Stream of Consciousness
         --- Chris Padfield's Blog ---

A year or so ago I first blogged about kiva.org a company that organises funding from people like me and you to finance microcredit operations around the world. This week my first kiva loan got fully repayed, at which point I could withdraw the money or reloan it again. I still think the concept is brilliant, you generally get your money back (kiva has zero bad debt so far) and if you do end up lossing a bit you just consider that “charity”. I have been trying to add a few more loans, here are the list of people/companies around the world I am trying to help out. If you want to give some many to charity but don’t know which one, maybe consider a loan to kiva instead.

After almost 3 years of work with quite a few mistakes along the way, DeskPRO v3 has now been released. The relief of finally getting this out is huge and the response so far has been really positive. New versions are already under development along a much more rapid release schedule and things are definitely looking up for the future.

It was a bit strange coming back to Whistler after a week in the sun, a good part of me just wanted to stay in Hawaii surfing but luckily I had Tim staying for a couple of weeks which motivated me to get out skiing. While the snow wastn’t amazing, we definitely had some good days skiing and showing Tim some of the new spots I have found since he stayed two years ago.

My parents came and stayed a couple of weeks later and that is when I found out my Dad has prostate cancer and needed to have his prostate removed. By then I had been thinking about coming home a bit early and this made the decision very easy, so I changed my flight (BA were really good about it as I was not meant to be able to) and go back home in time for my Dad going into hospital. The good news is the operation all went well and the cancer was localised so while it’s fingers crossed everything looks good.

So since then I have been back and forwards to London seeing friends and house hunting. Today I finally found a flat, 3 bedroom place in Belsize park which is in a perfect location and looks really nice; and seems the two other rooms are already taken. Move in on the 1st May - the day I was meant to be getting back from Canada!

Vicki, Carl and Stu decided that coming all this way they might as well go somewhere hot as well and Hawaii was the place choosen. I decided to tag along, I am certainly glad I did.

It has been almost 4 years since I went to Hawaii after my first ski season, and about 3 years since I left. I have always missed the place a lot and I certainly knew it was going to be a bit weird going back as a complete tourist and not living there.

We had an amazing week, mainly action based. Starting with:

Surfing, I managed to rent a board a little like the one I bought in Hawaii for the week. Managed to fit some surfing in most days.

Body surfing at Sandy’s

Sky Diving at the North Shore

Kayaking in Kailua

Diving with Martin

Hiking (poor Vix cut her hand)

Visiting Turtle Bay, to look for turtles - we failed, also failed to see Whales

As well as other points round the island

All in all it was an amazing trip back to Hawaii. I met a bunch of fun people at the hostel and wish I had some more time to have hung out with them. It was definitely strange seeing the places I lived a few years back but amazing to be surfing back on the ocean looking at Waikiki; I have a feeling it will be less than another 3-4 years before I return.

It was with some sadess I left New York but also a lot of excitiment to be arriving back in Whistler. There was no time for feeling sad with two extra house mates camping on our couch (James and his travelling friend) so I was straight up the mountain a few hours after getting back. The snow wastn’t great for the next few days which was a shame for the guys but we still managed to ski quite a lot.

Only a couple of days after they left (leaving my apartment a hell of a lot tidier!) my sister, her boyfriend Carl and a group of friends all arrived for a week or so skiing. They where staying in a unit just a few blocks away, with the added avantage of having a hot tub. The rest of the week was spent drinking, skiing and trying to get some work done. It was great to ski with my sister again, the last time was just before my finals; she was also quite a lot better than I expected so I got to ski most of the runs I would normally, if a little slower! Jamie, a family friend, also joined us - a really good skiier and I think he had some fun finding some of the more extreme places to ski in Whistler.

The higlight was perhaps skiing Coulour Extreme, which for some reason I hadn’t skiied. With nice snow it’s really not that hard but I guess one of the hardest marked runs. Vicki skiied it without any problems. Another evening we went tubing which was pretty cool.

Not so cool was Stu’s and Jamie’s bbq. This was literally the worst BBQ food I had ever eaten in my life. They may look like dab hands in the photo but looks can be very misleading!

Another amusing side trip was through the castle on Blackhomb. I hadn’t been here before, but obviously mass snow ball fights began.

Everyone seemed to have a good week, it was quite a mixed group of abilities but it all seemed to work itself out.

So, the long awaited trip to New York to see Libby. Well, all didn’t turn out exactly as expected and during the course of the week we decided it wastn’t quite working how we wanted - so we broke up. Big disappointment that it hastn’t worked out but doing 6 months long distance after knowing each other a relativly short time was always going to be hard; still I wished it had worked out but not everything is meant to be.

