Cramming

Would someone please tell me how I can cram eighty megabytes of scanned documents into an email? I am having a go with 'zipping' but it's rather like wrestling with my suitcase when I'm packing for a family skiing holiday - it almost took the entire family sitting on it to get it all in last time. I think I am going to be here half the night sending eight separate emails instead. That should create a marvellous first impression to my would-be examiners. Oh the joy - it's deep.

In case you're wondering what I am wittering about, I am finally getting my application sent off for my teaching course - the deadline is tomorrow. I hope I can squeeze these files a little bit before then without having a full-on meltdown. Ooh, melting. Does that compress documents? I also hope that the university don't take my tardiness as a benchmark for future assignment submissions. Yes, I did pull several all-nighters when I was a student first time round, trying to be hip and cool and run the deadlines to the limit. But those were the days when I could handle a whole packet of Pro-plus in one sitting and no-one was expecting me to get up at 7am and give them breakfast and wipe their bum the next day (at least I think there wasn't...) I would like to think I am somewhat more sensible now. There's just been some fun and games getting all the information about the course and subsequently getting the forms filled by the school which has caused the delay. I think I am in for a roller coaster year.

Anyway, I am happy to report that the Simply Red concert on Saturday was a total success, not one drop of rain all evening. We arrived by taxi at the rear end of a crowd of ten thousand people and managed to bop our way to very near the front - we couldn't quite see the whites of their eyes but still a great view. There were huge screens all around to get the full Mick effect, and he was superb as usual (I know my brother will be shaking his head at that comment..) And did I mention that this was all free? They closed off a whole section of Budapest surrounding Heroes Square for celebrations to mark the 20th anniversary of the end of Communism in Hungary. Even though we are not natives we were very happy to join in with everyone else. We rounded off the evening with dinner al-fresco and a boogie in some student cellar-bar, much to the amusement of the trendy twenty-somethings we were elbowing out of our way so we could give the Macarena the full treatment.

Sadly the rain returned on Sunday but that didn't stop us Brits donning the raincoats and wellies and wading around the Railway Museum. My friend Bob was here with her hubby and son and the three year old is well into trains. His Dad didn't seemed too put out either about climbing all over some of the trans-Siberian monsters they have on display, some of which have wheels two metres in diameter. I have to confess that we chose to dry off in McDonalds, clearly we know how to show our friends a good authentic time when they travel halfway across the continent to see us!

Today was also wet, so the kids opted for swimming. Argh!

OK, while I have been typing this I have put my daughter back in bed three times, talked to my brother for the first time in weeks and found out that my Nectar card with 32000 points on it has been deactivated for my lack of activity, just when I was planning to spend some on tickets to Legoland. Great. See, I can get on with lots of things at once when I want to; coursework will be a breeze - think of all the Blog entries I will be writing mid-sentence. But I have also now pinged off two enormous zip files containing my application. Fingers crossed everyone.