Peeple - I miss them so.

Laura & Luke
Originally uploaded by lauraespence.

I stumbled on this picture a couple of weeks ago - and it made me think; the last time Em, Luke, Laura and I were on the same continent at the same time was 2003. Damn! That's a long time...

It's funny, really. When you're in familiar surroundings, you don't really think about it, and when you're just settling in, you don't really have the time to - but now, when the dust has settled, and you're not fazed by a trip to the shops like you were in the first couple of months, you start to think about how disparate your peeps are. Not in a maudlin way, you understand; most of the people concerned are coming (or plan to come) to visit during the course of our stay, so no worries there (and Laura, consider this an open invitation to cross the pacific anytime you want), but the fact that it's just that little bit harder to talk to people than it was bach in the UK is a little odd. However, I've managed to call people, thanks to Skype, and that's cool. But at the end of the day, it's no substitute for going for a coffee with someone (or sitting on a couch for that matter, drinking herbal tea and being rude about Eastenders - sorry J, P, B and C...)

Nakatsu's really started to feel like home the last couple of days. This is possibly a combination of more training at work, doing the same journey enough times that you can do it without really paying attention (that interesting tree becoming less and less interesting every day until 'wow - how did they manage that?' becomes 'only 4.2 mins to work' and eventually blends into the background), and finally getting 2 days off in a row (training, cover-shifts etc).
However, as soon as we settle down, as usual we're looking to mix it up. We're already starting to think about what to do next - we're in no particular rush, but it would be nice to do a season somewhere next year (07), and that would mean working very hard. I don't plan on staying with NOVA for more than a year, as i need varied experience if i want to get the DELTA/MA or some other such qualification, and we quite fancy another Asian country - perhaps China or Taiwan... but that's all really nebulous at the moment. We'll see...