our consent whilst we still held the tenancy. If I’d have been more awake and a little quicker I suspect none of what followed would have happened. Alas, it’s a lesson learnt.

She basically complained about the state of cleanliness of the property throughout. In fact I think the only thing she was happy with was the hob which was shining…… as was most of the house. Many hours passed and many comments were made and ultimately Ben and I somewhat gave in on some points which means we’re losing a significant chunk of our deposit. On reflection we could have been a lot tougher, heck based on the previous paragraph we could have been very tough indeed.

In all honesty though my heart wasn’t in it. At the moment there are just too many more important things going on in my life that fighting for some money pails in comparison. Another time and  I suspect I’d have tried a lot harder, or more to the point taken something of a gamble. You see a big part of our problem was our letting agents.

The reason, the only real reason Ben and I negotiated with the landlady direct was because we both felt it would have been a far bigger, messier fight with the agents. Honestly as I type this I’m sure the agents would have gone for more like 85% of our deposit and we’d be fighting tooth and nail over it for the next 6 months. In my final year of uni and getting married in a few months I just didn’t fancy that over my head. If you’re looking to move to Reading drop me a message and I’ll tell you who to avoid!

There were so many silly little details on Saturday that I could write a book on them. It wouldn’t do anyone much good apart from this, my intentions to own the roof over my head have never been stronger.

So Saturday was a write off, I was exhausted mentally and physically and didn’t fancy moving any more boxes into Portsmouth that evening. Sunday though was a success. After a much needed lazy start to the day we went down to our flat in Southsea and moved the final car loads of stuff in and began living there.

We unboxed a bit, got the TV kind of working and made the bed. Thankfully though we both felt like a walk and so we strolled along the beach, laughing and enjoying one another’s company like we haven’t in quite a long time. It was a really great walk, probably the most romantic thing we’ve done since Sorrento last summer.

That would have been a good way to finish the weekend but it got better. As we were aimlessly wondering around we came across quite a crowd. Not really knowing what was going on (apart from a big boat on the grass) we stuck around and to our delight a fantastic firework show took place marking the end of Portsmouth’s Festivities, celebrating 500 years since the ascension of Henry VIII.

So a great way to end a very stressful weekend.

Dan

Yesterday Kita put down the holding deposit on our flat in Southsea and as I’m sure you’ve read her job has all been sorted as well The flat we’ve got is the one we wanted, mercifully no one else went for it whilst we were waiting to hear about Kita’s job.

It’s a little bit quirky as a place but it is a good size, has a second bedroom which will make an ideal study and a terrace garden. I say qwerky but that’s not the right word, perfect? Well it’s pretty close. The kitchen is a little small for my liking but meh, it’s a tiny thing not even a niggle and for the rent we’ll be paying, honestly I don’t think we could have dreamed for anything better.

I’m looking forward to having a study for the first time and a decent sized desk in a fairly long while as well. I’m looking forward to having separate places to sleep, relax and work. Since going to Uni, that being the first time I’ve done much work away from school it’s always felt a little odd sleeping in the same room as all my computer bits and pieces. Of course in my first year of Uni it was worse then that as you try and cram in all your entertainment into the same room as well. Now though I’m looking forward to having room to spread out somewhat, to having those separate rooms for work and play. There’s something almost feng shui about it!

We’re also going to have a two week overlap renting wise between Southsea and Reading to make life a little easier, so no need to put stuff in storage etc.  We get the keys (references pending) on the 15th June and then the plan is to pretty much move in over the weekend of the 20th/21st. Friends on the Isle of Wight, free?

Between now and then I guess it’s a case of starting to box things up again and deep cleaning the house in Reading.

Man does it feel good that things have fallen into place.

Dan

Alas no, woke up about 3am this morning, tossing, turning and shivering. Eventually set up and felt rather sick which inevitably involved a trip to the bathroom. Thankfully all my moving had woken Kita enough to notice something wasn’t quite right and in the proceeding 2 hours or so she somehow nursed me back to health.

Come to think about it she did an incredibly good job. I really had to be in work today for interviews (that’s another blog post but simply we’re having to recruit an intern again) and the way I was feeling in the small hours that didn’t seem possible. Somehow though, entirely down to Kita I was up by 7:30 and set for work.

I was feeling rather odd this morning though, like I had a bad hangover. I’m guessing it was the dehydration but still a very odd feeling.

