Musings of an Englishman who literally quit his life in Devon in mid-2012 to move to Tijuana to love a girl.
They ended up in San Diego where he became a TV anchorman (yes really...), they got married, and now they're living in England together.
Simple as that really.
Follow your heart, who knows where it will lead.

Crazy. Beautiful. Madness.

Tuesday 10 December 2013

The things we do for Christmas... (and love)

"Can you tell me where your Christmas tree baubles are please...?" I pleasantly asked a frenzied-looking shop assistant in a store at the weekend.
Laughter ensued. Loud laughter in fact.
In fact the kind of laughter that upon diminishing, would have normally seen said sales assistant beckon to other sales staff to come gather for a good old laugh at the silly Brit.
Once the laughter stopped she pointed over to a small stand in the corner.
"That's what we have left," she said still smirking.
Had it not been the 'season of good will', I would have slammed my sticky iced cinnamon roll in her face.
Believe me I thought about it.
But instead I strolled over to the stand with Jacks now in tow.
"What did she say?" Jacks asked.
"That's all they have left," I answered.
"Seriously?"
Seriously.
Now I was warned about the 'holiday season' starting on Thanksgiving - aka November 28th - but I admit, I didn't really pay much attention.
I didn't hear the start gun, Christmas isn't a sprint... it's a marathon. Surely, I thought.
Wrong.
It seems that Christmas does indeed start on Thanksgiving... midnight on Thanksgiving Eve to be exact.
Overnight every retailer under the warm Californian night sky puts up every twinkly glittery decoration they can lay their hands on.
Overnight San Diego becomes a Santa's grotto.
As I've since explained to many American people here, traditionally retailers in the UK 'kick off' Christmas and it's frenzied consumer-led chaos in November.
For many people in the UK, Christmas doesn't really feel like, well... 'Christmas', until at least December 20th.
This is normally around the time when you read leaked details of the Queen's Christmas Day speech in the national tabloid press, and the likely inclusion of 'Indiana Jones and The Temple of Doom' and 'Love Actually' in the TV listings (AGAIN).
Up until then it's Christmas for the sake of Christmas. It's only when families begin to come together that our traditional UK Christmas begins.
I digress...
So there we were trying to buy a Christmas tree, some fairy lights and some baubles, on December 7th - two-and-a-half WEEKS before Christmas Day.
But it didn't matter.
We were late for Christmas.
A deep-rooted feeling of regret and sadness filled our tummies.
Had we seriously missed the boat? We didn't get the memo! Had that ship largely sailed?!
Pants.
Fortunately (because every Christmas story has got to have a happy ending right?) we found a bunch of people selling Christmas trees in the parking lot (or 'car park' as we call them).
And then of course the traditional husband-wife conversation began...
Me: "Which one do you fancy?"
Jacky: "That one!"
Me: "That's way too big."
Jacky: "THAT one."
Me: "Look at the size of the tree's TRUNK."
Jacky: "Okay... THAT one. It's small compared to the other ones."
Me: "Well, it's smaller than the other one..."
Sold.
$20 = bargain.
Now, I should mention at this point that we currently don't have a car here, and we usually rely solely on the good nature of friends and public transport.
Everyone else who bought a tree from that parking lot picked up their trees, placed them on carts and pushed or pulled them to their nearby cars.
As we didn't have a car to push or pull a cart to, I opted to carry the monster.
Of course being a man - a man who shirks at the idea of carrying two grocery store bags in favour of ALL of them at once (because I'm a man and that's what men do - albeit stupidly) - I hoisted the tree up and onto my shoulder, nearly taking out the tree-selling staff in the process as I spun around to locate the nearest trolley (San Diego's train) stop.

No I can't hold THAT pose

'Did Jacks help...?' I hear you ask...
Not unless by 'helping' you mean by taking photos and laughing uncontrollably.
All that was going through my head was 'it's our first Christmas as a married couple, it's our first Christmas as a married couple'.
With friends out of town and unreachable, we decided to try and use the trolley to get the bloody thing home.
Cue further comedy.
There are signs, clear signs, on just about every trolley carriage stating the size of things which may or may not be carried on said trolley.
Somehow, in the listing they forgot to mention that 'no Christmas tree over seven feet tall and three feet wide should be allowed on board'.
Yep, they missed the trick there.
Clearly no-one would be crazy enough to attempt such a feat...? That is until last Saturday.

Where's Wally?

So there I was at the trolley stop, roughly ten stops from the nearest stop to home, thinking there is no WAY we are going to be allowed on the trolley with this beast.

"Not a chance..." or so I thought

But then magic happened. The trolley arrived, we got on (well, I 'stumbled' on), I wedged the tree up against a seat and the trolley's ceiling and I smiled at the other passengers pretending that it was the most normal thing in the world to do.

