Hiked up Squaw Peak (now called Piestewa Peak apparently) this morning. This is a 2,000 ft peak in Phoenix which is extremely popular with locals and visitors. I got there at 7h15 and the parking  lot was rammed (and it was a big car park). I felt very under dressed as everyone else was in hiking gear or running stuff. It was a good 30 min workout up, and the same back on a good path although pretty rocky. This place gets between 1,000 and 2,000 climbers a day. As much as anything it was fantastic for people watching ...all sorts were there, from oldies to nutters carrying backpacks full of rocks.

View from the top...

We've been in Cave Creek for 5 days now but it seems like we've just arrived. That said we've managed to see a fair amount of stuff (and eaten a fair amount of food and ice cream).

The other day I hiked up Black Mountain in Cave Creek. It's not muh of a hike - 30 mins up - but one of my favourites and a nice view from the top.

Unfortunately, half way down I got a call on the mobile asking if I could drive one of M's kids to school as he'd missed the bus. I ran down the second half, which was actually quite fun, although I had wished I was out of coverage or had switched the mobbie off.

Yesterday we went to Tempe and also saw the Mystery Castle which was a house built by this guy who wanted to build a castle 'like a sand castle' for his daughter. The place was very wierd and made from a lot of recycled stuff like telegraph poles, train tracks and car parts. The daughter actually did part of the tour and was quite a character.

We also took the kids for a short hike in White Tank Mountains which they eventually got into ...although it took a while!

Taking a couple of weeks off rest & recuperation. It was a bit of a late organised thing but we flew out to Arizona yeaterday. A relatively uneventful journey - or as uneventful as 11 hours on a plane with a 6 year old and an 10 year old can be. Actually a couple of decent movies on which helped; Blood Diamond and Casino Royale.

We arrived in Cave Creek around 8:30pm, located our friend's front door key in the designated hiding place and let ourselves in. M was supposed to be flying in from New York, landing in Phoenix around 8pm. We did some shopping in Safeway and waited around for a bit, then all conked out on the sofas for a couple of hours.  At around 1am decided to call it a day after no one showed up. We crashed out as best we could on the available furniture.

Of course the kids were up at 6am (the joy of jet lag) and we called M's mobby as we were starting to get a little worried. As it turns out she was delayed in NY and so would have missed her connection in Denver so opted to stay overnight (in return for a hotel room and complimentary round trip domestic flight voucher). She's going to fly out later today. We're expeting her, and the 3 kids to show up around 6:30 this evening.

Just getting our act together, and having a think about what to do today. There's so many options I think a plan for the next 2 weeks is in order or the time will fly past and we'll be home before we know it. OK ...to planning 

I was in the gym yesterday morning and there was this guy in there. He must have been about 70 years old, short and wiry, and wearing street shoes, regular trousers and a shirt. He looked very odd alongside the normal Nike and Reebok crew pumping away on the cross trainer.  Good for him is what I say, it's good to see people who couldn't care less about looking the part ...besides he is probably fitter than the lot of us, maybe training for some ultra event

In the afternoon we went to the school jumble sale. I took the kids for something to eat and unfortunately ended up sitting near this old 'jumble sale professional' lady. Had to put up with her rabbiting on to anyone who would listen about the fact they were selling fairy cakes for 40p each ...and that was at the jumble sale last year!

I know ladies like bags. I cleared out our study later in the day and found 43 of them (handbags, backpacks, 'useful' kinda bags, all sorts...).

Last weekend it was my work birthday ...15 years at the same company. Well strictly speaking it was 2 companies, pre and post acquisition.  Whilst it seems a long time (5 year longer than R has been with us on the planet), it also seems to have flown by in some respects. Maybe I've just become institutionalised or am losing my memory.

On Thursday we went out for some drinks to a bar in Islington. The girls in the office got me this ENORMOUS cake.

 I had planned to take a photo before we started getting stuck into it (you'll notice half is missing in the pic) but just as we were about to go for it this jumped up twerp from the bar made us move back to our 'reserved area' - we had overflowed into another area. He gave us some twaddle about loss of revenue, and spacious bar area etc. etc. After s delay due to health and safety discussions we eventually got a knife fittingly large enough to go with the cake and went for it.  Strawberries, cream and Guinness, a perfect evening.

A great evening all in all. The only blot was the universally snotty bar staff. Interestingly it was the same bar where we had an incident last year with one of the waitresses running off with our change ...an incident a certain good friend in Oz will surely remember well. 

Managed to talk to the flower company about the missing flowers.  After waiting on hold for 10 minutes - which isn't a good sign, surely flower delivery customer support lines can't do much else apart from take complaints of missing or sub standard flowers.

