I Cannot Believe This!!!!!!!!!!

I have been blogging a lot lately about the great things England has to offer, and this is great, because of course I want to remember all the wonderful things we did while we were here. 

On another note I did promise to document pitfalls of this journey, and today seems like a great day to start.  Today was my cracking day, meaning there is only a certain amount of British things I can take until I crack.  Now I have been trying to think, okay this is another country, so I should take it in strides but GEEEEZZZ what is wrong with this city.

Firstly, I am going to organize a seminar for dog owners.  My seminar will be very cheap and will last 5 minutes, because it will only entail a lesson on how to PICK UP DOG SHIT!

Sorry for the language, but how nasty is it that people can leave their own dog shit laying there?  I mean this must be a cultural thing, because seriously I cannot think of any person in Windsor who would let their dog leave a load on their own neighbourhood streets it’s just plain weird, sick, and rude. Ahhhhh... feel better now that I got that out.

Okay next thing, council taxes.  Okay so it’s not normal for a city to charge renters (letters) taxes.  I am soooo sorry it is just wrong.  Charge it to the landlord, but I do not own this building, therefore I shall not have to pay £135.00/monthly (that’s $212.00 Canadian) on top of our rent, which if I told you how much we are paying in Canadian dollars you would cry.  

‘Oh but the council does so much for our neighbourhood’.... BULLOCKS!!!!!! (Do you like the British wording I used there?!).  We have had freezing rain and ice storms and not once have I seen salt or sand or even this ridiculous stuff you refer to as GRIT be distributed.  I have fallen on public walkways in my neighbourhood far too many times this year due to the lack of GRIT being distributed properly by council.

This is England's idea of ice control.  I am being serious.

This is their system for ice removal, there are boxes at the end of each street and in them is sand.  Supposedly council is supposed to come around and shovel the grit around the walkways.  Good riddance all I have seen in these boxes is rubbish (garbage) and DOG SHIT hahah go figure!

Yes so there is the council tax, but on top of that there is ‘entertainment tax’.   Ohhhh lordy! Yes imagine!!! We do not watch the telly (television) because in order to watch 4 channels, four BBC channels that is (hahaha) you have to pay £145.00.   This is not cable.  This is on-top of cable.  Trucks with satellites go around inspecting whether or not you are watching illegal telly.  If you are caught watching telly with no entertainment taxes you are fined £1000.00.  

So now the taxes are talked about, but what is wrong with this city and bills.  When we arrived I sorted all the electricity and water and gas bills out.  I have been paying these religiously like a good little girl, because frankly I am scared of the British law.  In September I spoke with a person from our water company and set up all our payments, great thanks British man!  Today after making 5 payments on time I received a nasty letter, (please refer to photo)

Previous correspondence?  The one where I called you and set up all my payments?  Oh and this was addressed to 'the occupier' As if they don't even know my name anymore?  When I receive the bills it is labelled 'Ms. Washbrook'?????

To complete this fantastic week I received a £400.00 electricity bill.  Our last electricity bill was £70.00.  I called to inquire and this was their response, “Oh that is just an estimate”.  Hahahaahhahaah I am still laughing... so what am I suppose to do? I’m supposed to do your job? Go and look at my meter myself and send myself a new bill? LUDICRIS!!! Errrrrrrrrr........

One last one for y’all.  Last week our carbon monoxide and fire alarm stopped working.  We took them down and went to a hardware store to buy batteries for them.  At the hardware store we were told that these were not battery operated alarms, and that we needed to buy new alarms outright.  The alarms were each around £60.00.  We decided to let our landlord know about this, mind you this was 2 weeks ago now.  Our landlord is currently in Dubai, because that is what you do when you own property in England, you live in Dubai.  Anyway, it just so happens that instead of contacting our landlord we were supposed to contact our letting agent (I have talked about letting agents before and you can find out what they are here).  I finally get an e-mail from the letting agents asking if I tried to change the batteries.  Ummmmmm... NOPE! Thanks SOHPIE! Never thought about doing that...

Anyway, after a polite exchange of words with our brilliant letting agent she sent someone over to collect the alarms last week.  We were all working that day so I left the alarms in a bright orange bag, on our table, with a note that said ‘This is our alarms’.  When I got home the alarms were still there.  I received and e-mail saying that someone was there to collect the alarms, but could not find them anywhere, he looked for half an hour even!  HOLY COW!!!!!!!!!!

