We have just got back from the Footage & Firkin where we watched the dazzling England completely thrash Denmark 3 – 0. Oh my God!! We are on to the quarter finals against Brazil!!

The Footage & Firkin is a HUGE barn of a place that houses 2 big screens, 3 bars, 1 sad DJ, 1 crumbling roof and today, approximately 1500 screaming George Cross flag / England shirt clad English fans. The result? Magic.

Never in a million years would I have imagined myself in such a setting without help of drugs and a very angry rotweiller. However, I hardly drank and could not help but be utterly swept away but the sheer energy, joy and excitement of the game and the people watching. For all intents and purposes, we were seated in that stadium in Japan watching the players with our own eyes - not through a big screen. We sang every football song and chant ever conceived and lost our voices in the process. People screamed, hugged, kissed and generally ran amok and it was a beautiful thing. This is what football does to people. This is what happens when England play against great world class teams and win. People smile. People talk to each other in the street and on buses. People are elated beyond they wildest dreams as they dare to hope that their team, and thus their country, make it through to win the World Cup. I love it.

I'd love to psychoanalyse the national English mind set but not here and not now. For now I want to remember what it felt like to see England crush the Danes 3 - 0 and make it look like a doddle. They were brilliant. And for a moment I felt what it must be like to be English.

C x

This week has flown! Its finally Friday and I've got the house to myself as Ian is out with the boys for their monthly boys nite out. I'm looking forward to surfing through our 90 new cable channels we received yesterday. All for only £3 more than we were paying for FilmFour! Outrageous.

I simply can not not mention the weather. Its been crap.

I saw Kate the Nutritionist yesterday. I feel a little encouraged that there may some solid reasons for the various symptoms my body is throwing up at me. I have to wait for her to get back to me in a few days with a course of action. She made it sound like an expedition. Or maybe that is just how I hear things.

The job situation is sounding good. The woman who is screening the CV's met with a friend of mine in Marketing yesterday and my friend gave me a good rap. They have 2 external and 2 internal candidates but due to the expediency of the situation they may go with someone who knows the firm and the subsequent ropes. That'll be me then! However the job I'm in at the moment has just kicked off and got incredibly busy. I'm helping the Project Manager of a proposal we are pitching and it is all hands to battle stations. I love being this busy. It'll be hard if I do get the other job though - I'm terrified of telling these guys I'm leaving. They've been so good to me. It's just like hair. When my hair has pissed me off to the point that I make an appointment at the hairdresser, it goes and looks better than ever in the days leading up to the appointment. But I've learned. Hair will deceive you but you must persist. So when that feeling that I'm swimming in water so deep I can not see the bottom overwhelms me when I consider the jump into a new career path I remember how good my hair looks after a haircut. And 12 tonnes of product slathered all over it.

Have I mentioned the weather?

I wrote a long email to my sister today. I miss her. I do hope they end up in the same hemisphere as us soon. I wouldn't even mind the 2 hour time difference so long as she sees the same constellations as I do. And we can plan decadent shopping trips to Rome, Florence and Barcelona!!

England play Denmark tomorrow and we’re off to the Footage & Firkin with Mark for what will be a huge game. Too excited for words.

I have to cut this short as work is calling again.

C x

I can't just post the once today so I'll ramble for a while. I want this to be a bit of a link to family and friends over the seas to keep up with life in my world. Email is good but there is too much to say to too many people so this might be the answer. I think.

We woke up at 6.30am - well the alarm went off at half six but I dragged myself out of my state of cosiness at about ten to seven - and got half ready. Made if downstairs and into the lounge three minutes into the game. We knew England were through unless they got a severe thumping from Nigeria - which was hardly going to happen - but it was still a fairly tense ninety four minutes!

I heard 'World in Motion' on the radio just before going downstairs. Again I feel like two parts of my life have been connected to complete the picture I now stand in. When I first heard that song, never in a million years would I have imagined that I would one day be living here and feel so a part of a culture and land that is not my own. With each day that passes I experience another moment where I know I am where I was meant to be. As much as I miss Australia is about as much as I love England. Both places have faults, things that I once denied in order to feel 'safe' in either place. But now I live in the understanding that if I accept the good with the crap, life is a whole lot richer.

A bit deep for two in the afternoon huh.

Steph called me at work this afternoon to chat about the game and life in general. It was good to hear his voice. Lisa then got the phone and we talked about life at our far ends of the planet which was nice. I do love hearing from them and it was a break from the tedium of today. It is overcast again and I'm feeling a little 'stretched'. Don't know how to explain the feeling but I could do with another holiday in the sun. I so miss the sun.

Enough for now. I'll keep this a secret for a few days until I see what flows best. I may show Ian though.

C x

Well, here goes. My first post on my very own online journal. I think I've realised that I've not kept a paper type diary in the past because nobody ever sees it! My deep seated exhibitionist/performance tendencies must be reaching the surface after all this time. Wow, is this what getting older does to one?

C x