Anyway, I gave them the reference number, the lady said "Ah yes, that was delivered by our courier service, please hold" [long wait] "erm, I contacted them and they don't seem to have that order on their records ...sorry".  So we agreed to get my money back. She also asked if I still wanted the flowers ...even if I didn't I would have said yes ..."OK, they'll arrive sometime next week!".  I'm not holding my breath.

Last week was very different from the normal week...

It was half term and both kids went up to my mum's for the week. I worked from the Bath office on Monday and C came down on the train to join me, dropping the dynamic duo off with mum on the platform at Didcot. We stayed over and I took the day off on Tuesday to be tourists. It was really nice doing stuff we don't usually do. Normally all I see of the city is the walk from train station to office ...and back again. We saw a few of the sights and ate a lot!

We returned Tuesday evening ...one day was probably enough of the country life for me. I wondered if I would bump into anyone I knew - I didn't but ironically C met someone from personnel from her last company.

During the trip I managed to keep 2 of my 'golden rules'.  1/ always order the Sea Bass if it's on the menu, and 2/ always order creme brulee if it's on the menu.  On reflection I guess I also achieved one of the others too; never pack to go away when drunk!

Wednesday was Valentine's Day. We decided to stay in, partly as we had been away for a couple of days and also because V Day is always such a zoo in the restaurants. Ironically, for once I decided to have some flowers delivered to C ...but they never showed up, we're still waiting. Strangely they can't start to trace the flowers until 48 hours after they were supposed to be delivered, it's only 24 hours for a missing person isn't it?

On Thursday we went to KCH to enroll on a vascular study run by one of the doctors there. He's doing research into strokes. We asked for him at the help desk and the lady said "that's the one like Mr Bean". Sure enough when the guy turned up he really was a Mr Bean lookalike and behavealike. He had C and I in giggles.

On Friday C dropped off an art competition entry in the V&A and we had dinner out in South Kensington - in a nice Polish place. Good solid comfort food.

Saturday C and I went to see Palace get beaten 1 - 0 by Birmingham. C borrowed R's season ticket but luckily no one seemed to notice she wasn't a junior - perhaps the technology for the cards can't tell the difference, or the guy on the turnstile just didn't care.

After the game we drove up to mums to relieve her of her duties, stayed overnight and today drove home with the juniors.

A good time was had by all ...but back to school tomorrow.

All that and we got a new Sony laptop from the insurance company to replace the water damaged one ...it's a better spec and pretty cool.

And the back is slowly improving still, day by day.  I've started some light running (up to 15 - 20 minutes only) as well as the daily stability and core exercises. I'm a lot more confident in it now so hopefully soon I'll be back to the usual routine. 

Today is A's 6th birthday.  Due to fixture congestion (2 other parties today) we arranged her party yesterday.  We took her and some friends down to the Snow Park at Diggerland. They make their own snow and you can toboggan, tube or just snowball fight. Here's a quick video taken on my phone of her ladyship tubing... 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_gQ0mgEgqIc

Considering we had an inch of snow at home in the week, at one point it looked like we could have just done the same thing on the hill outside. Ironically though it rained on Friday and it looked like the whole thing might be a non starter due to rain, but it worked out well in the end. Everyone had a great time despite getting completely soaked and frozen stiff.  

...since I last blogged.  Since then a few things have happened...

It snowed in London - for one night only...

We have had a bit of a re-org at home. We've moved A into the 'spare 'green' room after a trial couple of nights and I'm having her old room as a study. At last a place to call my own!  I've also been trying to keep up some momentum clearing out some of the junk. That's a much bigger proposition altogether...

At the weekend we took the kids to see the Elgin marbles (and yes, R did think they'd be small round bits of glass), and the Rosetta stone. The attention span wasn't massive - as expected - but it was a rewarding trip. Stopped off for a Thai/Chinese meal on the way back in what used to be the Museum Tavern by way of a reward for the under 11s...

The Rosie Stone

The back has been s-l-o-w-l-y improving day by day, although some days are better than others. Generally though I am feeling more confident in it and that it is more robust than it was. On Saturday I thought I'd try out a bit of running and aerobic stuff, 5 mins apiece on the treadmill, bike and cross trainer (wow!). That went well. Today I went to the gym and half ran, half walked, there and back. It's the most I've done for a couple of months except for 2 x 20 minute sessions of core stability exercises I have been doing every day. I'm a little sore this evening (I also had a physio session at luncthime which probably added to that), we'll see how I am tomorrow to determine if I can build on doing the same and steadily more in the next week or so. It's all very frustrating but psychologiclly it was good to get out running again and in the gym. Hopefully no return to the Duck tape in the near future.