British Expatriate Network

I've been here too long.

I'm going back to the UK in two weeks and though a friend who has recently moved emailed me her address I've lost it.

I phoned her today and said I'll come and visit and asked this question

"What's your new address?"

Her Oh, well you know where I used to live?"

Me Yes

Her Well you drive out of Coton on the same road and you get into Grantchester and you pass this pub on the corner turn left and I'm the third house from the telephone box on the left. OOargh!

Me Oh

Her Well, I'm not the last house though it looks like I'm the last house but the last house is further back from the road and has big trees around it.

Me What's your new address?

Does all this driving around landmarks such as pubs and telephone boxes get on your wick now you've been here a few years?

The last time I went to her house on her directions I ended up having to do a nine point turn down a dead end where there was one house with huge hay bales outside. The occupants of the house all went to the window and gawped when I backed into the hay bales (didn't knock any over)

I like those kinds of driving directions myself. I actually find it easier to give and recieve directions by landmarks such as pubs and telephone boxes. I once made the mistake of telling some Americans visiting England for the first time to "turn left opposite the pillar box". Well how I was I to know? lol

I just use the address and something like MapQuest or a GPS.

Back in 1980, we took our three daughters to England for a holiday. We stayed with my mother in London, and then we headed up to my wife's hometown of Hull to stay with a friend of hers, we took my mother so she could visit her sister who had married a man from Hull. As we approached Hull I asked for the address so my wife could give me directions. The address book was back in Paddington. We stopped and called my wife's friend, who's husband was a policeman, and asked her if she could track the address. We went on a few miles and phoned again and got the address.

She had called in to a radio program, a chat and records type of deal, told them the story and asked them to broadcast the request. My aunt wasn't listening but a neighbour came banging at the door to tell her. So she called in and..........

As Shakespeare said, "All's well that ends well."