The joy of looking like an idiot

Week two is done, and I am well into my first week without grandma (aka any comfort of home). It's been good b/c I can now focus on settling into my flat and working as late as I want to (yeah, so far not seeing a big difference in UK/American hours, but we'll see), but it's also been hard to officially be on my own and floundering through every day by myself. I keep telling myself that there will only be a few weeks of looking like an idiot and then I'll start to get my feet on the ground and after only a few months this place will seem nearly as familiar as Kansas City is to me. In the meantime, I just have to suffer through the times when I get off at the wrong bus stop and have to walk seven extra blocks to get home, try to no avail to fax something back to the States and all the while standing right next to it while the thing screeches and everyone in the office stares at me, and nearly smashing into everyone on the street b/c I'm walking on the wrong side of the sidewalk or stairway (they walk on the "other" side as well as drive).

My first experience at the grocery store was a halfway success. It was very busy and the aisles were really tiny with everyone pushing past each other and I felt really rushed, so I didn't end up finding the sugar and flour even though I went through all of the aisles about two times. My flatmate went the next day and told me that he found them no problem - so I am apparently blind. I also got a package of something labeled "turkey", but it is certainly not turkey from the taste of it. Either that or they put some disgusting spice in it. Let's just say I did not have the most pleasant experience eating my "turkey" sandwich for dinner last night. But I did find some really good cheese and crackers, and they have great cereal, which is the basis of my entire diet anyway, so I was happy.

Oh, and I have to say thank you Mom for the Cheez-its!! They arrived on Tuesday, and I laid on the couch and ate about half of the box on Tuesday night.

Last week before grandma left we went on the London Eye, and she bought the champagne flight (they call them "flights" b/c it's run by British Airways - clever), so we got to the front of every line and had chapmagne on our little go-round. Gotta love grandma! On Saturday we went to see the Lion King and it was amazing, it's defintely one of my favorite shows ever. If you haven't seen it make a point to go, you'll be blown away.

I had my first pint at a pub after work last Friday (pint and a half, actually), and had some good banter with one of my British colleagues about whether or not England is a country. By the way, don't ever have this conversation with a Welsh, Scottish, or Northern Irish person, apparently they might get very defensive. For the record and those who are not sure, I am currently living in the country of the UK, and England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland are all kind of like states, although some people here refuse to acknowledge that fact. Seriously. We also talked a lot about football (soccer), b/c I want to start following it and need to choose a team. He tried to sway me to his side of course, but it's not even a London team and I'm definitely going to root for a London team. I'll report back on what I decide. Hopefully I won't get shot for my decision or trampled in a staduim during a game or anything.

I got all moved into the flat this weekend, and Andrea (his name is pronounced like Andre the giant, with an A on the end) spear-headed a major "reformation" of the whole place. We somehow got the whole place painted for free by professional painters through one of his connections (amazing!), and we did a few other things and cleaned the place inside and out. It looks incredible now, not that it didn't before but it's stunning now. I'm so proud of it. I say "we" like I did a lot of it, but I didn't help as much as I should have - since grandma was still here I spent most of the weekend hanging out with her. I did go shopping with her though for new things for the flat and got really fantastic sheets! They jumped from cheap to really expensive, so I decided to treat myself.

At work it seems like I've been getting all the crappy projects that no one else has time for so the new person gets it, but I think I've got some real client work coming up that will be more substantial and seem more worthwhile to me. I had a meeting with the partner who's in charge of my group though, and he seems really laid-back and intelligent, and gave the impression that he really cared that I got a meaningful experience from my secondment and wanted to make sure that it meets my expectations. I'll be spending about half of my time in the regular audit department doing the same thing that I did back in the States, and the other half of my time in a group called FRAG, Financial Reporting Assistance Group. This is a team that assists clients in converting to IFRS (international financial reporting standards). So this experience will be excellent for me b/c US public companies will have to convert to IFRS by 2014, so they will be starting right around the time of my return, making my expertise very useful. If I stay in public accounting, of course. :) The partner in charge of my group told me that I should consider taking the test to become certified in IFRS which would help accelerate my understanding, but I told him I had to think about it. I mean really, do I want to spend 3-4 months of my secondment studying?? Hell no. But...it would be really useful strictly for my personal knowledge, since the damn thing won't even be recognized in the US. I don't know, we'll see.

Ok, enough about the boring work stuff, b/c I know you non-accountants have probably stopped reading by now. Some funny/interesting stories:

The other day an English guy came up to me on the street and asked if I knew where a particular tube (subway) stop was, and amazingly, I did. So I told him it was just around the corner and about a block down and he said, "A block, what's a block?", to which I responded, "you know, like a city block in between streets." He said, "Oh, you're American." I asked a Brit about this later and apparently they have no word equivalent to "block", they just say "down the street". Real creative.

Almost everyone has asked me about the upcoming US presidential election, and who I am going to vote for. I've been surprised about the level of interest, b/c (apologies for sounding egotistical), for the most part we don't really care about elections in other countries.

I was reading a magazine the other day and came across an ad that said "American Living" and had loads of pictures of traditional American things, and it made my heart ache. I really miss everyone so much. I'm having a great time here so far, but I just wish I could have brought all of you with me. So...you'll just all have to come and visit!

Wow, this was a long one. Hope you haven't fallen asleep yet. Or better yet, I hope it was a welcome break from your workday! :) Love you all, and don't be shy about posting comments to my blog!

Cheers,
Heather