D Day approaches. Today I have to do my pet hate - housework! C's parents are headed this way very shortly and we might have a guest tonight - well at least a visitor.

Just been out to the local Dutch store to buy decent coffee - not the usual brown muck from S****B**** - I had an espresso from there the other day and it had no effect whatsoever, a bland espresso? c'mon people!

Oh and by the way I hate G4 and comcast and may your company rot in hell! phew glad I've got that off my chest. The reason I'm venting is that TechTV - one of our most watched channels has been taken over by comcast's pathetic G4 gaming channel. Now we had the misfortune to watch G4 when we had cable - the whole channel is full of pre-pubescent presenters with zero personality - I think the fact they are hot looking is supposed to take your mind off the lack of well - anything else.

Haven't they ever heard of the phrase if it ain't broke don't fix it? Tech TV is a great station with lots of varied and fascinating programmes about technology. Their presenters educate you without making you feel like an idiot (I've learned lots of tweaks for my PC) they also have fun and make you laugh out loud sometimes. First G4 got rid of Leo, and now they've sacked the rest of the Screensavers staff and told them to reapply for their jobs in LA. Tech is based in San Francisco. Bye bye TechTV it was nice to know you. Maybe the staff could get Paul Allen to start another TV station but I'm not holding my breath:-(

Life may be cheap but trainers aren't!

Saturday - my old trainers - not to put to fine a point upon it - stink. They are only a year old and probably the most comfortable pair I've had in a long while but they are just nasty now. So on the way back from our shopping I dropped into World O' Shoes (it isn't called that but I can never remember the name).

My plan was to nip in buy the trainers and nip out again - no sweat - 5 maybe 10 minutes at most. How wrong I was!!!

A quick glance up and down the shelves revealed that no pair were less that $59.99, which is a ridiculous price for what are essentially a glorified pair of plimsoles. On to plan B, I used to have a pair of converse baseball boots which were comfy and oh-so-cheap. Obviously I was buying knockoffs in UK the real thing are - well you don't want to know how much they cost. Plan C the bargain area, at the back of the store. Now here I found the multi-coloured stuff but being difficult I wanted plain white. Finally, a pair of Keds, white and only 29.99. Yay!

World O' Shoes is exactly like any other shoeshop anywhere in the developed world. You go to pay and they try and sell you a whole bunch of crappy cleaning products and leather protectors.

The evening was fun as we went to see some friends of ours who live up the valley. We always have a good laugh when we go over to them and before our usual spirited political debate we watched Master and Commander on DVD and it was a lot better than I expected so much as I wanted to doze off on their very comfy sofa I watched the whole thing.

Sunday
Quiet, we went out to dinner at Charlie Chow's which C has been talking about taking me to since we moved over here. Very good food! After that we went over to H's concert, the second and as it turned out, last of the 04 season. It was OK, I could've done without the organist and the plaque ceremony.

Today
I've just been getting the house ready for C's parents who arrived in San Francisco last night. They will be here in a weeks time so I have to get my skates on.

Hi Folks

Yes, I know it's May - and where the hell have I been? I hear you cry.

Well working, travelling, the usual stuff. I'm gobsmacked that the time has gone soooo fast. In fact in less that 2 weeks C's parents will be back. There have been some changes mostly PC and jobwise. I now have my own sweet little PC, upstairs, my own office (small but perfectly formed) and a whole new e-mail address.

OK you know about Vegas, (cool and cool) my skiing prowess ( I can do the snow plough and we have pictures to prove it) Gaspacho (the best food in the whole wide world and I have the master's recipe) Let me tell you what we got up to last week.

One of my botanist friends needed a hand with surveying a bunch of plants in the South of Utah so she asked me to tag along. St George is a beautiful place, or at least it was until they came in and started building houses all over that georgous red rock scenery. You wouldn't catch me living down there - me no hypocrit.

We picked the hottest week to go down there (so far this year) it was in the low nineties when we started our first survey by the afternoon it was up to nearly 100 with a very hot, very strong wind blowing. I can't tell you what we surveyed or where we surveyed it but I can tell you that this plant is in the brink of being no more - mainly because the people who own the land want to sell it to developers so they can plough it over and build houses on it. They don't care about plants or even the animals that live all over this area. Our work was done by about 5.30 so we headed for the little mexican restaurant we found the night we arrived. They do great food but the Margaritas were the thing that brought us back. You guys know that I don't drink much but I do like a good Margarita and these were excellent.

Friday was more of the same except different species and we only stayed out about 4 hours because the pops were the ones we mapped last year - my directions to the place were bang on! Then we headed home with a longer than meant stop in Cedar City at a little coffee shop my friend had noticed on the way down. It was like walking into somebody's living room, the owner was friendly and chatty. It is also an internet cafe and their coffee comes in byte, mega, giga and kilo. I can recommend the "hamlet sandwich" my megabyte of coffee was just what I needed and we played chess over our lunch ( I still suck at it but we didn't complete the game so at least I didn't lose ) The place is called "the Kafe" and it's well worth seeking out.

Back in SLC the weather is nuts - it was so windy on Monday that it stirred up dustclouds and you couldn't see up the valley, tuesday and yesterday it rained like a son-of-a-bitch and today it's climbing back up into the seventies. What is with that?? I never thought I'd say this but I miss the rain. Tomorrow we're going hiking up in the Canyons - that should be fun so will probably post again on Monday.