Things You Won't Miss

Ok, I am on vacation (holiday) in Gran Canaria. I am busy reading books and working on my tan. I wrote my last BB column (June newsletter!) for SJWWC the other day on Jeff's laptop in our apartment only because I didnt do it before I left London! So to save time, here it is................

Sadly this is my last Bulletin Board. No, I am not moving back to the USA but it is time for a sabbatical! I have now lived in London for nearly ten years. I went only once to the Moving on Seminar and it turned out to be a false alarm!

What I have learned over the years about moving is that it is so very hard! I just don’t mean the physical packing and going but that the emotional strains are the hardest to bear! There should be a class for those of us who are left behind! Last year a group of life long friends (Woo Hoos!)moved away and this year brings the lost of another good friend who taught me a lot about computers, zisdeco music and that it is ok to snore when you share a room on the Christmas market trip! My advice to those moving away is to make a list of all the things you won’t miss about living in London. The lists of things we miss far outweigh the things we won’t but hey I am trying to help! I polled my family and the Woo Hoo’s who have moved away and this is the list we came up with.

Women who complain that nothing in London is as good as back home! They can’t wait to move back home!

Lack of garbage cans on the streets.

Congestion charge and outrageous parking fines

Crazy aggressive motor cyclists who weave in and out of traffic.

Dark at 3:30 in the afternoon in the winter months!

Getting groceries out of the car in rain.

Finding a parking space blocks from your home!

High prices of just about everything!

Being far from family.

Pay & display

Small parking spaces.

Living in flat instead of a house

Small washer and dryers!

The cost of petrol!

Plumbers.

Street names that are only differentiated by St. Ave. Road, Close, Mews, etc. endings.

Small print A-Z that always have the street you need in the fold!

Repairmen who never bring the part you need with them the first visit!

People who correct you when you are speaking and don’t understand that you speak a dialect called American!

London Gatwick Airport!

The Northern Line

Oxford Street on a Saturday before Christmas!

Having pay at the o2 center to park just to do your grocery shopping!

Crime (cars stolen, homes broken into)

Sky News

Sorry, sorry, sorry, I’m very sorry! (all right, already with the sorrys!)

Underground at rush hour

Underground in the summertime

… and tourists !

So, if you find yourself in the moving state of mind (sorry, Billy Joel!) think about the negative! Let me know if you have something to add! I may need it someday. But for now I am the one who is still here putting up with all this stuff!