Is this the end or just the start of something new?

Hi blogfans. As you may be aware UBS informed me that they, ahem, no longer require my services.

This all began around 11.45am on Tuesday 28th April when the 'big boss' called me on my mobile. This, I knew was THE call and yes I could have run away and joined the circus / gone to the pub I went straight upstairs and faced the music. In a meeting room. With the big boss and a gentleman from HR.

I can't exactly remember what was said but I think I heard the words "your role is now redundant" and "economic downturn" and as I was part of the Bank's employee forum I sort of knew what would be said next, the forms shown to me and that I would be due back in UBS in two weeks time (less now) to be handed my notice formally. During this two week period the firm will look for potential roles for me internally, not that I am holding out much hope, because let's face it, the market is not good - but hopefully something will be out there in the big wide world of jobs for me soon.

Tuesday night, after an afternoon of clearing my desk and sending personal information 'home' I went to the pub and consumed two and a half pints of John Smiths Extra Cold - boy did that go down smooth. This was swiftly followed my two vodka and orange chasers. I stopped at this point to go home and nestle in the bosom of my lovely family. I bumped into a friend on the train who very kindly drove me home in my own car to save me walking and leaving my car at the station. Thank you Ryan, that was much appreciated!

I went out with my lady wife to the local pub / eaterie for a lovely meal and nice long chat. Here we realised that a)we like food b)we like each other (phew) and c)you know what, we'll be ok in the end.

Just before bedtime I looked at the form which informed me as to why I was not as good as others in my job pool and went to bed with that and many other thoughts milling around in my head. I slept very badly but once I was up the next morning (wednesday) the sun was shining and I got myself showered, dressed and took the children to school. This was a really nice thing for me to do and I very much enjoyed taking that part of the morning routine away from my wife for any times that I would be around (possibly for quite a while now!).

After this I spent time at home installing Microsoft Office 2003 on my home PC (thanks Ricky) and synching my gmail account to it too. From here I emailed various contacts and throughout the day received lots of lovely calls from friends and family who were and are very kind and supportive to me.

I went to the supermarket for a break with the missus and here I eyed up the pot noodles on offer as my money wont last forever! No (delicious) pot noodles were purchased even though I remember chicken and mushroom to be the best and only flavour worth eating.

I continued to send my CV to various contacts and register online with 'cityjobs'. In the evening Gabby went out and I suddenly remembered my all important 'TV clock' was out of synch as I had totally forgotten to watch The Apprentice! This, as you may know, never happens. I waited for the missus to return from her (cheap) evening out and we watched Alan Sugar and all his apprentices (is that a word?) perform their task (badly) and then get grilled in 'the boardroom'.

Thursday was a new day and I had slept REALLY well! I took the children to school once more and then went to get a decent, interview-friendly haircut. Yes, I do look good and much neat and tidy! I then kept up my thursday lunch arrangement with an old colleague and had a lovely beef in black-bean sauce and a long chat. Amanda (the FX panda) inspired my to write a list of 50 things I would like to do and then to actually do at least 10 of them. I really need to start on this list - maybe you'll read it here first (luck you!).

I also stood outside UBS and faced 'the three-keyed demon'. I bumped into some (already ex-) colleagues and had short chats. Then my good friend and colleague Dan brought out a couple of belongings for me that I had missed.

Finally I decided to meet up with my recent boss and team-mate for a beverage. This is something we did often anyway and maybe I shouldnt have done so but I really enjoyed meeting up and getting it over with so there are no stigmas in my mind about doing so in the future! I stuck to many diet cokes and after this came home.

Last night I had a lovely salad and then popped over to the same friend who drove me home on 'day zero' for a chat and to 'chew the fat'.

Today I got up early and came into town to come and see 'Penna' who are an outplacement firm UBS pay for me to use to take the next steps. It's really good here and I have plently of resources to use including 9 hours of 1-2-1 time with a consultant, use of a PC and phone for months if needed, and 50 credits towards various courses, which is excellent.

I will soon leave to meet up with my pal Ricky for a coffee (chocolate in my case?) and then over to Milly on the train later for some lunch.

In between all this I will be touting my CV (which Penna will help me touch up) and working on my list of things to do.

Thing 1: visit Borough Market (!)

More soon, thanks for looking.

All Good Things Must Come To An End

The last full day. The sadness. The happiness. And reflection.

The title of this blog is 'The Rose American Dream... Or Is It?'. To be honest and with all things considered it really was a dream holiday and we had an absolute blast - from the relaxation of the pool to all the shops, the theme parks and almost into space at Kennedy. All in all I can hardly fault this trip at all and this is a sentiment shared by us all. Sniff.

