Last week's latest

This week, I spent the first day travelling home from the Philippines. Leaving the Philippines is always a bit surreal as I always leave alone, leaving my husband there with his family. Visa process ongoing - this saga may be fleshed out in a future post. I'm sad to leave but also happy to be going home. The flights were the usual affair of drudgery, but all in all it was a relatively comfortable experience.

Now that I'm home, I am experiencing the usual thoughts of 'Was it a dream?' Sounds weird, I know. But being back home, I look back at that time, which was 28 days, and it barely feels like I've been away at all. It feels like it was all a dream, my imagination. How could I have been gone for so long and feel like it just wasn't real.

Well, to bring myself (and you) back to reality, I have picture proof. Enjoy!

What have I been up to this week?

📚 Reading -  Hired by James Bloodworth. This is a book I wanted to read for a long time, as I have heard about the working conditions in Amazon warehouses and how the author exposed these in his book. He goes to other bad-condition jobs including home help and a call centre. It's a great insight into modern Britain and the zero-hour contract setup, despite being a little overly academic at times.

🎙️Listening - Highasakite. I first got introduced to this indie pop band from Norway when watching the first series of Young Royals on Netflix. Since adding the song Samuria Swords from the show to my playlist, I would occasionally get recommendations for their other music and I love a lot of their stuff. (I originally didn't know their band name was in English, I simply assumed this rather long word was Norwegian and didn't try and process it).

📱App - JustPark. I take great joy in finding free parking, which is generally very easy to do in my hometown, and less easy to do in cities. I would drive around my town in the search for a free parking space, primarily due to my detesting paying for parking, but also because I never carry cash. Recently I discovered that my home town car parks actually use this handy app JustPark which lets me park and pay using my phone. Now, this could have been implemented months or years ago without my knowledge, but now that I know there is slightly less hatred of paying to park. Especially if it's raining.

📺Watching - Shadow and Bone. This show has been on my list for a while but I just never got around to watching it. Since coming back from my holidays, I fancied a new fantasy show, and one that showcases alot of diverse inclusion such as Shadow and Bone seemed like a great choice. I didn't expect it to be so dark and so much stabby-stabbyness. I'm loving it!

Thanks for reading

Aaron