I am able to sit here now and a have a nice drink of wine with Anne!  Oh wait... I just spilled my wine all over my electricity bill!!!

Problem Solving

There was a study done in the late nineties that revealed how central Canadians lacked problem solving skills.  More specifically, it was found that central Ontarians have difficulty moving on to the next step.  I remember hearing this is on my mom’s car radio.  It was one of those extremely fresh memories, so fresh that you could re-play it in your memory and feel as if you were in that moment once again.

 It was in her Tempo.  It wasn’t raining but it was grey outside.  We were driving on Tecumseh Rd. near Catholic Central High School.  I remember this women’s calm voice over the radio explaining how not only had Ontarians scored the lowest in academics but had the issue of not knowing what to do next?  We stumble with this, and frankly it was big enough news to hit the radio waves.  There it is, for some reason I remember this, and for some reason it continues to circulate within my brain and make its way out every once in a while.  I remember thinking, well than I shall show these statistics!  I will always think of the next step I will work harder at my problem solving skills!

It brought light again the other day, when Ryan struggled with this exact issue.  Now some background information to enlighten you all.  I usually make dinner, which is okay and I am not complaining.  I have actually started to enjoy being domestic, and have thought of sharing some of my dinner ideas here on this blog, but that is for another day.  Right now we are back to problem solving issue.

Fridays are Ryan’s early days he works 10-4pm instead of the regular 12-8pm shift.  On these random Fridays, when I’m working, we end up coming home around the same time.  This Friday I decided to ask the daunting question to my lovely fiancee, “Would you like to make me dinner tonight?”  Which knowing Ryan, you would know he loves to cook! So this was not such a bad thing to ask him, I thought he would be delighted to be creative in the kitchen and whip up something that we haven’t had in a while.  Like I thought, he took the task with gratitude!  “Ya, sure I can do that!”  Ryan said with excitement, ahhhh..... I know how to pick ‘em! Even though I knew what was to come I started on some house chores and left him in the kitchen to organize his thoughts.

I heard some clanging, and some sighs and some ‘self talking’ before watching the kitchen door swing open and their stand my 6’2’’ fiancée looking confused.  I didn’t say anything I waited until he started the conversation, that I knew was going to happen.  Soon enough Ryan said, “Babe, we don’t have anything to eat”.  I smirked and looked his way and said, “Well my love, we have ourselves a PROBLEM, now how can we SOLVE this problem?”  He didn’t say anything in return, because he can’t stand it when I talk to him like a teacher.  He turned right back around and shut the door.  I started to hear more clanging and then I heard the microwave.  Out of pure curiosity I got up and made my way to the kitchen.

“What have you decided on?”  I asked, as my eyes looked into the microwave to see 2 oversized potatoes spinning in a circular motion heating as we spoke.  Ummmm.... Even before I looked over at him I could hear his silent giggles, the giggles I love about him, the ones that make me giggle!  The next thing I know we are both laughing out loud, both of us close to tears!  “I was thinking of making jacked potatoes for us!” Ryan finally explained.  Ya, no ... here is the Ontario problem solving skills at its finest!

Ryan knew that it was grocery shopping time, but decided to try and weasel his way out of it.  Now do remember fellow Canadians we are not talking about jumping in our SUV’s heading to the Real Canadian Super Store, stuffing our trunks packed full of oversized bags of rice, potatoes and toilet paper!  In order for us to go shopping, we must put on a pair of ‘Hunter Wellies’ (rubber rain boots) bundle up and brace the icy North East England weather walk 15 minutes to the smallest grocery store you have ever seen, with a limited selection, try and fit enough food into 2 or 3 bags walk back and try to fit that food into a beer sized fridge.  

Anywho... I then told Ryan that I was having flash forwards of me coming home from work and our children saying, “We haven’t had dinner yet, because Daddy couldn’t problem solve”.  I told Ryan about my concerns and we both laughed.  At least we find it humorous now!!! So Ryan gave me his best puppy dog eyes and pout and we BOTH made our way to the market.  He did still end up making dinner, and it was amazing.  He made a homemade curry sauce over chicken and veggies.  It was very yummy!  He also did the dishes, like I said, ‘I know how to pick ‘em!’

On another note, we had the pleasure to start our engagement session with our very good friend Daniel Alecks.  We are doing more at the end of this week and I am soooo excited about it!  He has done an absolutely stunning job so far and has allowed me the pleasure of one photo which is on my FB page.  You can see some of Mr. Alecks other works here.

