Live the Dream Exercise: Leave job, family and friends. Pack backpack, wallet and passport. Ensure willing attitude to everything and adventurous spirit. Live the Dream. Results below...

Ok, quick re-cap on where I left off last time. Found myself a girl in London - you know, the one that made my heart feel like I'd just spent two straight weeks at KFC..? Yeah, so our first little tipple went well, with our getaway to the lovely San Sebastian in Spain. This left my plans (which let's be honest were pretty non-existent anyway) in a bit of a tizz - Ireland, Africa, home? - and now a girl in London? Procrastinating any major decision I went back to Edinburgh to spend a couple more days with my friends there (Scottish Warrior ones) and to say goodbye. With my other good friends Devo and Louise in Glasgow, I decided to get across there with Nat and spend some time in their hospitable company. We had a great time - Devo and I renditioning the ladies with the soulful ballads of 'Easy', and throwing the frisbee around the lake. Hmm, and yet I still do not grow tired of this wee English lass... what is happening to me? Saying our farewells, Nat and I arrive back in London to a rather tumultuous few days, but a highlight being watching Optimus Prime come to life on the big screen! Yeah, don't pretend you don't know what I'm talking about - you loved it too. Every mid 20's male is looking for the old action figures now I'm sure... As well as that I got to finally fulfill an ambition of mine and to watch Les Miserables on the West End. It was good... not great, but good. I guess when you have been wanting to do something for such a long time and have the perfect soundtrack memorised since being a wee tacker, it was always going to be hard expectations to fill. But it was really nice to be there. Also had the good chance to meet up with some more good mates from home - Pete, Claire, Cuey, Mike and Paige. Found ourselves a great place for Thai and Guiness, the perfect combination. This was followed soon after with catching up with Paul from Sri Lanka - it's great fun to meet people you had met whilst on the road - more alcohol consumed, and Nat got a nice insight into "night-time" Steve... With the living arrangements in London becoming completely untenable (you don't need to know this story), Nat and I beat an escape to the house of some friends that Nat knew in a place called Nuneaton - close to Birmingham. Again, I was able to flex my newly found skills with children as we soon had three in tow. We spent over a week in Nuneaton just chilling out, playing with the kids and never spending more than a couple of minutes apart... This put me in a quite a quandary. Here was a girl happy to indulge me on my whims to Spain, listen to my singing without complaining and happy to come to the Transformers movie with me AND enjoying seeing it too! With my lack of a UK visa and both of our funds running low, there was not much else for it but to book our flights to Australia and ready myself to join the working masses once more. So there it is. After 8 months of adventurous travelling I have the ultimate happy ending. Going home to family and friends, finding a place to move into with my new beautiful girlfriend, and a job to walk back into - reporting to a previous colleague and good friend of mine. The purpose of this trip was to 'Live the Dream' - my friends, mission accomplished. For everyone I've met on my travels - thanks for making this such an awesome time in my life. Have truly enjoyed having such great company and meeting such great people to share my dream with! And for everyone back home - haha, you get to look forward to seeing my pretty face around again! Can't wait to catch up with everyone. (And before I get any comments regarding the lack of paragraphs - especially from you Nat, I don't know why the computer won't add them - might have something to do with the MAC I'm using...)