Images by John 'K'
Life as seen through my lens…
It’s been a while…..
Posted by on August 16, 2006
… since I’ve done one of these, so here goes for a quick update for the last couple of months…..
Work-wise things continue to go well and there’s plenty to keep me busy.
We got our green cards, so we’re now officially permanent residents of the United States of America. As such we can now get social security cards for my daughters and have them earn some money!
As mentioned in an earlier posting, one of my daughters had to do a 6 week stint in Summer School. Well she finished that, and came out with a much improved grade (just goes to show what she can do when she puts her mind to things). My wife spent a week helping at a girl scout camp in the Santa Cruz mountains, and came back with a rather funny accent!
We had my wife’s mum with us for 3 weeks – we did many trips out with her, including San Francisco, Mount Diablo, Angel Island, and we nearly killed her doing the ‘easy’ cave trail at the Pinnacles National Monument (oops…).
Despite summer school, we were able to find a week (OK – 9 days) to go on a vacation road trip around Southern California, including some time in Los Angeles (Hollywood, and Universal Studios (where the wash from a jet ski in the Waterworld show nearly wrecked my new camera)), San Diego (Zoo, Wild Animal Park, Sea World – highlights include a balloon ride over the wild animal park, and dining with Shamu), and a 2 day drive back up Highway 1 (Pacific Coast Highway, where we saw whales and elephant seals) as far as Santa Cruz. We even squeezed in a visit to one of my wife’s aunties who lives relatively close (80 miles!) to Los Angeles. All in all just over 1300 miles…….
So we’re now trying to get back into the flow of ‘normal’ life. My youngest goes back to school in a week and a half. She does her registration tomorrow. She’s still got some significant work to do to finish a homework assignment, and I feel we may have to get nasty with her to make sure she completes it. The other daughter here with us starts college next week – missed the orientation day, and has yet to plan out how best to get there. I feel she really hasn’t grasped the importance of what’s coming up. They both have a lot to do in a little time, and I’m not sure if they really appreciate the fact that the real world needs to take priority over their on-line worlds.
Back in the UK our 2nd eldest daughter has her birthday at the end of the week – this will be the first time we’ve been apart for that – even last year as we were moving we managed to be together for her birthday. It’s going to seem really strange, and I’m not quite sure how everyone will take it. One of our grandsons had minor surgery to remove some bony growths (family trait from my side) on his hand. He is recovering well.
That just about covers it for now….. Hopefully it won’t be 2 months before I do another update!
Images by John 'K' 