Therapy

Today, a student acknowledged me as ‘babe’.  Not in a flattering way, not that this could be flattering in any way, but a creepy sarcastic way.  Like anything in life, teaching, comes with a few objections that sting.  The stings, unfortunately, stick longer with you, than any great shining moment can. 

“Nick, let me help you with this sentence”.  “Ya, sure babe”.....

It is still ringing in my ears.  I can still feel my ears burn with anger and my body stiffen with furry.

When I booked this job my agent warned me that this school was not like any of the other wonderful schools I have worked at.  She referred to this school as, ‘a challenge’.

Although I am still annoyed with the disrespect I was faced with today, something else stood out, something far more important.  These students live a different life than me.  The area that this school is in is one of the less desirable in Newcastle.  I felt as if I was bringing a, self-fullfilling prophecy with me to this job, I couldn’t help it.  

My agent explicitly told me about it is a ‘challenging school’ and knowing what type of area the school was in only tainted my vision of how the day was going to go.  To make this even worse, I found that the school had a low Ofsted Rating.  Ofsted, is a private independent company that inspects schools, rates them and sends this information to parliament.  I have never worked at a school with such a low rating before, so on top of everything else I am heading to work this morning with a spoiled view of what was to come.

To summarize my day I can tell you, ‘yes it was challenging’, but still my ears are stinging with the lack of respect from ‘Nick’.  I am writing this blog today partly because I need therapy, and this blog has become my release and also to remember this ‘aha’ teaching moment I had.

Like I stated before, something else stood out, something far more important; behaviour.  I have dealt with ‘difficult students’ or ‘managed poor behaviour’ before, but today it was different.  Within the first 15 minutes I recognized a disconnect with the majority of the students.  Not the regular disconnect, this was not the disconnect that you see when your students can’t figure out the polygon formula you just taught them, this was a social disconnect.  These students come from homes that I have never seen before, homes that show more hate than love and have in some cases not enough attention.  

I have heard of this ‘disconnect’ before.  Whether it was in one of Gotshall’s social theory classes, or something I overheard other teachers refer to.  Whatever it was it was like a bell ringing, and me realizing, ‘ahhh.... so here it is’.  I am foreign to any kind of poverty, ‘other than school debt poverty’ so this is why I witnessed this disconnect today.  The type of poverty I am referring to is not simply funds or money, but more so love.  It was extremely sad to see these students yearn for attention or yearn for love or for anything that made them feel like an eleven year old should feel.  

If the students did not have the control of the class today, they would act unreasonable and disrespectful.  They would burst out in crazy laughs to interrupt my lessons, because they were left with their classmates not paying attention to them.  At first I was annoyed, having to re-teach things, do to interruptions, but late in the morning after their first break, I realized that the students were reacting to the lack of attention that they receive.  

After break, ‘Kourtney’ a student who, laid on the floor, sat on her desk top, snuck up behind me during a lesson while I was at the board to make her classmates laugh, came up to me and apologized.  At the same time she hugged me.  It was a hard embrace that I think was genuine.  I asked her what she was apologizing for, hoping she would refer to her disrespectful manor of the morning, but she simply had no answer for me.  I gave her a long drawn out ‘teacher look’ before I asked her to show me she is sorry by behaving properly for the rest of the day.   Of course she did not, in fact it got worse and she quite enjoyed entertaining her classmates.

I have to explain first how, during the last 2 months almost all of the supply work that I had has been for teachers to write report cards.  Yes, Canadian teachers who read this (I mean you REBECCA) teachers here in England get prep time for their report cards, an entire 3 days usually!! Anywho I had to explain this because the teacher was at the school today, just not in the classroom.  

It wasn’t until after the day had finished, typical of teachers, that the regular teacher informed me of the ‘social issues’ that are in his class.  Today there were 23 students in my class, 9 of which are foster children, 1 who is being sent to, what he referred to as, ‘a unit’ (I think this is some sort of boot camp) and another who was suspended for beating another student in the yard then running a mad goose chase around the school with teachers chasing him (literally) until he climbed up a tree and stayed there until night time.  On top of these social issues, there were also the regular learning difficulties, and a student with ‘high functioning autism’.  

