Ian Laidlaw ropes in a visa

Eight months and a stack of forms later, we have our visa! Just for the record, Ian ticked the "No" box for the question: "Do any of the following classes apply to you: An alien who seeks to enter the United States to engage in espionage, sabotage, export control violations, terrorist activities, the overthrow of the Government of the United States or other unlawful activity..." Now everyone can give up their suspicions about Ian.

Easter weekend started off with a trip up to Edinburgh for Ian's birthday (Friday). Yes, the flower of his youth is now fading as he has now reached the 30 benchmark. Can you believe he used to look like this? He does look a bit different with a full head of hair, although James hasn't changed a bit...

Note: James is the one in the little yellow top and then in the Ben Folds jumper. Just in case you were confused.

We spent the day on Friday walking around Edinburgh reminicsing about our visit in '05 just after arriving in the U.K. At that point we didn't have much money, no place to live, no jobs in sight, and only knew one person in Leeds. We had just signed over most of our savings to pay for six months of rent on a flat in Leeds (no references, so we had to pay all in advance). Everything was an unknown, and we were mildly freaking out. Now, nearly two years later, it was nice to visit in much different circumstances and get some perspective on our time here.

Friday evening we met up with James and our friends Matt and Jude Tindale for dinner, then down to the pub for a birthday whiskey. We spent the weekend spending quality time hanging out with Matt and Jude down at the seaside and watching "The Mighty Boosh" with James. Also, James took us out to an amazing restaurant called The Witchery where we ate like witches (?) Anyway, it was yum and our very first experience eating at a Michelin-starred restaurant, which we thought was very cool.

On Monday we trained down to London to meet up with ex-Okinawa friends, Phil and Bethany (not ex-friends, we just used to live together in Okinawa) and also our ex-Leeds kiwi buddy, Shaun. Tuesday morning was the exciting visa interview, which actually was pretty boring and not much like an interview at all. Basically, we sat in a big room with a bunch of people waiting for our number to come up periodically so they could ask some standard questions. The staff were nice and friendly, and you could buy potato chips while you waited, so all in all, all three hours of it was a relatively pleasant experience.

Afterwards we headed to Gordon Ramsay's (Gordon Ramsay is like a celebrity cook here) restaurant, Maze, for a little birthday and post-visa celebration. Maze was so cool! It's a kind of posh restaurant with really interesting and unique dishes like "Honey and soy roasted quail with Landes foie gras and spiced pear chutney." One of the most interesting and original things we had was a dish called the BLT: "B.L.T Bacon and onion cream, chilled lettuce velouté, tomato gelée." We even got to tour the kitchen and meet the head chef, Jason Atherton, who wished us well in our move to Chicago and even signed a menu for us. Thus concluded our Edinburgh-London weekend! We had always wanted to eat at a Michelin-starred restaurant, and this weekend, we got to eat at two! Now we both have stomach-aches...