Hola de espana

So we have arrived in Spain. Things could be going better. I'm walking like a cripple. We have and are still experiencing some mobile technology problems. Not to mention the BBC looks really weird outside of the UK. Also Spain has had some of its worse flooding in a while. We have spent probably more time indoors then out and it's all been very emotional up to now.
So much to say I guess the best place is to start from the beginning.

So Wednesday morning I got about 4 hours sleep. I woke up 2 hours before my alarm was to go off and decided to stay up as I was far too excited.

After saying goodbye to the missus family we headed for the airport. Everything went pretty smoothly in the airport. We got through check-in and security rather quickly. Although we did have to pay an extra £40 as we were carrying to much.

The plane ride wasn't the most fun. I was extra squashed on this journey as I had giant heavy boots on and a bag at my feet which left my legs with not a lot of room.
Arriving at the airport was a little bumpy. The weather outside was drizzly. The sky looked horrible, but the air warm as we stepped out. It wasn't the greeting we wanted, but it was OK.

We picked up our keys from the estate agents and made our way to the apartment. The area seems really residential. I guess we were expecting more of a holiday home, which it is not.
We were even more disappointed to find out the communal pool is more communal then we had expected. It's shared between two apartment blocks. It's empty and closed at the moment so we don't know what to expect when its full. I hope there is room to chill out in the summer.

We didn't have a lot of time in the apartment as we had to leave to go pick up some new fresh bedding and towels.
The trip to the nearby centro commercial was a bit of an adventure. We had no idea where to get off the bus or where to get the connecting tram. We played it cool and managed to time our bus departure correctly and get off in the right area. There was no problem with finding the large shopping centre and we quickly had picked up our bed stuffs and were about to head home. When we got to the tram stop there was a message on the electric board saying the tram was out of service. We hung around for a bit and nothing changed. So we decided to walk back down to the bus stop, it seemed pretty straight. But we soon realised that there was no path. So we went to a near by bus stop. There was no bus timetables or route numbers. We wondered about hoping to find something to help us. Eventually we bumped in to some Spanish people at one bus stop and had to ask in basic Spanish if we were at the right bus stop. We were told we were. Phew.
A bus ride later and we were at the main bus stop and had a ticket for the bus back home to Nerja. Only problem was we had to wait around for 45 minutes.

It was pretty emotional day altogether. We were in a foreign town. Tired. Sore feet. We had been up since 2 in the morning and hadn't eaten since before our flight. And the flat wasn't all we had dreamt.

We had a nice meal that afternoon. Ate out. When we got back we pretty much went to sleep immediately hoping that our first day would be are only bad day and that our views on the apartment and its areas were clouded by the fact we were tired, hungry, feeling lost and running on empty.
But day two had its own twist. More about that later.

You might spot my flickr is updated. All the photos need to be tagged and labelled. I'll post some of the better ones soon. For now though here is a panorama view of the distance from our house to the beach.


Click here for the full size.
If you want to know where we live, are apartment is the high rise that is towards the left edge of the panorama. If you can spot where the photos are stitched (which should be easy as the images have different brightness) we are just to the right of the edge of the first photo.

Right I'm off to read all of you. My RSS feed says I have 96 new messages. I'll be a little busy.

Now it's time to get excited.

In less then 24 hours I'll be a few thousand feet above France.

Destination: A new home and a new life.

Me and the missus have been planning this move for a few months. The excitement has slowly built up like a snowball being rolled in the snow.
The last three weeks have been a bit tiring. We've travelled up North to say goodbye to my family, had to get rid of the pet fish and said goodbye to various friends and more recently the missus family.
All this saying goodbye wasn't fun. Obviously there are downsides when moving country, like not taking your loved ones with you.

But each visit to a family member or friend has had the conversation about how excited we are, but knowing that we still have day even weeks left. The excitement, being honest, has gotten a little tiring. Don't get me wrong, I can't wait to step off the plane. Actually I can't wait to get our essential first few days out of the way and take the short 5 minute walk down to the beach. But those that have moved will know that feeling of all the anticipation having built up over months and you just want to get rid of it.
I just want so see the new house. Want to start my new life. I want to be able to take sunset walks down the beach in warm weather. Go to weekly farmers markets and haggle, badly, in Spanish.

