Don't have much time - I'm just killing time before meeting people in angel - so i'm not gonna be able to put much on.

Just wanted to acknowledge a great grand final. Was worth getting up at 4 in the morning for (after getting to bed at 1.30). Being in the living room has been tough. There are so many people in the house doing different hours that there's usually someone watching tv till well after midnight then someone's back in there at like 9 the next morning. It was worst on saturday when after having had 2 hours sleep the night before we went out that night and after getting home from the bar, the guys stayed up till 4. For all intents and purposes i was dead.

leaving in 2 days - can't wait. Hope everything's cool at home.

I didn't forget your birthday sam, its still the 27th here! I'm calling tonight.

GRIM...

Evicted from 18 Lochaline Street, St Kilda out of the finals, Stuart's bike stolen outside the 'Spicy Fong', Saturday night live from a toilet bowl and adjusting to my new life on a couch. Its been a lovely week...

Friday, as I'm sure you're all aware, was a dark day in the history of the St. Kilda football club (I'm sure Tim Pekin would never think the Saints making the preliminary final is a dark day). As far as I could tell sitting in my office in EC3, listening to it on TripleM, it sounded as though it was just an extremely soft effort in the last quarter. No excuses. Dad was devastated. Apparently he didn't talk for 2 days afterwards... At least I haven't missed anything (like our first flag in 40 years and second ever), but now its going to be hard to find the motivation to get up at 4.30am to watch Sydney v West Coast. Then on Friday evening Saffa housemate Stu had his bike stolen while ordering chinese take-away. Grim at the best of times but he'd just spent over £300 and many hours in preparation for an Oxford-Cambridge charity cycle.

Saturday was our last day in the house and was spent wiping, scrubbing, vacuuming, polishing, etc, etc. This continued for the better part of 8 hours and when we were done - the house still looked like a complete dump. I loved living at 18 Lochaline - it was close to all manner of transport, takeaway and pubs - but general house cleanliness was not its strong point. Having been an antipodean share-house for an estimated 10 years, there was grime and mould everywhere. It was completely uncleanable. And after a day's hard work the only things that were really noticably cleaner were the carpets (we rented steam cleaners) and the windows. Hoping to put the misery of domestic labour behind me I went a bit overboard on the absinthe and spent (literally) the rest of the night making a mess of the newly polished toilet bowl. Sweet poetic justice...

And now I'm staying with George-man Doyle, midget-kisser extraordinaire on the couch in the living room of her circus-house. She's living in a house with 10 people from all over the world, which would be heaps of fun, but I have no energy for fun anymore. Last night she discovered that she doesn't have a return bout of chickenpox as diagnosed by the friendly and thorough English health system but rather bed bugs. I'd be sympathetic, but its just too funny.

Only 2 more days of work and then finished. Last issue I received comments requesting more details of my travels. I wasn't entirely sure if that meant my future plans or what I'd done already. If you meant the latter, tommy, then you've heard it all. In 6 months in London, we've made it for weekends in Oxford, Paris and Amsterdam, all of which have been written about right here. That's not to say we've spent the weekends sitting around the house (well at least not the nights) but we have not managed to get very far out of London. If you wanted details of my plans, I'm sure I've been through this before but I'll make a new post which I'll keep a linked in the side-bar so my plans are always accessible (see 'Itinerary').

So yeah, its all coming to a painful and drawn-out end here. But it just makes me more keen on travel, and really thats what its all about. I've had more fun than I ever thought I would working full time but in the end I'm here to see as much of the world as I can manage on the measly pension centrelink give me...

...God bless the welfare-state.

• We leave next Thursday for a bus-tour to Oktoberfest with all the hosuemates and a few hangers on. Should be fun in such a big group, but not what I'd call value for money (it was peer pressure all the way). We're away for 7 days and only in Munich for like 4. Taking a bus was THE worst. idea. ever. Irrespective I'm absolutely super duper pumped.

• Returning on the 4th of October, we doss in London for a couple of nights before flying to Helsinki on the 6th for 3 weeks around Finland, Russia, Latvia and Estonia. Hana finally got her arse into gear (should I say Hana finally got my arse into gear on her behalf) and arranged flights and visas so its all ready to go.

• Flying back to London on the 27th October, we're there long enough to arrange getting back onto the continent to begin a big loop though Western Europe. Countries we're intending on visiting are: France, Spain (possibly Portugal), Italy, Slovenia, Austria, Czech Republic, Germany and Belgium.
  

• I'm spending a week in Seville with my parents for Christmas and I'm hoping to catch up with Sam in Lyon around the same time.
  

• Both Seany and Hana's friend Kate are arriving at the beginning of December, so they may catch up with us during the loop. Seany and I are in talks about getting to Egypt after New Years (still to be decided).
  

• Then in mid-January I'm off to South America. I spend 2 weeks making my way from La Paz (Bolivia) to Lima (Peru) via the Inca Trail, then have a week in both Peru and Chile at the end before arriving home on the 17th of February.

Well, it has been a while but all is still well.

In the three weekends since my last post I've been to a premiership game, gone crazy at the Notting Hill Carnival and gone even crazier in Amsterdam. So things are drawing to a climax here in London. Its now only two weeks till I finish work and I'll set off traveling only a few days after that. Hana, Byron and I got back from a (long) weekend in Amsterdam last night and it has only made me more keen to get going. It will be sad to leave the house and everyone behind but I'm now so over my job, only the thought of having more money to travel with is keeping me going. Amsterdam was good fun. While everyone else was staying in a hotel, Hana and I stayed on the floor of her sister's room (She's spending this semester there studying). She's only been in Amsterdam for a week and doesn't yet have a mattress for guests, so we were on cushions on the lino floor. I slept solidly every night we were there........ Byron's brother Pete (who was there with us) has a mate who lived there so we had some local knowledge to help us in choosing venues at night and fun times were had.

The weekend before I was ill as a result (i've deduced) of the weekend before that. It was the August Bank Holiday - last weekend of summer and the last bank holiday of the year. On the Saturday nothing much was happening around the house so around 3pm I just wandered down to craven cottage, bought a ticket and watched Fulham v Everton. Not the best quality game, but the home side won and the crowd were jubilant. With English Football you pay for the atmosphere. £30 may seem a lot when you can watch the same game at the pub for free but the atmosphere (even at a game like Fulham v Everton, where the away section was only half full - the scousers can't afford the bus down) is electric. I want to try and get to Fulham v West Ham this saturday, but its the day we're being evicted so i think the plan is to spend to entire day cleaning. On the Sunday we had the Notting Hill Carnival - A massive street party through Notting Hill. Luckily we knew of a house party right on the route so we had good access to toilets and refreshments all day. The amount of people there was insane - the papers reckon 800,000. Massive trucks with nothing but speakers sitting on the trailers drive one after the other through the streets with thousands of people trailing behind dancing. The general mood was so positive and happy, everybody just had an awesome day. I think hana has photos on her online gallery and if she doesn't, byron definitely does. In contrast though everyone was completely ruined on the Monday and the extra day off was put to good use with some lounging around in the sun in a nearby park by the thames.

But yeah, we're evicted this weekend then only one more week working (probably out of a hostel) before Oktoberfest, then straight on to Finland, Russia, etc. Its a good time to go, because even if we were staying we'd have to find a new place anyway. I'm so ready to leave work (if I was here longer or didn't need the money I would've left 3 weeks ago) and just get out there and enjoy the rest of my trip. Everything's in place - visa's have been organised, tickets booked and injections injected - all I have left to do is pack up and leave...