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$1000 Weekends

Thursday, February 16th, 2012

$1000 Weekends

We love being ex-pats. We have tried to take advantage of the culture and the location and the vicinity of surrounding countries/opportunities whenever possible in all the places we have lived overseas. When we started living overseas many years ago, there wasn’t a lot of money or time in the budget to do much but we still managed to visit some incredible places and see some fantastic sights in each place we have lived, albeit on a minimal budget most of the time which meant cheap hotels, long uncomfortable bus rides, you know the drill.

Nothing is different about that philosophy now except the location has changed, there is a more money in the budget, and we have a bit more time too as my husband has off work every other Friday. That gives me two 3 day weekends each month to try and come up with something exciting, either here in England or “on the continent”. So far we have managed to go south towards the coast for a weekend, to Cardiff, Wales for a weekend, and will soon have a nice weekend in Cornwall. We have also hit Belgium for a weekend and I have just managed to set up a weekend in Sardinia. Also on tap are a lot of the “English Must Do’s” such as Ascot, Windsor, Diamond Jubilee celebrations, and Royal Chelsea Flower Show. And I’m just getting started!

Needless to say, these weekends are no longer budget cheap, especially if it is a weekend where we have to fly somewhere and rent a car, stay in a hotel, pay for food, yada, yada, for two people do cost more than one even when I am getting every discount I can find, every Groupon coupon, every mileage usage and points usage due me. So it’s about a $1000 for a good weekend away. That probably includes all of the above plus gas and entertainment, entrance fees, diving fees (sometimes we dive), transportation, whatever. The end point you ask? It’s a hell of a lot of fun, we are enjoying the heck out of ourselves, we are seeing a ton of wonderful things, and we aren’t broke yet

The Move and the Beginning

Sunday, September 18th, 2011

We have been ex-pats off and on for the last 17, almost 18 years. I love the life but I hate the intervals in between when we are stuck, usually in Houston, for some unknown period of time. While many people love Houston, I am not one of them and if necessary to spend a long period of time there (longer than about 2 weeks), I tend to get cranky, irritated, depressed, and generally all around nasty. Such was the case last year. We had this wonderful assignment to go and live in England but the project was delayed and we were stuck in Houston, again. I had changed all kinds of cool plans to make the move to England when we got stuck in Houston, again. I was deeply nasty, deeply depressed, and probably a real pain in the a** to all around me. For that, I apologize.

We finally made the move to England in September. yea! As I had pretty much stopped all my writing activities in the interim period of time (i.e. time spent in Houston), it has taken me awhile to get back into gear and start writing again. To any readers who were with me way back when and might still find me, I am so sorry that I haven’t written. To new readers, hope you will find me informative at times, amusing at times, provocative (probably never), or just fun to read. I will write about our experiences in England, living here, traveling around from here, people we meet, things we do, etc. etc. and also will add to some of my other blogs, namely Tales from the Litter Box, and Bits and Pieces. Yes, our cats did make the move to England with us. They love it here, especially if they can curl up on the floor next to the radiator. So, we are off again. sorry, again, that it has taken me so long.