I don't think I'll blog from the airport tomorrow night unless we're very delayed so this will be the last (of the holiday). I'll continue to blog from time to time with random pieces of crap, normal service to be resumed.

So this is what we did on our last full day. After our day at Universal yesterday with its early start we gave ourselves a well needed lie in (only broken briefly by a call from across the pond, but that's ok cos we went straight back to the land of nod!). We (liderally) chilled by the pool as it still wasn't that warm this morning. The children braved the cool waters of the swimming pool and I tried my best to relax whilst the beautiful wife buried her nose in a book.

Once the children craved heat we went back to Prime Outlets and whilst Gabby took Freya for a healthy sandwich / salad myself and the boy went for a real burger. I had much researched the 'best burger in Orlando' and the 'tinternet had mentioned Five Guys Burgers and Fries a number of times - so that's what I munched on with my best boy. Now before my main food worriers worry too much this was the only burger I had all holiday - strange but true. How good was this freshly prepared pattie of beauty? Twas excellent and the web was right - thumbs up for this delicious embodiment of America. The burger wasn't huge or beautifully presented - it was just the most tasty of its kind I have devoured in a long time. As for the fries (with skins on), they too hit the spot. Tidy.

Whilst I sat with the children Gabby managed to race round, find a new jacket and jeans, get a couple of things for the children and exchange some Converse shoes (Jacob's Rubik's cube boots) for the bigger size. Phew.

After this we all went to Florida Mall so Freya could 'Build a Bear' with her holiday money - and this she did with the production of the very pink and flowery 'Violet'. Jacob soon decided to follow suit with the brown 'Furry' bear. As you can see from the below picture these animals are popular (at least for today!). I bought some jeans and then we headed back to the hotel so the kids could swim again. Mrs R and I relaxed in the setting sun and thought about how much fun we have had.

We went out for a last night treat to Vito's Chophouse for some decent red meat (that's the family photo below) and only my second steak of the trip for the worriers out there. The meal was excellent as was the service received from 'Ken'. I never seem to menion what the others had as only my food is important (hehe) however Gabby had some delicous lamb (rack of) and even the children meals looked good, Jacob opting for some very nice roast chicken with hand cut wedges and Freya having lamb kebabs with a lovely garlic mash. There was definitely no room for dessert and I may still yet have some (caramel cone Haagen Dazs) ice cream that will have to be left in the freezer (boo hoo).

It's now ten past midnight and almost all packing is done thanks to my top wifey!

Tomorrow I think we'll be back at Epcot in the morning for the final bit of theme park fun before heading to the airport to drop off the 300C (the car) in the afternoon and take the red eye home to ole blighty. This is one flight we are not looking forward to - bah.

Hope everyone is OK there in blog reading land and wish you all a Chag Semeach / Happy Jesus Resurrection and Egg Day.

If there's one conclusion drawn from this trip (apart from 'no wonder there are such big people in the USA if portion size and food prices are anything to go by') it's that somehow, sometime, some day, WE'LL BE BACK!

See you, Paul and the Roses x x x x

The Ride Of My Life

Today's GENUINE (well, almost) sponsor and all round super excellent person is my pal Mark and his site is http://www.jazzivories.co.uk/index.html . Check it out if you need a jazz pianist for any occasion!

After a late night with the Fantasmic show and watching the box until midnight I was up at 7.15am getting ready for the day ahead. The kids were so tired we had to wake them both up - but we had a job to do. We had to go to Universal, and our ticket was for two parks in one day - Universal Islands Of Adventure and Universal Studios.

This may all sound like a lot of work but it's not like we get to come here very often so wanted to make the most of it....

We arrived at the park about 8.20am and decided to splash out on the valet parking ($20 vs the day parking fee of $11) and I'm pleased we did it. It saved us the walk from the biggest car park on planet earth (another bigism I know but I kid thee not) and it was collllld today. We wrapped up in sweaters etc but it was windy too just to make sure we were well chilled.

Starting at the Islands Of Adventure they opened the gate at 8.45am and as we pre-planned (got to pre-plan to get the best out of the day) Gabby took the children to Suess landing where they arrived to the 'rope drop' and went on everything about 5 times. I, however, hot footed it to Marvel Superhero Island and rode The Hulk. This was the most adrenaline fuelled ride I have ever been on with it's multiple looping and corkscrewing green tracks. The guidebook said that once ridden (it begins with a 50mph boost into the unknown) you will not be able to walk straight - and I couldn't!

