Greetings and Salutations my family, friends and compatriots,
I thought it was due time that that I get back on the BBB (Baker Blog Bandwagon)... Lots has happened since the last time I wrote. The job is in full swing! Ben (former Director of Coaching) has been patient enough to let me shadow him for the month and show me the ropes. We have been visiting franchisee's a couple times a week to assess the coaching and quality of the sessions. This has brought me to Fullham, Chiswick, Islington, and Fleet. I have also been doing my first bit of coaching on the weekends doing three sessions and on Wednesdays doing a Little Kicks class of tots aged one and a half to two years and three months!! I am working on putting a program together for kids visiting Lego Land on June 6th, which is the big amusement park around in Windsor. I am loving the job so far and I feel like I am getting more confident with each session/visit.
I've managed to get a couple touristy things accomplished since I have been here. I made it to Oxford for a day of visiting free museums. Among them was the Museum of the history of science which displayed, among many other historically scientific artifacts, a chalkboard full of Einsteins work from a lecture performed at Oxford University. I also went up a big tower in an old church and did a little shopping... I hit up the Blenheim Palace today. This was pretty cool to see. It had a big section honouring the late Winston Churchill including letters to his dad, Lord Randolph. The letters were written when he was a child with topics ranging from him asking his dad to bring him home some stamps from Africa, to asking for daddy to send him money when he was away at school. He also wrote a letter apologizing for losing his dads watch in some pond, and wrote of how he payed 23 men from the infantry to dig a trench and empty the pond so he could get it back!! The palace was amazing and the tour took us through the room where past dukes and kings and queens had stayed, as well as through a massive Dining Room with the most amazing paintings I have ever seen. If I can figure out how to post pictures on here I will show the photographic evidence.
Last weekend was great fun. I met up with my long lost cousin Jamie whom I hadn't seen in about 10 years! We met up to watch the FA Cup final and then got together with my buddy Andrew Baker's friend Erin from Montreal and her boyfriend and then another friend of a friend that night. When I went to see Oksana she was sitting in a restaurant with Loren Duhaime. (A girl who also played soccer at Laurentian) I must say it was great to see somebody from back home!
The most recent develoment would have to be that I found myself a place to stay in London! After weeks of planning out trips to check out different neighbourhoods, flats, and houses... and cancelling each of these trips for one reason or another, I ended up taking the first place that I looked at. It is a huge house with six bedrooms, a large kitchen/ dining room and a fairly large back yard. My room is quite large with my own frenchish doors leading to the back garden and a fireplace. It's in a borough called Herne Hill which seems to have everything I am looking for! I will have plenty of room to put up any friends or family that would like to hang their hat for a night or two! (Let me know if you are planning to come to England anytime soon, there are still some nights available for this summer and I will be booking for next fall in the near future)
Some people were asking about how they could leave a message. Wellll it's simple. At the bottom of each posting it will say: 4 messages (or however many people have made)... click on that and then send a message using your google account. If you don't have one, sign up for one, its right there! It's great to hear from you all so don't be shy... show me some love!
I have to go now, tea and biscuits are calling my name! Oh, and I forgot to mention that it is a long weekend here and Harwell has its summer feast going on!! Woohoo... I am going to hit that up for sure, and might even cap it all off by attending the highly anticipated 'barn dance'! Brings me back to the Jr. Farmers Dances in Elmvale.
Peace out y'all... Bakes