I ache physically, mentally, and emotionally.  I cannot believe the stress that these students have.  It is so bazaar how far I am from their worlds.  Can I teach students that I have no relation with?  Why does this happen?  It shouldn’t, but of course we do not live in a perfect world.  I feel as if I robbed them today.  I could have done so much more, because these are the students that need that extra attention, they need the extra love to make them understand that they are able to do anything and can accomplish their dreams.  Instead I lost it, and heard my voice scream for the first time as a teacher.

I was absolutely appalled after the swear words, the disrespect towards me and their classmates I snapped.  “THESE ARE THE PEOPLE THAT YOU WILL PROBABLY SHARE THE NEXT 10 YEARS WITH!  HOW DISCUSTING IS IT THAT YOU ARE INTERRUPTING YOUR CLASSMATES WITH RUDE COMMENTS AND SWEAR WORDS”.  I was close to a tremble while saying this, I was through I was done, than Nick inserted his lovely two cents.

 *All names have been changed to respect the privacy of students*

30

So it is true, Ryan is old! And I am soooo happy that I am still in my twenties!  I am such a cruel creature, because every year around January 29^th I get uber excited about being YOUNG, well YOUNGER than Mr. Aschaber that is!

Ryan always plays the, ‘I am cool with being old’ card, but I know that he, like many people, probably looks back and thinks, ‘at 30 I was supposed to be so much more?!’

Well my love, you have done soo much in your life already and you are still, okay I will say it, YOUNG!  

Ryan moved away from home to pursue hockey at such a young age.  He was only 16 years old when he left the Aschaber house hold leaving Mumma Aschaber in tears (a regular scene at the Aschaber house, but we would never change it for the world!) to move to Bancroft.  There he lived with a wonderful family who taught him about hunting, snowmobiling, spirituality and friendship. He, ‘minded the net’ for the Bancroft Hawks in the OPJHL for the 1998-99 year before making an even bigger move South, down the 401 to Windsor, ON where he entered his first year of OHL action.

Windsor contained much fun, which I am sure Ryan can only remember, but a few things that I can recall about his OHL career include, the Paulins, Selfer, John and Judy, the Bu (Club Malibu), Johnny Shots, Rush, Curfew call-ins, Chicken Delights, Spy’s sub shop, The barn, 1990 Dodge Shadow, St. Joe’s, Rookie parties, Rye n’ cokes, Skol... to name a few.  There are names and other things that come to mind, that make even me become a bit misty eyed.  Ryan’s OHL career remained in Windsor for his entire 4 years.  Ryan charmed the Windsor crowds with his patience in net, and continued to make tending look easy.

Ryan never flashed the leather, and always left the Windsor fans on the edge!  On more than one occasion I have witnessed Ryan calm the Barn to a complete silence.  Fans would be puzzled with Ryan’s unique saves, you could hear the speculation, did he catch it?  Because Ryan resembled the most humble goal minder style ever, the crowd would never know whether the puck crossed that ever so holy goal line.  The fans would be left in suspense until Ryan would toss the puck to the linesman.  Indicating that yes once again Ryan had what it takes to be a solid tender.  During his OHL stint, Ryan had the once in a life time opportunity to shine his skills on Bruin territory.

Ryan shared his unique saving skills at the Boston Bruin camp in 2000, and received feedback stating that his style was ‘unorthodox’.  This was only because they were not used to seeing a goaltender be so patience and not overconfident in net.  To think at this time, he was only a baby, at the age of 17 he was granted an opportunity that only goes to a select few.  After the camp he continued his OHL career ranking in many records, such as, most assist by a goalie in a single season, and continued to shine bright with receiving numerous first star game titles.  After the OHL, he continued on with his hockey career and entered into the UHL.

He shared his first year between the Columbus Stars and the Muskegon Fury.  Ryan was introduced to a new world while playing in this league, no billet families, just roommates, where many parties went down and new faces and friendships were made.  Ryan spent the rest of his UHL career in the Southern state of Richmond Virginia.  After sharing his talents with the Uhal.. Ryan moved back to Canada and began college.  

Ryan attended Sir Sanford Fleming, where he tackled the ‘career work counselling’ course with flying colours.  Ryan took his studying skills to the next level by applying to St. Francis Xavier University, Dalhousie, and Brock.  It was Danny Flinn from St. FX that welcomed him to Nova Scotia, where Ryan continued on with his hockey skills while beginning his finance undergraduate degree. 