En route

The 'magic' revolved around two transport police looking up at us, and simply ignoring the tree.

"Nothing to see here..."

It was a strange moment. It was like it was invisible.
And as weird as the rest of the journey was, it was also wonderful in equal measure.
In our crazy randomness we brought a fair amount of Christmas cheer to that carriage attracting smiles and nods of approval from every passenger who happened to get on, or off.
A couple of people commented about how great the tree smelt.
"It's smells like Christmas," one man said before thanking us.

Are we nearly home yet...?

So yes, we made it 'home' seemingly leaving half of the tree's needles on the trolley, in the elevator, and along the passageway to the front door.




Once in the apartment I grappled with the tree to raise it up, cut the string which had held it so tightly together, and then looked on with some amount of smugness as my aforementioned views were realised that this was indeed no 'small' tree.

Oh dear lord...

"Oh my gosh..." Jacky said.
Long story cut short... it looks amazing.
We found some baubles (around 60) from a store across the road at a discounted price because it's 'past-season' (?!) and we bought 75ft (yes... 25ft x 25ft x 25ft = 75ft!!!!!) of lights.
I could have covered my entire house in England with that length of lighting!
Still.
It does look pukka.

Twinkle twinkle in the Casa de los Nichols

America does Christmas well.
And now, so do we.
Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to go and be horizontal for a while and try to soothe this aching back.
Happy holidays everyone!

@tristan_nichols




Saturday 30 November 2013

Shop 'til you drop

WALKING to work yesterday I couldn’t help but feel like I was involved in a particularly dramatic scene from the latest Hunger Games movie.
My decision to divert from the usual daily route to the studio, and wander through Fashion Valley mall was a tad silly on reflection.
Black Friday?
Tsk. More like ‘black and blue’ Friday.
Americans do love their contact sports but wow.
Check out this video taken yesterday in Texas...


During the course of yesterday's national shopping holiday a few shoppers got punched and bundled over; someone got stabbed; someone got shot; and someone actually got stun-gunned… I mean, TASERED… by a female shopper.



How does someone actually come to the decision when leaving their house that they need to bring something like that when they’re going shopping.
I mean, keys – check; purse – check; 3,800K volt stun gun – check…
Er… tis is not the season to be ‘jolly?’ Peace on earth and all that jazz?
Anyway, yesterday morning on my way to work here in San Diego I forgot it was ‘Black Friday’.
That was until I was met by a scene akin to The Walking Dead.
“Hey look at THAT guy jumping the line…” one infuriated guy shouted in my direction as I criss-crossed through the sheer hordes of eager-eyed bargain hunters in the mall.
“I’m not queuing, I’m trying to get to bloody WORK!” I replied with desperation now distinct in my voice.
I almost felt the need to shout that I just wanted to “survive”.
Shopping at any other time of the year is one thing. But shopping on Black Friday here… there’s a fevered intensity bordering on insanity.
People line up outside these stores for days. Literally DAYS. Some have tents. I even saw one with a generator so he could cook meals.
And I’m told that the ‘holiday season’ deals here run almost daily up until Christmas.
Joy. Maybe I’ll stop by a local sports store and stock up on some NFL padding and a helmet.
During these sales people seemed to line up outside every store in the country.
Sony, Gap, Zara, Macy’s… these I kind of understand.
But Target?! Everything’s so cheap in that store any way, staff must have been literally handing out free stuff.
Sure there are deals to be had but is it really worth risking your life over?
I always find that most of the things I actually want to buy are never on offer in any case. Typical.
It’s also impossible to drive anywhere around these malls because of the traffic.
By the time I got home to the apartment last night, I wanted to walk in the door, lock it, and declare to Jacky: “do NOT go outside”.
Here’s an idea for bargain-hunters. Instead of shaving years of your life through stress dealing with the craziness, why not just shop online?
The deals are the same, most stores boast free delivery, and there’s less of a chance of being attacked by a woman with a frikkin stun gun.
If you need any more reason to lose faith in humanity check out these stories: http://www.buzzfeed.com/jordanzakarin/17-black-friday-stories-that-will-make-you-lose-faith-in-hum.
So yes… Thanksgiving.
It was my – and ‘our’ – first Thanksgiving in the States.
I can tell you that the level of excitement was not really shared by me, an Englishman, or my wife, a Mexican.
My only real link is that the Pilgrim Fathers left from my home city of Plymouth.
Judging by the conversations I’ve had, I think I actually know more about what Thanksgiving is, than most Americans.
“Turkey” seems to be the most popular answer when you ask someone here what ‘Thanksgiving’ is all about.
Interesting answer.
"Football," too.
“Family”, is the answer which seems to come in a close third.
It made me miss my mum and dad, and the weekly Sunday roast.
We roasted some veggies and some chicken.

