After spending a month at home, I finally left the Old Country for London on 30th October. A lot had happened over those weeks: it was a lot of fun hanging out with my folks and friends but that was also mixed with a lot of frustrations concerning vaccinations, visas, and other irritations. In general, it was a great time and I was sad to say goodbye to everyone at home.
I stayed with Dave, Nuala and the kids in Windsor for the first few nights, and it was good to catch up. Halloween was a lot of fun and Orla dressed up as a spider, while Nuala donned a robe, hat and mask to make a very convincing witch, so much so that she scared the wits out of poor Orla! Orla had fun trick or treating and collected quite the collection of sweets, all of which were eaten before bedtime!
On the Friday night a crowd of us met in Kavanagh's in South
Kensington, and it was great to see everyone, especially those I hadn't
seen in a few months.
I also spent time with Maria & Simon, and Donal & Leona, although it was a pity that Leona had to fly out to the US for work commitments, and didn't get to see her over the weekend. We had a bit of a gathering in Dave's when Conor & Sara came around. The following day we met up with Kenny, Sian & James for lunch.
Then came the time to say goodbye to the guys, a moment I wasn't looking forward to. A year is a long time to be away from the people you love. I'll miss everyone very much but hope that modern technology and the interweb and all that will enable us to keep in touch. However, it's an exciting time ahead and will thankfully see some of you in foreign lands over the next 12 months.