Then there has been my constant daily checking of facebook groups for Nerja and message boards which has only increased my excitement to very high levels.

But there isn't long left. 23 hours and we will be taking off. A few more hours and we will be dumping our bags and enjoying the new beach and mountain scenery.
The anticipation will then be able to trail out of us the closer we get to the house.

The excitement. Well that's going to stay for some time.

Although there are a few things I could moan about, and that could make any jealous people smile. The Euro is at it's highest against the Pound ever. We won't be getting as much for our savings. Although we will be getting in jobs in Spain so hopefully not spend to much of the savings.
And the forecast for the first few days is going to be rain and mild temperature. It might not be until after the weekend that we see some really good "go and hang out at the beach weather."

Right I'm off to unpack my suitcase to see if I have packed everything.
The next you hear from me I'll hopefully be blogging my from my back garden.


But if we haven't got wifi, I'm sure there will be plenty of bars by the beach that we can use :D

And for those that missed it, make sure you check out my previous blog about many different ways to follow our adventure.

Wish us luck and I'll see you on the other side.

Is that it?

It's getting pretty close to the move. So close infact my phone now displays the calender entry on it's front screen.

Everytime I look at my phone I see this

We moved the fish yesterday too. Unfortunately due to us panicking a bit about the fish we forgot to pick up the camera to celebrate their Big Move to a garden pond.

Tank before the move

Empty tank after the move
There werent any problems with moving the fish in the end. It might be hard to spot Annie (the bigger white fish) as about 50% of the fish in the new pond are big and white like her.
But they seemed to like their new surroundings. The cutest moment was Larry the Loach, after being let out of the bag, came up for a little mouthful of air before disappearing to the bottom of the pond, where he will most likely spend the remainder of his time playing at the foot of the waterfall in the bubbles. I hope he is enjoying himself
I'd love to see him, and the other three, again some time in the future.

So I've started my packing. I've already sent off about a third of my clothes to my mum so I can use some of the baggage allowance she had spare. The remainder of the clothes here are slowly filling up my brand new, to be used only once, suitcase.

The case looks like its about half full. But I know its not close to being full as every time I close the lid it drops down and closes without any resistance at all. I'm not close to filling it.

There isn't much more to pack. I have a few work pants and shirts hanging up. A few other things, a tshirt or two and pair of jeans. Basically anything that is coming back from the washing machine clean is going straight in to the suitcase.

Now we have loads of hangers that have no use

There has been a bit of debate over the packing management too. I've packed my clothes by rolling everything. The way I see it things may be a bit taller, but they are not as wide. The missus on the other hand has gone for folding everything. Everything may be flat, but it's also longer. There is a bet going on as to who can fit in the most in the suitcase - without going over the 20kg allowance.

It's only a few more days now. Less then a week in-fact. I've got 1 more day in work, a weekend with the missus family then two days of cleaning up the flat and turning in to a giant stick of excitement. Can't wait!


Ducky looking lost. Guardian of the fish no more.

Making a dash for The Future and Teh Interwebs

UPDATED 08 APRIL 2008

You might of noticed a few small changes to the layout of my blog recently.

With moving to Spain I've started to embrace new technologies to enable my family to keep more in touch with me.

Some new features to my blog are you can now easily digg any of my blog posts if you so please.

You can also find my Digg (what I am reading online), Twitter (what I am upto at this minute) and Flickr (what I can see) badges on the side and if you use either of these why not add my to your list of followers/diggers/contacts/friends. The more the merrier.

EDIT: We have now found a decent website for our videos. Check out robbiesherman.blip.tv for video updates of what we are up to.

Get rich fast and die trying

I have found a new favourite website.

Starnow.

You can find jobs for a variety of different media vacancies, like being Miss England, being a TV extra, a musician or photographer.

Some of my favourite are from the Magazines and Newspapers section. This really is were journalism sells out. I'm not sure if this is a contributing factor to the state of journalism today or a product.
Basically you will be paid for writing stories of various problems you've had or things happen to you.

Some of my favourite ones are;

Did Computer Games Make You Turn To a Life of Crime?
A national newspaper wants your story and will pay hundreds of pounds to the right person.
Write a few lines about how computer games turned you to crime and if it's something we like, we'll call you straight back.

