HTMW Recaps: February 2019

I normally add a quote to the beginning of each post that sums up or enhances my writing. However, I’m going to use my monthly recaps as an opportunity to sum up the month – be it the mood, the weather, my feelings… Anything really. February was quiet, though I did find myself burning the candle at both ends a little bit on a couple of weekends! This month’s quote sums up the joy of quiet. Those precious moments, days, weeks that you sometimes just need to digest, recuperate and reflect.

‘Quiet is peace. Tranquility. Quiet is turning down the volume knob on life. Silence is pushing the off button. Shutting it down. All of it.’ – Khaled Hosseini from The Kite Runner.

In January 2017, I announced I was going to start monthly recaps on my blog. If you missed last month’s recap, you can find it here.

February was relatively quiet.

It was always going to be quiet. I’ve been starting to recover my finances after my trip to New Zealand and Australia, and it was nice to have some down time. I left London once in February and spent a night away in Brighton with J. It was great to continue catching up with friends, and to have my sisters and C come to London to help me celebrate my birthday at the beginning of the month.

Additionally, we had a week of really unseasonable but gloriously sunny and warm weather. It has been the hottest February on record or something crazy! P and I made the most of it one Sunday and enjoyed a touristy day out in London.

The Highlights

My London birthday weekend.

I have the best group of friends and it is weekends like this one that remind me of this. C flew over from Munich. P and I came from Bristol. Z forgot, but got out of his pyjamas as soon as he remembered and came along to celebrate. On a Saturday night! Legend.

Basically, I decided to throw a ‘gathering’ to celebrate my 30th birthday in London with my friends and sisters. It was the perfect night. Everyone was so generous, everyone got on and I really felt the love. I’m eternally grateful for the wonderful people I have around me and the network I’ve built in London and elsewhere. This was the perfect way to kick off February!

A glorious weekend in Brighton!

J surprised me with tickets for us to go see Dolly Alderton (she of Everything I Know About Love fame) in Brighton, so we made a weekend of it.

We booked to eat at The Ginger Pig, where the food was excellent. Afterwards, we went out, stopping at several bars ‘on our way back to our hotel’ before ending up at The Gin Tub, thanks to a recommendation from H. It turned out to be a great bar, with a small club downstairs where we danced until the small hours.

On Sunday, we walked along the beach to blow away the cobwebs and then spent the afternoon with Dolly. She was in conversation with her friend Lauren and several interesting topics were covered. It was a wonderful present and the perfect way to wrap up my 30th birthday celebrations!

With an hour to spare, I walked back to the train station along the beach and was treated to an absolutely beautiful sunset. You can see one of the photos I took below!

A Private War. What an excellent film!

Despite trying to stay on the straight and narrow with my finances, I decided to splash out on a cinema ticket and headed off to Covent Garden to see A Private War one Tuesday. I’m so glad I did!

It was such a brilliant film. Gritty and hard hitting, it had me crying openly in the cinema almost from the get-go. Rosamund Pike gave a fantastic performance as Marie Colvin and Jamie Dornan wasn’t bad either as her photographer. The film doesn’t shy away from showing war and what it is like for a foreign correspondent behind the lines. It also focuses on PTSD and mental health, a particularly relevant subject these days.

I went along with A, who isn’t a huge cinema fan, and even she came out saying how good the film was. I’d highly recommend seeing it if you get the chance. It’s a bit harrowing at times, but sometimes you need film to remind you about the world beyond your little bubble.

A touristy day out in sunny London.

Mix together glorious sunshine, a glass floor, a walk through the Barbican and a pit stop at a beautiful new rooftop garden and you have the makings of a pretty awesome day.

P and I went up to the top of Tower Bridge first. This cost £8 each as we booked our tickets beforehand. There is a glass floor that you can stand on if you’re brave and look down on the road and river below. It was a pretty cool touristy thing to check off and I’d recommend it if you want something fun to do in the city in any kind of weather.

Afterwards, we headed for the City and a brand-new rooftop garden. We stayed up there for about an hour, admiring the city laid out below us. It was a beautiful day and London was shining. Finally, we strolled through the Barbican before making our way home as the sun set.

Lots of behind-the-scenes work on this blog!

I’ve been re-writing old posts, updating information, improving the SEO and doing a lot of boring, tiresome work on the back end of How The Mind Wanders… It’s long overdue, but it gets dull.

There’s a long way to go yet. Some posts are easy to update, and take less than half an hour. Others have needed a refresh, an entire overhaul, before I was happy to re-publish them. My post on Wales took me two days to update. It’s satisfying once it’s done though, and I’m pleased I’m finally making progress.

An entire week where I spent £0!

I was super proud of myself for going an entire week where I literally spent NOTHING. How, you may ask. Good question!

Well, I have a prepaid monthly travel card. And I had bought in a big supply of food at the beginning of the month (think Asda delivery for canned/frozen goods and an Aldi shop for fruit and veg). I chose not to drink alcohol for the week. And these three things combined meant I spent £0.

Sure, I was using things I’d bought earlier, but it made a huge difference to my budget for the month. Spending £0 for a week meant I avoided using my credit card. I’m planning on doing this more often in my efforts to recover from my trip to New Zealand and Australia! Oh, and to save for future trips…

The Lowlights

Recuperating funds after my six weeks away…

I am of course proud of my budgeting (see above), but it doesn’t detract from the fact that it does also get very dull. I’ve found myself become more than a little bored on occasion throughout February, and irritable too.

