Sunday 27 February 2011

February in the North

The northeast of England is still a pretty cold place, with only a little sun each week, and we've taken advantage of the gloomy drear to stay inside and write. Still, we have been getting out into it when we can. This last Thursday we drove to a part of Hadrian’s Wall we hadn’t visited before and hiked along for a couple hours. We had a lot of fun and saw some beautiful scenery, though some of the slopes were very steep and muddy and we thought we might get blown off into the sheep manure if we weren’t careful. We had a lovely picnic there, as the English seem to enjoy lovely picnics whatever the weather. From one of the lookouts we saw a few hundred rooks circling and calling from their rookery. We also encountered a curious white rooster at the trailhead.

We have enjoyed a few performances in Newcastle this last month. The first was Shakespeare’s Richard III, performed by the theatre company Propeller. This was an amazing show, very bloody but also very creatively done. It was Brian's first Shakespeare inside England, which was a different kind of experience for him. The second show was a performance of The Talent by an all male company called Ballet Boyz. We enjoyed this a lot, though we thought the second act was by far the best and could have been developed more. We thought the last act was a little unfocused and never clearly resolved into any conclusion. Still, we would go to see them again, and it’s been nice for us to get out and start familiarising ourselves with some of the cool things going on in town. We also found a new restaurant in Newcastle, a Japanese-inspired place called Wagamama. Actually it is a restaurant serving pan-Asian food in the style of a modern Japanese Ramen bar. Positive eating + positive thinking = positivity. We’re thinking of going back there for our approaching 2-year anniversary.

I've been looking for a job since Christmas without much luck, as the economy here is pretty rubbish at the moment. Our idea was that I could work for a few months before we went wwoofing but now we’re thinking that if I do land a job it might be worth it for me to keep it. In that case Brian might make an abbreviated trip to Italy, just so we don’t leave our hosts in the lurch. Then he could return to the US to start filing for the visa that would let him return permanently to England. We would like to get married soon but for Brian to stay in England I have to be earning a living wage to support us both until he can get a work visa and find a job. I have an interview tomorrow, which might mean we can move ahead with these plans now. But we both feel the dilemma of wanting to see more of Europe before settling down too much. We’ll have to see…

Well, that’s all for now. After our Sunday dinner we’ll be gannin alang the river to the Baltic, which is full of new exhibits at the moment.