Bits and bobs

The end of Cath's exams meant it was time for a clear out, which meant going through the files, clothes, books, etc. We can only really throw out her accounting notes once we know she's passed everything (fingers crossed) but I've been needing to throw out books for a while. I actually wanted to do a stocktake of all the books I've bought since I got here (I arrived with about 2) but it seemed too tough a battle (okay, I can't count that high). I settled, in the end, for a photo of my books.

This photo below is of the longest day of the year, the peak of summer as it were. Please note the rain on the window, the jacket I'm wearing and the steaming cup of tea to warm me up. Mutter, mutter, mutter.

But having a wife like Cath makes it all better. Well, almost all better.

Whenever I get a little too down, Cath whips up one of these babies. Banana bread. Mmmm. Oops, drooled on the keyboard again. She often makes it when Emma comes to visit too, which would be great if Emma didn't "tidy it up" so often, as she likes to say.

This is our fridge. I include it simply for those who are interested in the life and times of the Valkenburgs and for anyone lucky enough to have cracked it onto our fridge by sending us a postcard, photo, etc. There is still time to get your postcards into us, but you have to act quickly.... please enclose cheques to guarantee prime position.



And then last but not least, proof that Cath spoils me every now and again... this is the life...

Married three years

Thanks for the congratulatory emails and texts guys - we really appreciate it.

Cath and I have, as of the 20th of August, been married three years. Seeing as most marriages that split-up end in the first two years, we are now even safer than we were this time last year.

Of course I shouldn't entertain talk of divorce or separation at this happy juncture - besides - Cath and I would never divorce - her bumping me off is a much more realistic end. Death by strangulation probably.

Still - the anniversary was a great day. I let her lie-in before making her get up and go out for a cycle together. We've decided this year is the year of being healthy - more healthy eating, more exercise, etc. We're in the process of cleaning out the sweetie cupboard and are not gonna restock it. Me being the guilty one in that department. Anyhoo...

After the cycle we had brekkie and exchanged gifts - Cath got me a cool Italian leather wallet and I got Cath a leather bag. Three-year anniversary being the leather anniversary - in case you were wondering.

Then I made her study while I watched TV before we had lunch, watched more TV and went out for supper to a cool little place. We then had to roll home cos we were so stuffed from our meal. Portions are definitely bigger here or something! We'll start that good eating thing tomorrow....

Mr Unpopular

Mr Unpopular - that's me.

These days find me sitting in the lounge with the TV basically on mute because Cath sits in the next room studying (or pretending to) for her most major of all major exams.

I whack her with a wooden spoon when she takes illegal study breaks but it doesn't really do the job because she's quite persistent when she doesn't want to end her study break - she tends to take two-hour breaks if I leave her be.

Getting her out of bed in the morning is anothere matter altogether. I have to push her to the edge of the bed with her fighting me every push and shove of the way. But it is only at the edge that the real battle begins. She then reaches off with her legs and puts them against the wall. Then I have to get up (I don't start work until 5pm so why I have to get up before her .... well, it's just wrong). but I get up, go around and physically drag her off the bed. I then take (basically carry) her to the toilet, sit her down and then return to the bed where I sit on guard cos rest assured, if I don't guard the bed, she goes straight back and plonks down asap.

It isn't even 10 and I'm exhausted!

Having done that, we go through to the kitchen and make breakfast. I can't turn on the TV yet to watch anything cos if I do, and she gets interested, it'll take another mammoth effort to get her to leave the room. Only once she's in the study room with two doors closed between us that I can turn on the TV.

However, if I watch Everwood or any other programme that she likes and she hears the theme music at the start or between adverts (if I don't fast forward in time), she comes through to see what episode it is or what's going on. This leads to another argument with me Mr Unpopular again. Sigh. It isn't easy.

Oh poor me you say - yes! YES! Considering I make her tea, take her snacks - like celery sticks and carrot sticks - all prepared by me - and what do I get - abuse!

I tell you what - she'd better buy me a bloody nice house when we go back home!

NASA website

Got this in an email entitled 'Why you can tell no South Africans work at NASA.....

Still chuckling....

