Gary Writes A Blog

Stideon, what’s that sound, can you hear it…?

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38. frazman78 131
1507. gudgeb 110
3463. stideon 101
4236. GaryfraetheDale 99
6275. rubbish_runner 91
11104. craigyule 56
18526. stuartybrown 5

The move has been completed (in fact it was completed in the last weekend of January).

As is always the way, it didn’t go smoothly…

The van we rented was a wreck, the inside of which was caked in some kind of cleaning liquid (about an inch worth) and mud. We had to take it back and wait for 3 hours for them to clean it out, but by the time we moved the furniture it was dark and a chilly -15 degrees, so the inside was like an ice rink.

We’re lucky that we had some good (and patient) friends who helped us out!

Old place, packed into boxes…

Old place after moving the boxes…

New Place…

Still looks like this two weeks later !!!

One of my aims this year was to regain my rightful place above the Rubbish Runner in the Mini-League…

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35. frazman78 115
978. gudgeb 99
2640. stideon 91
6641. GaryfraetheDale 79
6994. rubbish_runner 77
10793. craigyule 56
18210. stuartybrown 5

Will keep an ear on the tennis this morning re: Andy Murray.

Saw his match against Nadal on Tuesday and it was great stuff. Hoping for more of the same.

… is conspiring against me.

It’s been cold, but clear weather for the last two weeks, but with my big move coming up on Saturday, the snow is falling very heavily today and is set to continue for the next four days at least.

The stuff still has to be moved though, as this is the last weekend of our lease. Anybody got a motorised sledge?

What a couple of weeks! We now have the keys to our new apartment!

We bought it back in November and it has been a real roller-coaster getting the mortgage to pay for it. We thought everything was going to be fine and then last week, the bank pulled out at the last minute.

I had 2.5 days to organise a new mortgage with another bank or else we would have risked losing our deposit (It normally takes 3 weeks to organise a mortgage).

On Monday the 11th we got the OK from our new bank at 12 noon and our deadline was 15:00, so in the end we actually had plenty of time, so I don’t know why I wasn’t more relaxed.

The start of the year has been a bit weird what with all this stress to do with the mortgage, but I’m convinced that things are on the up now and we’re gonna have a great 2010!!!

It seems as if the whole of Europe is fixated by the cold weather just now. I don’t want to feel left out…

In northern Sweden they had -40 this week and on Tuesday and Wednesday we had -18 in the middle of the day here in Stockholm.

I thought I would put a live feed to the recorded temperature at Bromma Airport which is about 15 mins drive from my flat.

Back in Sweden now. I flew over on Monday, but my flight was delayed for a couple of hours and they let us board the plane but then sat there for hours on the plane. The reason? The toilets had frozen!!!

Someone had left the water in the system overnight and we all know the icy temperatures we have been having in Scotland and the toilets couldn’t flush so we couldn’t take off!

Anyway they solved it and we got over in one piece.

New years day for me was a nice one. Not only did we get a nice Goose for dinner, but I also got a bit of exercise under my belt.

Neil was doing the Edinburgh new years triathlon, so I took the chance to climb up Arthurs Seat. It was like an ice rink and I only had my trainers on, so it probably wasn’t the smartest thing to do, but the views were cracking, looking over to the Pentland Hills which were covered in snow.