Right, hopefully, tomorrow will prove better.

Dan

There’s a scene at the end of the Mr. & Mrs. Smith which for me sums up some of the really strange bits of love. It comes after Mr. Smith (Brad Pitt) and his Mrs’ (Angelina Jolie) have kissed and made up… a lot. They’re back at a psychologists mirroring the start of the movie and Pitt is saying how much he does love her but at the same time, aaah I could just… (mimics ringing her neck).

That’s the thing that’s been going around my head a bit. It’s fair to say Kita and I have had our fair share of arguments and I guess really it’s no surprise as we learn to live with one another as well  as trying to save for a wedding. It’s the irrationality of my thoughts for those few minutes after an argument I just don’t get.

Pitt mimicked ringing Jolie’s neck and I’ve thought other bizarre things, giving up on the wedding, stomping out etc etc It makes no sense and thankfully my head reigns in my heart plenty quickly enough its just, yeah so strange. I feel perfectly secure with Kita (and hopefully vice versa!) so it’s crazy but there you have it.

Just some thoughts going through me noggin.

Dan

Kita’s Grandparents have a holiday place up there which is pretty awesome, nice and cheap break for us! Be nice to escape the characterless Reading for a few days at least and spend v.day somewhere a bit different.

Should be about 260 miles there which should be fine and doesn’t really concern me although I did check the oil in the car, Dad will be proud! The only thing that does concern me a little is that yesterday the main road from York to Scarborough, the one I’m intending to use, was closed last night due to heavy snow fall and then it freezing over. A good number of cars got caught in it, fun fun!

So see you Tuesday or sooner (T&C, look forward to seeing you on Monday :)) when I get to put the new HD into the mini, it’s arrived at my parents.

Dan

We all met for drinks yesterday evening at a bar in Oxford (neutral ground) with Zach (Kita’s brother) as a mediator basically so Kita and her Dad could talk through their differences. A fair bit of it revolves around the wedding but I think the wedding has really just highlighted problems that exist regardless.

I felt/feel a lot of it is down to communication, specifically a severe lack of it and that seemed to be what most of the talk centred around. We’ve all agreed to meet up more often, starting as soon as possible. We’re meeting up on the 27th for a late Christmas and I’m hopeful that things can begin to pick up again. I think my part in it all is going to be largely taxi but if that’s what is needed then that’s fine.

Don’t really know what else to say. It’d be nice and I think beneficial if and for Kita and her Dad if they could get along well, it’ll be interesting to see how the next couple of months go and I’m guessing that should give a better indication of where things are at and what the wedding will look like.

Dan

So Friday Rachel came over and Kita got some Christmas shopping out of the way (think I’ll be starting that soon) and Saturday we all just relaxed in the lounge, watching movies and catching up. In the evening we had some HP friends over for a somewhat epic Monopoly game, finishing somewhere between 2 and 3 Sunday morning. Come to think about it though, are there any Monopoly games that aren’t epic?

Sunday was somewhat busier however and I don’t think I was too popular waking Kita up to head back to Oxford. First off I had to go to Richer Sounds to take my poorly CD player back for repairs, then sort out a refund from Halfords and finally go to Debi’s (Kita’s Mum) for dinner.

The left channel has been intermittently cutting out on the CD player and only a full power on/off will resolve it. Seeing as I took the Super Care package out on it I figured I’d best get my money’s worth turned out to really be worth it. I’ve got a loan unit whilst mine is away (2-4 weeks) and the customer service was simply superb. I’d done the usual thing of losing the receipts etc and the clerk was plenty happy enough looking up the purchase. I’ve now decided that on the basis of all the excellent service I’ve got over the years that when it comes to any other purchases, assuming they sell the product, it will come from there.

So I was a happy customer at Richer Sounds and then tried to sort out the battery mess from last week, Halfords’ tried to wriggle out of the refund a little bit. I’m not sure if this was intentional or if they just didn’t understand, who knows? Still it’s all sorted now and my credit card got refunded

The evening saw us having a meal at Kita’s Mums place and well, I guess you can tell from Kita’s post it was… interesting! I haven’t got the time to go into it right now and if you follow the link my comment should give some indication of how things are. I’ll probably post about it later, if anything, just to get my thoughts clear and committed.

So yeah, successful retail experience in the day. Less successful evening.

Dan