"Yes I was playing Mario Kart when I decided to go joy ride and chuck turtle shells at people in front of me. Although the downside was someone through some squid ink in my eyes and I couldn't see for 30 seconds."

My brush with facebook
Have you missed out on a job opportunity or discovered your partner was having an affair through using facebook?
Have you been sacked because of a silly picture you had on your site?
A woman's glossy weekly magazine wants to hear from you and will pay for your time and trouble.
Please apply now to take part or for more information.

I can imagine everyone, of you female readers, will be able to add 2cents to that.

Playing the same lotto numbers for more than 10 years and never won?
Have you been playing the same lotto numbers for ten years or more each week but are not giving up.
I need your story - I need to speak to you for a series I am doing for a women's magazine
Please include your phone number in reply as it is often not in the profile.
You'll be interviewed on the phone, need to provide a couple of pics as well
Please apply now to take part or for more information.

There is something great about loyalty. But you have to learn when to change.

Weird and wacky weddings
Did you opt for something out of the ordinary when you tied the knot?
A women's magazine is looking for brides who bucked the white wedding trend. So maybe you made your big day fancy dress, your dog was a bridesmaid, or you got married with dolphins?
Whatever your story, if you haven't appeared in a women's magazine before then please apply today....

What are the chances Jordan is thinking "damn it, if I change my name to Jordont will anyone recognise my wedding photos"?
If any story can get printed without a personal quote from the bride saying "people have always said I'm a bit mental hehe" then I will gladly except that journalism is only just hitting it's peak.

Is your name Jesus or do you have a birthday on 25th Dec?
Is your name Jesus first or middle?
Do you have a birthday on Dec 25th?
I would love to hear form you for a UK womens magazine story.
You will be interviewed on phone, need to send pics and possibly take part in photo shoot.
Please include your phone number I reply as I am under deadline
Please no time wasters - only apply if you are prepared to be involved in the article.

I don't even know where to start with this.
How did they get this idea past the editor?
What made them think this would be good?
Have they already cleared some space above the fireplace for their Pulitzer?
What made them think writing "please no time wasters" would deter anyone?
Do they have the internet in Longview Psychiatric Unit?
Will this be there lead story?

Anyway, I highly recommend you check out the site. You might be able to make some extra cash. If your story gets published just remember me ;)

A little bit of Radiohead news.

Not content with distributing In Rainbows in their own way, Radiohead have another way of marketing their singles.

With the release of Nude just around the corner (next Monday on CD single or can be downloaded now at some online stores) Radiohead have set up a website so people can buy seperate components of the song, ie bass, voice, guitar and remix their own version. If they want to people can also upload their creation and have everyone vote on them.

radioheadremix.com

Thats much better then just sticking it Capital Radios 8 song playlist.

Neat.

PS Radiohead take over BBC Radio2 today with a whole bunch of live performances and interviews. It all kicks off at 2.

Happy April Fools

Happy April Fools day people. This is always one of my favourite days as I like taking part in, reading about, seeing practical jokes.

Unfortunately I haven't got the chance to carry out any practical jokes as the missus was far too asleep this morning to realise I would even be speaking to her.

But really it doesn't get any better then this

The Cottingley Fairies.

I salute you Frances Griffiths and Elsie Wright, great work. Genius stuff from some creative kids.

Obviously some modern day ones are taken far too seriously, like this one from The Sun saying Fabio Capello can't be bothered learning English so has told the England squad to learn Italian.
Some of the 'Reader Comments' are pretty idiotic. Football fans at times can be a proper stupid bunch.
One fan Man United fan said "The clue is in the job title, "England Manager", if you cant lean it, take a hike!"

What has been your favourite practical joke, either in popular culture or something more personal to you?
Have you done any pranks this morning?

PS, I'd just like to add, my favourite piece of news today, in a non-joke way, is the reports of the man who lost his house over the weekend when the plane crashed in to it. With the greatest respect to the pilot and crews families, I couldn't help but smile at news that the man of the house won't be returning home just yet as he is finishing off his golfing holiday and his wife has good taste so she can do the decorating.