Room with a view

This is my first view of Lake Ontario, taken from our hotel window. It's massive. I remember learning the names of the lakes off by heart at school and it was a bit of a moment, getting to see one for the first time.
No-one who reads this less than fascinating blog can be unaware that we are moving next month to Canada and living there for at least two, and maybe three years. It feels exciting, daunting, mad, brilliant and difficult more or less all at the same time. There have already been tears. Dominic cried at the thought of leaving school and Max cried when I gave away his slide because we can't take it with us. Although it will be, we are sure, a really good experience for all of us, the reality of leaving a place does suddenly put the life that you have there into a sharper focus. It will be some time before the miserable old witch in our next local shop asks me how the kids are and until we can't go out to buy a loaf of bread without bumping into someone we know. We've got some good friends here too and there will be a lot of quiet hours for us to spend without them.
Still, we won't have to worry about poor old Mr Brown, the decline of house prices, teenage knife carrying or bi-monthly rubbish collections. Instead we'll be fretting about whether the pool is warm enough and wondering for how long we will have to repeat everything we say twice before people understand us (I wish I was joking on that one).
The trials and tribulations of renting out our house, re-homing the moggies, fixing up new schools and pre-schools in time for September, shipping our belongings and doing without them for a month are occupying me greatly - but aren't very interesting to write about. I leave you to imagine a big bowl of lumpy porridge filled with unsuspected and unwelcome chewy bits that keep getting caught in your teeth and are naggingly painful. That's what its like in my brain, and that's it for now.