After this I went straight onto Spider-Man which was a sort of coaster come 3D all enveloping ride and very impressive it was too. If the baddy was an ice man then cold water got sprayed at you, real fire blazed and 3D arms grabbed at you - very good indeed. My final romp before catching up with the rest of my family again was Duelling Dragons - a beast of a looping, corkscrewing rollercoaster ride where you almost 'bump into' another coaster (the other 'dragon) whilst hanging down from your seat as there is no floor. Awesome stuff and again I couldn't quite walk straight for a few minutes.

Was the Hulk better, or Duelling Dragons? I'm not quite sure but together they were the best rides I think I have ever been on, closely followed by Everest at Animal Kingdom. I still say though, that as an overall experience, Epcot is the best park by far. End of.

The Roses were reunited in Suess landing and then the wife and daughter went on Spider-Man themselves. The lad isn't such a fan of fast rides but then again I was terrified of everything when I was 7! We then moved into the Studios park and made a beeline for the new Simpsons Ride which was a very clever simulator that immerses you in a Krustyland fairground ride gone wrong. This ride replaces the classis Back To The Future ride and is really quite similar - and even has a Simpsons cartoon whilst you queue to explain how things changed - all very amusing. The ride was good fun and enjoyed by all although the missus felt a bit sick(!).

We then did Men In Black: Alien Attack, a shooting spinning ride which left me a bit giddy (see below picture of us all - Gabby almost hidden by gun - and me looking traumatised, maybe because of the stranger we picked up). The queues were getting bad and this 45min line was beaten by the 70min E.T. line. We hadn't encountered queues like this in any Disney park and Universal don't have a free fastpass system to help bypass queues.

The tattoo / chav count was definitely higher in this park and you could also buy beer in glass bottles to swig which people were doing over their buggy riding babies. Nice.

Fear Factor Live was a fun show based on a US show where members of the public sign themselves up to mad stunts and insect eposure contests similar to those found in I'm a Celebrity. This was very good as some Estonian nutcase won the challenges hands down. Ending with having to retrieve flags from a car dangling at 30 feet and ending by firing a 'rocket launcher' from the car to hit a target.

We didn't have the time, or the inclination to do all things in both parks but this, to us, was an excellent 'best of' and we left around 5pm as our valet returned the car to us - great stuff.

We ate a great meal at the Olive Garden (again) and wifey and I had salad followed by some very good pasta with meaty sauce.

Finally we had to pop again to the supermarket (Publix) for final supplies. I have to mention this visit as yet again the customer service received, compared to ole blighty, is simply outstanding. ?They can't do enough for you helping you find what you need and not just giving you blank looks and shrugging which happens all too often at home. Oh home, sweet home, we are not quite ready to return to thee just yet.

Sadly 'Man V Food' isn't on tonight but tomorrow, our final full day, will be more chilled and maybe without theme park visit at all! We may have to pop to The Magic Kingdom though to meet some friends!

I am now getting worried our Sky box has failed and that we will have missed all the 24's, Losts, Desperates and Apprentices. We didn't even bother recording Corrie - shock horror.

Such worry!

A reminder again of today's GENUINE (well, almost) sponsor and all round super excellent person is my pal Mark and his site is http://www.jazzivories.co.uk/index.html . Check it out if you need a jazz pianist for any occasion!

Is it big? Oh yes it's big, and Fantasmic!

Hello blog viewers, how are you today? I'm a little tired as are we all but it has been a busy one. Earlier today we relaxed by the pool and it very nearly rained but didn't (20% chance of precipitation according to the weather channel... ahem).

After this we headed for another large American thing only this time it was a supermarket or maybe more of a hypermarket... choc full of the freakiest trailer trash Americans I have ever seen in one place. This was Super Wal Mart (yes , it's Asda but bigger). We had transexuals with lots of make up and big boobies, mullets, bad moustaches and people who looked at home in 'My Name Is Earl'. I spent far too long in the candy aisle and bought some ... to give out at work. Uh oh, I'm talking about food again... as I also bought Double Stuff Oreos - which we all road tested in the car - top marks. Whilst in American-Pikey-Big-Supermarket-Ville the heavens opened so we missed the main rain of the day, huzzah!

Then we ventured to Downtown Disney, a cornocopia of shops, eats, clubs, a big cinema and the largest (big things again) Disney Store in the world. It was fekkin big. The whole place wasn't so fab but we had to have a look or I would have felt we missed out. They also had a big Lego shop (which I love) but this didn't have the same grandeur and ambience as M&M's world!

Finally we went to Hollywood Studios again and began with their American Idol experience, which was excellent. This was just a shortened version of the real show with the audience voting for their favourite act who can go through to the real show. It was very well done and I found myself whooping and booing (at the baddie judge) along with the rest of them. Here we bumped into our new holiday pals so the children were happy.

