So just a quick update (via my iPod so please excuse any weird formatting).

My K1 US fiance visa was approved this Wednesday and i’m now waiting for it to be couriered to me, probably Tuesday or Wednesday this coming week. My last day at work is this Friday and, if I have my visa I’ll probably fly out next Saturday or Sunday.

I spent the night at my mum and step-dad’s house yesterday and my dad’s house tonight and tomorrow – to say goodbye for the last time until Lisa, Brit and I come over next year for a holiday.

I
Am
So
Happy
And
EXCITED

This week I have my K1 visa at the US Embassy in London.  Wednesday to be precise.

Yes..

..it is a big deal.

Assuming it goes successfully – and it should be fine, no-one could have done any more than we have to make it go smoothly – then the remainder of the week will be spent saying goodbye to my family.  Next week is my last week of work in the UK – after that I fly to the USA to marry Lisa!

To use an Americanism: holy crap.

Ok, well maybe not.   It’s a bit like that though if you take in the altruistic character disorder I seem to suffer/benefit from and my current cloister-like surroundings.

I have now successfully given away virtually everything I own, save for the clothes I am taking with me to the USA and some random bits and bobs like my poetry books, a laptop or two and, essentially, my snow boots.  I will need my snow boots – my Christmas visit to Omaha made that absolutely crystal clear.  The car goes back to its owner on Saturday (newly returned from rescuing the free world from Enemies Of The State) after which I think I may get a bit fitter – it’s so *easy* to jump in the car for even the shortest journies.  Still, good training for being a non-walking American. 

I’ve moved out from my sister’s house where I’ve languished for the last few months (I’m missing Bouncer, her dog, already) and I’m now firmly entrenched in a B & B hotel 2 minute’s walk from my office.

Visa progress: I’ve now sent off “packet 3″ which is the penultimate part of the K1 US immigration visa process.  I’ve scheduled my US visa medical appointment for within the next week and the US Embassy in London has all the information they could ever want from me about my life.

A weird amount of information they need too, including details of *every* address I have lived at since the age of 16 – and the month I moved!  I don’t know about you but given that I am in my mid-forties and led a bit of an itinerant lifestyle that’s a hell of a time period to cover.  So much so I had to sit down and write out a chronological biographical timeline stretching from when I was born to the present day.  Still I got it done.

So what happens next?

This Saturday: give back the car.  The following week: full tackle-out don’t blush we’ve-seen-it-all-before medical.  A couple of weeks after that (or, please God, sooner) I go for my embassy interview where the final decision is made and my visa is issued..or not.  The chances of it being “not” are extremely slim but you just never know. 

Lisa and I get asked all the time “so, when are you getting married?”  This is an impossible question to answer: it’s really in the hands of the US State Department and when the embassy get around to assigning me an interview date.  The current theory is I will be “in America by the middle of November at the latest”.  In practice it’s likely my interview date will be “some time towards the end of October” but it could be middle of November or who knows when.  Sigh.

I’m ready to go now..really really really really ready to go now.  Please.  Pretty please?

Oh, in other news I have some more poems coming out in a few magazines.  Popshotzine are featuring “Not my baby” in issue 2 (with artwork and everything – woo!) and Monkey Kettle are publishing “Winemouse”.  I seem to think  someone else asked for permission on a couple of others as well but I can’t remember who at the moment – the curse of visa stress – if it’s you then please let me know so I can show off about it to anyone who stands still long enough.

I’m shy really.  Honest.

FINALLY!  Our visa paperwork is off to the US Embassy in London.  Hurrah!

In the next week or so I should start receiving letters from them inviting me to send some bits and bobs and then arrange a medical and my visa interview!  SO EXCITED!!

It’s REALLY happening now.

I *should* be getting married, in the US, in November, a little while before Thanksgiving.

Meanwhile, I’m educating my future wife and in-laws on the correct way to do The Lambeth Walk.

For those that asked: still waiting for the National Visa Centre to complete their random “additional processing”.  ETA on my visa, marriage date and new life is therefore indeterminate due to it being in the hands of the big wheels and little cogs of the US Government.

Nutz.

On the plus side, Lisa just said to me “I learnt Spanish by watching Sesame Street“.  This, for some reason, makes me laugh hard enough to almost pee my pants.

Tell me she was not a genius; the perfect poetry of Michel Emer’s lyrics and the profoundly artistic performance of Edith Piaf just brings tears to my eyes.

This version has English subtitles – the original French words are even more beautiful.

I’ve been off doing poet things. Sorry.

Oh, and I’m getting married on 10th October to Lisa - who is the love of my life, my soulmate, and my best friend in all the world (clichés seem appropriate here mainly because they are entirely true and apt).  I am so happy and feel very lucky to have found her :-)

Ah yes, and I’m emigrating to the USA at the same time – middle America here I come!

I’m not sure this is factually correct…

Don’t tell anyone – but I moved out of MK over the weekend!

Life Plan Stage 3: Step 1. Completed.
Life Plan Stage 3: Still running.