Thankfully, things with money do always seem to have a way of working themselves out. I’m almost back on an even keel after my NZ and Oz trip… I’m hoping that March can be a slightly more relaxed month financially.

Burning the candle at both ends too much!

There was a time not that long ago when this would’ve fallen right into the ‘highlights of the month’. But I’m different now.

I’ve had one too many late nights in February and I reached a point where I felt burnt out. Time to relax and spend more time sleeping in March!

Posts This Month

Postcards from Australia

An introductory post to the time I spent in Australia at the end of 2018, including snapshots from Sydney, Brisbane and Port Douglas.

Some of my updated posts from the work I’ve done this month…

I’ve only posted once this month, but there has been plenty of updated posts. I’m particularly proud of the updated guide to Wales, which I may turn into some cornerstone content for this blog at some point.

Additionally, I’ve been hard at work updating posts from our Long Journey Home, time spent in Ghana and many other posts besides! It’s been enjoyable to reminisce over past journeys and travels and remember all the fun and exciting things I’ve done over the years.

The updates will be ongoing until all posts are optimized for SEO, so bear with me! New posts may be a little delayed, as I’d really like to get this hefty chunk of work over and done with sooner rather than later!

What I Read This Month – February

Four Feet Under: Thirty untold stories of homelessness in London by Tamsen Courtenay.

Courtenay has gathered thirty or so stories told to her by various homeless people and literally transcribed them into this volume. It makes for some compelling reading. I was shocked and saddened by some of the things I read, though not surprised.

This book really stirred something inside me. I now look at homeless people with renewed compassion and respect. I’m investigating how best I might be able to contribute something towards helping – volunteering at a shelter, making donations or simply seeing them for the fellow human beings they are.

I’m now trying to acknowledge homeless people where possible, instead of ignoring them as I step past. Giving them spare change if I have some, more if possible. Buying the odd hot drink or sandwich if I’ve no money on me to give. There are many, small ways we can help individual people who find themselves homeless. A smile and a ‘hello’ might not seem much, but having read this book, I now understand how it makes homeless people feel slightly more human again.

If you want to understand homelessness a little better (you should, it’s one of the biggest social crises in modern Britain), then read this book. There are no facts and figures, but there are honest, gritty, true stories from people living this life.

Don’t shy away from this social issue because of guilt. If we all acknowledged it and faced it head on, I suspect the situation for homeless people could be improved considerably in a shorter space of time. Understanding is the key to bringing about change. This book will help people begin to understand.

Instagram Pictures of the Month

My photos this month are mainly from London, with a couple of shots from New Zealand and Australia and one massive throwback photo from our Long Journey Home in 2016.

I choose these three images based on which got the most likes on Instagram and then tell the story behind the picture. Disclaimer: They are not necessarily my favourite photos!

The Last Hour, Brighton, England.

I had an hour to spare before I needed to catch my train back to London. Instead of taking an Uber and sitting around to wait, I decided to walk along the beachfront. My reward? This incredibly beautiful sunset – the perfect way to end our weekend in Brighton.

A Gap in the Trees, Milford Sound, New Zealand.

This is one of countless images that I took on the day I went to Milford Sound. It’s also one of my favourites. Mitre Peak looked so moody when I arrived – cloud covered and dramatic. By the time I took this photo, after a couple of hours there, it looked more placid. As the rain passed on, the whole area grew calm and peaceful. I could’ve stayed for hours, but it was already six o’clock by this point and I wanted to get home before it grew dark!

Looking Across the Lake, Lake Baikal, Russia.

I’ve been working on updating my posts from The Long Journey Home and as a result, was going through a heap of photos from our trip. I stumbled across this one in Dropbox that P took and it made me smile, so I posted it on Instagram. I rarely put up photos of myself, but when I do, they always get a good reception. This day during our trip was one of the best – we spent it exploring the northern end of Olkhorn Island. I couldn’t believe we were so fortunate as to be able to see Lake Baikal for ourselves and experience rural Russian culture.

My Favourite Image: February 2019.

For 2019, I’ve introduced something new and am now adding my personal favourite image of the month in these recap posts. This means that you’ll now get to find out even more about my life in London or my travels!

A Little Honey Bee, Wanaka, New Zealand.

Ever since I realised there was a lavender farm in Wanaka, I was dying to visit. So I seized the opportunity when I was finally back in New Zealand in January and spent a happy couple of hours wandering around, photographing everything and enjoying myself in a sea of purple. This is one of my favourite shots from my visit – a close up of one of the countless numbers of bees there, all of which buzzed around feeding off the lavender.

Coming Up in March

March is a bit busier than February. I have things planned anyway! I’m beginning the month with a quick trip back to Wales, as I’ve not been back since November last year. I have a day out in the countryside around London planned with E later in the month, as well as a coffee tasting afternoon with A that we booked on a whim a couple of weeks ago.

Most excitingly, I’ve got tickets to ride a 1930s art-deco train from Northfields to Upminster on the District line mid way through the month! I’m super excited, as you can imagine.

There is also a couple of birthdays to celebrate, P is coming to London for a weekend and I’m sure there’ll be other evenings and weekends where I eat out, go drinking or meet friends to catch up.

Be sure to follow my Instagram feed and stories for all the latest on my life!