So there must have been a conversation going on in Portugal about a week ago. Three reprobates (namely The Swan, Devito and Mike, King of Love) were sitting in a bar one evening when they got talking to the English (loosely used) barman. They tell him that they are all at Loughborough University. He tells them that he knows a couple of people from there. He names them. I don't know which name he said first, and I'm guessing he mentioned the other name at the same time. Paul Pennell? No they don't know him. Andy Higgs? That name rings a bell. Oh yeh. It's me. The person they (on the whole) are living with next year and have been very luckily been acquainted with for the past two years.

It turns out that the English (actually French) barman is non other than big Will Brown, ex-OSH lad and fellow History student. I haven't spoken to him in nearly two years and then this pops up out of the blue. Apparently there is another OSH lad working with him, but as The Swan is inept he appears to have lost the note the Willy B wrote for me so it maybe a mystery for a while until I make contact with my Portuguese based school mate. It's a small world.

This information was weaned from Swan during a telephone conversation during the middle of the working day yesterday. Clearly no part of his summer job actually involves doing any work, so our call went unnoticed. I have also spoken to all other housemates bar Devito in the past two days, but assume we will be catching up in the next few days as we all shall be back in Lufbra by the end of the week.

This scary thought means I am going to be rushing around madly organising last minute meetings and mopping up the remainder of the summer work, that is if it all goes to plan. Currently I am getting my thinking gear around Andy's website, but also have some tweaks to make to Matthew's and the Old Ed Club site.

I got a haircut today and if you want to see all those fantastic shots James and I took in the USA and Canada this summer, visit the gallery here and click on 2005 > North America 2005.

Jetlag is doing it's best to stop me getting started in the mornings, and despite being able to use the excuse that it is a Sunday anyway, getting up as late as 12 noon isn't my usual self.

We had lunch out today - my first chance to see Grandma since arriving back, and had every intention of giving her her present when I saw her, but inadvertently forgot, however she won't remember so it can wait until next weekend.

I have a number of items to buy, which I had hoped to pick up today as my face is getting very sore from old razor blades. However with Sister One and her newly acquired driving licence this could mean a trip to Merry Hell tomorrow in the Pocket Rocket 'going solo'.

Uncle Mike and Auntie Gay came around this evening for tea and then I got on with my own agenda of sorting out a damned annoying problem with the online StudentXtra registration form (I think I've finally cracked it; friggin decimal places in the code...)

I also had a silly number of phone calls from DDS who couldn't seem to string a sentence together for his damn phone kept on cutting out. After the whole debacle I don't think we actually confirmed or ratified anything but at least it seemed like we were doing something important.

Sister One is also making frantic preparations for the university plunge pool and so there is paperwork flying everywhere. I still have to sort all of mine out. So little time...

It took me more than half the day to figure out what day of the week it is, let alone managed to do much else. I woke late and spent the first few hours of the day spreading myself between wading through correspondence, working on the StudentXtra project and talking to people who I haven't talked to in a while.

I've got some new projects sitting on my desk. My friend Andy has finally asked for a website, so there is a quote for that, plus there is that list of things to do which seems to be expanding faster than I can burn my way through it.

Today, therefore, has not been the pinnacle of excitingness and so this entry is short compared to my recent tirades of information overload. I'm in a moving mood and there are things to be got moving. Don't step in the way...

Our final day in NYC was spent frantically scouring the shops and touristy boutiques of Times Square and China Town around Canal St. Due to travel capacity it had been hard to pick up souvenirs beforehand, so we had to rush-buy all the presents - even if we knew exactly what we had wanted to get for a long time before.

A tip off from the guidebook suggested a store called Century 21, which happens to be directly opposite Ground Zero. James and I explored the shoe department first and I picked up a much needed pair of 'sneakers' (whatever they are). We then went into the main store and did the rest of our department store fishing.

I was keen on one particular visit while we were in the city. On the day we had travelled from D.C. I found a Apple Newsletter in my Bulk inbox advertising the new iPod nano. At first glance at the subject line I thought it was a wind up, a promotional thing, but on closer inspection (and a visit to the Apple site) I discovered that this was indeed the replacement to the iPod mini. At first I was very sceptical. Posters appeared on the subway and my first impressions were of a flimsy credit-cardesque design with a pathetically small screen. We went to Apple Store NYC (on the corner of Prince St. & Greene St.). I changed my mind.

