A Trying Comical Day in England

A Trying Comical Day in England 9-24-08

Let me tell you about our day yesterday! It’s quite good!! Even if some of it is at my poor dear husband’s expense!!! 

David got up and did some errands before we fully started our day – I can’t remember what he did. However, when he returned we started our day, which began at the real estate place, had to run in and talk with Janine about our lease (few questions, but everything is fine). It was raining, so the kids and I stayed in the car, while David did the work. We’re so nice to him.

After that we went to the place where our car was to get everything squared away for us to pick it up and take it to the place to have UK stuff done to it. Maybe I’ll have David write a blog explaining all that – it’s a mess! We got that squared away and we’re told if we made it back from “school clothes shopping” before 5, it would probably be a good idea, because they had to jump start the car to get it going. Apparently this is normal with vehicles shipped in…with the exception of our car!

We left and went to the UK’s form of “Wal-mart”, very interesting. It’s called Tesco’s and they have them everywhere. Personally, I think they carry more food than other items, but they did at least have school uniforms. They didn’t have grey trousers in Ashlynn’s size so we had to get black ones. I might have to just sweet talk David’s mom into buying grey material and keeping these kids stocked in trousers for awhile, rather than trying to find things to fit them! The sizes are totally different.

Anyway, we were able to get Ashlynn, 2 summer dresses and skirts (on sale), black trousers, 1 blouse, 3 white polo’s, and a navy sweatshirt…plus a swimming suit. Now, as to whether or not we purchased the right swimsuit I don’t know. It was on the clearance rack with the summer dresses for schools – so I got it just incase. The school has a swimming pool and they teach swimming lessons. Marilyn will be so happy to hear that! I think it’s cool! Oh, we also got 2 pair of navy shorts off the clearance rack!

All the British schools have uniforms. The Primary (elementary) schools wear grey trousers, shorts, and dresses with white blouses or polo shirts, and some where black trousers or navy. The schools themselves sell sweaters/cardigans with the school logo on them, for the children to purchase if they want. They have to wear grey, white, black, or navy socks. The boys are not allowed white socks and the girls are allowed grey, black, or navy tights. They have to wear black shoes, not tennis shoes. We are still looking for shoes, we are going to look on base for those and socks. Trying to determine the UK sizes is not easy. We spent a lot of time in the dressing room.

After we finished school shopping we went to, believe it or not, McDonald’s! Yep, they have a McDonald’s in England. Crazy isn’t it? Funny thing is they discourage you from driving and eating something at the same time, I think you could even get a ticket for it. As a matter fact their cars do not even have a place for a Pepsi! They don’t want you distracted while you’re driving. Smart, but irritating for someone who always has a drink with them.

Anyway, we got back to the place to pick up our car and guess what? It’s a good thing we made it by 5 p.m. because the car would not start and had to be jump started. So we get it down to the place to have the UK stuff done to it and it’s out of gas. This is where it gets funny…David takes it up the road to the service station for some gas and turns it OFF!!! So guess what? Yep, you got it…it wouldn’t start. Brier had gone with him and Ash and I were back at the mechanic shop waiting. I’d read an article in a magazine and thought man, he’s been one for a long time…and then it hit me!

At most places you have to turn your vehicle off to put gas in it, right? So I look for the key to the car that I am sitting in…not there – David has it. Then I notice the cell phone, so he can’t call us, even if we could remember the number…which we have yet been able to do! So I get out and I got tell the guy in the shop what I think happened. He gets someone with jumper cables to go get him and just as they are fixin’ to pull out of there, David and Brier come walking down the road!!! Yep, that car did die, didn’t it! I love it when I’m right.

So anyway, the guy takes David back down there to jump start the car and stuff. We finally get all cars, and people back to the shop and we’re getting ready to go…when David remembers to tell the guy about the swimming pool in my floor board! It had water literally standing it in and we had no idea why, my side was the only one wet. It soaked my purse, my magazine…yeah – I wasn’t pleased. Not to mention that the day before we’d come back to the room for something and my left pant leg was soaked and I couldn’t figure out why! I hadn’t stepped in anything, but it was literally ringing wet. I had to take them off and put them in the dryer before we could go to the movie! At least now I know what had happened to my trousers (pants = underwear here).

Doug – the dude I’m talking about says its something to do with the air conditioner, I don’t remember what, but he comes out with a drill and a, oh crap, what do you call those things…you know that hold a lot of water and people dry their cars off with, shimmy? Is that right? I don’t know, anyway he drills 2 holes into the floor of the car, for the water to drain and then dries up what is there. Thank God it’s his car! Just drill a hole in the floor, that’ll fix it! He is definitely American…I should ask him if he is from the backwoods of Missouri.

Anyway, poor David has had a horrible time with all this car crap. I really will have to have him blog about it – it’s quite the headache. It appears we need a new battery for our American car. Our UK car that we did in fact purchase (I know crazy) we have to get the road tax paid, before we can drive it anywhere! So it’s sitting down there waiting on us. I know crazy – but hey at least we got a car, right?

Oh and I forgot, we shipped our American car out of St. Louis on I think July 17th …the darn thing has been sitting here since August 20th! We were told it would arrive by September 9th …boy was it early! It’s a good thing we went to get it though, a few more days and they would have started charging us for it being there. I guess it can be there 45 days, before they start charging you…talk about cutting it close.

So after all this hassle and entertainment we returned to our room and watched movies. We decided we better not try to accomplish anything else for the day, plus it was already like 630 or something.

For those of you asking about shipping things to us, this is the information…I trust you have the address – if not email me.

