Well slack old me has not posted to my blog since way back in June and that is just disgraceful but is I hope an indication of how busy Ive been in the last 5 months or so.

From my last post I mentioned that we were looking into moving house and that is partly why posting has been delayed. It took me two months to get an internet connection in new house due to the incompetence of Tiscali. Made me realise how dependent on broadband I am. Anyways new house is lovely with some friendly housemates. We have just spend a wonderful christmas day in our new flat with Turkey, Ham, wine, cider and my awesome red Xmas jumper as shown in pics. I got and gave some awesome presents including a Joe Blow standing pump for extra awesome bike tyre pumping action, a print of london life for Emma, some nice music by Bon Iver and Fleet Foxes and an adult sized space hopper.

November saw Emma writing a novel as part of National Novel writing month. Kind of strange to have a girlfriend so consumed by a single activity needing to write around 1500 words every day. Im massively proud of Em though and hopefully she will let me read the finished product…just as soon as she completed National novel editing month in the new year.

Going back a few months before xmas to September we did a cycling trip around Normandy over a week covering about 400km or so. This was our first major trip cycling and camping with all our gear on our bikes. Emma is in the process of writing this trip up so rather than repeat everything I will link to her blog when its done. A few highlights of the trip however were:

• Cycling so much the first day I almost fainted (about 80km with no sleep into a headwind) and then eating a hot cheese filled croissant to restore strength
• Camping in a massive rain storm and not getting wet at all. Praise the Macpac tent!
• Cycling past boulangerie after boulangerie snacking at each one
• Drinking cider beside the Seine in the sun watching freighters from Hong Kong steam past
• Cycling through acres of apple orchards smelling blossoms and shouting bonjour to friendly farmers and dogs
• Watching kites at the Dieppe kite festival. Nothing like a massive flying penguin to cheer you up after a day of rainy cycling
• Finding a quiet spot on the ferry back to england to sleep the night through and waking to a glorious sunny morning over white cliffs of dover

So overall a very successful trip and something we will do a lot more of in future. Heres a map of where we went.

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Towards the end of August we took a bank holiday weekend holiday in the Lake district with a night in Liverpool along the way. In Liverpool we played the tourist bit as having less than 24 hours we decided doing a Beatles tour was the only way to go. Besides the obvious Beatles nostalgia Liverpool is a very vibrant city lots of interesting arts and cultural events along with music around almost every corner you turn.

After leaving Liverpool we travelled north to the Lake District home to Beatrix Potter and met up with some friends at a cottage we had rented for a few days. We had a lovely day of cycling along quiet country lanes with views across hills, valleys and lakes. Em and I took a slightly unplanned off road route at one point emerging in a disused quarry to be met by some rock climbers cooking sausages on a BBQ. We eagerly ate a few sausages and bread and chatted about NZ before heading down one of the longest downhill descents Ive done it seemed endless and was welcome reward for our off road climb. The remainder of our time in the Lake District the weather was fairly wet but thst didnt stop us enjoying the log fire at our cottage and the hospitality of a few local pubs and cafes.

Well thats a short summary of the last few months. Tomorrow we head off to Eyemouth in the Scottish borders where we have rented a cottage for a week. We plan to have a road trip up there then a bit of walking and a lot of relaxing. If Im making any resolutions on New Years eve I will try and remember my blog and maybe rashly promise to update more frequently. So expect some further notes on events during 2009.

Its been a fairly active last month or so covering the full spectrum of music, cycling, eating, working and playing. Actually on reflection that’s just your normal kind of month but if I didn’t introduce it as exciting you would never read any further. So onto some of the things I have been up to.

After we got back from Italy Emma headed off to Finland for a work conference and then took a few days afterwards with some workmates to do some walking. I spent the week at home wishing I was on holiday still and wishing I hadn’t decided £350 wasn’t to much for a ticket to Finland.

We then entered into June where we had the three weekends filled with activities starting off with Epsom Derby Day. We sat on the hill with picnic blankets cider and the obligatory bottle of sauvignon blanc/rose/champers dont you know. I think I might have won a few quid but when you are betting the princely sums of up to £3 a race its easy to lose track of these things.

