The big 40 has come round to give Frank a handy reminder – great job all are away in Orlando to celebrate – don’t drink too much buddy….

Simon is heading South to join the family later today and should arrive just in time to have a beer or three with Frank as a final celebration of the day 🙂

Anyway, more as and when time permits…..

Vicky and Elliot arrived safely in Orlando yesterday and are now settled in well at the hotel near Downtown Disney.  Apparently, Elliot only slept for about an hour and was only cranky for the last hour or so of the flight – not bad for a 9 hour flight in fairness.

It is very hot down in Orlando currently so I guess we will see how we are going to deal with the temperature.

Anyway, more as and when time permits…..

It is now 21:30 as I type I (Simon) arrived in New York a few hours ago (via JFK airport) and was collected by a rather nice large black limo – total cheese but was nice to be whisked to the office in style – apparently there had been a mix-up with the cars and this was all that was available – darn it 🙂

Anyway, currently as I type, Vicky and Elliot are probably preparing for landing at Sanford International Airport near Orlando in Florida – the plane has made good time and should be in nearly an hour early – 16:40 local time or 21:40 in the UK.  I do hope that the flight has been good and Elliot has dealt with his first flying experience well 🙂

Not sure how often we will be able to update the site in all fairness, but we will try our best – the hope is that the hotel in Orlando (Simon will arrive there late on Wednesday – hopefully to have a beer with Frank to celebrate the BIG 40) will have free (or nearly free) internet access.

The weather in New York is astounding – feels like 30 degrees C and the short walk (admittedly with three bags) to the limo was definitely one of those walks that would have been better done in shorts and t-shirt – not smart casual office wear 🙁

Simon spoke with Jenny earlier today and apparently Pepsi and Max have settled in and are behaving themselves 🙂

Anyway, more as and when time permits…..

Picture the scene:

Greg, Richard and Albert (the May team – Home team)

Frank, Rusty, Darren and Curtis (the others – Away Team)

At the pool table, it’s Richards turn….. he grabs a cue, lowers himself to the table ready to have a crack…… a slight look of confusion crosses his face, then came the question – “what colour are we?”  Without a second thought Darren buzzed in with the answer – “GINGER” he offered – that was it, the tears were streaming down Rusty’s face, Darren was similarly uncontrollable (when he realised what he had said) and Frank, well Frank thought best not laugh in front of everyone – what a saint 🙂 – the rest of the evening turned into a mickey taking, little boys sniggering in the corner type event.

I think we all had a great laugh on the night and enjoyed it thoroughly – it certainly started with a bang.

On other matters, we got the 7 back from the dealership today – BMW have kindly offered to pay for the wing mirror corrosion issue in full, the wipers are now functional (again at BMW’s expense) and the software has been updated in the centre console to hopefully prevent it returning into the German language on occasions (as it has done on a couple of occasions prior to the visit to Sandal).  Strangely the dealership wanting paying for this piece of work, something that Simon was not up for – it seems that they have kindly offered to pay for this also 🙂  GOOD to have the big fella back – the garage was feeling strangely empty without it sitting in full glory.  Anyway, it goes back in on Thursday next week for the wing mirror work, and we will also invest in the new DVD for the Navigation system to update the maps and the postcode searching facility etc.

The photo shoot pictures from yesterday are now available for all to see online. An example is below….

The rain has arrived in bucket loads, so that has firmly stopped the park visit that we planned for today 🙁

We are considering a trip to the Lake District for this afternoon, but we are slightly concerned about the weather that has rolled in over the last couple of days – cold and wet seems to be the state of the game unfortunately.

We forgot to post here a few weeks ago – Elliot has been standing up very securely for a few weeks now and has even begun to take a few steps – we think that the best he has managed is about 6 or 7 steps – typically he only really does the walking when nobody is actually watching and he certainly won’t do it to order 🙂