The Holidays part 3 and beyond....

So ‘down South’ we went. We stopped on the way at TK Maxx, Tesco and also to buy some shower gel that you can’t buy in Austria. Friday night was spent catching up with Pops and Pam, with some birthday presents and a belated Xmas present (thank you to my secret Santa), and then a special trip to Spurs restaurant in Staines…yum yum.

Saturday was another South African themed trip, to a little South African shop, where we spent 35 pounds on yummy chocolates, and Nik Naks, (luckily I can buy some items at my work’s commissary) – oh and also a fresh Melktert (milk tart)….mmmmm.

We stopped off at a ‘fish’ shop….not an eating establishment, but to buy some new fishes for the Pattison’s aquarium…..I fell in love with a little Nemo, and I am seriously thinking about having 2 little fish at home. We relaxed with the Pattison’s on Saturday, while watching the chickens in the garden jump for minced meat (thinking they were worms), and caught up with Georgie and Anton (who, may I remind them, will visit us in Austria soon). Saturday night was an hour’s drive to the Luton Premier inn for a cheap night’s stay, but welcomed as we had to get up at 5.00am to catch our flight at 7am. We arrived in Slovakia in the morning, and did a quick shop at the Slovakian Tesco’s……doesn’t really resemble English Tesco’s, but has so much more than Austrian supermarkets. Stocked up on goodies, we headed home to give our boys and girls so love.

Last weekend, we started our spring clean, or as Ian calls it, disinfecting the house. Two whole rooms were ‘disinfected’ and items thrown away. The rest of the house was cleaned on Sunday, with a trip to Hardegg to make sure the heating was working, and a little chat with Leo, the friendly neighbour, who I am beginning to understand more and more……his wife was ill, Austria is expensive and said that a man without a beer belly is a cripple! At least that is what I think he said. So all in all a successful weekend of cleaning, cooking, shopping, cat brushing and more organizing. Sunday Ian and I made a Milk tart, which was scrummy…not sure how many points that is on weightwatchers though, and then followed by ironing and packing for our 4am start on Monday to take Ian to the airport. I arrived at work at 6.30am, where I am currently writing this, as I can’t officially start work until 7am. So I thought I would keep myself occupied from not sleeping on my desk. I am definitely leaving at 4pm today to go home to sleep….. Ian is back on Tuesday.

This weekend, disinfecting the house started again. The office was ripped apart and all paperwork was organised. The recycling bin is now full of paper and we still have another month before it is collected. So the office is starting to resemble a room again, and I may even feel like actually sitting in it occasionally. All PCs were upgraded to windows 7, and a new router was installed. After a few hours of Ian cursing his PC, we had a fully operating network, where streaming video actually worked. In fact for the first time in 10 years, all PCs can see each other. A quick trip to the Czech Republic was made on Saturday, where we bought some new Reebok trainers, after we found out all shoes were ½ the outlet price. Ready to start the upgrade from walking, to trotting, to jogging and then finally running.

Czech Republic - Airplane restaurant and a big globe, with some dragons and knights (Don't ask me why).

19 Euros for a visit to Moulin Rouge....enough said!

You can but full size plastic cows in the Czech Republic.

The holidays part 2

Thursday was a day of fun and Richard's birthday (yes 3 birthdays in 3 days). We relaxed a while in the lounge, and I tried my best to annoy my sister, without success.
The best part of the day was our 75 minutes of lazer combat. Richard, Ian, Sam and I ran around the woods with our £1000 lazer guns trying to shoot our enemies, which included many 6-10 year olds.
My mum and dad were watching with amusement and catched some great photos.

Always time for a quick pose during war.
Ian trying to be a sniper.
Me hiding behind the Ammo shed.
The 4 shooters at the end of combat. As you can see I still had
my gun and helmet, I like to think that was because
I was better than the men and wasn't killed.

After combat we did even more exercise and walked the long way home across the forest to the house. Our last night was spent eating Italian food for Richard's birthday.

