This is the first weekend in a while in which both Katie and I have had no plans (and before my weekends are all booked out for the rest of the year doing this, that, and the other). I biked out to Windsor back in May while Katie was stuck in New Zealand sorting out her UK entry visa. Since I rather liked the place and she'd never been, and since we're trying to do a few day-trips since she has a company car at her disposal, we decided to take a drive out there this weekend. However, the weather forecast was for the storm of the decade: torrential rain, 120km/h winds, and all that good stuff. Be that as it may, it was sunny this morning, and although the sky started to cloud over a little it didn't look too menacing, and we both really wanted to get out of the house so off we went. Bad idea hehe. It was hardly the storm of the decade, but it was wet, it was windy, and it was British ;)

We shared a car park with this beast: Nissan Skyline R33 - what I wouldn't give to still have mine from back home :(

Nice ass!

We walked into the middle of town (which is very pretty by the way - Windsor's a nice place!). Windsor Castle is one of the official residences of the Queen (apparently she spends most weekends here). The public can do tours through here, but I didn't bother last time, and we didn't bother this time either.

Bit moist out.

We walked around the back of the castle to the start of this - the Long Walk, leading 5kms south of the castle.

However it was really pissing down at this point and the wind had come up, so we took refuge in...

...the nearest pub hehe.

45-minutes and a couple ales later, the wind and rain had calmed so off we went.

The Long Walk has been around since about 1700, and half of it leads through Windsor Great Park which is a large deer park of some 5,000 acres and home to thousands of semi-wild deer that don't like being approached for photos hehe.

Although the rain had (mostly) gone, the wind hadn't and took every last leaf off the trees and sent them flying all over the place.

After a good 40-minutes walking and terrorising deer, we'd almost made it to the other end of the Long Walk.

And this is what's there - a big bronze statue of King George III, pointing at something fascinating in the sky over there (probably the planes taking off from Heathrow which is barely a stones-throw away).

Looking back north towards Windsor Castle.

On the way back Katie and I had some fun with the deer - we stalked them and chased them. Cheap thrills.

This morning on my way in to work I came across a cacophony of horns that caught my attention. This silly bitch was waiting to turn right as you can see, but wouldn't move into the intersection when the light went green. This intersection is such that unless you do so, the oncoming traffic doesn't leave you enough time once the lights turn orange and red to actually get around them before the adjacent traffic (now on a green light) starts coming at you. Subsequently, she missed her chance (twice), and the taxi driver and every other car behind started to let rip hahaha!

Only when disgruntled traffic began undertaking her (on a red light) did she finally get the message. Spot the cab driver still screaming his head off at her as they went round hahaha! Women drivers :)

Our (temporary) flatmates moved out last week and have been replaced with... a lot of stuff! We have a Hungarian couple in the process of moving all their crap in, and I'm hoping there's not too much more crap left to move in because as it stands my pool table is all but buried, we have bugger all bench space left in the kitchen for when I want to cook up a storm, and twice yesterday I walked straight into their shoe rack in the hallway en route to the toilet hahaha! As for them, well I've got no idea where they are (almost the perfect flatmates in that respect ;) - Katie and I are just living with their stuff.

Every lounge should have a bongo in it.

They've even got a welcome mat for their room hahaha! It's amazing how crap just two people can accumulate over time. And there's that damn shoe rack thing I keep walking into in the dark in front of the dunny!

The things some people will do to live in this country. More info here.

More fun on the way in to work this morning :) Traffic had ground to a halt and I could hear another cacophony of car horns up the road. This dork in the grey Vauxhall decided he wanted to turn right. However, by the time he'd decided this he was already halfway alongside the stationary queue of traffic waiting at a red light in the right-hand turning lane. So, he stopped in the middle of the road (in the straight ahead lane), put his indicator on and just sat there waiting for the queue to move and create a gap for him. In doing so he held up an entire lane of London's main east-west arterial route through the north of town - what a prick! After holding his horn solidly for a good 20 seconds, the guy in the white van behind got out, stormed up, ripped this arsehole's door open and (verbally) abused the hell out of him all while the traffic behind was still letting rip with their horns hahaha!

The All Blacks took on England at Twickenham today in atrocious weather. I saw them in Cardiff two weeks ago and would've loved to have seen them here, but instead had to settle for the pub.

Richie McCaw, the good-looking guy that he his, got things started with the Haka while the pale little Pommy poofters looked on in confusion.

It was a nervous start by the AB's, going into half time 6-all, with Dan Carter having a shocker of a game. The second half was more like it with England failing to pick up a single point and ending the game 6-19. Straight afterwards we saw Scotland beat Australia for the first time in 27 years by just a single point after Matt Giteau royally fudged a conversion right on full-time from almost right in front of the up-rights hahaha! Not a good day to be the mouthy Aussies in the pub next to us because man we cheered the Scottish on (especially me ;)

In other news check out the latest energy drink on the market: Pussy, sponsored by MTV hahaha! I haven't tried any yet (I was very hung over today after the rugby last night, and opted for PowerAde instead), but I'll be sure to try some Pussy as soon as possible.

Peckham, an area of dodgy old South London - about 4am this morning on the left and about 7pm tonight on the right. Twice in the past while biking through this area I've been diverted due to a road closure because somebody's been stabbed. Anyway, this block of flats went up in flames (and a neighbouring pub was destroyed) after fire broke out in a construction site next door. 300 were evacuated, 150 fire fighters had a crack at it, and it all set off quite rapidly apparently but at the moment the cause is unknown (my money's on arson). Resident John Osagie was quoted as saying "I was scared and I had to take some of my stuff and come and stand out in the cold, innit." - well that's no good John, that's no good at all. I obviously didn't take the shot on the left (no way I'd be wandering around here at 4am) - I stole it from here. The shot on the right was the best I could get. I did at one point slip through a cordon behind another guy and get a full-on view of the carnage, but couldn't get a shot in before we were swarmed upon by police (My usual "I'm a tourist and I'm a bit lost since you've cordoned off my normal route" line always works ;)