Uncle Traveling Matt and his traveling wife are off for our first true vacation together in 2 years. Technically, it’s honeymoon III. We’ll be spending a fun filled week touring some of the wonders Scotland has to offer. Full blogging (and pictures, of course!) will resume when we return. Have a lovely week!

Out in the blog world that I roam in, there’s a time-honored tradition of Friday Cat Blogging. This is exactly what it sounds like: pictures of cats. Since I’m a silly cat owner, I thought I would add this to my currently infrequent blogging. Let’s give it a try:

We bought Chewy a cat tree a couple of weeks ago. He’d started gaining weight when Anna wasn’t eating (I guess he decided all the food was for him since she wasn’t interested). We figured this might give him some new perspectives on the flat and make him excercise a little more. So far, with a special diet of food as well, it seems to be working. He likes to hop up and lounge on it.

OMG!!! He’s got frickin’ laser beams in his eyes! That’s just a nice full on view of his cat tree.

Coming up, I have tons of trips to fill you in on. Ludlow, the Lake District, Dublin, Cambridge and a parental visit!

So Carolyn’s visa came through with no problem. I’m back in the UK and this means that very very soon, Carolyn will be moved here and can look for work and no more distance. Hurray! Very exciting.

In saddening news, I came back to find Anna extremely thin. She’d had problems and some very nice friends had taken her to the vet. She’s seems ok, but she is really really skinny. The vet took some blood and hopefully, they’ll have some news soon. Poor kitty.

So, on 10 May 2008, I married a wonderful woman. Most of you who read this have met Carolyn by now and know she’s pretty darn cool. Allow me to officially introduce you to my (hee hee) wife, Carolyn Hyson:

I’m not sure who that snazzy lookin’ guy is, but I hope she married him

We’re working on getting Carolyn’s visa set up now, but we’ll spend a day or two in NYC to relax while we deal with all sorts of chaos in the meantime and I head back to the UK in less than a week. So many wonderful things going on. Married life so far is going very well. I wouldn’t change a thing.

Well, it took a year, but Carolyn is finally making the move. She arrived for her first really extended stay on Friday night. She makes the final, official move after the wedding (in 2 months!). Now we’re stocking my bachelor pad up to make it a little more friendly to others as Anna and Chewy get used to the confusion of another person around. And, as luck would have it, the hot water broke in my place. Allegedly, it’ll be fixed tomorrow morning. I never realized how much I love having a shower nearby. We have some nice friends who are letting us borrow theirs, but it takes a little trip to get there. Never fear, Linda, your daughter is not stuck without a hot shower.

In the meantime, I’m obviously very happy to have her here. It’s nicer to have your loved ones around in person than over the phone. And, the waiting is over as Carolyn begins her adjustment to a pretty big move. Here’s a picture of Carolyn and her new roommates:

OK, this is about the longest I’ve gone without posting. It’s January and I’m basically working and doing the usual day-to-day things. If you’d like me to write about the mundane, I can try

In the meantime, the first Super Bowl in ages that was actually a game (well, I guess lately they haven’t been total jokes) and it starts a little before midnight my time. Not only that, but the Giants freaking ruined the Patriots perfect season. How cool is that?!?!

Anyway, I need to figure out what to do with this blog when there isn’t tons of exciting things to be written about/photographed. In the meantime, I’ll jump in with whatever random I can come up with.

Sorry for the radio silence. I’m in New Jersey and I’ve been spending heaps o’ time getting wedding related things done. I’m flying to Arizona tomorrow and hopefully, I’ll have some more downtime whilst I there to provide some entertaining updates. In the meantime, talk amongst yerselves or something.

I figured I should start the new year out with a blog posting since it’s been exactly a year since I first posted something on in it and, in three days, since I publicly told anyone I’d be making a trip to England. It’s been a long and busy year. Let’s hope the adventures don’t stop

I’ll be making a US trip in 2 days. I’ll be in New Jersey to see Carolyn for a few days and then off to Arizona to see my parents in their new environment and my sister. It’ll be a much needed break.

As a result, I was in the UK for the whole of the holidays. Considering how hectic London is during the bulk of the year (7 million people in a single city makes it a little crowded), this was a ghost town the last week. My commute, short as it normally is, was absurd. The roads were empty, the buses were empty, the office was empty. Alas, I was sick, so all the work I planned on catching up on became ‘This needs to be done yesterday’ again. But it’s been nice and relaxing to have everyone off on holidays. And now I get to flee before it gets to crazy again. I’ll post more once I’m stateside!

Oh yeah, if you’re in NYC on 5 January (it’s a Saturday), lemme know as I’m hoping to spend the evening in the city.

Been pretty quiet around here. I’m still recovering from that really horrible flu which means that, when I’m not resting, I’m trying to catch up at work. yuck.

On a positive note, I’m taking a much needed vacation to the US in about 3 days. Very exciting.

Hope all you people who read this have a wonderful 2008!

For those of you reading this today (you shouldnt be! ), I just wanted to wish you a merry christmas. I managed to get down to Brighton before the entire UK shut down (it really does), but I’ve got a nasty flu which made for an unpleasant time but Dina and Adrian have been very nice and helpful. So it’s been a nice relaxing Christmas. Hope you’re all having the same.

OK, technically, the previous post was the last one on Paris. However, I’ve had a few people who have seen that I usually take more than 3 photos of a place mention that they’d like to be able to access these photos outside of my apartment. Now I could easily do this with flickr or ofoto or a million other sites that I have no control over. Instead, I’ve set up an area where I’ll try to dump my photos on a regular basis for all the world to enjoy. While I’ll not upload really shitty pictures or ones where I took 7 trying to get the right angle or focus, it’ll pretty much be raw. The photos are about half their original size (otherwise, it’ll load veeeery slowly) but they’re still quite large. If i feel like a photo needs an explanation, I might add one, but that’ll be it. And i’ll just add a link to the blog when a new one is created. So, without further adieu:

Matt’s Paris Trip — December 2007

(If you want to see any and all photos I might have on that site, check out the Main Picture Page)

Carolyn is gone which makes me very sad.

And I’m having phantom ponytail moments. I keep thinking to put my hair up and there’s no hair to put up.

That’s all I got for now.

So, I’ve been saying for months that, once my hair was more than 10 inches long, I’d donate it and finally bite the bullet and figure out a hair style instead of the default ‘don’t get a haircut’ mode I’ve been in. Well, today was the day. Here is me before (my hair is wet as I’d just showered):

And here I am 2 hours later:

So what became of my hair? Well, it’s currently sitting on my kitchen table, drying. Soon, it’ll be in a ziplock bag and I’ll mail it to one of those charities that makes wigs for kids with cancer or early balding. The length was about 12 inches:

I managed to find a reasonably priced place with a guy who knew what he was doing. It looks like the cut he gave me should be flexible so, if I don’t like how it looks now, I can just tousle it around and it’ll be different.

This is just short note to point out that, in a very short while, Carolyn will be arriving in London. Alas, it’s not for good, but she’ll have her first chance to see London without the tourist thoughts. It’s a very different city when you look at it as a potential place to live. Needless to say, I’m very much looking forward to her arrival.

Plus, she’s bringing me a new camera, so I’ll be able to document things again. Lots of excitment!