The following weekend we took a bike ride out to see our friends Laurie and Anita and their kids. We planned to cycle a circular route called Chiltern Heritage Trail that we found on the Chiltern Council Website. This was ideal as Prestwood where Laurie and Anita live was around half way through. After finally finding the start (It all looked much simpler on the PDA phone) it was a really good ride. The terrain was nice and varied and thre were loads of quiet little villages and country pubs to stop at. The reason for our visit was the end of season football bash with a covers band, really cheap beer and dancing till the wee hours. The next day after a cooked breakfast supplied by Laurie we continued on our way around the rest of the circular route back to Amersham.

The next week was filled with some frantic present buying for Emma’s birthday which was actually kind of easy as we travel light the rules were strict nothing big and everything needed to be practical. So an SD memory card and a solar panel along with a few cycling books it was. The following weekend we went to a Silent Disco at the South Bank Center where Andrew Weatherall was playing as part of the Massive Attack curated Meltdown festival, which was very awesome. Being able to have loud thumping music one minute then order a beer in a normal voice then jump back on a different channel for some nice electro and breakbeat. Ive done this once before at Glastonbury but adding the sophistication of the South Bank Centre was very nice.

The evening of 22nd June saw us at Radiohead in Victoria Park which was another very awesome night. Im a Radiohead convert via Emma so I cant say I recognised every song but the ones I knew were awesome and theres nothing like being pushed around in a mosh pit by kids half your age to make you feel like an old man, who is hopefully still young at heart.

Interspersed amongst this fun stuff we have decided to move out of our flat a combination of other flatmates leaving and very difficult to deal with estate agents have driven us to this. Normally we use The Gumtree website when flat hunting but this time as we wanted to search a few different suburbs I decided to write a little screen scraping code to merge a few different Gumtree website searched into a single search result set. Its still pretty rough and ready but does the trick and I find it much easier to read than the main site.

For my birthday this year my lovely girlfriend Emma decided to arrange a trip to Italy and not just any old part of Italy but to a town called Riomaggiore think fishing boats, winding streets, focaccia bread and houses coloured by a child with a penchant for pastels. We flew to Genova and then trained our way down the coast catching glimpses of a picture perfect summers day, blue ocean, rocky inlets and a myriad of villages filled with houses piled up high like building blocks as we sped through tunnels.

As we approached Riomaggiore the tunnels seemed to get longer and the glimpses of towns shorter with the station we arrived at being half hidden inside a tunnel. We collected the keys to our apartment we had rented through Mar-Mar and dropped our bags only pausing long enough to take in the view through the village from our terrace. We picked up some deliciously fresh focaccia bread and walked our way down to the end of the coastal path that connects the 5 villages of Cinque Terre. A short walk away was a quiet rocky beach where I sat in the sun feeling a million miles away from London while Em paddled and soaked up the sun. We ended the day with a walk along the Via dell’Amore, dinner pizza and steamed seafood accompanied by wine. A perfect holiday already and it was only the first day!

Although I could have sworn I heard every ring of the local church clock through the night I woke up the next day ready for our planned walk along the coast to Monterossa. The weather was a little grey however the forecast was for rain the next day so we decided to setout, after a little breakfast focaccia of course. The walk follows the coast and is around 9km long taking 5hours. The initial stretch from Riomaggiore to Manarola is a wide paved path perched high on the cliffs so you spend most of your time looking down at the sea or ahead to how far you have to walk. From Manarola to Corniglia the track descends a little and becomes more dirt than pavement but is still easy going. Approaching Corniglia which perches atop a hill you begin to wonder how you are going to get up to the village, the answer is one of the longest set of steps I’ve climbed for a while. Corniglia to Vernazza the path is a lot more like a hiking path and I was glad of my mountain-jandals. We stopped half way along to eat out bread, ham and tomatoes we had brought along seeming to time it perfectly with about 50 school kids all wanting to go past us the other way. Vernazza we stopped for an ice-cream and enjoyed what is probably the most beautiful town along the walk with its picture postcard harbour and castle tower. Vernazza to Monterossa was probably the hardest part of the walk as it came at the end and had some fairly steep sections of track. Approaching Monterossa we found a bar for a quick drink then time headed home to cook a delicious dinner of local fresh ingredients on pasta.