To commemorate our final night, Georgie decided she would have explosive vomiting during the night. Poor Pauline and Richard had a very upset baby, with a travel cot covered in puke and a very stinky bedroom......Everybody managed to get to sleep around 3am.
Friday was goodbye day, with an early start to trek to the car and bring it back for packing. We all left and said farewell to one another, which led Ian and I onto the next part of our trip 'down South'.

The holidays part 1

Well it has been a while since the last blog, and I actually have things to talk about.
We arrived in the UK on a busy Saturday, after the usual hassle free, yet slightly squashed, Ryanair flight. We picked up our hire car and drove through the usual road works to Derby to have a little shop. We found a new shop that we walked around in awe.....Poundland. So much to buy for a pound. In fact by the end of the holiday, we had been to 3 poundlands and bought lots of interesting items.
We stayed the night at the Hilton (sale prices), where I fell asleep at 8.30pm for 12 hours and left Ian slightly bored. Sunday we had our English breakfast, but counted our WW points and only had a miniture fry up.
We drove 'up North' on Sunday, with a quick trip to TK Maxx, to Stevie and Tay's house, where we chilled, chatted, ate and watched a film. We always love visiting Pudsey, to visit our bruv and sis, see the town we used to live in and chill on our old sofas!
Monday morning was another early start, with a birthday trip to the helicopter shop for Ian, where he bought some helicopter goodies (which I won't try to explain). We then met my family at Castleford outlet village for some more shopping and a pizza hut buffet. It was the first time ever that I only ate 2 slices of pizza and salad at a pizza hut buffet.
We then drove down to Sherwood forest in 3 full cars and drove around the maze of centre parks to find our lodge. A lovely 4 bedroomed, 4 bath house with a games room including a PS3 and a pool table. Unpacking took place quickly and the cars had to be returned to the car park, as it was a no car zone for the rest of the week. Tuesday, my 34th birthday was spent walking for miles through the forest and watching Sam quad biking.


My birthday treat was 3 hours of relaxing in a spa, with many different steam rooms, saunas and relaxing rooms and an outdoor pool....It was fabulous.
Wednesday was Ian's birthday, where I sneaked a facial in the morning, and we walked and walked for the rest of day, with a quick game of pool with sam, and enjoyed a birthday meal at night.
When we first arrived in the lodge, there was a huge chalkboard by the entrance and so I wrote everybody's birthday on it. The cleaners obviously saw it and left a Thortons Birthday cake for the 2 boys and 1 girl. Little did they know, it was for a 41, 34 and 32 year olds! oops

Spring - come already!

Well it is still -10c and the car is still frozen every morning . Spring needs to hurry up and get to Austria. I am hoping when we get back from the UK, Austria will be warm and sunny.

This week has been quite hectic, with putting up exhibitions at work, attended 3 days of Nuclear technolgy seminars (and trying not to fall asleep), being airport driver to Ian and finally taking down the exhibition in heels on a ladder (only to find out the building services man was waiting for his ladder and just watched as I struggled up and down the ladder 8 times - what a gentleman). As you can see from the photo, we spent 3000 Euros on 8 panels to fit inbetween windows. Unfortunately not my design as my PC couldn't handle Indesign with such a big file, but at least it was my idea for the design.

Ian had a successful day in Slovenia training 'Amgeners', who all loved him and gave him presents for being so amazing. He returned home on Wednesday night with the excitement of a meeting with his boss on Thursday to discuss his annual payrise and bonus. He had performed above and beyond his role and was given a 3% payrise and 14% annual bonus. The norm is 10% for employees, but as Ian has only worked for Amgen for 6 months he was expecting less. Well done super training manager, but as I always say to Ian, he always does super good at anything he tries.

The 3 days of seminrs I attended were very interesting and I learnt about what the IAEA does in other departments and what technology is used. They talked about safeguards and how they keep track of the world's nuclear sites - interesting to find out that they only use commercial satalite imagery and pay a fortune for them, to keep track of things.....no 'big brother' through Government's satalites. I also learnt about nuclear energy, eradicating Tsetse fly and rinderpest. So luckily for the IAEA, I am all for 'nuclear'. Plus I decided I want a job in our safeguards Department analysing all their data.