Liverpool City

Let's be clear on this... the only reason I flew into Manchester was to get to Liverpool and go to Anfield. I did not want to see Old Trafford (pweh pweh!) at all and we spent little to no time outside the Manchester airport - except when travelling to or from Liverpool.

So we got there in the end, after sleeping in Manchester airport. Well Cath slept, I finished my book. Then eventually after getting to 'Pool, we got to Anfield and a dream was realised. Above...me outside the Kop and us at the shop entrance.

This was in the museum... Liverpool legend Shankly and a photo after the Hillsbrough disaster.



This one below was about the British okes who were massacred by the Boers at Spion Kop in South Africa. They named a stand at the ground in memory of the dead soldiers who were massacred by a smaller, wiser troop of Afrikaners. That's where the name 'The Kop' came from...

Then before the players go up onto the field,
they pass a sign like this one which they touch for luck...

Outside again, and another Liverpool legend... Mr Liverpool Bill Shankley. He's the one who came up with the classic... "There are only two teams in Liverpool... Liverpool... and the Liverpool reserves."




And we got to pose with all our European trophies. All of them. There are many. Lots. If you win it five times, you get to keep it. That's only like, three more times for Manchester and oh, five more for Chelsea.



And I got to pose with the boys too...

And then Heaven's gates...

we did a bit of running around the city too but mostly it was about Anfield.

My beautiful wife in Liverpool city.



That's right - Liverpool is the European capital city of culture. What's Manchester now? NOTHING!

We caught our flight out in the eve - delayed AGAIN - and returned to a soaked Cork. Sigh, at least we saw the sun on holiday.

Easons - my first job in EIRE

MEMORY LANE. Well, O'Connell street actually

These picks are a real blast from the past - this was my first job in Ireland - working at Easons bookshop - a four storey building that did anything from books, to stationery, to gifts, to cards, etc. Was a pretty big place - I worked in the magazines section, in charge of the 596 sports mags.



It wasn't a great job, but it paid the bills. At least I got to sleep in a bit and miss the peak hour traffic.

Below right, my magazine section. Ay-ay-ay people make a mess... note, no reading of the magazines allowed.

For those of you that think it is fine to go into a shop and 'just find an article' of a newspaper or magazine or 'just browse through' one without buying it... let me put this simply... if you take longer than a minute or two, you are reading it and you are annoying, cheap and lack class.
Yep, think that was pretty much straight to the point.

Kevin Pietersen

This was just too good not to include. My job gives me access to some pretty cool sports pictures and when I saw this one, with the sign 'cockspur' (i think) behind Kevin Pietersen, a big bright lightbulb appeared above my head and I emailed it to myself and edited it slightly at home. Maybe I'll send this one on as an email - it should do the rounds.

Shame, I don't actually have anything against the oke - who can blame him for leaving SA when he was told affirmative action would see him miss out on a chance to play for SA.

For me it is just amusing that England can't produce anyone as good themselves. And now a South African is their captain - that won't sit well with a lot of them! Haha.

Croatia baby!

CROATIA BABY!!

I'm excited just saying that we went to Croatia -imagine how excited we were going there.
The trip was a bit deurmekaar - that's disorganised/crazy (spelt badly) for non-Afrikaans reading this. We hadn't actually booked anything for the Croatian leg of our trip except the flight back in four days via Manchester. There was a provisional camping booking and we had a tent with us (minus tent pegs which were taken away at the airport security check) but we didn't have any Hungary to Croatia transport booked.

Anyhoo, we finally booked a train from Budapest to Zagreb, Croatia, while walking around with Emz and Delboy the day before so when the morning came, we had to get from the airport, where we slept with them (we don't get to see them very much - every second counts) to the train station.

It was a bit of a tight squeeze cos we needed one bus and two trains to be exactly on time or we'd miss our train. But as I said earlier, everything in Budapest is great transport-wise and our transport was all spot on and we made it with time to spare. Here I am about to embark looking slightly knackered. I couldn't sleep in the airport and kinda sat watch over the bags while the other three slept like babies.

But I got some shut-eye on the train.

We also met an American girl, Kelly, who is now a facebook friend, in our carriage. We decided to stick together and tour about Zagreb before we all headed to Dubrovnik - again, we hadn't booked anything. We decided that after all we'd been through, the 16 hour bus trip didn't sound so appealing so stuff it - we booked a flight for later that night. That freed up the day for getting around Zagreb - the Croatian capital.



