Reading Festival 2008

Every year over the August Bank Holiday weekend (long weekend) the Reading Festival takes place in Reading, where I live. The Festival is very similar to the UK's Glastonbury Festival, the USA's Woodstock Festival and dare I say SA's Oppikoppi.

It's a music festival attracting (a record this year) of 80,000 people, some which camp on-site for 4 days. The bands playing are normally up and coming rock bands, with a few main acts. This year famous names included the Manic Street Preachers, The Ting Tings, The Fratellis, Metalicca and The Killers.

The festival organisers stay at our hotel, which is right next to the site. As I arranged all their accommodation, I managed to get 2 free tickets for the Saturday, when The Killers played.

Willie and I went in around 13h00, and spent the day with some of his colleagues who also attended. We had a nice spot near the Main stage (there are about 6 stages) and did loads of people watching. With it being a Rock Festival, there is a fair amount of "interesting characters" milling about.

At around 21h00 we made our way forward to get a good standing spot for The Killers, who played at 22h00. It was amazing!!!!!! I was a very big fan of their music before seeing them live, but now I am a devoted fan! A fantastic live show - they played all their hits and ended the show with some fireworks from the stage, and all these little white pieces of paper raining down. Click here for videos:

Mr Brightside

All these things that I have done (The Finale)

Look at how dumb-struck the Lead singer is at the end.....

Mom's Birthday

On Friday 15th August we celebrated Mom's birthday at Leon and Elizma's with a lovely fondue.

Happy Birthday Meis!!

Road trip

Dad and I went to Liverpool this weekend. WOW!!! What a great place.

We stayed at John Lennon Airport at the Holiday Inn. Took the bus into town and walked around Albert Docks, which are the old docks of the city, now converted into a modern shopping and restaurant mecca. Also home to the Beatles Museum.

At 14h30 we went on the Magical Mystery Tour, discovering interesting things about the Beatles, like how they all met, where they lived and placed featured in famous songs like Penny Lane and Strawberry Fields.

We had dinner at Blue in Albert Docks, and then went for a few drinks in town. We took a taxi home and chatted to the Liverpodian taxi driver. A hard accent to understand, but the people are soooo friendly.

After breakfast on Sunday morning we drove to Anfield, home of Liverpool FC. Then we headed back home.

Thanks for a lovely weekend Dad!!!

Love you!

Click here for our photos and comments on the places

Murphy - the dog with 9 lives

Yesterday, I was performing a long overdue clean of my car in the car park in front of my house. Murphy was playing in the garden, which is enclosed. He is forever barking, and at one stage when I switched off the vacuum cleaner, it was ever so quiet. I was quite please that he had found something to amuse himself with, and stopped barking.

I carried on with my cleaning, only to hear the sound of silence once again when I turned the hoover off. I though to myself that he must be digging or chewing, as that is the only time he keeps quiet in the garden.

I continued hoovering............truth be told, the next minute I see a little black head pop into the car next to me, panting like he's just run the Durban July......

Upon investigation, I found he had somehow managed to bend open the chicken wire my dad had put up to secure the garden. I reckon this has been a "project" or "escape plan" he has been working on for a few weeks, as the hole was rather large. Something like the canine version of the Shawshank Redemption. The only thing he still had to do was cover the hole with a photo of Lassie!

He must have been out and about for 10-15 minutes, but the prodical son returned, just like that time in South Africa, only slightly sooner this time. (Thanks Murphs)

Bless you Murphy - you're a true Legend!

I Love you Baby

Just look at the proud grandparents...

Dad is so good with the editing of movie files!

Model for Advanced Hair Studio

Duppies does London

My good friends Francois and Jeanne, as Jeanne's cousin and hubby, came to visit me here in the UK.

They spent 2 weeks in Croatia on a yacht, and ended their holiday in the UK. We spent some time in London, visited Bath and Bradford-on-Avon and Stonehenge.

Click here to see our photos.

It was so lovely to see them again, and made me realise how much I miss them, and all my other loved ones in SA. Thank goodness my family is here.

So here's to all my friends in SA!! Who's visiting next??