lovely day

it has come to my attention that I have adopted the word lovely and that I have been using it entirely too much by north american standards. 'Lovely' was one of the first words to strike me as being very british during my first few weeks as its used to describe just about everything from people, weather, food, art, movies, etc, etc... its pretty universal and you hear someone say it at least once an hour if not more.

Originally, every time I heard the word it always took my by surprise because its used so often and made me think of that song from The King and I where they sing "lovely, lovely" over and over again... but I've lost that association because I've heard it so much and because I've picked it up myself.

In unrelated news, I recently saw a deal for the Jamie Oliver Taste of Italy cookbook on sale for ten pounds and so I snatched it up... thought it would be a nice treat to myself, and it would expand my abilities to cook italian since learning a lot about italian food while working at Gusto. I'm currently making a really nice soup with cannelini beans and kale so I'm hoping that it will turn out to be, of course, lovely.

I was put it a bit in a bad mood yesterday when I started to research my options for what I'm going to do as of March 1st a bit more seriously, and for the first time I came to the realization that british visa/work permit laws are extremely complicated. My basic plan was that if I was not going to work with the museum any longer than the six months that I would at least extend my visa for 15 days or so, so that I could stay in the country for the remainder of the time I'd paid rent to (I pay from the 15th to 15th) and that way I would have some time to say goodbyes to people and what not after finishing work... but apparently an application to extend my visa only 15 days could cost me about 355 pounds just to apply, and so that option is looking a little less than likely right now.

I did discover however that if I was serious about kicking around this place and working for a few months or maybe even longer, that I could quite easliy and quite affordably apply for a working holiday maker visa which would allow me to work and travel in england for up to two years... Although I know that I dont want to stay here two years, the work permit is designed to be incredibly flexible so I could easily use it for just the summer or something... the only little snag (and I'm being quite sarcastic in regards to it being little), is that I physically have to leave the country, apply for it in Canada, come back and activate my visa upon entry directly from Canada. Although a friend of mine got around the waiting period by mailing her passport to Canada and getting all the paperwork done ahead of time so she can activate her visa upon reentry at Christmas-time - this still presents the problem of having to buy a plane ticket across the Atlantic just to get the visa activated.

Apparently its going to cost me a lot to stay here either in the form of a visa application or a plane ticket - so I'm not sure its worth the trouble. Its so complicated - mostly by the fact that becase I'm already in England to extend my stay for even a few days involves me submitting the same application form and fee that people who are applying to immigrate or people who are seeking asylum/refugee status have to submit. Arg!!!!

I'm going to have to look into my options more, but for now it looks like I am leaving england in March at which point I'll either come home and spend a bit of time travelling around in countries that aren't england.

anyway, I need to get back to my soup... it should be ready soon.

not a very exciting entry I know, but I needed to rant a little about these ridiculous visa restrictions.

- Chris