Blogs from Long Beach, Los Angeles, California, United States, North America - page 7

Tuesday 29th July, 2008 It happened at 11:42 am. Paul Wood, the company Chief Executive had minutes earlier arrived in the office from his Princeton, New Jersey base as part of the company’s ongoing goal to achieve OSHAS accreditation, an internationally recognized standard for health and safety management. His task for the afternoon was move around the office quizzing workers individually about their knowledge of the company policy with regard to all things health and safety and all morning staff had intermittently been quizzing each other from the double sided list of questions from which they’d been told his questions would be asked, like a bunch of excitedly worried pupils at exams time. No one wants to look dumb in front of the boss, even less as though they couldn’t be bothered attempting to avoid looking ... read more

Saturday 12th July to Friday 18th July, 2008 The events of the previous night had left Phil, Rainer and I all feeling slightly delicate as we stopped off Saturday lunchtime at the supermarket and loaded up the cool boxes with ice before heading off for the fifteen minute drive to Bolsa Chica Beach, part of the continuous wide stretch of sand that runs south along the coast from Long Beach to Huntington Beach and beyond. Faithful and Gould promote themselves as a caring, modern employer who as such believe that giving staff the odd treat will ensure a better return on their investment and as a result we were headed to the F & G Summer Beach Party. The instructions received via e mail the previous week were simple, just bring yourselves, a towel, some sun ... read more

The word "excited" just doesn't seem to fully capture these last few days before I leave. Lets add to that word: nervous, anxious, butterflies, longing, anticipating, disbelief, all right already and lets go, happy, determined, focused, imagining, planning, etc, etc. I am exhausted because I have gotten a collective 15 hours of sleep in the last 4 days and didn't get many more than that the preceding 4 days. Its hard work wrapping up one's professional, domestic, and personal life. Not to mention trying to pack for 7 months of travel in 10 countries and many more types of climates...while limited to one large backpack and one day pack. Good thing I am not a hight maintenance type of girl. I can be, but I know how not to be...thanks mom! But none the less, it ... read more

We're in California - by George Today finds us in Long Beach, CA. Home of not only Mickey Mouse, but Helen, Zed, Jamie, Catherine and the cats... We managed to survive both Friday the 13th's (courtesy of our first trip across the international date line) and have had a very welcome bit of family life here with George's godmother and her family. On Saturday morning, and in the face of a 9-hour time difference from Hong Kong, George got up before 6am to go to a Classic Car Meet with Zed. There they saw a lotta weird and wonderful vehicles, including several classic Corvettes, hot-rods, Thunderbirds, Cobras and a "Horseless Carriage" - a steam powered car! In the afternoon we went to the zoo on mass and saw lots more than on any of our jungle ... read more

Some General Observations About Life in America. You would think that re-locating to the good old US of A would be as easy a transition, as small a culture shock as could possibly be imagined. After all, the white caucasians over here appear pretty similar and speak the same native tongue as us Brits don't they. Or do they ? After four weeks or so over here I'm not so sure. Fact is, this country differs from what you'd find in the UK in many more ways than some of our closer non English speaking European neighbours. Cultural differences that set the yanks apart, most of which one can only imagine have happened deliberately due to their late start and lack of history are plentiful. Here are just a selection;- Health and fitness:- As we all ... read more