Confession time, I had a weightwatchers blip while Ian was in Slovenia - 4 jaffa cakes and a flake! I went over my points, but then you are allowed an extra 49 per week for treats. needless to say I only lost 1lb this week.

Cats are all fine and dandy....Neo has a new sleeping place. For the first time ever he has decided he would like to sleep on my pillow during the night and jumps up and makes himself comfy above my head. I usually wake up without a pillow and a snoring Neo above me. I am blaming the new pillows I ordered through Amazon, as they are so comfy. Although today I was no so happy when I awoke with a painful neck!
Later on Saturday morning, Tank was a little jealous of Neo's comfy bed and joined him.

Later the cats decided they suddenly loved one side of the sofa and decided to all contregate on it for a nap.
Saturday afternoon, I decided to paint the hallway, over Ian's expert plastering job. It kinda looks a bit like clay/poo/wet plaster colour....not sure yet. Ian became a lumberjack and bought a

axe and proceeded to chop down any out of control small trees in our roof garden. We just bought 100m2 of garden weed cloth cover from ebay and will cover the whole thing before anything grows, so it will hopefully not put people off buying the house with an overgrown garden.

Sunday we went back up to the garden and laid black weed cover, but ran out, so still more to do. I did a second coat of painting, and now have the task of cleaning, washing, ironing and preparing for our week's holiday, which I am very excited about....
Update, washing check, tidying check, cleaning and ironing ooopsss not checked!
Have a fun week!

Sorry...but I had to post this photo

Take the meaning as you wish!

Scared cats, shopping and Scrimgeour.

Well, Tank is back home from the vets, after they could not find anything wrong with him. He came home slightly affected by the anaesthetic, and would not sit and rest. So he spent around 4 hours trying his best to walk around the whole house screaming and then falling over. He shuck his head and then would fall over on his side. Anyway I decided to go to bed and he slept with me all night. One problem, Morph doesn't take kindly to a cat visiting the vet, and spent two days hiding and hissing at Tank. He's the biggest guy, but the biggest baby. He has eventually calmed down, but everyday when we come home, he is shaking and hiding. I think maybe someone is bullying him, as he a cut on his ear and nose.
Friday evening we went to the large Eurospar supermarket (ok, for the English people, large is not a ASDA or Tescos, but more like 1/4 the size). We spent 45 minutes wandering around with our iphones checking how many weightwatchers points the food was. Also managed to bag a few bargains in their sale - Lego star wars space ship and playmobil boy on a bike for Sam.
Saturday we took a trip to Vienna to do essential shopping:
New scales to measure our weight loss (so far 6lbs in 2 weeks),
Double-side tape, elastic bands, car fuses - the essentials for helicopter maintenance.
2 pairs of shoes (bargain prices!). I had to include a photo, so my sis can see my purchase.
We also found a new car garage, luckily 500m from my workplace. So we shall see how much money are little baby will cost us this time!
We got home, and Ian had a little helicopter flight around the house.



The cats saw the opportunity of an empty shoe box. Tank could just manage to fit in the box, but poor fat Neo could only manage to sit on the lid.




Sunday, as we were up late watching 'the resident' the night before, we slept until 11.00am. Although it was like the twilight zone, as Ian woke before me (2 days in a row)!
We did a clean of the house, washing etc and then went to Brigitte's house for cake and coffee (our Retz friend). Brigitte and her family make us feel very welcome and we sit around the kitchen table with the whole family, and they excuse our bad german and speak English with us. Brigitte takes English classes in Retz (although she doesn't need them), and they have a Scottish lady teaching them (she has lived in Austria 26 years). The teacher brought some of here old school ties in to show the class, and Brigitte mentioned to her that my maiden name is Scrimgeour. Funny thing was, one of the school ties was the Scrimgeour tartan and the teachers mother was a Scrimgeour too. Small world we live in. I am now in contact through facebook with her, and will hopefully meet up with her soon.
Anyway this week, Ian is going to Slovenia for 2 days training and I shall be doing the opposite by being trained in a 3 day seminar on nuclear technology. It is always best to understand it, when you are communicating and promoting it!
So a busy week ahead....gotta go now as my weightwatchers dinner is ready.
xx

Happy Valentine's Day

Love is in the air.......