St. FX offered living with a girlfriend for the first time, meeting many new amazing lifelong friends and practicing and learning real life skills.  Such things that will forever be remembered from X, bleeding blue and white, Ohio, homecoming games, Pipers pub, Sean Riley, X ring, Lupo, Flyner, Peck, Case, Big Bruce, Reeder, snow, Julia(the aveo), airports, Statistics, Economics, corporate finance, German, Fras Lade, I wanna win Bobby, The wheel, Lavallee, Peddle, Dr. Phil, M&M’s, this list could go on for days... so I shall stop here.

Ryan successfully earned his undergraduate degree in finance and landed a cosy job with Toronto Dominion Canada Trust bank as a financial planner.  For a year he delved into the women dominated ‘bank branch world’ where he wore green on Fridays and learned so much about customer financial needs.  After his short couple of years back in Ontario, he headed across the pond and landed in Newcastle upon Tyne, England.

England has offered so much surprise and shock to life that only your memory, I am sure, can provide for us.  Ryan has travelled to Scotland and Holland while being here and shares in the wonder of Geordie life.  He has entered into a ‘bro-mance’ with Mr. Alecks and continues to enjoy the lifestyle of never ending football games and pint drinking!

He is currently working with Barclays, England bank learning more about the financial world and moulding what he wants to do next year.  Ryan has already begun the hunt to travel back to the wonderful homeland, Canada where he will prepare to write his CFA and continue to be loving brother, son, grandson and fiancée.

I have to say Mr. Aschaber... you have done soooo much in your short time that I cannot wait to spend the rest of my life with you xoxo.

Jealous?

I still would not change it for anything....

5:00am: Alarm goes off...

5:10am: I finally get out of bed...

5:30am: Eat a Hearty Breakfast (because you never know when you will be able to eat again).

6:00am: Agency calls and tells you where you will be working

6:30am: You finally come up with a public transit journey plan, on how to get to the school.

6:45am: Leave the house (Yup, it is still dark outside!!)

7:09am: Catch the Metro

7:19am: Get off at metro station that is in a different city!!! (yes they are super fast!)  

7:27am: Your bus does not show up, so you call Nexus and re-route your travel plans and catch a new bus.

7:42am: New bus shows up

8:00am: Introduce yourself to a new secretary or Head Teacher, who presents you with a foreign school policy.

8:08am: Read over notes left for you, find out you have to teach integers in numeracy, personification and metaphors in poetry, and ancient Greece for topics.  Also realize that there is no material left for you, so you must find your own material, and remember the students will start coming in at 8:50am (about 40 minutes).

8:10-8:45am: Have re-taught yourself integers, come up with an exciting attention grabbing activity for poetry and have familiarized yourself with enough information about ancient Greece.

8:55am: Thirty students aged 11 come running in excited to have noticed there is a supply in today, so decide that it is time to party and begin to run around and talk on their mobile phones.

9:20am: Register and dinner have been sorted, students have realized that I am their teacher and I mean business.

9:25am: Have been asked, if I am: American, Irish, Australian, or Scottish at least 15 times from at least 20 different students.

10:25am: Break time most students go outside, except that one student that is just DYING to show you her new book, dance moves, or new toy for the 10 mins that you wished you had to go over your next lesson plan.

10:45am: students enter once again

11:00am: students are finally calm enough to begin Literacy lesson.

11:55am: Students head off to dinner.  You are excited to get some food yourself and plan for the afternoon when you are called down to the office because one of your students has been involved with a fight outside.  After you have taken care of the mischief you are then told that you have lunch duty, so you grab your coat and head outside into the England cold rain, where the other teacher blabs your ear off, so you can’t mentally plan your next lesson.

12:55pm: Take the register

1:15pm: Students tell you that they have already done the lesson that the teacher has left for you, so you grab into your ‘magic bag’ (that all supply teachers have, and usually takes weeks to put together) and begins to teach a pre-planned lesson that you have luckily photocopied the day before.

2:30pm: Break time becomes a inside playtime because of the England rain, and the quiet time you planned to have to look over the rest of the lessons and maybe eat a yogurt turns into a chaotic mess, where Kaitlin and Dylan fight over who gets to go on the computer for 10 mins.

2:45pm: Give in to a fun activity to win over the students hearts and finally reveal to them that you are Canadian.

2:48-3:05pm: Students ask about snow, igloos, skiing, mountains and lumberjacks.