This is a truly beautiful piece of design. Once again Apple excel and I find myself strangely drawn to this fantastically tactile object. The screen maybe small, but fits so cleanly into the layout; the ultra-thin layout, that I was overwhelmed.

Another great discovery by total chance was that The Doves were playing a live set upstairs by the Genius Bar at 3pm. Unfortunately this was not compatible with our flightplan/schedule, so I had to just settle for watching them go through pre-show checks. Still cool though.

China town and some late lunch was next. We then had a final stroll through Little Italy before jumping on the subway back to the Malibu Hostel and picking up our bags. We had to walk five blocks to the next 'blue' station, which made for sweaty backs and wasn't pleasant. It was then a straightforward metro ride to JFK.

Straightforward that is except that when the 1 week unlimited metrocard says it will get you to the airport you need to know better, as in fact it gets you to the perimeter of the airport, dumps you, then demands a further five bucks each to take you to the correct terminal (not walking distance). This was a point of annoyance for us as both of us had thought we had been safe to spend our last dollar; even extracting a last twenty to pay for a final souvenir (so incurring the ridiculous ATM charge once more). We put it on card.

And so we flew home. A hour long delay on the runway was illustrated and lightened by the pilot allowing the cabin to listen to the ATC radio on one of the earphone channels. I had always assumed the responsibility of controlling the world's airports fell to serious individuals, but all these illusions were shattered after five minutes of comedy eavesdropping. Something had held the whole runway up and there were planes stacking up everywhere. The controller was issuing messages as different pilots joked (totally dead pan delivery by some - some had to explain that they were only joking) and one participant even started singing about his love for New York. It was all a bit surreal really, but made the wait more bearable. We also had the gift of a fainting passenger, a over melodramatic camp air steward, and were kindly upgraded to the back row of economy for no extra cost (great).

We got in at about 9am, and I 've spent most of the day just chillaxing as flights mess with your head and your timescales. I've met the new cat (Alice) - seems nice enough, and also seen the final Tours4 prints with which I am very pleased. All in all, very good day so far, but I've got a list as long as my arm of things to complete/buy/set up/make contact with in the next couple of days. I'm going to need everything caffeinated.

Today didn't quite go as planned. Although we had great plans absolutely nothing we had expected occurred and everything we did, didn't; if you know what I mean.

We had thought that an early rise might have taken us back to Time Sq. for some tickets to go and see Spamaalot (the Monty Python Musical) but upon arrival discovered that the queue earlier in the day is much longer than in the evenings and the tickets for the main Broadway shows as extortionate as we thought they would be before we went to STOMP.

Instead we rounded on a few touristy shops along the street and was approached by a woman to join up with the Scientologists. We kindly refused her attempts to lure us in to watch the video, and I have Tom Roberts to thank for the information regarding ignoring these people; after all, who wants to end up like John Travolta or Tom Cruise..?

We then made our way to several other big NY attractions on our list and our plans had to be changed at every stop. We grabbed lunch from Grand Central station, and although we had then thought we would stop off at the UN building for a tour, we soon found most of 42nd-47th St. cordoned off with massive security. It turns out that we hadn't been the only people to pick today to make a visit - there was a full blown meeting of the General Assembly starting (a three day event) and with a full scale protest outside to match. In our adventurous spirited nature, we moved through the ranks of anti-Iranian Presidency protesters and the police to see what exactly was going on, but soon decided eventually that penetrating the assembled throng wasn't actually that easy and so headed back.

We were overwhelmed with vast numbers of black, blacked-out limos heading in all directions, many with police escorts and it was all amusing to watch. A heavy police presence allowed us to poke fun at the 'Secret Service' who clearly haven't come to terms with the first part of their division name. Maybe more appropriate would be the 'Slightly Obvious Service' or 'Quite Easy to Spot Service' with their big black flak jackets, branded in the boldest typefont 'Secret Service'.

We headed back in the direction we had come from and ended up at the NY Public Library. As we had nothing else to do we took an hour long tour of the library (with the epitome of the perfect 60 year old librarian stereotype) and got a rare glimpse at a Guttenberg bible (if that means anything to anyone else - its rare and significant in the story of print).

This cut another chunk out of the day and so we made a beeline to our next proposed stop - a renowned photography exhibit. Turns out that was closed for renovation of the exhibit, so we sat in Starbucks and watched the world go by until James suggested a round trip on the Staten Island Ferry.

We returned later to a very humid Manhattan - apparently hurricanes in North Carolina are giving us some poor (very sticky) and misty views. It's very good luck that we did all the sight seeing we wanted to do in the past two days.