After this TV show-fest we started to queue up for one of the most popular shows in all Disney Parks, Fantasmic. We had to start at 7pm for the 8.30 show (seriously) and continued the trailer park trash theme by the wife drinking cold beer out of a plastic cup and us all eating hot dogs on cardboard tray. Even though Fantasmic wasn't our favourite production it really was very well done - with a river (more of a lake) of fire, projections onto fountains, Disney characters, lasers and fireworks. It was the children's favourite though so that was good.

We left the park after the show ended around 9pm and that was about it for today.

Tomorrow we attack Universal (a little Islands of Adventure and more of the Studios me thinks) finally. The end of our American adventure approaches but we won't think about that - we'll look towards theme parks and eating - as per usual then.

Night.

Man v Food

Some say you cant eat a three foot bratwurst and others gawp at the 7ib burrito challenge. Today's sponsor is the excellent Man v Food on the US Travel channel - http://www.travelchannel.com/TV_Shows/Man_v_Food This show is excellent and certain friends of mine will appreciate these awesome meaty challenges. Mmmmm... IFOCE.

One blog viewer has commented this is getting repetitive (and they may be right!) and another is worried about my ice cream intake (large amounts of hydrogenated fats I'm told). One must understand that not only can such a trip be similar each day but that ice cream and (some)bad food intake is part of MY holiday and this is why I did pre-holiday diet. CAN A MAN NOT INDULGE FOR A COUPLE OF WEEKS?? I've had plenty of decent meals without fries and with veg /salad. OK OK so I've eaten one apple since March 26th which is my only piece of green.

Today we returned to Epcot and arrived before it opened around 8.45am. We had a great time on hangliding simulator Soarin' where we 'flew' over various Californian hot spots - very cool ride. Then whilst Mrs R took the children back to see Nemo and The Seas I quickly did Mission Space - a trip to Mars simulator that was quite intense. If you're claustrophobic then you don't want to do this one! After this I met up with the other Roses and we all rode Test Track, which is a car ride where you go uphill (fnarrk), speed up, slow down, skid, brake hard and then end with a 65mph zooooom round a long track with super fun banked curve.

We saw a show all about Velcro (yup, really) and then moseyed on down to the World Showcase - venue of the awesome fireworks I spoke of a number of days ago. We ate in China (I had a veggie stir fry to appease my dietary critic(s) ), saw a bit too much of Norway and looked in Germany a little.

We took a boat back to Future World and rode the 'golf ball' ride again - all about man's development from caves and through to 'the future'. We then left and took a drive to Prime Outlets - yet another massssive mall. It was just stupid sized really. The missus bought a few things and so did I in Bananannana Republic - who can resist 50% off already discounted prices. I also instantly found the Oakley sunglass lenses requested by 'repetative' blog viewer (within 7mins of text request) - but they didn't respond to my price info so they did not get boughted.

Whilst typing this I am still watching Man v Food where the man is eating the hottest wings on the planet and now he's attempting 'Burritozilla' (a burrito the size of a medium to large newborn child)- hahaha. Sorry, I'll continue.

We ate in a Bahamas style cafe in the mall with excellent food and utterly dire service. I had a chicken salad and still haven't eaten ice cream today - though I may raid the freezer after the blog ends.

Beyond this we drove back to the hotel down the utterly awful (north) International Drive - some of you will know this road is like Blackpool, but worse. Mind you it does contain the biggest Maccy D's on the planet - woo hoo. Must eat there...maybe. Our hotel is thankfully just off the nicer part of this sh*t road with lots of greenery and trees and without all of the discount crap stores and 67 fast food joints per square metre that the north end of this road has.

Right - off now to eat some lard, chocolate (battered) and 3kg of ice cream. And fries. In bed.

Poolside and Sweets

There isn't too much to say about today, I 'relaxed' by the pool as my tiny angel children played in the pool in the hot sun. The missus went to a couple of malls from 10am (left me at 9.45am) and didn't return until 4pm, the bare-faced cheek of it! On top of that she hardly bought a thing - good for my wallet but would have rather the wife found a few nice things for all the hours 'off'. Ho hum.

After all the sunshine I had to come up to the room around 5.30pm to rehydrate and relax. This consisted of some water from a bottle and me in a jacuzzi bath (sans bikini) watching Friends. It was utter bliss (no kids no wife!). They soon invaded my peaceful TV watching and we all got ready to go out. Note to self: when moving to dream home in lala land install a TV in the bathroom, along with a bath that actually fits a full sized adult - as ours blimmin doesn't. Anyhoooo....

