Farewell Pt 3 (Back to the UK and Beyond)

It was after six months of office work (I'm not cut out for inside work. I was like a caged animal..) I moved back to the UK for a job with Cotswold Archaeology. I was supposed to go to Worcester, but instead they threw me into Wales unaware of my Anti-Wales stance. To Four Crosses I was bound for Cedric's Guesthouse;

You can see the site which was under the houses on the right of the picture, the road that runs through the middle of the picture was on the edge of Offa's Dyke. Unfortunately I was on the Welsh side of it, Cedric was a bastard, The faulty kettle he gave me nearly burnt my house down and I couldn't get to Birmingham for a party and ended up getting stuck in Welshpool one weekend, this again probably points towards why I hate Wales so much. Besides that, the crew were brilliant and we cleaned the local pub out of beer every week at the pub quiz. Then Cotswold sent myself and the crew out to Worcester, to this place;

This was in the middle of nowhere and each weekend my housemates would leave to go back to their real lives and leave me alone there. With a twenty minute walk up the drive to the bus stop where there was only two buses to Worcester on Saturday it was almost true isolation. I remember one Saturday morning walking up the driveway to catch the only bus in the morning to Worcester City for the day. There still a five minute or so walk to the top of the drive when I saw the bus go past. It was heartbreaking. Then in an even smarter move Cotswold Archaeology moved me back to Wales, to Trimsaran, near Llanelli

You will note how fucking far away from the main road this place was. I know how far it was cos I had to walk it every time I wanted to get a bus out to the bright lights of Llanelli or Carmarthen. There was a bit of a theme developing with Cotswold Archaeology putting me in places with really long drives. God I hated that place. The only good thing about it was Sam, which turned out to be a bad thing after all. This place definitely tipped me over the edge of unbridled Welsh Hate if nothing else did.

This job was the straw that broke the camels back, I left Cotswold and moved back up north to York, where I spent six glorious months in what I still think was the best place I ever lived, Osbaldwick Village;

Yes, this house was lovely, my housemates were the best and York is where I am generally happiest. It was also in this house that the concept of Ninja Metal was born. The only black spot on this other wise halcyon existence was the couple of months I worked for Network Archaeology on the the big pipeline project that finally broke me as a field archaeologist, and here is where we were housed in Ingleton;

I know what you're thinking "That's just another field. Were you living in tents again?" No, we were living in houses which obviously were not built at the time this photograph was taken.

I went back to Osbaldwick but the joy was not to last however and I was forced to move back to Whiston due to circumstances beyond my control. I was always planning to move out again and then I got a job in Singapore, we all know how that ended, but my time there was spent in Yishun in this block of flats;

The Singapore adventure came to an end and I moved back to my parent's house again, I soon picked up work at the Barbican in York and removed myself to Sarah's bedsit on Holgate road;

I was only there for a short while until I took Craig's room at Precentor's Court;

You will see from this picture, how fucking close the house was to York Minister. The bells woke me up every Saturday morning. I used to hang out of the window screaming 'Shut up you Bastards!!' They never did. Craig was moving out and I moved in with the Violent Alcoholic John Clay. He had this practise he called the 'thirty minute Hate' where would beat me with a broomhandle every evening until he broke it over my head one night. He would then use his fists to pummel me into a bloody mess. He has a different account of it and it can be found here.

I escaped the brutal regime of Clay to Lichfield for an away job for Onsite Archaeology;

This was Pauline's Bed and Breakfast. I never knew madness until I had a breakfast time conversation with Pauline. She would tell us about the ghost cat that haunted the place, you could tell it was a ghost because it's tail 'bent the other way'. I still suffer from sleepless nights trying to figure out what this even means. She once introduced one of the other guests to us as 'Ahmed, he's a dentist.' When she was out of earshot 'Ahmed' told us his name was Daniel and he worked in the Prison Service. Utter, unadulterated madness.

There was another place we staying in Lichfield, but it was only for a short period of time and I couldn't find it on Google Maps so it will have to fade into obscurity. After Lichfield wrapped up I was back up North again to York to help finish off at the Barbican. I moved into Ross's place which he had got after moving out of Precentor's Court;

It was on Broadway in Fulford (Ross always said he was destined to be on Broadway). It was above the Thresher Wine Shop and I was awoken every Saturday morning by the delivery of thousands of bottles of booze for the thirsty denizens of York. It was like the ringing of the Minister bells, but more alcohol related. Ross also had an aversion to putting the heating on and it was a constant battle to get him to turn the hot water on. He used to tell me it would make me a stronger man. I used to tell him to fuck off and turn the radiators on. Sneakily I would put the hot water on when he was out.

Work came up in France for three months on the Finding the Fallen TV series, so I moved back to Whiston in between bouts of filming and again I fell into the easy trap of staying put at my parents house. Picking up work locally made it all too easy to stay there until this present job came up in Iceland, which I took, for better or for worse and ended up living here;

Where I am presently writing this post. Over the next couple of weeks, I shall be moving into this place here;

Which, you may or may not notice is about two minutes down the road from the previous address. Well, there you have it, my life in three posts. I found writing this post pretty interesting and looking for the old houses also stirred up a lot of old memories, good and bad. Maybe you could do it to. Write in and let me know how you got on!