Happy Valentine's day everybody. I hope you receive a secret gift from your loved one.

What has been happening in the Pattison's world over the last week. Last week I saw Princess Dina Mired of Jordan. The IAEA were supporting World Cancer Day, and she came along to support the cause.
She is the pretty lady at the front, and you can even see me behind the big speaker.

Apart from that Monday excitement, my week was full of meetings and web site design. Yes that's right, although I didn't do the really hard designing (templates etc), I am doing the content.

The house is still not on the market, the thought is there, but motivation is lacking. Last weekend we stuck plastic foam 'stuff' around the windows, so the road

noise was quietened. This weekend, we bought some masking tape and a paint brush, with the idea of painting the entrance hall, but failed. We are also thinking of a quick way to finish the patio (as we ran out of stones) - so I think a strip of chippings at the back of the patio with potted plants on it will do just fine! Mollie is slowly motivating me to finish the house and sell it, as I miss my friend in Vienna.

Ian and I are very happy with our weight watchers diet plan, I managed to lose 3.5lbs last week, and Ian was around the same. I am loving weight watchers, it makes you think about and enjoy food much more, plus I get to eat a flake at night.
Tank is at the vets today, he lost a lot of weight over the past week (just bones), so we went to the animal dentist, as I thought it was his teeth. He managed to suck down 3 tins of cat food mousse at the weekend, showing how hungry he actually was. The Dentist (luckily trained in Canada - so speaks excellent English) said Tank's teeth were very clean for a 9 year old, but would take x-rays, blood work and a ultrasound, with a hefty price tag of around 300 Euros. Waiting at the vets was an experience, it looked like 2 dogs were going to put to sleep with 2 crying families, but then there were plenty of happy dogs and a loving Tank, which made the waiting people smile (we let tank out of the carrier as he loves to be nosey). So Tanky is in a cage somewhere waiting to go under, and being the softie that Ian is, he was loving Tank just in case anything happened and told the vet to take care of him (huge softie).
Last night Ian was playing with Neo, the results can be seen in the photo. I also was looking at photos on my camera and came across a photo I took on our way to the airport around a year ago. My caption for this would be 'only in Austria'

It is a goat in the back of a micra!

For all of those family and friends who are desperate for Ian and I to start a family, I made the first steps in trying to work out how we get pregnant when an essential part of the puzzle is in another country. The Oxford clinic gave me an address of a shipping company who can transport frozen tadpoles abroad, but I am still waiting for a consultant to contact me as to whether I can take an easy option and just pop into the clinic for the turkey baster approach (a lot less hassle and a lot less money). I seriously doubt that this approach will be acceptable, but it's worth asking the question.
We will definately keep you informed when we start trying. The good news is that the Austrian health scheme pays for 80% on IVF for 4 attempts, and then I will get another 80% back from the remainder from extra private health insurance - another bonus of living in Austria.

Oh I should at least add another funny story from my working week with the youngsters at work, who made me feel really old when asking for advice with their boyfriends.
Would I let Ian play poker with the boys more than once a week, or once a week and let him stay out after midlight? My responce was, firstly its not about 'allowing' Ian do anything, and secondly yes he can do as he pleases, which leaves me a quiet evening at home.
Do I get jealous? No.
Does Ian get jealous? No.
Does Ian speak to women? Yes.
Is that ok by me? Yes.
Does he have female friends? Yes.
Would I let Ian go out alone with another woman? Yes
and on and on and on. An intense lunchtime grilling from my officemates, cute!
Cheerio for now

P.S. The vet just rang and said he couldn't find anything wrong with Tank, but we should pick him up in a little while and see an internal specialist. Bloody cats! Tank has done this once before. He was really ill and wouldn't move off the bed and cried when we touched him, panic obviously set in. Off to the emergency vets in the morning, and as soon as we started driving he made a miraculous recovery, so we turned around and he was fine....maybe he does this for attention.