A Victorian Christmas

The Victorian Farm made a re-appearance on the television screen in the UK last night with a special three part christmas edition and this time they have a number of additional activities on the associated website including making a victorian style christmas card, a paper mache box and the old mince pies.

So much better to be able to make presents rather than by them if you have the time. This will be the first year that I haven't managed to make mince pies, as I kept thinking I would make them in Cornwall when I had moved, thinking I would be there by October and now it is less than two weeks away it will be a bit late to make them now. But some of the other ideas I might look at including decorations.

I have already listened to a Christmas Carol, one of my favourite books at this time of year, I have it on CD and love the transition of Scrooge from grumpy old character to loving employer, friend and Uncle. I read it first when I was about 13 and usually have listened, or read it before christmas to enjoy the story and to make the season.

What do you do to make Christmas real to you?

Saturday Satire - At the Barbers

A guy stuck his head into a barbershop and asked, 'How long before I can get a haircut?'

The barber looked around the shop full of customers and said, 'About 2 hours.'

The guy left.

A few days later, the same guy stuck his head in the door and asked,

'How long before I can get a haircut?'

The barber looked around at the shop and said, 'About 3 hours.'

The guy left.

A week later, the same guy stuck his head in the shop and asked, 'How long before I can get a haircut?

The barber looked around the shop and said, 'About an hour and a half .'

The guy left.

The barber turned to his friend and said,

'Hey, Bob, do me a favour. Follow that guy and see where he goes.

He keeps asking how long he has to wait for a haircut,

but then he doesn't ever come back.'

A little while later, Bob returned to the shop, laughing hysterically.

The barber asked, 'So, where does that guy go when he leaves?'

Bob looked up, wiped the tears from his eyes and said,........




'Your house!

New Shoes

I decided that a new pair of shoes for my venture into the job market was in order, normally I shop at M&S who produce Footglove shoes which are amazingly comfortable but the cost of a pair was nearly £40.00, and while they fitted I didn't think they looked particularly nice. Instead I walked along a little way to the Clarks outlet, and lo and behold they had a sale on, I am now the proud posessor of two pairs of shoes for the price of one at M&S and they will be more comfortable than the pair I use for interviews.

Just need to sort out the rest of the packing and get the rats accustomed to their temporary home while they go into foster care, they are going to be missed but Bodmin isn't too far away and I will be able to visit them.

I am hoping to spend a lot of next year by the coast as I will be living in a caravan only 6 miles from Portreath and it is going to be a splendidly hot bbq summer next year according to the met men so I will be investing in a souwester lol

The raggle taggle gypsy oh

I am about to up sticks and remove myself to Cornwall, and therefore have now handed in my notice to the University at the back of beyond and will be in Cornwall from 2010. A brand new year and a brand new start.

Thanks to all of you who offered words of encouragement and support, it hasn't been an easy decision and not everything is yet in place but it is where I want to be and even though it is going to be tough financially it will be beneficial in the longer term.

Somehow today seems a little lighter, I feel less weighed down by the situation and even have a big smile on my face.. what could be more beneficial.

Busy having some down time

Sorry to be absent without leave, having a few days downtime to consider my options will update the blog when I have made a decision (or two)

Hmmm

Never mind about global warming, I think carpentry skills to build an ark might come in useful any day now. I can only commiserate with those people affected by flooding as the rain is practically non-stop for the past few days and shows no signs of letting up.

Christmas shopping is a wet bedraggled experience, and shows none of the joys of the season and my bah humbug persona is taking over. With less than 19 days to go, no wonder more people than ever are shopping on-line this year.

Saturday Satire - Retraining

A Gynaecologist had become fed up with malpractice insurance and Medicare paperwork, and as burned out. Hoping to try another career where skilful hands would be beneficial, he decided to become a mechanic. He went to the local technical college, signed up for evening classes, attended diligently, and learned all he could.

When the time of the practical exam approached, the Gynaecologist prepared carefully for weeks, and completed the exam with tremendous skill. When the results came back, he was surprised to find that he had obtained a score of 150%.

Fearing an error, he called the Instructor, saying, '' I don''t want to appear ungrateful for such an outstanding result, but I wonder if there is an error in my grade. ''

The instructor said, '' During the exam, you took the engine apart perfectly, which was worth 50% of the total mark. You put the engine back together again perfectly, which is also worth 50% of the mark. '' After a pause, the instructor added, ''I gave you an extra 50% because you did it all through the muffler ''

There is no hope :-)

I was listening to the radio this morning and found myself in agreement with John Prescott over the RBS issue of the directors wanting to pay bonuses. He says that if they can't accept that they shouldn't give out bonuses given that 75% of the company is now owned by us the taxpayer, they should all resign to a man.