3:15pm: School ends, students stay to tell you all about their holidays that they have had in ‘America’.

3:30-5:00pm: Mark numeracy and Literacy so you can show the teacher that you are competent to come back to that school.

5:17pm: Catch bus

5:42pm: Catch Metro

6:15pm: Finally back home

7:00pm: Make dinner (FINALLY FOOD!!)

8:00pm: Begin planning for next class filling your magic bag to be ready for tomorrow.

The BEST Year 5 Class!!!! I know I am not supposed to have favourites but this IS My Favourite by far :)

Hot drink?

The infatuation with, ‘hot drinks’ here in England is fantastic!

Wherever you go, you are forever greeted with, “You arite?” (How are you?), “Would you like a hot drink?”

I have always been suspicious what a, ‘hot drink’, actually is?!  I usually always decline the offer, when people ask if I would like anything, I feel rude to make someone go and fetch me a drink, of MY choice!  That all changed!!!

It was a Tuesday and I was in a weird mood to begin with.  I was visiting with one of my agencies when I decided, ‘why yes! I think I will have myself a hot drink!’  mmmm.... I was not asked how I like my hot drink, I was just given a grin and off, sweet Gillian went, to fetch me my ‘hot drink’.   About 5 minutes later a ‘hot drink’ was placed in front of me!  With a lovely biscuit and all the fixings!!!   How wonderful hot drinks are here!  And everyone is always sooo concerned about them!

One of the first things I am told when I visit a new school is where the hot drinks are.  They will usually go out of their way to explain where the ‘fixings’ are and then say without fail, “can I get you a hot drink?”  During break time (recess) I have every school that I have worked at so far, have a lovely teacher pop her head in and say, “Go on then, and fix yourself a hot drink”.  Looooooove this! I just want to hug them for saying it!

The tea in the Staff rooms comes in those huge metal coffee maker thingys.  They are filled every morning and teachers flock to it.  My new infatuation with the hot tea made me think about Canada, and I have realized that we are not much different.

I remember being in Canada last year and seeing the brown paper cups, and at certain times of the year, the red rrrroll up the rrrim cups sitting on desks, or in hands of teachers.  I remember being asked on numerous occasions, “want something? I am goin to Tims.”  

I have come to believe that England’s ‘hot drink’ is Canada’s ‘Tims’......

We do share one thing in common about hot drinks....Starbucks!

This is my Saturdays, when I am not lesson planning :) On many occasions it's Nicci sitting in front of me for one of our 3 hour chats ;)....

"Doors closing"

It’s the little things that excite me.... I am like a child, and maybe this is why I love teaching so much. 

Let me explain this in more detail.... I marvel at the slightest differences that I have encountered here, but could care less about the big stuff.  I know that England is full of great history and that there are literally castles and ruins all around me, but I rather ride the metro and listen to the British accent recording.... it still to this day brings me great joy that I have been without car.  I seriously do not miss it!  I actually look forward to grocery shopping because it means I get to take a walk!

Ah walking!  I will most definitely miss the walking come June.  I have learned to enjoy my time alone and walking in the early mornings while on route to work or the library.  A cup of Java mittens and of course an umbrella and I’m a happy camper!  The fantastic British accent recordings on the metro have become another rather odd infatuation of mine!

Yes I may have some underlying psychological issue, but I wouldn’t give it up for the world.  I will forever understand the joy of hearing.... 

“Next station Haymarket...CHANGE HERE FOR ALL LOCAL BUS SERVICES” 

“The train standing at platform one is for ST. JAMES via THE COAST”

 Baaahhhahaha yep definitely an odd ball!

Here are some miscellaneous pictures to keep you entertained...

Us trying to take a 'Serious pose' picture... turned out that we just look ridiculous!

Finally decided to check out 'the other side of the footbridge of Jesmond Dene' and it took us all the way to Heaton!

Ryan on the foot bridge in Jesmond... shall we continue on and visit the other side???

When we got to the other side..... we seen this!!!

And this!

School buses... England style

Take a look at the bargains! £2.00 for a pint of beer, 3 beer for £5.00 ANY 4 SHOTS for £5.00.  I am not even going to get into the JagerBomb deal!!!!!

Us on a random Saturday... Ya this is how we do it! sooo COOL! I know!

Dogs everywhere! Always in the pubs... You would be able to take Rusty and Kirby with you whenever you wanted!

Newcastle (North Tyneside) at sunset :)