Shopping Trip!

With myself!

Yes, after a bit of waiting (or perhaps own waiting) I finally got some paperwork from the Army confirming their acceptance of me, and my start date and suchlike.
I was called in yesterday to go through some paperwork with them, so after an incredibly bad night's sleep (friday: 9am-3pm, then 11pm until 2:30am on saturday - and then completely unable to sleep before eventually getting out of bed at 8:30am) along I went, signed a couple of things (that's basically all it was), and had the rest of the afternoon to myself, with a big packing list of things to take.

See, in addition to all the shouting and running around and climbing up trees etc etc, There is actually a lot of classroom work involved in training. With this in mind, I wrote down some of my packing list, and went round a tour of the local shops to get various items on it.

First stop? Breakfast, actually. Turning up in Mcdonalds nearly half an hour after they stopped breakfast, I asked nicely if they had any McMuffins (my favourite) left, and they did.
So I sat downstairs for a while eating my breakfast and reading through various paperwork and whatnot, and eventually set off out round town. After a fashion. You see, (and I didn't know this), 3 or 4 times a year, apparently, Sheffield has a continental market (which continent exactly? There were chinese noodles, polish cuisine, flowers from holland, coffee from italy, curries from india etc etc), and as a result, the entire pedestrianised shopping area was full from one side to the other, with market stalls sellinf a huge variety of fantastic and interesting and (in some cases) very nice smelling goods. Everything from African handmade art items, wood carvings etc etc, to Chinese noodles, Italian Gelato, North Korean paranoia, and German beer.
And one of those cool things we saw in london, a huge barbecue pan thing suspended over a fire. All this under the huge circular span of the Wheel of Sheffield, which as usual was rotating in its circular type way.

For some reason, maybe it was the lack of sleep, the strange and wonderful smells from the market, the fact I had money to spend, or the lovely weather, I was in a really good mood, and for some reason, this mood persisted throughout the day. I actually found myself smiling a lot, laughing at jokes I'd normally consider crappy, and seeing a couple of toy stalls, smiling at the idea of my lovable ickle nephew playing with some of them. I was in a mood to be very nice to people, a state of genuinely wishing the world well, and to be honest, whatever the reason for it, it was wonderful :-). I dunno maybe I breathed someone's drugs in accidentally or something.

Remembering the toy stall, I resolved to buy something for the ickle guy in my travels.

So I wandered round here there and everywhere, buying "masculine hygeine" products (extortionately priced razors/blades, shower gel, etc etc) and stationary stationery (the stationery didn't move about) like marker pens, nice gel pens and other cool stuff, for all the classroom lessons.

I wandered to one of the hardware stores and bought some padlocks. For some reason, all three padlocks (they were a 3 pack) take the same key, and each padlock came with two keys.
So I have three identical padlocks with six identical keys. Bizarre!
Now maybe because of the lack sleep or whatever, I found myself blissfully drifting round most of the day, walking right past stuff I wanted to buy, several times, while trying to find it.

I also came out with the comedic concern that if those six keys fitted my padlocks, I didn't want to buy them because maybe everyone else who bought those three-packs "from any other Wickes in the country" would be able to open mine with their keys.

Fortunately I realised my incredible stupidity before I left empty handed (the hardware store was a bugger to find), blinked, turned on my heel and with a sweet smile, marched back to the counter, padlocks in hand.

Eventually, after buying some hungry hippos for my nephew (who didn't get one because he was an absolute little sod!!!) yesterday, I returned home, and resisted the urge to sleep until about 10pm when I fell asleep during a documentary on sniper rifles.

Today, I woke up, having slept well, and went out with my parents to enjoy some time in the sun at the chip shop.
Unfortunately my dad got a strop on at "being excluded" from conversations between my mum and myself (twice he's butted in and twice he's politely but firmly been told to mind his own business) and drove home, leaving my mum and I at the chip shop.

Not to worry though because the weather was lovely, and the chips were amazingly good.
Deciding we were going to walk home, my mum send me to the shop opposite to buy some bottled water, and I laughed inwardly when I saw what greeted me.

Just inside the shop, the owner had a shelf, neatly filled up with various kinds of cider, White Lightning, White Dragon, White Cobra, White Viper, White Reticulated-bloody-python, Diamond Ice, Diamond Jack, Diamond White, more diamonds than a bloody jewellers. Oh, and Frosty Jack's.
Below this he had two shelves of Lambrini. All straight at the front of the shop, opposite the door.

Now for people outside the UK (the citizens of which would immediately find this amusing) who are wondering what is funny, all the brands above, some of which may or may not exist, are firmly thought of as, Hmm. Budget drinks. That is, Cheap drinks. Inexpensive but strong drinks, usually entirely made with synthetic ingredients (In the same way that a fast-food fizzy orange isn't made from oranges, I doubt any of those ciders have ever seen an apple) that can (and usually are) be bought by underage teens with their pocket money, thus allowing even impoverished teenagers to get drunk and go round smashing windows with hammers and whatnot, and generally keep the police busy.

It's nice to see just how keenly this shopkeeper follows the needs of the local community.
Well it made me smile anyway.

Here are some pickatures. Only one of them is visible at the moment, the others I forgot to upload, but here they are anyway. I wanted to get some of my puppy, at special request, but I'm afraid I have one of my last shifts at work in 40 minutes and must go!

Bye for now :-).

PART TWO: PUB MEAL

Sunday 25th:
Had a nice sleep, and went off to the pub to have a nice pub meal with the family.
Was quite nice for us to get together and a nice day was had by all.
Popped in to see grandad afterwards, and then had a bit of a cycle ride round the park.

Also took some more photos for Lexi :-). Our puppeh continues to be a cute and awesome and affectionate little girl :-).