Veggie-tastic

Oh, and ate an apple pie donated as a Thanksgiving gift by a Mexican friend of ours.
And I skyped ma and pa.
Good enough right?
Personally the occasion did make me feel thankful for everything I have here, and at home in the UK.
And now, sitting here in the apartment I’m also thankful for a decent Wi-Fi signal to allow me to shop from the safe confines of home.
Be nice to each other America.

@tristan_nichols


Sunday 27 October 2013

Fright Night


YOU know that horrible moment when you turn up at a party only to realise that you ‘didn’t get the memo’ regarding dress-code?
Yeh… THAT.
That was last night.
Picture the scene… Jacks and I walk past the man bizarrely dressed as Cleopatra in the apartment complex hallway, past the pumpkins and cobwebs laid out on the furniture, and enter the lift (sorry elevator) to head upstairs to the party.
We get to the apartment, I knock on the door, and the hostess answers.
“What are you guys supposed to be…?” she asks as she eyes Jacks and I up and down noting our almost-matching black leather jackets.
“Dead bikers…?!”
There she stands in blonde wig, moustache, vest and jean hot pants (she was Seann William Scott’s character from Old School with her boyfriend made up as Will Ferrell as ‘Frank The Tank’ – complete with dart in his neck).
Awkward…
You see earlier this week the party hostess – who is also one of the U-T TV hosts – asked if Jacks and I wanted to come to a party at her and her boyfriends’ apartment.
“Is it fancy dress?” I remember asking.
“No… it’s not fancy dress at all,” she replied.
Of course, I now realize that ‘fancy dress’ isn’t the ‘fancy dress’ that us Brits know, and refer to.
‘Fancy dress’ in the U.S. refers to ‘fancy’ dress – as in smart wear like a tuxedo.
What I should have asked is it ‘costume?’ – because that’s how they refer to our ‘fancy dress’ here in the great U S of A.
Epic fail.
Just to add to the hilarity, when we woke up yesterday on the morning of the party I suggested we go to a fancy dress shop and grab some fake blood and vampire teeth – but then backtracked thinking that we’d be the “odd ones out”.
“How stupid would we look if we rocked up all dressed up and no-one else was…?” I pondered.
*face palm*
So anyway, there we found ourselves, surrounded by dozens of excited costumed party people.
Talk about odd ones out.

Odd one out...

Doh!

Even another guy from work, who didn't really make an effort, still wore a T-shirt with skulls on just to fit in.
Yep, we’re still just as lost in translation as we ever have been here in San Diego. And I can’t even rely on my wife to help out as she’s just as lost as me in the language.
Oh well, it gives me something to write about.
And it gives you all something to laugh about… albeit at my/our own expense.
Tsk.

Fancy dress or night my wife still looks amazing

If there's one thing more scary than Halloween itself, it's the American fascination with it.
It was a pretty strange sight to be stood in the supermarket aisle next to the Phantom of the Opera, and his witch girlfriend.

Even the Phantom of the Opera has to shop right?

It was another weird moment to be stood outside checking my emails, only to be asked for a light by a mummy fully-dressed head to toe in bandages.
Even pets here can’t escape the madness.

Pet cemetery
Clearly not amused

Sure, as a student I dressed up as a vampire or zombie and went to parties in the UK but here… well, it’s another level.
Jacks and I are gearing up for the army invasion of sweet-toothed trick-or-treaters expected on the 31st.
Don’t get me wrong, I love the idea of it.
Someone told us last night that after New Year’s Eve, Halloween is the biggest fancy dress, sorry… ‘costume’ night of the year.
And who needs an excuse for a party right?
I just can’t get my head around it just yet.
The premise of Halloween is ghouls and ghosts right? As in ‘All Hallows’ Eve?’
It’ just that Halloween just doesn’t seem scary when you’re living in a place which is so ‘new’.
I joke to people that I have cutlery at home which is older than San Diego.
It seems that Hollywood has made Halloween the big deal it is here.
Some of the weirdo tramps who shout random things at you on the train are the scariest thing about this place.
Downtown’s ‘Haunted Hotel’…? Give me a break. The décor appears to be the scariest thing about it. That, and the price of admission.
Pumpkins are synonymous with the autumn or ‘Fall’ in the U.S.
It seems that you can’t go anywhere at the minute without seeing them.

Pumpkin patch

Outside most stores here there seems to be a stand selling pumpkins or other weird vegetable/fruit thing which looks like it was grown on Mars.

Space fruit?

Yep, your guess is as good as mine...

