the adventures of pinkaholic girl

hello :o)

ooh, it's been a while. Work has occupied a lot of my head space recently. I've been wrestling with code/database scripts, and frustrating work processes like i) having exclusive checkouts in a team of 20, ii) having an international development team that writes the architecture and communicates seemingly only via msn messenger, iii) not giving developers db owner access to the db server with their windows login.... instead we have fights over the one login available on the development server that has the rights to do anything. (eventually, you get sick of fighting and use the admin account to create another user for yourself so you can actually get some work done. ha.)

I've had a fantastic time outside of work though, so overall there is balance :) I went to Norway a couple of weeks ago, have yet to upload the photos because there are so many of them! but it was a nice trip, I'd like to go for longer and actually hike around some of the fjords. But if you ever go to Bergen, take the cable car up to the mountain tops, and bring some walking shoes. It won't be long before you feel like you're in the middle of nowhere. You can't get much better views for less effort :)

Weekend before last was a trip up to Cambridge to visit Anika, which was seriously awesome. The weather was absolutely gorgeous - sunny skies and warm weather both days! As soon as we'd arrived, we collected our bikes for the weekend and rode off to her college. I haven't actually cycled along the roads before, so it was pretty scary (especially without a helmet!) but it's a high-student-population-with-bikes town, so the drivers were used to it.

Her college has its own punts, so we made excellent use of the facilities :D you're not allowed to ever laugh at other people's poor efforts at punting until you've tried it yourself. Anika has some kind of sixth sense when it comes to water craft (she is a rower, after all), but Cally and I had some issues with steering. I was experiencing a mysterious gravitational pull towards thick overhanging willow trees, and Cally had the same sense towards concrete walls. After a picnic lunch, Cally and I retired to our room for a rest before our dinner appointment, which involved cycling through the countryside to a gastropub along the river cam for a filling meal. Unfortunately we couldn't stay for dessert, so we did a thing I'm not particularly proud of: went to tescos and bought two litres of ben and jerrys ice creams to eat in our hotel room and cancel out all that exercise! sigh.

Next day we were up and enjoying a full english breakfast at our hotel (mmmm.... fried goodness) before cycling to The Three Horseshoes, which is a gastropub in Madingley and a really fantastic place to lounge around on a lazy Sunday if you get an outdoor table. Then, to top off the eating tour, we had tea and scones at the orchard, former haunt of many an author and student. Basically this involves a giant garden and lots of deck chairs and some very tempting bakery goods....



Back to Cambridge, we had a dinner booked in at Anika's college hall, which was a pompous three course affair. Students of the college have to wear their black gowns, and they serve you the main course in stages. Tee hee! Check out the cambridge photo album for all the goods.





Thanks so much to Anika for being an awesome guide. :)

Next weekend I'm in Paris with Vicki, and coincidentally also Niall who will be there with his folks. I'm anticipating some good food and hopefully shopping. :)

posted by d @ 7:30 am