And so we spent our last remaining money on a big meal out just down the road. Our last night in NYC and we have decided to relax as its been busy all this week. Need to take a breather before the big flight.

DDS has finally sent me a photo of our first production run. Looking good. Dandy is nearly set for launch...

Well James and I got cultured today. We got up early morning (ish), partially due to poor sleeping. Our room at hostel last night was sparse to say the least, even if it was private. We headed into downtown Manhattan again and went through the streets to find the NYPD museum which the guidebook recommends as a stop. A couple of hours later we emerged back into the heat and took the subway to Canal Street (cheers for the tip Oli) and ate fried rice/noodles for lunch before trawling the rows of tacky electrical and tourist shops.

DDS might be interested to know that The Trump Building on Wall Street was one of our many stops along the way for suitably posey photo opportunities.

We decided to walk back through Central Park, arriving at the hotel/hostel mid afternoon in time to book back into our room and get ready for our evening 'on Broadway'. Although not strictly budgeted for, we splashed out on 'TKTS' for STOMP, the acclaimed dustbinlid-banging, brush-sweeping and lighter-flicking theatre show (Good tip off Devito; knew you couldn't have been put on earth for no reason). Highly impressed, we watched the whole show on very little resources, and decided once everything was over to go and get some proper food. This roundabout trip extended until the early hours of the morning with stops being made at the Brooklyn Bridge (part 2, by night), Times Square and the highly impressive Empire State Building observatory. This is definitely the best time to view the spectacular skylines from above.

Overall another jam-packed day, and it looks like if we are mad enough (not sure where the money is coming from) we may end up on Broadway tomorrow night for another show... (not that our hotel isn't on Broadway either, but you know what I mean).

First thing's first, I need to apologise for spelling and grammar etc etc in all of these blog entries. before any more sticklers get annoyed at these garbled scripts, the reason mostly is due to the time limits and I need to let you know it frustrates me as much as you - especially as I don't get a chance to read it back until I get your comments :)

Well James and I are in the Big Apple. We moved out of the sober Washington DC pretty quickly after we had seen all the major sights - the Whitehouse was (typically) surrounded by a police cordon which meant we couldn't get very close until later in the day when it had been moved back. We were also denied the opportunity to take any photos by a cop-on-a-bike, who was unsuccessfully trying to marshal all the tourists. Most people realised if they walked back out of pedalling distance he couldn't stop them.

We then got hold of our tickets for the Washington Monument. It's a huge structure, and so is the queue usually, but we darted in due to reduced sales (Sept 11th?), but had to wait until our time came up so spent the next hour and a bit exploring one of the other wings of the mall. We walked towards the Capitol, and popped into the National Museum for the only bit of culture that DC can provide before heading back to the Washington Monument for our viewing. There is surprisingly little in the way of viewing space, but after out peer in all four directions we headed back down and out. The rest of the day was spent looking at the (huge) Lincoln Memorial and then taking a four hour Greyhound to New York.

After all the administrative and frankly boring austerity of DC (not worth another visit but for the three or four monuments and the Whitehouse) it was refreshing to reach a city with some life. James had been feeling pretty ropey all day, and Washington wasn't doing us any favours as the heat was stifling and there was little in the way of shade.

New York on the other hand interested me from the moment we arrived, but I think I was/still am expecting a lot from this place, so it may just be childish excitement. We booked into what seems to be an oversubscribed youth hostel, grabbed some subs for dinner and chowed down to Oceans 11 (one channel only) and an early night.

This morning we awoke of our own accord and headed down to South Ferry at the bottom of Manhattan to explore the area (Battery Park, Wall St), find a Starbucks for coffee (living the American dream) and then get a trip over to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. A few hot hours later we arrived back. It had been a really good chance to explore some of the offshore attractions and see the skyline from the water. Plenty of photos too. Back on land, we made a beeline for downtown (more food needed) and ended up at the vast expanse that is ground zero. Although we knew we were heading for it, it eerily arises as you approach, as one of the major features of NYC seems to be an overcrowding of towering buildings, then suddenly, in the middle of this metropolis, there is nothing. Even before you see the signs and the displays you know where you are.

After some more subs (James is sick of them) we took the subway back to the hostel and checked back in. (room change). I also did some haphazard sewing repairs to my backpack which has started to break at the top, a new type of stitch called Limping Stitch was used.

And so we have just got back from some wholesome American food (pizza) and will be having an early night to see the further delights of the city tomorrow.