Starbucks are also serving ‘pumpkin lattes’, which I just can’t bring myself to try.
Are they on sale in the UK too?
Halloween of course falls at the end of October – a time of year when, back at home in the UK, I’ve packed away all the shorts and T-shirts and unpacked the hoodies and jumpers.
However here, even the coolest day yet in San Diego has felt like a pleasant English summer day.
But all I hear from people here is how “cold” it is.
One colleague told me last week she was “so cold” she had the heater on all night.
That’s when the temperature didn’t actually drop below 54 degrees Fahrenheit (12 degrees Centigrade).
I’m still parading around town wearing shorts and T-shirts like I would in the height of summer in Cornwall.
And there I am passing people wearing full-on North Face coats complete with hats and scarves.
Weird.
You know it takes time to settle into a new place and I guess we’re still finding our feet – even after six months.
Next year you can be sure that we won’t make the same mistake again of not dressing up for Halloween.
We’re planning it now.
Be afraid… be very… afraid.

@tristan_nichols




Saturday 19 October 2013

California cool


YOU know… for as long as I care to remember, I’ve considered myself ‘cool’.
I really have.
When I was younger I had long hair, and I actually thought I was Kurt Cobain.
And as I’ve grown older I’ve felt I’ve maintained that hip stance.
I’ve played guitar since my early teens, I’ve always liked good music and movies, I’ve hung out with other ‘cool’ people, and I like to think I still dress well, um, ‘cool’.
I even think my parents – my dad being a huge blues fan – are pretty up there too.
But any belief I had in all that has faded like old fat kipper ties in the wardrobe during the last few weeks as Jacks and I have explored San Diego, and indeed California.
In the last few weeks we’ve met ‘cool’.
And his/her name is Chad… Arthur… Roxy… or something even cool-sounding.
These guys… they’re ‘hipsters’.
They’re the epitome of cool and hip, or whatever you call it in this age.
They have at least a couple of tattoos, androgynous hair styles and they boast the finest groomed moustaches or beards a man could cultivate.
They wear colourful Ray Ban sunglasses with thrift store purchased skinny jeans and faded t-shirts or lumberjack-style shirts. And they all seem so thin and pale even their fatigued figures seem fashionable.


Everyone, and I mean EVERYONE also seems to naturally be in a band.
The girl who served us a slice of pizza in Golden Hills, SD, was in a band; the kid with the skateboard was in a band, and of course the girl smoking on the sidewalk (pavement) walking the dog in North Park was in a band.
It’s much like how everyone in London seems to work in PR.
“Who are these people?!” I asked a friend during the recent Golden Hills Street Fest we attended.
“Hipsters…” she replied.
“… Californian, hipsters.”
The one and only thing which seems to make me cool and interesting to others is my English accent – but even then people seem to think I’m Australian.
Sadly, I can’t compete - no matter how hard I try...

Fail

Oh well.
When did everyone become so bloody cool? Was I asleep? Was I not paying attention? Was I in TIJUANA?!
I’ve seen a few of what I’d call ‘hipsters’ before in England– or at least people who thought they were hipsters – but here is where they seem to live and breed.
Even their pets are cool, and they could quite believably also be in a band.
So yes, Jacks and I have been out exploring San Diego, and meeting people.
It takes time to get to grips with new surroundings. And of course to meet people you’d call ‘friends’.
Where’ve I been? Where did the blog updates go…?
Well, we got married.

Ay caramba

And then we went on our honeymoon.

Life's a beach

There, that’s a good excuse right?
Without boring you all too much, our wedding was pretty much perfect.
There was no fear of it ever raining on our wedding day here in San Diego because, well, it just doesn’t really rain here.
It was a short and simple affair carried out under bluebird skies among the company of new friends and family.
The ceremony completed the amazing fairy-tale story which we’ve been living for the past 18 months.
And then we buggered off to Fiji to spend time on a near-deserted island for a couple of weeks.
Note: Isn’t it funny that within 30 seconds of being married people begin to ask you about babies?!
Sheesh… yes everything’s happened in a very short space of time but hey, give us a break!
Aside from all that I’ve come back to work on the most exciting and amazing project of my career.
The hugely talented Alejandra Cerball and I now co-anchor U-T TV’s U-T San Diego News from Monday to Friday.

News team assemble

It’s a new hour-long prime-time show which airs from 5pm (1am GMT) and then re-airs at 7pm (3am GMT) on U.S. cable and online.
If you want to see it, tune into Cox 114 or AT&T 17/1017 on U.S. cable, or watch it live online at www.utsandiego.com/tv/.

On air

So there you go.
I’m an anchorman in San Diego… and no, my apartment doesn’t smell like rich mahogany.

@tristan_nichols