Since I’ve been gone…

If you’re reading this then you may have noticed that I have got a little behind with my blog posting.  I’m hugely sorry about that.  Something has been tapping at my window demanding my attention and sadly that thing is called the real world.

I’ve been extremely busy with my guided tours and have given 20 so far in July and this being July 21st you may deduce that means I have only had one day at home and even then I was working.

So I have quite a backlog of posts to write up but as most days I am up at 5am, out the house before 6am and usually back home between 7 and 8pm then you may see why I am a little behind.  Several days I haven’t even had anything to eat or drink all day until 8pm, it all depends on the tourists.    This is obviously really bad in almost every way, except for the one good way and that is that twice in the last week, my breakfast has been a home-made pizza albeit a breakfast 13-14 hours after I got up.

Still I actually enjoy it for the most part.  The least part being I’m exhausted and I know almost every pothole in the 300 mile round trip to Bath, Stonehenge and back.  I’d rather work 14 hours a day for myself than 7.5 hours a day for anyone else and one of my upcoming posts will be all about my experience of working for myself for almost 3 years.

What else has been happening?  Absolutely nothing.  Well that is if your definition of nothing is the opposite of most peoples.  Our country has voted to leave the EU, our Prime Minister has resigned and a new government put in place, Wales did really well in the Euro football tournament and it’s been pretty hot in the London area.

I have been meeting some really interesting and nice people on my tours and from such differing places and backgrounds.  I had two chaps from Tenessee and one of them had family from England that left for America in the 17th century.  Somehow I managed to trace his old family home, miles from the nearest real road.  He made me laugh as he commented on how he has to admit that I am game for everything when I was driving my Audi off-road on a dirt lane up a private estate.  He was ever so grateful and over the moon about it all.  They were such fun and I had them for two days.  Knowing I do history, they brought over documentation from the American Civil War showing amongst other things that some ancestors both deserted and were executed.  Despite family history, both men stayed at their posts for the duration of the two days and I think we all spent far too much time laughing.

Just to show how quickly the weather changes here, a few days ago it was just 13 degrees C (56 degrees F) on the white cliffs of Dover and this week it has been around 34C or 98F.   It’s funny as many tourists can’t handle the weather, they complain when it is cold or wet and then complain that they didn’t come to the UK for their Philippines/ Texas/anyway else that is hot.   The lady today couldn’t understand why I personally don’t have air conditioning even for very average and frequent high 20’s C / Mid 80’s F weather and went on to ask what do we do in this weather so I just said, we just stay hot.   As the song goes, only mad dogs and Englishman go out in the midday sun.  No wonder I love the Sahara desert!  I actually found the near 100 degree heat really pleasant, I just would have liked to have something to eat or drink before 8pm that night.

Oh also, look at all this rhubarb that my lovely wife picked from our garden yesterday?  Pretty mammoth stuff.

I haven’t just had to put a pause on my blogging but also on my book writing which is annoying as I have 2 factual books that are quite close to being completed.

I actually have this weekend off.  Like the rest of the month I could have been double or even triple booked (yes I am looking for someone to work for me).  However after a month of constant epic days I decided I had to take a breather.  More importantly I am really looking forward to seeing the new Star Trek film.  I love Star Trek, even the less than stellar showings.   I started watching it when I was less than 3 years old and though I always go in with very low expectations to avoid disappointment, there is quite a lot of excitement going on and I expect to retain that excitement for at least the first 4 or 5 showings I see at the cinema.

Anyway, I gotta leave this here.  If I wrote any more then I may as well have written one of my more usual blog posts but I hope you will like some of the photos I have taken on my tours this week.