Never thought I would say this, but well said John..

What is NaNoWriMo and what happens next

NaNoWriMo was something that I hadn't heard of until Tom Reynolds mentioned it on his blog, I needed a distraction from real life and thought yes have a go.

The idea is to write a minimum of 50,000 words from 1st - 30th November 2009 and that means 1,666 words per day... easy peasy I thought. They aren't expecting to be edited so even if you change your mind, or see a problem you just carry on regardless.

You write with a region, and though I am not yet in Cornwall I decided to join their region and had an absolute blast and will stay in contact with fellow writers in Truro and surrounding areas.

I used to write with a group of friends, and posts between us could be easily 3-5,000 words knocked out in 2-3 days; but that was then and this was now.

I took an idea that had been knocking around in the empty creative spaces of my mind and decided to see what happens, not having set ideas helps because the character starts working with you on the creative process [for all those think voices, speaking to me - honest it is fine I'm used to it :) ] I very often start typing only to find that the persona who finishes the storyline is part me part character and it can be very enlightening and funny on occasion.

I did put a blog together for the posts and then thought if I ever wanted to publish it, it perhaps wasn't the best idea and the thought of other people reading it and making caustic comments wasn't something I felt comfortable with. Having said that I have put half of it up, and will put the rest of it up and if anyone feels a burning desire to read it I can add them to the readership.

Swine Flu

I get my injection for swine flu today, hopefully this will stop me picking up this awful bug but you never really know. Friends in Cornwall have one son ill with it, and potentially their second son has it but we are keeping our fingers crossed that they recover soon.

Since my return from Cornwall at the beginning of October with a heavy cold, I have had no end of sinus problems and finally the docs have decided that perhaps a course of amoxycillin is in order to try and clear it up.

I had tried :

Steam baths
Steroid nasal spray
Reducing milk intake

Was there something else I could have done?

ps - grateful thanks for the grand annual christmas tea held in Aspen, I had a lovely time and arrived back in time thanks to my Fairy Godmother for her help and assistance.

ATC?

If you didn't know what the title of this post meant, you weren't the only one. Kath from Railway Cottage Blog had a post on recycling and offered an ATC (Artists Trading Card) as a prize for the best comment with an interesting recyling story.

I proposed the story of the fish in the fish pond made of a fibre-glass planter that was being thrown away and how I had ended up with fishlets after borrowing some pond week from a neighbours Koi carp pond..

Kath liked the story so much she awarded a prize of one of her ATC's and this morning it arrived safely, so for your viewing here it is.

It is truly beautiful and Kath wrote some lovely words on the back before putting it in a small cellophane bag to ensure it doesn't get damaged. Now all I have to do is find a small photoframe to suit the item and I will have my own piece of art.

Thanks Kath, I will treasure this and you never know you might get another person to tutor xx

An Event and an Achievement

Kathy pointed me in the right direction to Mr Toast's Blog and the 1st Annual Christmas Tea in Aspen Colorado.

I need to be there by 3pm local time, and it wraps up at 10pm so I figured that my fairy godmother would ensure that unlike Cinderalla that I would be back in time for work tomorrow and kit me out with something absolutely magical to wear and arrange the transportation too.

She came up trumps, the fairy godmother (FG), I have a black velvet gown and warm red velvet wrap which matches the shoes. Apparently I can get concorde direct to Aspen and arrive in time even leaving after work. FG has also arranged for hair and make-up to be done on the flight so I am going to look stunningly gorgeous. I love having a FG, and am looking forward to meeting up with some blogging friends.

I have always wanted to visit Colorado, it is just a shame that I won't have any time spare to look around and see the beauty. At least I will have a fun time meeting all the blogging faces I see are attending.

Yesterday saw the end of NaNoWriMo, or National Novel Writing Month (all you had to do was write 50,000 words - simples), I had fun with this but it was incredibly hard work and not helped by me having a crisis of confidence a week in resulting in me starting again from the beginning (though I have kept my original 20,000+ words in case I want to revisit it. I tried to do as much as I could daily but even though the daily target was 1666 when it was hard to even think of 50 words to add to a story it was difficult enough. I took a week offline (except for blogging) to concentrate on what I had and my final tally stood at 56,211. I could have had more but I edited a lot of rubbish out in the end and felt it didn't matter as long as it was over the 50,000.

Time to put the writing tools away for a short while, think about other more pressing things..