New York itself was, well, cold. I thought coming from Whistler no where would feel cold but it really did. That was a shame because it took away some the enjoyment of wondering around the city. Libby was working during the week but I managed to explore somewhat. I had already covered so many of the tourist sites when I visited New York with Harj a few years back that I didn’t feel too bad about not going to tick them all off again! Anyone thinking about going to New York, avoid the winter would be my suggestion!

Also got to meet a few more of Libby’s friends which was fun and had some nice meals. Now, I was expecting a lot after Libby’s comparisons between New York and London food, but I didn’t really eat anything better than you would get in London, it was certainly a lot cheaper though!

Some random pics from my exploration.

So I have a new flat mate, Jess. All happened a bit randomly, met her step Dad at heli skiing and he was asking around for a room. Long story short, Jess has taken the room now that Oli has left. As a bit of a welcoming, combined with a saying goodbye to Romy cooked Thia food for a bunch of friends, a really fun evening. Romy is off back to Oz to start Uni; not going to be the same without her.

Went skiing the day before I was off to New York. Snow was pretty crappy but sun was out so all very pretty. I went home to get my metron skis as the scratches where rubbish on the ice but in the end decided I need to get packing sorted ready for the early start.

So thats the big update that I should have done ages ago. Hopefully I will try and keep this a bit more up to date now. Oli left on Saturday so this week is going to be a big work week to try and catch up a bit and get the next release of DeskPRO out. I also want to get lots done because a week on Thursday I am off to New York to visit Libby. Libby has been sent there for a month from work (clearly she is miss important) as part of her new job. Really can’t wait to get there now, been way way too long.

When I get back from there I have a week or so and then a work conference in Vancouver which I am looking forward to as something a bit different. Then my sister, Carl and friends are all coming to Whistler so I imagine I will be giving a few skiing lessons during that stay. They have a hot tub though so its a fair swap! After that I am here until end of April before I head back to London which although I don’t want to wish any of my time out here away am quite looking forward to.

So this has to be one of the funniest set of photos I have taken. In the photo is Oli, one of the French guys living in the house with Chloe and Romy. He is a damn good skiier and just a little bit crazy. This was a great fall he had recently!

The big event of the last week was going Heli Skiing with Oli. We flew with West Coast Heliskiing which are based out of Pemberton. The day was incredible; don’tthink I have ever had so much fun. 7 heli trips where you are picked up, taken to the top of a mountain no one has skieddown and then you ski it. The snow was incredible, the sky was blue (blue-bird day) all in all the perfect experience.

After heli we want and had great food at Ric Grills - one of my favourite restaurants in the world followed by some partying. Oli managed to sleep all night on the couch, sitting upright - which is some feat!

Christmas morning was spent skiing with Bernie, we had over 40cm of snow so was an epic day. For a very “Christmas Lunch” we had Lasagne for dinner! Proved to be lots of fun. I left that house to go to another house party sometime adfter dinner. I don’t really remember much after that

For New Year Oli was back out (got here Boxing day). We knew from Chloe and Romy about a house party. We only knew the street it was on and that was it. The taxi driver dropped us of at some random place thinking this was where the party was despite the complete absence of any noise; it didn’t take us long to follow the noise to where the party was really at. I don’t think I have ever seen so many people in one place, must have been 300 trying to fit into this little garden and house. Eventually the cops came and closed it all off (rather agressivly as it happens). Luckily it was quite late by then anyway so not the end of the world at all.

That’s my 3rd New Year in a Ski Resort in a row now. I think I want to be somewhere warmer next year!

Some drunken photos from the night.

There where a few more weeks in London before I left to Whistler on November 1st. My first couple of weeks in Whistler involved meeting some people out here, getting everything ready for the ski season and getting quite a lot of work done. Then the snow started to fall. And Fall. And fall a bit more. The mountain opened a week early middle of November sometime and I havent looked back!

The skiing has been amazing. I have never seen so much powder. Oli came out for the 1st week of December which was actually a bit unlucky because there wasnt that much snow then. He returned Boxing Day and has been here for the last 3 weeks.

On a happier note, around the same time as the funeral my girlfriend Libby and I took a trip to Rome. I had never been to Rome before and we had an amazing time. The Coliseum was much more impressive than I expected - I can’t even begin to imagine the effect is must have had on people back when it was built given how impressive it still seems now despite being only half there and very discoloured. A true spectacle. We explored a lot of the other parts of the city, a few churches and the Vatican, all in all a great weekend.

We where, however, a bit disappointed with the food in Rome, I had such amazing Italian food when I visited Katy with Nicki back in Uni days and was expecting more of the same - but this was not to be. The food was fine but hardly impressive - I think even Libby would say she prefers English food (she is generally a tad rude about our food!).