The day of my birthday dawned pretty wet and grey making our plans of heading back to Monterossa for the Sagra dei Limoni or Lemon Festival look a little unlikely. After a morning of lazing around the house the rain began to ease and we decided to give the Lemon festival a go. Arriving in Monterossa it seemed like the locals had also been put off doing much towards the celebration of all things lemon. We spent a few hours wandering around the streets and shops before we began to see a few lemon themed decorations appearing outside shops. It wasn’t long till the sun had begun to glimmer behind the low clouds and we were eating lemon slices while watching a stage being erected for the concert happening later in the evening. After a dinner of fresh seafood and watching other tables get served huge urns of seafood stew with whole lobsters and fish in it we went outside to discover what the music was like. Earlier in the day a local had advised us that the band were the most world famous Italian band ever so we had high hopes. I think it’s safe to say that most other world famous bands have nothing to fear from Ricchi E Poveri although they provided a lovely way to end my most unusual birthday to date.

The next day it was time to head home to London and after a very scenic train ride inland to Parma where we flew out from we had a hectic time getting to the airport involving catching a bus the wrong way, a massive thunderstorm appearing from nowhere and the final football match of the season occupying every cab in town. Em and I arrived panting at the check in desk with minutes to spare only to discover the flight was delayed by an hour or so. The final moment of panic was me leaving my camera on the plane and only realizing after clearing customs, proving once again that this was the perfect holiday another passenger had picked it up, found me in the airport and returned it.

I had one of the most diverse and interesting holidays filled with surprises and best of all was celebrating my birthday yet again with my lovely partner Emma who arranged the whole holiday so thank you so much.

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Somehow I have managed to catch the worst disease I have ever experienced, Chickenpox. Ive had my body covered in bedbug bites, scabies crawling all over my skin and been devoured by midges but nothing compares to the itchiness and irritation of Chickenpox. On top of the itchiness you also get all the symptoms of a very bad case of the flu with headaches, muscle pain and lethargy.

When I felt myself getting sick around 5 days or so ago I put it down to a seasonal flu and took a few paracetamol then off to work. By the end of last Friday I thought something more was up as it was more than I could do just to pull the duvet up more snugly around my neck. Waking on Saturday morning I had a few tell-tale bumps and after a quick call to NHS direct I confirmed it was Chickenpox.

The last few days have been spent trying not to scratch any of the well over 200 bumps on my body and dosing myself at regular intervals with anti-histamines and flu remedies. Ive also been reading up about Chickenpox online and finding out that adult Chickenpox is not quite as rare as I first thought.

Im hoping that as the bumps start to scab over in the next few days I will feel a little better and that the itchiness will decrease a little. I usually have a very good level of health but catching Chickenpox has pretty much floored me forcing me to sleep a lot and despite my best efforts trying to do any type of work from home just tires me out to much. I think Chickenpox is worse in adults than children so if you have kids do your best to spare them this in later life try and get them infected as soon as you can!

Emma and I are in full swing of planning our holiday to Cuba for the end of February which should be very much fun. Ive got an initial route planning map here which shows where we are travelling to but Im adding and changing it every day at the moment as we figure things out. Plan is generally Havana, Vinales Valley, Trinidad, La Boca and then beach somewhere for a few days. Hopefully biking thrown in somewhere as well.

In other news my work is still mad as ever with role changing a bit at work so I now work across the Monarch group of companies which means Im very busy and split my time between two different offices so a bit of travelling. All good fun though.

Im also now a voulnteer at the Roundhouse music venue which is good fun and a great way to see music and otherwise sold out gigs for free.

Other things planned for this year include:

• Bike ride to Laos maybe Septenber
• Ride and camping from Exmoor to Lands End maybe July
• Trip to Newcastle for a weekend at some stage
• Seeing loads of music including
• New York to see Radiohead in concert
• Cimb/Hike Snowdonia

A few highlights since the last post include:

• We spent Christmas in Paris with friends and had a very good time with nice food and company

For those of you who last saw me bearded and shaggy headed Im now clean shaven and close cropped but not gonna scare you with any pics of my ugly mug.

Also been doing a spot of country walking in last few weeks trying to make the terrible UK summer last for just a little bit longer. Both walks so far very successful with pub stops half way. Check the gallery pics for the Lewes Walk and for the Dover to Deal trip.

Way back earlier in the year a few edited highlights include:

• Trip to Lisbon with a day cycling to Sesimbra and night in Sintra
• A trip to Morocco with Cat and Graham
• One very wet, very muddy, very rockin Glastonbury 2007. Not many pics as my camera stayed quivering in its dry bag the whole festival
• Discovering we have foxes in our garden
• Going to some amazing music gigs
• Loads of cycling around London, Isle of Wight, Cambridge and various other day trips over summer