Happy New Year

Celebrated the New Year with my mother. It didn't go according to the plan. A few years ago we did this at her "club", and while the Hoddesdon and Broxbourne Con Club was full of elderly right wing farts, they were fun, elderly right wing farts and the club steward was an old school 60s entertainer who'd played with Adam Faith and had a band who had played with pretty much everything.

As we're moving this month, Mum wanted to see us and M and I decided that this would be a bearable way of spending the festivities. It wasn't. John, the entertaining Steward had left and was replaced by a line dancer with more than a little similarity to Lurch. The entertainment was a 60s vintage rocker who believed that he could sing and play the guitar. He could do neither.

We hid in another bar and left as soon as was acceptable.

We said our goodbyes to a tearful and very hungover Mum in the early afternoon and crawled around the north circular home. Now the hardwork begins.

Have a happy new year all, as for the resolutions...

Well, I would like to get my weight back down to what it was a few years ago which means actually exercising more. I have reasonably high hopes. Actually living in Seattle rather than going there every 3 weeks might make that a lot easier to achieve.

I'd like to Blog more on sensible matters. With luck, and a prevaling wind, I might not have to travel anywhere near as much. What these sensible matters might be is anybody's guess. I'll let you know.

Generally speaking, from a work perspective, I want to be more "detached". I've been too involved and monomanical about it. I don't like that, I don't like what it does to me. So, I'm going to try and improve on that to.

Ok.

On the subject of work, I need to speak to a Korean about a phone. Later!

Busy Day

So, today I've been back doing the work thing, plus trying to figure out the logistics of the move.

I've sent the letter off to the mortgage company to ask to rent the flat (bit arse about face on this one as we've already found tenants).

We're handling a slight logistical "SNAFU" with the move to the new appartment, in that they need the lease signed and notirised before Jan 15 and the full deposit paying. As they can't accept a direct bank transfer, I'm having to put money into the US account and then rely on our new Seattle bank to physically post a bankers draft to them... ok...

Had a look at the storage options and we might just swallow the cost and ship the whole damn contents of the locker (those that others don't want). I'm leaning towards shipping at the moment, although that will cost us a couple of grand which isn't in the relocation budget.

On the other hand, that would give us my books, a bunch of other stuff, the nice desk we have and a few more extra's we've done without over the last year. We've certainly got the room and there's more than enough storage at the new apartment... I'll take the call by Friday.

M is organising some going away drinks with various friends, while I expect to make it to the Tun on Thursday. So, hopefully we'll see as many of you as possible there.

Seattle Tech Questions AKICIF

Not sure if anybody can help me, but here goes.

We're moving to an appartment block in Downtown Seattle (Belltown) where they have Quest for phones and Millenium for Cable. Both do broadband, but at 3MB connection speeds - is there better broadband in the Seattle area at a more sensible connection speed?

Does anybody have any first hand experience of these providers?

Any suggestions about what I should watch out for?

Another question - if I forgo paying for digital cable, what exactly is if that comes out of the socket in the wall????

EDIT - Another question - what are average utility bills like in Seattle?