So it’s been a very long time since I last wrote anything to this blog so thought it was time for an update.

It starts sad. My Grandma Gwen (my mum’s mum) died towards the end of last year. She hadn’t been very well for most of the year but her death was somewhat sudden. She was an incredible woman; someone who had a major impact on my life. The photo below is from 2001 with her at the end of the table at Christmas.

I will remember so much about her, our holidays in Devon with trips to the Moors, her cooking our favourite foods and always leaving things for us in the top room we stayed in. Christmas, Easters, holidays in Cyprus- always being so dignified and strong in adversary. She didn’t have an easy life with a lot of loss but always managed to persevere, to be happy and exude that happiness - it was always a pleasure to be around her. I remember visiting her last year and taking her to the shops, everyone knew her, everyone offered to help in one way or another. She touched so many peopleslives in such a positive way.

It’s going to be very strange not having Grandma around anymore. I will miss her deeply.

Well it’s been a busy couple of weeks. With DeskPRO getting very close to release there has been a lot of work to do regarding that but I have also been trying to enjoy as much as possible my last few weeks in London. Done a few more tourist things with Libby.

Last week a few of us had a champagne Sunday brunch. This was inspired by the brunch I went to with Harj and Sara in Singapore. Was lots of fun although they refused to give us any more champagne once we got to dessert - I guess their idea of unlimited is different to ours. Just last night we had a fondue party at my place, now while I wouldn’t really like to say I cooked (it’s foundue of course) I think that is the most people (10) that I have ever “prepared” food for. Was lots of fun

Getting very excited about skiing now, it’s a little more than 3 weeks away. Not entirley sure what I will do for the first couple of weeks before the mountain opens but I guess it will involve a lot of praying for the snow and maybe a “little bit” of drinking. There is also some food and wine festival going on which looks fun (although expensive).

On the subject of praying for snow, I really am now allowed to do this any more. I have been reading Richard Dawkin’s new book, The God Delusion which is very recommended reading.

Champagne Brunch:

Foundue.

London Tourist:

This was a bit weird. They seemed to be doing some sort of cleanup on the river bank but then burning stuff. Some of the stuff that seemed to be found down there was more than a tad weird. I trully wonder what they would find if they dredged the Thames.

Someone hastn’t read the “God Delusion”.

Its already started snowing in Whistler!!!! You can see pictures here.

All getting very exciting!

So the big change is that my flight is booked for November 1st to Whistler, season pass purchased and flat I am staying in to be finalised this week.

I did try to organise a big house with lots of people but this hastn’t worked out and I think it will be hard to work out not being in Whistler. I want to head out there knowing I have a place to live which is particularly important as far as work is concerned so its going to make it all a lot easier staying in the same place I stayed in for the 04-05 season. The flat is lovely, the landlady is really helpful and the location is brilliant. I can’t wait to get there and just hope there is more snow this season!

Oli has already booked two sets of flights to come visit, first for the start of December and then for Boxing day for almost three weeks. Nick is planning a trip in January and my sister along with Carl and 5 friends are coming out in February. I hope a few more people will come and visit through the season but already looks like it will be a lot busier than last time.

Some pics of where I will be staying:

This is actually the second party at our flat since I have been in London but didn’t take any photos of the first one. I think we had around 150 people for this one throughout the evening, probably 100 or so max at one time. All went pretty well apart from someone who found a fire extinguisher and sprayed it down our inner metal stairway. Other than that, a great evening. Think I passed out around 4!

Have been on a few more trips down to the boat. One weekend I went down with Jenny, Mike, Pete and Harj as well as Pete’s brother Doug and his girlfriend. Pete also brought his rib behind which made it a bit easier to wakeboard than behind the boat. Skiing however was a bit of a challenge.

The weather wastn’t that great on one of the days so we went to Corfe castle. I havn’t been here in at least a decade. unfortunately a large section is currently closed because of concerns over falling blocks of rock so they are having to do a lot of restoration work. My guess is it will be another decade before I visit again so the work will probably be completed by then!

So I havn’t written anything here for a while, everything has been so busy with life in general, work and travelling the next big thing. So here are a few updates with photos of what I have been up to.

Firstly some photos from near where I live, this is along the Canal on the way to Camden.

Oli, Nick and I decided to go back to Milton Keynes to feed our skiing addiction. On Friday night they have a more freestyle setup with a bigger jump some rails and a few boxes. Given that we are all a bit crap at the boxes/jumps stuff we thought it would be a good way to get out of our comfort zone and try these out. When actually skiing its easy just to go and do fast runs, moguls and powder and avoid the park so given that there are none of these things in Milton Keynes we might actually try and get the jumps sorted.

