blogging from a real place of residence

yes, it has finally FINALLY happened. after months of living in a hostel, sharing a room, I have earned the rights (and more effectively the funds) to live in a real house. In fact, I am sitting in my (rather pink - which may change in january) large room. I have now slept in a real bed, NOT A COT, for the past two nights, cooked two dinners of my own....and even had the luxury of breakfast this morning! In the past month, breakfast has been whatever muffin struck my fancy at 7am in starbucks as I passed by it to wait for my bus. Accompanied of course by the oh-so-necessary coffee I did not have the means to make myself.

It's really amazing, what you take for granted and just how relieving the comforts of life you become accustomed to. That's not to say that I was living horribly in the hostel, but little things - like being able to have some me-time at a time of my choosing, lasting as long as I would like it to. A task completed by closing my bedroom door and just leaving socialization when that door goes "click." Things like not having to listen to my music through ear buds. Being able to choose what goes into my food. Brewing a pot of coffee or tea. Being able to dry my hair in my room, not in the corridor so as not to wake up sleeping roommates. Turning the lights on and off at my discretion. Things like that. I appreciate a lot more than I think I expected I would now that I am back to being in a room of my own. I can create, I can practice, I can just jam on my guitar without disturbing others, or having eyes and ears peering over the 2-7 feet of space between myself and the next person.

Today's triumph was learning how to turn on and regulate the amount of heat generated by the radiator. Since London has decided that it is going to hover around the freezing mark this week, I would say that is a pretty important and significant triumph. Especially when I consider the fact that I left my parka at home. My parka and I are not separated by too much time though, as I will be home in only 3 more sleeps. Unless you count the inevitable nap that I plan on taking on the plane - whilst over the ocean, of course, because then there isn't that much to see. I do plan on seeing some ocean though, as I will be flying backwards through time into daylight, if only to gain perspective of the vastness of the Atlantic.

Three more sleeps, and Canadian winter awaiting me on the other side.

the girl has a postcode

Yes, ladies and gents who may or may not read this - i have a post code now. I found a place to live out my time in London-town in the Marylebone area. It's big, it's a shared house, it's not a hostel. Essentially those were my criteria - minus the "it's big" bit. I didn't necessarily care that the room was large, but that's a perk, to be certain.

The reason I was able to come across such good news is because I had some other good news pass my way about a month ago. I have a job, working in a primary school as the music teacher. The way it is working out is that I am covering for a woman who is on her maternity leave. The school is up in Harrow, and from my former position, I was commuting about an hour each way to and from Notting Hill. I'm quite pleased to say that now, my travel time has been cut down by about half an hour. That will make everything much easier on my system, I'm sure. The school is great, and my schedule has me teaching music solid all day long on tuesdays and thursdays, then monday/wednesday/friday I float amongst the classes covering various prep times, illness absences, and absences due to course attendances.

Things are definitely looking up from where they were not too long ago.

I am going home to Canada in 7 days to spend 14 days rushing around seeing people and doing things over the Christmas holidays. I get to be home for exactly 14 days, then back to London, back to working, back to living in a beautiful flat.

Since I only have 7 days left here, 5 of which are going to be spent working, I need to do some Christmas shopping this afternoon so I can bring back gifts that are, hopefully, pleasingly British for all the people on my list. I have about 4 hours to do this in. Can she do it? That question will be answered by dinner tonight, for tomorrow I move all of my things out of this ruddy hostel and into a real place.

It's exciting, folks. Hopefully the next blog entry won't be so far in the future like this one was from the last one (thanksgiving....wow....where has time gone?)