One year on (as the Brits would say)

So this past Monday celebrated my one year anniversary in London. I seriously can't believe how fast the year has gone by, and how much has changed in the past year. This time last year, my office was in a different location, I had no friends (but the promise of some through a kind soul at my old company who was connecting me with her college friend and his wife), and I was about to move in with people who I had met once for about 20 minutes.

One year later, I work in an office with twice as many people, I have a great group of friends, and am about to move into my own place. On top of that, my friends lives have been changing a lot too. Tam and Lindsey just bought houses, Hillary's about to pop with a baby, Chris is working in Helsinki (that's in Finland - I had to look it up too. Oh you didn't? Shut up), Sio is engaged...crazy changes are happening!! In two weeks I'm about to celebrate the one year anniversary of meeting most of my friends by going to Allison and Chris's turkey day celebration. Last year I showed up with microwaved mash potatoes that I had to search high and low for in ghetto SheBu. This year I'm rolling up with a bit of a crew (Liz is in town from Bath! and Rachel and Jess will be in town!!), and I'm in charge of dessert. Lots of pies and cookies!

Surprisingly, even after a year, I'm still learning new things every day. On Monday, I was reading an article about how British spies foiled a plan to blow up the NYC subways. It referred to Scotland Yard. I had to call out, "Um, can I ask a really stupid Brit question?"
Eddie (he sounds like a Beatle): Sure Kat
Me: So you Scotland Yard? Is it, like, IN Scotland, or is the British police, or is it all of the UK?
Eddie: Wow, that really is a stupid Brit question. Ok, its the headquarters for metro police. Its a London thing.
Me: Ohhh..gotcha.

A little later that day I was talking to Jess online about her excitement to come to London. She had one specific request: she wants to see my keyboard.

I told her, well you know its not that different. The @ is over the apostrophe instead of on the numbers. And the " is over the 2. Also the £ is over the three and there is no number sign.

THEN, my finger slipped and a # popped on the screen. I shouted in excitement and confusion. I think stopped, stared at my keyboard until finally I found it! The # was hiding LITERALLY under my fingers the whole time!! Right next to the enter key and next to the @. Its just so close to the enter key that I had always overlooked it. Then I started to really questions my own intelligence. It took me exactly ONE YEAR to find a key on my keyboard that has less than 100 keys total. As much as I started to hate myself for my stupidity, I was far too excited to let that get to me.

So the next few weeks will be really busy for me. Saturday is Beyonce WHOOP WHOOP, then going out to celebrate Verity's birthday, then moving into my new place on Sunday. I've never moved not hung over, so why start now?