Little did we know they put some micro moguls down one side of the run. Despite being very easy with an almost perfect line they where a lot of fun and this destracted me at least from doing the jumps. Still, sort of got one of the boxes sorted by the end of the visit but have a nice bruise on my bum this morning to remind me that I couldn’t do it to start with.

Below are a couple of quick videos. The first is doing the mini moguls (I go first, Nick goes afterwards) and the second is doing the jump, rather badly. My aim for Whistler this year is to get a *lot* better at doing jumps.

After over 2 years of development (back to when I was living in Hawaii) DeskPRO v3 is now ready for beta download. A few people are trying the beta now but the full email will go out to everyone on the mailing list (about 3,500 people) tomorrow. Its probably going to be a long day!

As suggested by Carlos, here is a cropped version of one of the bee photos. Pretty pleased with it in fact.

 Ok, so Carlos came up with a better crop:

I tried take a few more macro photos. This was one of the days I didn’t feel so well so it didn’t last long. I need some more practice!

All week it has been boiling hot and a lot of it I have been inside feeling ill. So finally feeling better I thought a trip to the boat would be a good idea. Two of my housemates, Nicki and her friend Jenny all got up at 7am (to beat the traffic) and drove down to the boat, expecting lovely blue sky.

As this is England we probably should not have expected blue sky. We got onto the boat and for the first hour or two it was cloudy with the odd bit of sun. Suddenly however we noticed some very menacing looking clouds coming from over Old Harry. These clouds looked anything but benine so we decided to head back to harbour. We where not the only ones doing this, in fact there was a huge exodus from all around Studland and Swanage with boats heading straight back. It is quite hard to explain the scence but it was almost like a cartoon with the cloud as some evil spirit chassing us all. The thunder and lightening soon started and the clouds overtook us and started raining, heavily. It then started hailing. Trying to moar the boat in the hail, freezing cold, was not my idea of fun and far removed from the blue sky sunbathing I had planned.

Anyway, we eventually got the boat moared and broke all records for putting the cover on (Guiness have been informed for their next publication) and took the English option of having our picnic indoors. Of course once we had finished eating the sun came out so we just lay on the boat for a few more hours.

That evening was our first flat party while I have been there. It went really went, had an about perfect number of people (30-40) and as far as I know have had no complaints about the noise. I believe I passed out (on the sofa) at around 2 so don’t remember much more than that - which is normally a sign of a good evening!

Below are some photos of water skiing and ringoing. Luckily we did this straight away before the storm came in.

Went to the Cricket last Sunday with Oli, Oli’s brother in law and one of his friends. I wastn’t feeling great at that point but still enjoyed myself. Lords is literally 2 minute walk from where I live so wastn’t much of a problem getting there - even I didn’t get lost finding it. The cricket was unfortunatly a bit defensive with England seeming to accept a draw. Bit of a shame, it could have been an exciting game had England wanted to make it so.

Last week I had tonscilitus which knocked me out for most of a week. Luckily penicillin came to my rescue and that rapidly made me feel normal again but being ill was not fun. I don’t get ill very often (can’t even remember the last time I was bed-riden like this) but certainly seem to feel it when I do get something. All better now at least!

Been exploring where I live a bit more recently. Last weekend was pretty hot so spent most of the time in Regent’s park. On sunday we hired a rowing boat and toottled around the lake. The whole park is massive, I wondered around a bit more of it on Monday. I can see myself spending a little more time here this summer!

So that rather crazy Fiji/tribewanted thing I signed up for a while ago had another meeting in London - and living here made it a lot easier to actually go. Despite getting there a bit later than I had wanted I had a really good time meeting some of the other crazy people all joining in on this adventure - and anyway it was in a pub so it would be hard not to enjoy ones self.

The matching t-shirts do make it look a bit like a cult, honestly it’s not - but then I would say that, wouldn’t I.

(The 2nd photo is of one of the guys who set the thing up)

Last Friday I moved up to London. After driving up earlier to go and pick up the keys from the agents my lovely Mum drove up with all my stuff in her car I had packed this morning. I met Katy at the flat and we both managed to get all the stuff into the flat. As I hadn’t actually seen this room in person I was pleasantly surprised. Easily as big as I hoped it would be and quite a lot of storage space in the inbuilt cupboards. The rest of the flat was how I remembered.

Wanting some furniture (book selves mainly) the three of us then headed to Ikea, always an exciting prospect! I picked up two £19 bookcases (deal!) as well as the same sofa bed that Harj has. A few other bits and bobs (and the rather rubbish Ikea food) later and we headed back through lovely Friday evening London traffic with a very full car.

From then on everything has been a bit hectic. From a very drunk first weekend to getting the whole room unpacked and organised and this week quite a lot of work. Trying to buy a fridge has proved surprisingly difficult but one is on the way now.