The wife had told me about a place she came across today at ginormous (it is a word) Florida Mall, so we headed there. This mall was so big it has it's own large hotel within the complex - only in America (and other countries I'm sure - does the Lakeside Travelodge count?)

It was at approximately 7.16pm that I came across one of the coolest (non Star Wars) shops (in my geeky eyes) ever. May I introduce our sponsor for today... drum roll... da da da da da daaaa....

m&m's World

(clickable link)

This emporium, devoted to this popular American candy was bigger than many HMVs I have seen and sold everything under the sun, devoted to these sweets. It was utterly enormous and just crazy really. I obviously had to buy t shirt since I came across another excellent pop culture crossover - m&m's and.... Indiana Jones. So I bought two, since they were half price - wahey!

Please enjoy the following colourful snaps of my favourite part of the day as I browsed this huuuge shop. Only four of them exist in the world - double corrrr.

After some more shopping we had Mexican for dinner - arriba arriba! The missus and I had mm mmm combo fajitas and part of the kids meals were the best waffle fries ever - brurrrrrp. We got the kids to bed by about 10.20pm which is just a little late for our delicate flowers.

Tomorrow - back to Epcot me thinks. Got to go now and watch TV with a lot of adverts. Tata.

To Florida... and Beyond!

Kennedy Space Center

Today was a lonnnng day which all started about 7.45am when we left for Kennedy Space Centerrr arriving around 8.55am . I wanted to go back here as I haven't been in over 25 years and Gabby wanted to go and for us to take the kids to something that's real and not Disney! How impressed we were with our day...

The place is by the sea around an hour away from where we're staying (I guess you can tell that from subtracting the two times above, ahem). The visitor's complex was very nice indeed with a real space shuttle (Explorer) and rocket boosters near the front to have a good gander at. Wifey and I both did the shuttle launch experience which was rather a good simulation (apparently) of shuttle take off. My cheeks and 4 chins were wobbling like mad as we 'lifted off' then somehow felt almost weightless as we 'floated above earth' - OK so this is a bit Disneyfied but it was simulating something that is very much real.

After this we took a stroll in the Rocket Garden and let the children loose in the play area since we somehow managed to miss both IMAX films (oops). Before long it was time for lunch... with a REAL ASTRONAUT (did I mention that 23 times??). The food was good ( I ate these interesting potato things with mini viennas inside - these, I am told, were corn dogs - healthy? I think not) and the room was relatively intimate with tables of 8 people totalling approx 70. A lady called Wendy Lawrence who had not just flown in the shuttle (4 times) but also piloted it twice, I guess you could say she was a bonafide astronaut because she was! She spoke of her training, space flight and got asked the usual questions about weightlessness and doing a poo in space but it was all so fascinating. After this we got to have a photo with this person - who was a pleasure to meet and something Mrs R and myself will remember for a long time to come.

The children were interested too but probably didn't appreciate the magnitude of this encounter and how few people get to go to this place / meet someone who has been into space.

There was also a memorial to those who lost their lives such as the Challenger and Columbia crews.

We then took a 'close up' bus tour where we saw a couple of launch pads, the crawler / transporter vehicle (weighs 18,000,000 ibs fully loaded with launch pad and shuttle) and the vehicle assembly building (largest doors on earth that take 4 hours to open / concrete floors are 8 feet thick / foundation piles of about 160 feet etc etc http://science.ksc.nasa.gov/facilities/vab.html)

Finally we went into the actual mission control room from the Apollo VIII mission in 1968 where they simulated the whole launch experience which included all the real footage sounds and even the windows vibrated. We then moved into the new building that housed Saturn V - the biggest machine man has ever made with 2,000,000 processes / parts that had to work at once for this launch to happen - wow!

I know some people aren't the biggest fans of such things and personally I've not been bothered about many a shuttle launch , however, after today I now feel the need to keep track of these missions.

Geeky facts: The shuttle will only fly eight more times (five in 2009 and three in 2010)and then they are going to start sending astronauts in capsule rockets again, firstly back to the moon, and then to Mars by 2025. At least that's the plan.

And there ends my space-tastic time, it really was ever so good and was somehow an emotional experience for us grown ups - both of us this time! Totally fascinating.

We finished off going to Tony Roma's (on planet Earth) for dinner where unfortunately it wasn't Monday when I could have taken advantage of their 'Unlimited Slab' of ribs, mmmm unlimited. I managed though with a full rack (Gabby had two) of BEEF ribs. Rather tasty they were too.

That's about it for today - and I'm sure we'll soon be back to the pretend fun of Disney etc soon - still need to revisted a parade, ride or two. And still haven't done Universal yet.

Now off to pick beef rib out of my teeth, night all.