What a weekend!

Friday night we went to see a series of 'Endurance' movies, part of a special week long showing of Adventure movies at our local theatre. There were 6 'movies' in total that night.

The first one was about a guy who swan the Amazon (yes SWAM - all 6000 km - he is insane!). The most interesting part of that film was when he told about how at one point he was captured by a village who thought he was a white devil who caused every bad thing in their village. They took him off to their chief to kill him, luckily while playing with his radio they sent off the SOS signal and the army came in and scared them off. Geez!

There was also a short film which was a tribute to Dan Osman - an absolutely crazy speed climber and 'controlled free fall' specialist. He was well known for his crazy stunts and pioneered a 'sport' that is similar to base jumping - but even more insane. Jumping from extremely high cliffs attached to a very very long thing bungee rope, and trying to control where he fell so he didn't hit trees or smack into the rock face. We read up on the internet last night to find out why it was a 'tribute.' Turns out he miscalculated one of his jumps and ended up smashing to the ground and drying. Very sad. Actually, the 10 minute tribute is on youtube.com. However, I cannot seem to figure out how to post the hyperlink - so here's the standard link for you if you want to watch it.
Tribute to Dan Osman

There was also a short movie about a ten year old girl who is an amazing rock climber, a guy who walks tight rope attached to huge clifts, and another guy who speed climbs huge rock faces. In total the 6 films were just over two hours, and I swear I have never felt so physically ill as I did that night when leaving the theatre. Seeing someone throw themself off a cliff counting on one little knot to keep them alive - I just cannot imagine!

Saturday had a nice morning babysitting Abigail. We just hung around the house as the weather was a bit chilly. Lorraine arrived mid afternoon, and once Eva came to pick up Abby Lorraine and I went off in search of a decently priced duvet for her dorm room (woolworths - £5 - score)!
That evening we went to see 'The Vegemite Tales' with friends. It's a play about a group of Australians (and one Italian) living in a shared house in London. There were some very funny bits, and they were pretty good actors, but overall I think it was poorly written, could have been done better. It was a nice night out though.

Sunday we got up early (well, early for a weekend - 9am) and headed out to Elephant & Castle to move Lorraine into her dorm. The mix of people was interesting. Some very young looking people (one girl was sitting on the floor clutching her teddy bear), Lorraine is very mature for her age - so we found that pretty funny! It took AGES to get through the queue for her to register, I sat outside with her bag so no one would take off with it. I felt that a LOT of the parents were give me a look that said 'you're a bit old for uni aren't you'? Ha ha. Once she finally was assigned to a room the exciting part began. It's great - a private room for just her, huge wardrobe (with floor to ceiling mirror - YAY), a nice big desk to study at, and nice people on her floor! There's only 4 flats a floor, a very cute shared kitchen (with lockable cupboards for each person, a nice big full size fridge and freezer) and a cute table with 4 chairs. It's all set up in a very social, but in a clean and cute way. After we dropped off her unbelievably heavy suitcase we headed to the shops to get some groceries and some student essentials (3 ring binder, pens, paper, mug for tea, can opener, etc). Had a nice lunch, then left her to set up her home for the next year:) I got a text from her late last night that said she has all her pictures up now so it feels a bit more like home, and she met a bunch of nice people in her buildling. Gosh, I remember those days - SO SO exciting!

Last night Murray woke me up at 4am by jumping up and turning on the light. He told me a spider had crawled across his face. I assured him it was probably just a dream, then I spotted a giant raison with legs walking across our bed - EWWWWWWW! We ended up catching it in a glass and tossing it out the window. It was hard to get back to sleep after that though, and predictably I had a few nightmares!

I still got up half an hour early this morning to catch the early bus, I just don't want to be late to work anymore! And wouldn't you know it - transport for London decided to be SO unhelpful. Due to slow tubes, delayed trains and a slow bus I did get here on time, but thirty minutes later than I should have arrived. Very annoying.

Ah well, bring on Monday! Only 1 week and 4 days til we're drinking beer in Munich. Woo hooo!

(I have a few pictures of Lorraine's moving in day on my phone, but due to the exhaustion this morning from being up at 4am I forgot to transfer them to Murray's phone so I could post them. Will try to get them posted asap)!