Whats new?

Bank Holiday Monday, sitting in the garden, listening to Radio 1, wearing rose tinted sunglasses (which perhaps explains the outlook on life) and sipping lemonade.

Whats been happening here lately? you may be wondering? (or not? ... im going to continue writing either way though im affraid!) Well That my friend is a good question, what has been happening here lately? Lately i should probably define as the week that i have been in England for, because i think you are probably up to date on what has happened before that, even though my blogging was a little lacking my photography more than made up for it i believe and as a picture is equal to a thousand words (Very much Liams motto in his first dissertation, that went horribly wrong) i feel as though hundreds of thousands of words have been written on the topic of Australia and Singapore and hiking and camping and all that jazz.

England - weather = quite normal, bit of rain, couple of nice-ish days before the kids go back to school tomorrow.
Pretty much i've been job hunting for the past week - not an overly enjoyable task during this dreaded recession, basically there are no good jobs out there and all the ones i would like to apply for you need significantly more experience than i have (due to the dreaded R word i guess). I know a few people who have successfully found jobs woring for big pharmeutical companies (but most of said people worked in the industry during their 3rd year of uni and really wanted a job in the field, im affraid neither is the case for me, i really have no desire to work in a lab for a big faceless corporation .... i guess i would have taken up the opportunity to get my PhD if that was the case). So job hunting is a tad rubbish. However its not all bad news, it seems figuring out what you definately want to run away from doing does propell you slightly more in the direction of the things you actually would like to do. I have applied for the aaccelerated graduate level mental health nursing course, which starts at some point in September. I realise the 1st of September is tomorrow. Maybe i wont get it but sometimes you need to try just so that you're not wondering about what ifs forever. My thinking was this - i know im headed towards the medical field - i cant get into a graduate level medicine degree this year, so i have a year of potentially not doing a whole lot of worth, i cant find a good job so im left getting a rubbishy job and waiting - which seems a tad pointless, nursing is in the right direction and would give me valuable experience if nothing else, and im kinda wondering if this is the type of thing i would be more suited to anyway, im not affraid of hard work, im really not, and ..... the time this was offered to me and the way it fits into things and how it means i wouldnt have to take out anothr student loan or pay more tuition fees (or really have any living expenses) just makes it seem so right .... i mean obviously i havent even got into the course yet so i might be jumping the gun, but it does seem quite like an answer to a much asked question. Well, we'll see anyway, references have been written and referees have said how much they think i would be suited to the profession and my mum badgered me until i told her that i was applying too (i wanted to wait until i knew whether i was actually doing it first but oh well) so, i guess i should know for sure one way or the other soonish!

What else has been happening? The kitchen got refurbished whilst we were away (by Roberts and Co - my uncle and cousin) who did a marvellous job and as my other cousin is going to pick up all th rubbish that is currently in our front garden on tuesday we decided to chuck out a whole lot of rubbish to be taken too, which has meant a WHOLE lot of clearing, a WHOLE lot of pikey action of people taking rubbish off of our hands for us and subsequently a car boot sale carried out by Alice and I on Saturday at Kingsmead school, we sold a decent amount of stuff and it was a beautiful day for it, we took the rest of the stuff to charity shops, Oxfams book bank and the market stall in the town (an exhausting day). The only reason i mention this really was because of a reminder from God whilst i was there, there are a lot of cheap people who go to these types of things because they dont want to spend a lot of money on things (okay fair enough) but there are also a lot of poor people who cant afford to spend money on things for their children or books and such, we saw a lot of these people and Alice and i agreed that selling the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle toy to a five year old refugee boy whose mother was 10p short of the 50p we were selling it for was a million times more statisfying than making any amount of money from a collector. The lady asked if she could have the toy for 40p as that was all she had and we agreed, the boy walked away playing with it (pretending it was fighting his little sister), which is what it was made for, i actually dont think ive ever seen a child quite so happy with a toy. You could give some children a hundred expensive presents for their birthday and they wouldnt be half as excited at this boy was with a 12 year old, second hand toy with previous combat dents and scuffs. It made me think.

We also had a ton of books for sale, most didnt get sold because the majority of the people didnt speak a whole lot of english and probably read even less. However we did sell two books in particular to a middle aged Hindu man (whose wife had just walked in the other direction - he told us he wouldnt have been able to buy the books if that hadnt have been the case), they were two of a collection of books Amy used to own and rejected once she moved away, books on finding Jesus in the modern world - one was called A purpose driven life, i think and the other was about the meaning of life and faith to Christians, what Jesus is all about. He was searching through the boxes for more. You have to wonder what God is going to do next with that man, perhaps he was curious, perhaps he actually wanted to know more about what he was up against, perhaps God had been speaking to him, either way a door has been opened and the possiblity of marvellous things happening is there, its the biggest cliff hanger ending you could read in any book. Pray for him.