Dear Mom, Dad, Mr. Ed, Ed Sullivan, Sully and Mike, and the blogosphere,

It’s a beautiful day here at Camp Hollytree, which is a nice change from the rainy grey skies of the last week or so. The wind has been picking up and sometimes the waves on the loch get rather violent, sloshing against the rocks and spraying up the sides of the pier, so I think that winter is on the way, and soon we’ll start stoking the fires and hunkering down inside. Once November hits, I plan on introducing the staff here to the glory that is pumpkin pie, so I say bring it on.

Yesterday I had the day off and I went into Fort William to do some wandering, shopping, and mingling with people other than staff and hotel guests, and I had a great time. We’re having a leaving party for Aisling on Friday night (she’s headed to Australia for a couple of months to enjoy the summer weather down under), so we need to start stocking up, and I did my part by buying more wine than I was really able to carry, which made the end of my day suck, especially when I had trouble catching the bus and had to walk all the way to the other end of the street and wait for an extra hour. Scotland might be a country where they like the drink, but it’s still rather embarrassing to lumber down the street with heavy bags that clink every time you take a step, and it makes fishing through your purse to pay the bus fare rather more difficult than is usually desirable.

Luckily, the bus stop was near a coffee shop that I had already decided that I liked, so I bought a paper, a chocolate bar, and a cup of tea. Those things, combined with the general sense of satisfaction that I felt with the day and the knowledge that it will all be worth it when we are actually able to have a party on Friday, made it much easier to view the situation as humorous.  It became even easier once I was on the bus and therefore actually confident that I wasn’t going to end up stuck in Fort William overnight. Living here really does make one more appreciative of the luxury of living somewhere that is reachable by more than one form of transportation a day.  It’s somewhat reminiscent of that wormhole on Star Trek that only opens once every million years, and if you miss it, you just have to shrug your shoulders and play dominoes until next time.

I said somewhat reminiscent, OK?

Anyway, apart from wine and coffee, I also bought ingredients for hummus and granola, in an attempt to enrich our staff menu, and I started sniffing around for Christmas presents. It was nice to be able to walk down a street and mingle with people, and it was also nice to be less worried about running out of money than I was the last time I made it into town.  I am now the proud owner of a UK bank account, and money is deposited in it each and every week, which makes me feel warm and happy inside.  I still have to figure out how to get money Out of it and into the hands of US citizens without paying large transfer fees, but what’s life without a challenge, eh?

Saturday there was a wedding party at the hotel, so things were hectic and exciting. We put in a temporary dance floor, moved all the tables around, and had a special set menu for their dinner. Everyone was called in to work so we had more hands than usual, and it was actually quite easy to handle because of that. It got harder later at night when there were just a few of us, and I was in the bar making drinks. We ran out of ice, which was embarrassing, and the bar just isn’t used to that much business so we also had to scramble for change, but on the whole people seemed to be having a good time, and it was fun to break from the normal routine a bit.

Saturday must just have been a “break from the normal” kind of day, because in addition to the wedding, Scotland won their football match with France. You know, France, the ones who made it to the World Cup finals? That’s all over now, and now we’re working on the Euro Cup 2008 or something, which is all stuff that I don’t understand very well. But whether I understand it or not, Scotland is leading their division right now with 9 points (which is apparently a lot), and they are playing Ukraine tomorrow. If they win, the country might just fall into the ocean because too many people will jump up and down at the same moment, so stay tuned because I’m not sure the wireless works underwater, so I might have to find an internet cafe in Atlantis to send the next edition.

Other than those things, life and work are going along pretty much as usual, and we’re down to about a month and a half til the hotel closes. Tania and I are starting to talk about taking a little Scotland road trip in the end of November, so next week maybe I’ll have more news on that front.

Until then, wear fuzzy socks!

Love, Kynthia

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 10th, 2006 at 12:39 pm and is filed under things i do. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.