In which John and I discover our heritage

In the past week, John and I have eaten potatoes with five consecutive meals. We have also drunk an entire 26 (actually 700mL, because they cheat you on your liquor in this country) of whisky. Our Irish heritage is starting to show...

The times, they are a changin'...

Changing faster than I can keep up right now, and I'm the one instigating most of the changes! I am not moving out of my sublet (the monetary gain is not greater than potential emotional loss - packing myself up three times in as many weeks is stressing me out far more than a couple hundred dollars at this point), and, uh...actually, that's the only thing that's changed since yesterday.
John purchased my plane ticket today, so happy 25th birthday to him! I suppose he does get as much out of it as I do :D
I've been struggling with conflicting attitudes about this move - I alternate between being overjoyed that I am taking steps to do something major and life-changing (goodness knows it's been a while since I really shook things up), and wanting to throw up. Mostly I get overwhelmed at the thought of packing up my possessions, like, what if I give away this set of books and then decide in six months that I really wanted those trade paperbacks that I bought second-hand and read once? And this paper, it's so cool, I don't want to leave that behind! And this chili-pepper tin that I keep my pens in, I've had that since high school! I am shamelessly attached to my 'stuff', and that is what has been creating a lot of emotional turmoil for me thus far. I'm also very attached to my family and the group of friends I've made at Queen's, but thus far I am in denial about being several time zones away from them. At this point, I'm more concerned about whether I should take my watercolour pencils with me, or sell them ;)

27 days and counting

Testing...testing...is this thing on?
Welcome to my first post on what will hopefully turn into a chronicle of my experiences as I pack up my life in Kingston and head for the green hills of Sheffield, England. I've got a current passport, my travel visa, a plane ticket (as of tomorrow), waaaaaay too much stuff, no place to live once I get there, and negative money, but I'm going!
At the moment I'm trying to save some money by moving out of my summer sublet and onto someone's couch for the next two weeks, to be followed by living in a tent at my parents' house for a week, and then hopefully arriving to a home of some sort in Sheffield. The housing market there seems to have dried up (that's because terrible other people have taken all of the good places to live out from under John's nose!), so John is doing his best to find us a home.
Ahhhh, John. If you're catching up with my life via this blog, here's the short story (the long one to be posted in the future, maybe?). We've known each other online since late 2000; we met in person for the first time in Feb 2006, and started 'dating' then. Now that I'm finally finished my B.Mus at Queen's (though there is something to be said for taking the 'scenic route' through undergrad), I am going to move to the UK and work while John goes back to school, first to upgrade his A-levels, then to Uni for engineering of some sort in 2008. I'm going on a UK Ancestry visa (my Nanny is from N.Ireland) so I'll have unrestricted entry/exit (can we say, Europe is just a long swim away?), unrestricted work, access to health care, and voting rights. No, I won't be living in London, not even close in fact. Sheffield is great though, and I've really enjoyed my visits, so hopefully it's as nice to live in as John makes out!