We have been here a month already! Time is flying by! I'll start with a shout out to my mommy - Happy Birthday Mum (as they say here!). You're the BEST! Last Wednesday we cycled to a new gym I wanted to check out. Aldershot Garrison Sports Centre. It is on Army land and completely surrounded by military administration buildings, barracks, training grounds, etc. Kind of a weird setting for me and most of the members seem to be military (i.e. young males). I've never spent any time in a military setting or area so it is a bit of a culture shock but I think I'm going to like it. Those young fit bucks ought to keep me motivated! I realized that I was really paying too much for what I was getting at the nearby pool - it is run by the local government so that should have been my first clue - and they couldn't come up with a way to allow me to be a full member and freeze my membership when I am in the US. I saw an a d for the Garrison in the phone book. It is a nice place. Big gym area which they use for basketball and badminton that I've seen so far (badminton is SO cool to watch when it is played competitively!). Fairly good fitness area (cardio and weights) with newer machines. Best of all - a 50 meter pool! Thumbs up on that! So, I did a tour and asked about a membership that could be frozen. After getting hold of the right person and a couple days wait it all worked out! Every place I've been to here doesn't allow you to use the cardio or weights until you've been "inducted" (no problem just jumping into the pool though - guess they figure they can save you there!). I was impressed though with the induction. They did blood pressure, pulse, height, weight, health history, fitness history, fitness goals, body fat calculation, fitness test on the treadmill, then a run down of the equipment and how to use it. Friday we did a walk near Winchester from a little village called Sparsholt. I nice walk (of course, we got lost again - we are quite good at that) and back to the Ploughman pub for lunch. Luckily we had made a reservation before we started our walk! The pub guide said this was a very popular pub with "the well-heeled residents of Winchester". It certainly was some of those well-heeled folks sitting at the next table. I heard most of their conversation about picking up their new Mercedes and discussions about a villa they were thinking of buying in the south of France. The woman was whining that it is too hot there and the traffic in Nice is horrible. I really needed to slap her but I kept myself under control. Robin noted later that she was wearing a huge diamond ring. Why don't I notice that stuff? I must be missing some elemental female gene! Of course, they looked about 10 years younger than us too! We had fun speculatin g about all the people there and which ones might be having illicit affairs. Saturday Robin joined the local Randonneurs for a 100k ride south of us. He came home pretty trashed and said he needed me there to keep him riding a sensible pace. Silly boy! I showed him the "right" way to ride Sunday afternoon and we discovered some new roads nearby and it was a beautiful day but first we joined the Rowhill Nature Reserve volunteers again for a few hours work with them. Robin really enjoyed getting to do some work outdoors and the other volunteers seemed to enjoy our "accents" and explaining British things to us. Tea was served at about 10:30 and when they stopped for lunch around 1:00 we took our leave and went for our bike ride. A very nice goup! I'll be back to work with them again before we leave. Early in the day Sunday I was making all kinds of noise about wanting to join a group that were meeting up at the Farnborough Rugby C lub to watch the Superbowl on the big screen. The game didn't start until 11pm our time and by the time the clock was at 9pm I knew we'd never make it. We are such night owls! Still we did manage to stay up and watch the bloody thing (until 3am!). What a major bummer. We was robbed! That was the first football game I've watched in probably 15 years or more, the least they could have done was won for Pete's sake! That's about it for activities. Robin works 2-10:30 every day and leaves me to finish my training workouts, prepar gourment dinners, catch up on email, and plan wonderful outings for us. Still haven't made it into London or even made plans. Now it is warming up it seems a bit more tempting so I picked up a train schedule yesterday. Our apartment is really ideally located. By walking along the park behind us and a couple blocks through residential areas, a pedestrian bridge over the train tracks a nd I am right at the bus/train station and just another block to the town centre. I've been mentally compiling a lists of things I love here and things I miss so I thought I'd share them: Things I love here: * Cycling quiet country roads and even busy town roads where the drivers acknowledge your right to be there and work with you. * Walking to town and having a choice of routes with sidewalks on both sides of the street. * Interesting little shops in town centre and tucked here and there in residential areas of the town with little sign of mega stores (although one of the biggest retailers, ASDA, is owned by WalMart) * Our landlady, Christine and her husband, Bernard, who are very friendly and attentive. * Having breakfast with Robin every morning followed by a bike ride or a walk before he has to go to work. * Pubs! * Well behaved dogs. * Yummy cakes and goodies (although now I'm training I'm doing my best to stay a way from them). * Roundabouts * Bicycle postal deliverers (gotta get a picture of one). * All the young mums out each day walking with their kids in "buggies". * Hardly anyone on cell phones! At the pub on Friday the couple of business people that I saw get calls actually excused themselves and stepped outside for their calls! What a concept! Things I miss: * Friends, family, and my pals at US Bank * A washer and dryer that work! Ours is busted at the moment - not that the dryer part ever really worked anyway. I used our neighbor's upstairs machine today (he's another Boeing guy) to get caught up and now have 2 loads of laundry hanging to dry in the bathroom. * Knowing where things are and how to get there! * A-1 steak sauce. * Grand Central Baking and Essential Baking Company breads * Seeing Mt. Rainier from our sunroom (okay, probably wouldn't have seen it much in the past month but just knowing it is there sometimes is enough). * the WAC (I am SO spoiled there - even though the Garrison is a great gym it can't hold a candle to the WAC) * Ethnic diversity. Seems very white here and the few minorities (mostly Asian) don't seem to be integrated into society - they run their restaurants but otherwise I don't see them. We went to a Thai place Sunday night and the gal running the place seemed surprised that we wanted to talk to her. * Driving to Lacey with my sister to visit my parents on Tuesdays. Thanks for reading! Amy