They have special “flat rate” boxes for APO addresses. On the side of those boxes it will say “America Supports You Our Military Mean & Women”. There is a website listed as well www.americasupportsyou.mil I do not know what is on that website, I’ve not had the chance to look yet. Some post offices may not have those boxes there, so you’ll need to tell them “hey, I’m going to be shipping things to an APO address periodically and I’m going to need some APO flat rate boxes”. They will get them in – that is what we had to do for David’s mom’s post office (course your’s might be bigger and they might have them).

Anyway, to ship that box to us it will cost you $10.95. That’s it. So if you’re not going to fill it full of stuff, just send it in like an envelope. It will not cost you anymore to send it to us just because we’re overseas, because we have an APO, which is basically a US address in a foreign country. Weird I know.

You can mail us a letter and it will cost the same amount as if you were to mail us a card in the states. 1 stamp (unless you write a lot like me and then require 2 or 3).

With the flat rate box you will have to fill out a customs form. It’s easy, I promise, and the lady at the post office can guide you through it. I do not know if you have to fill a customs form out for just a “letter”, all other packages yes, you do.

If you have any questions about the shipping please let me know. I really would love to receive coupons, letters, whatever from you. I know we have email – so letters generally come that way these days. It’d just be cool to get some mail! I know I’m a goof. I’m actually praying my Mom will send me some warm fuzzy socks. I think she has a sock fetish, but for other people. She sees cute socks and buys them for you…so I need her to see the cutest warmest pair of socks ever and send them to me! My feet are freezing over here. I keep sleeping with my socks on – totally weird.

As for our house, we will be moving into our new home either Tuesday or Friday (there’s a lot riding on that). The inspection is today and as long as it passes we can sign the lease today.

However, that also means we need to give them the “rent and deposit”. Rent is 1200 pounds (aka $2400) and the deposit is 1300 pounds (aka $2500). So about 5 grand to hand over, the problem is – do we want to try to do that right now and what if the car takes all our money. We do get reimbursed and that should happen fairly quickly (like 3 days or something) but there is no guarantee either – it could take 7 days. We can not sit here for 7 days with zero dollars. I’m just thanking God we were advised to arrive with a set amount of money – I now see why, but even still you stretch and push things. Praise God we were able to put some back and save it for this move. And Thank God for a housing allowance – paying this much on rent is unheard of! In the states you think $900 is bad….try this!!! 

The kids will be starting school on Monday and we will have to buy gas. We bought uniforms (YIKES!). We will need some groceries as well. We have to pay for our car issues, plus road tax on two cars before we can drive either one …which means we are still currently renting a car!

Once we get the lease signed we also have to schedule delivery of our belongings and there is no telling how long that could take, 3-7 days, depending on how busy they are. Everyone is PCSing here or PCSing out, so those people are busy. I do think they try to get to you as quickly as they can but things seems to move slow over here…so my version of quick is not the same as theirs.

So as I said there is a lot “riding” on which day we will get to move in. Either we front the money and ride the next few days out on faith or we wait. Which one would God want us to do, he didn’t create us to be stupid, but at the same time is this one of those times where we’re just supposed to trust? I don’t know. I want to be in our home so badly that my impatience could interfere with our decision, so I’m trying really hard to accept that we may not move in until Friday (one more week of Temporary Lodging).

I stepped out a little bit the other day, at the bank, I know strange place to make a friend. We had to go set up a pounds account and a dollar account (it’s all so confusing!) and anyway the lady that helped was Jennifer. She’s been married I think she said 3 years, this their first assignment, and her husband is currently deployed. She’s also from Missouri! So she and I chatted some obviously, but when I left, I left her with my email – whether or not she emails me is yet to be determined, but I just thought you know she might get lonely over here all by herself, with just her dog (I think she said she had a dog). Thankfully, she does have a job and that can keep her busy. She said she was getting to go home for Thanksgiving – so that will be a big blessing to her. Just keep her in your prayers; it’s pretty lonely when your man is gone for months.

On that note, that reminds me of something. If you have an old cell phone that you no longer use or plan on letting your kid have to play with there is a thing where you can send cell phones to soldiers who are deployed. I’ve been holding on to ours because I lost the little baggie that you put them in – however in the Military spouse magazine I found their website www.cellphonesforsoldiers.com .

I was reading this article on “Clean up your act, when in doubt, throw it out!” You know how I like to get rid of stuff! Anyway, there are a few other websites for other things, so when you’re cleaning out – maybe these could come in handy:
1. www.salvationarmyusa.org (furniture, clothing, and household items) I think we all know this one.
2. www.operationpaperback.org (gently used paperback books) I never heard of this one.
3. www.veteransadvantage.com (used computer cartridges, laptops, and PDAs)
4. www.operationhappynote.com (musical instruments)

Anyway – that’s all I found, so just when you’re cleaning out what you call junk remember it could be someone’s treasure and be a blessing to them.

Well, that’s about it…I know LONG one uh? Keep ya busy until I get a chance to write about whatever happens today. I’m not quite sure what we are doing yet. David went into work for a while, the kids took baths, and I’ve been sitting here typing. We are kinda waiting on the mail to arrive to see if our insurance on the UK car arrived or not, because we can’t pay the road tax or something until we have proof of insurance. I don’t know – like I said this car crap is a mess big time! I know we have to go get groceries, find shoes for the kids to wear to school…and I don’t know what else. Maybe veg out. I can’t wait to take pictures of the kids in their cute little uniforms – I know I’m weird…it’s okay though – I like me this way…I’d be boring otherwise.

Talk to you soon – enjoy your long read. Hope you liked the pictures!

~T~