Here's us in Zagreb - the beautiful statues at a fountain.



And here's us with Kelly, running around Zagreb.

We had lunch together and I got my first taste of calamari in a long time - way too long - then more touring and the obligatory ice-cream stop.

Kelly took this one of us in front of... some nice-looking building.

We buggered around for the day and then headed to the airport together. The bus dropped us off and left us with a bit of a walk. There was one other guy also walking so we got to chatting and he gave us some good advice about a campsite - turns out there was a campsite much closer than the one we were going to atay at. We jotted down some details and his number in case of an emergency and parted ways.

We arrived in Dubrovnik late - at about midnight and the place was a hive of activity. We caught a bus to the new recommended area, walked around in the dark a bit to find the campsite, put up our tent (minus tent pegs) and hit the sack at about one. It was still warm.

The next morning we booked in and decided we needed a day of rest. Instead of touring around, we'd spend the day at the beach and go through to the old town later on. Good plan - the weather was good and we soaked up some much needed viatmin E from the sun (or whatever vitamin the sun gives you - what am I - an encyclopeadia!?)

After a few hours, we decided it was a bit too hot so we had lunch looking out over the beach and had a Croatian beer or two... Ah - this is the life. Jealous anyone?

When we eventually headed to the old town, instead of going in straight away, we went for a walk up the mountain and hit a viewpoint where we got a stunning view over the Adriatic and some islands...nice!

Then we hit the tourist info - Alan's favourite place in a new country - and armed with a map, went exploring. This is us at the Onoffrio fountain.

It wasn't long before we started feeling the stomach contract. But there was a problem - there were more places to eat in the old town than in the entire Munster region in Ireland! And Cath can't make decisions when it comes to choosing a place to eat (I'm not great either mind you). We eventually chose a place that did a mean pizza and calamari... and beer.

After the meal we explored the harbour, bought an ice-cream (we didn't want to but it would be insulting to the locals NOT TO support their business), ...

... found a cosy nook for a romantic smooch

...and set up the tripod for one of those cool 'everyone is walking around behind us but we're really still' photos in one of the busiest streets in the old town.

... and eventually caught the bus back to the campsite.

The next day we hit the beach again but the weather wasn't SOOOO great. We needed to do the city walls tour in the old city so we had to be there by a certain time before the walls closed. We headed through and spent about half a day walking around the walls alone!

Looking through one of the stone windows...

Uber-babe in the middle of the wall tower.

And then, around the other side of the town, looking out over the harbour side, we found a game of waterpolo being played. Which meant we had to sit down. Just as well I'm not afraid of heights or... oh no wait, I AM SCARED OF HEIGHTS!!!!! Holy crap this was a far fall. The game was good to watch though. Look forward to seeing how Croatia does in the waterpolo now - there's no chance any of those players were standing or holding onto the edge of the pool - they were bloody out to sea!

The city walls tour continued and I snapped these...

And Cath snapped these... he one on the left is just asking for a dodgy caption but I will restrain myself.

And last but not least, this one looking out over the rooves of the old town. Stunning, it really is.

We had to dash to get to church but made it and then had this photie on the church steps afterwards.

Then it started raining so a quick cuppa while we waited for it to pass before we moved on with our little look-around.

A bit of shopping and, you guessed it, more ice-creams.

We had some vouchers for a restaraunt near the campsite so we headed back to eat there and get an early night (anything before one am would do) for a change.

The next day was our last but our flight was only at around 10pm so we had the whole day for the beach. Good weather again luckily...

Here's me trying to kill off my book and a photo of the lesser-spotted Croatian angel fish.

Campsite - we forgot to take the photo before we packed up the tent. So this is me 'sleeping' in standing position...

And Cath snapped this sunset as we were heading to the airport on the bus. On the trip[ to the airport we drove for about 10 minutes and then passed the campsite that we WOULD have stayed in before we met your man from Zagreb who told us to rather stay at the other site. IT WAS IN THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE. Just as well we chat to everyone huh?

And with that we flew to manchester.