talking to myself

I'm getting fewer comments than ever, but I feel like I need to blog anyway for my own memory's sake.

So LAST Saturday, while we were supposed to be cleaning our old house, getting ready to move, we woke up feeling like NOT cleaning. So we took off to the largest mall I've been to, Bluewater. It was cold but clear that day and we were glad to be inside. We went first to the food court for pizza and Chinese, and then continued around the bottom floor.

BAH, I should have done this a week ago.

Anyway, we made it all the way around both levels, and then went back a bit. I got some new shoes - Nike's - on sale and in my size! Don't find that often, as I'm in a US 12 now (that's a UK 9.5) - the first shoe store we went in didn't even carry women's shoes in a 9. Ella took something from the toy store and we didn't notice for several minutes, so had to go back and return it.

After we finished there we started back toward home (it's about an hour away), stopping at a services exit for dinner. We ordered at KFC, but they couldn't swipe our card. Heads up for any American planning a trip to the UK! The banks here issue cards with a chip in it, and the stores increasingly don't have the magnetic stripe readers. No problem, there were 5 ATMs in the complex. We tried every one of them and none would give us money. So we told the nice folks at KFC sorry, maybe next time, and left. In the leaving, Taryn lost her purse.
So we stopped at the next services exit (we didn't know it was there). This was a little different setup - just a stand alone gas station and a Little Chef. Bob doesn't like Little Chef, but there were no choices, so we parked and headed in. As Naysha pulled the door open for us, Taryn noticed a sign on it - the cooker is broken and so all they have is cold sandwiches. So back in the car.
So the next stop was Newmarket, and by now Bob knew he wanted fish and chips. We'd been to the one pub there and thought we'd try one of the others. There was a sign in the window that said children couldn't be served at the bar, and must be supervised. Okay, we can handle that, so we started in. Several men sitting by the door looked up and said, "No children." Ooooookay. It was noisy in there anyway. So back out again, and beginning to wonder if we'd ever get something to eat.
We walked on down the road to the pub we'd been to before (it has a "family room" in the back for people who want to eat) and finally got some dinner. Phew.

I'm glad I got some shoes - my old ones were over a year old and pretty worn in the cushion department.