Hello from holidays

It's been a mad few weeks and I'm away recovering. Since the end of August, we have: 

• decided we would like to move in together some time soon;
• had an offer accepted on a house before I'd even considered getting my place ready to go on the market;
• got my place valued, signed up with an estate agent and had the board put up the same day I had four families of friends coming over (some staying) for my birthday;
• got the mortgage approved and got a new bank account;
• got very cross with lots of people and told them if my move hadn't happened before I went went on holiday, it was is airing a fortnight until we got back;
• completed the process and got the keys very quickly after aforementioned cross-ness, such that I had to transfer chunks of money to the solicitor over the weekend before because I couldn't get to a bank and couldn't transfer enough at one go otherwise;
• moved in dribs and drabs, culminating with a van and three men who couldn't get the piano downstairs without reinforcements;
• accepted an offer on my place; and
• come away on holiday to my sort of place, dragging the very nice man with me but being concerned that he might not really enjoy. 

So on return we have to get him moved and ....... well and then I don't know.  Make it to Christmas?! I'm really loving the new place and looking forward to it being ours. By which I mean getting extra bits of furniture and choosing pictures. The holiday has on the whole gone well, although I did nearly kill him yesterday on a 8km walk with 500m decent then ascent when he had a dodgy tummy and it was hot. But we are watching the sunset tonight, with a beer and feeling very happy to have had such a good year this year.  We both deserve it. 

Proper post on the other side - home soon.