Seasons Greetings

May you all have a wonderful day filled with fun, laughter, love and happiness.

May the coming year bring you peace.

Yuletide Greetings

Yuletide Greetings to all my pagan and non-pagan friends on this spectacular Solstice.

May this turning of the wheel bring you love, peace and good fortune in the coming year.

Happy Birthday Little Sis!

Happy Birthday Leanne. Hope you have a great day.

Lots of love from Toni, Keith and all the tribe!

Happy Anniversary

To my gorgeous, fabulous, wonderful, sexy KT Glitz.

Three years today and I love you more and more as time goes on.

You mean the world to me.

I am yours, always.

Warning! By Jenny Joseph

When I am an old woman I shall wear purple With a red hat which doesn't go, and doesn't suit me. And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves And satin sandals, and say we've no money for butter. I shall sit down on the pavement when I'm tired And gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells And run my stick along the public railings And make up for the sobriety of my youth. I shall go out in my slippers in the rain And pick flowers in other people's gardens And learn to spit. You can wear terrible shirts and grow more fat And eat three pounds of sausages at a go Or only bread and pickle for a week And hoard pens and pencils and beermats and things in boxes. But now we must have clothes that keep us dry And pay our rent and not swear in the street And set a good example for the children. We must have friends to dinner and read the papers. But maybe I ought to practice a little now? So people who know me are not too shocked and surprised When suddenly I am old, and start to wear purple.

Another Artist In The Family

OK, I'm doing the proud Mum thing.

These are some pictures that Gemima (my 9-year-old) drew today. They aren't traced but she did see them in a book and draw her versions of them.

Goblin:

Griffin

Pixie

Witch

Weekend!!!!!

Wow - the weekend got off to an amazingly good start.

KT arrived home on Friday evening with a really pretty bunch of flowers for me, which totally made my day! It might not sound like much to some people but this is the first time in three years that he has bought me flowers and it meant SO much!

After dinner we mooched on over to see Jodie and KT helped her plumb in her new washing machine. We haven't seen Jodie since boxing day last year and its the first time we've been to her flat. Gemima and Aaron were really pleased to see her again. Sadly we didn't get to met her fiance as I think he was taken by a sudden attack of the terrors (what with me being Jodie's foster mum a few moons back) and cried off with the excuse that he hadn't done his hair! Not to worry - we'll get him next time *evil grin*!

Saturday I generally felt like pooh, having had tummy cramps all night, so I spent most of the afternoon in bed sleeping and hoping to feel better in time to go out. I did have a house-full but KT played host, sorted Jade's laptop out for her and battled Pete on the X-Box. I slept blissfully through everything.

Saturday night arrived and KT and I headed off to the back of beyond to see the awesomely weird Throbbing Gristle. They are very difficult to describe; generally acknowledged as one of the starting points of industrial music. KT and I stood right at the frnt, pressed to the centre of the small stage. The whole "gig" was a quiet and well mannered affair (with the exception of one naked man! More on that in a mo) and actually felt a bit like being in a big university experiment. Four people sat at desks with laptops and odd looking gadgets which could have doubled as torture devices! A little weird; a lot pretentious (although that wasn't bad); a bit fun; a bit tongue in cheek; a bit shit - all wrapped up in one big cacophony of sound!

Back to the naked man - KT was happily videoing the encore when a somewhat enthusiastic young member of the audience leapt to the stage, stripped down to his birthday suit and did a swan-dive back into the audience. Sadly for him, no-one really wanted to catch a naked young man - not even all the gay men in the audience (of which there were quite a number!) so he ended up landing in an ungainly heap on the hard concrete floor. Ouch! Still - it was entertaining, even if I did have to endure a momentary terror as his winkie sailed overhead!

Sunday was filled with driving. Lots of driving. All the way to Aylesbury to pick up KTs new bass rig. He is ridiculously happy with it. We dropped it off at his house and spent some time with Sam before all heading out to TGIs for steak and stuff. Dropped Sam home and spent a bit more time there before heading back to my house in London for a fat, full-up sleepy snuggle... or not so sleepy in KT's case as he had heartburn so had a bit of a bad night.

Monday again and my brain is already excited about this coming weekend and our impending trip to Whitby for the Whitby Goth Weekend. Brain is already in holiday mode so trying to tame it into submission and get on with work may well be an interesting task today.

'80's Eyes

Playing with make-up. My eyeshadow looks more '80's than it did in the '80's!

CLUTCH The Regulator: This is what is in my ears this morning

Visits, Gigs and a Blast from the Past

Its been an interesting few days. Friends, Emma and Dren, were supposed to be visiting over the weekend; coming to see KT and the rest of Hollywood Doll play their first SE London gig at Dirty South in Lewisham.

The preceding week had been full of texts and calls as Emma and Dren's relationship seemed to drastically crumble and KT and I became something of a linchpin of communications; something we were only too happy to do for friends.

Friday arrived and so did Emma. I picked her up from the station and she came back to mine with me. Much chatting was done and calming advice given and to give Emma her due, she was very calm and rational about it all. Dren arrived a few hours later after crawling through traffic on the M25. I had to leave them alone in the house to drop Gemima at my Mum's for the night. When I got back there was a disagreement in full swing and to cut a long story short, Dren decided he was not well enough to come to the gig and he made his way back home.

Emma was initially a bit upset, quite naturally but resolved to have a good time anyway. And that is exactly what she did. A variety of friends and family turned out to see Hollywood Doll play and it was a really good night. Emma and I spent most of the evening chatting to Robin, KTs and my friend from our schooldays. We've seen him a few times over the last few years but Friday was probably the longest period of time I have spent talking to him since our physics lessons all those moons ago!

The rest of the weekend was for the most part quite a relaxed affair. Emma made a decision about her relationship which Dren agreed with and both decided to go their separate ways. Much positive thinking and talking ensued and hopefully Emma has a good clear focus on which direction she wants to take her life in now.

For various reasons, Emma was not able to leave on Monday morning as planned and so stayed an extra night, which was most welcome, not least because she made dinner for me. I can't describe how nice it is to come through the door when you have worked a long day at two jobs and be presented with a hot home-cooked meal. Bliss!

Monday night turned out to be movie night and despite Emma's dislike of Brad Pitt, we ended up watching Fight Club and Meet Joe Black. The night was finished off with me writing a long overdue review for Glitzine - only a few more to catch up with now before the rest arrive!

Emma headed off home back up to the frozen North this morning and I worked from home, glad I was not out in the rain today. KT is coming to stay tonight so I get to have Chinese food for dinner and then snuggle, which is one of my favourite things to do!

Life is good.

iPhone 4 at last

Yay! I have the new iPhone. I love it!


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Forging Ahead

Thank you KT for dropping everything and coming over last night. I love you loads. What would I do without you?!

So. Now..... Time To Focus On All Things Fun!

Packed calendar: Gigs to go to, Mum's birthday, Kids birthday, Whitby Goth Weekend, more Kids birthdays, KTs' and my 3rd anniversary, lots of Hollywood Doll gigs to try and get to amongst all that. Loads of stuff to do.

Life is good. 

Focus!

A Year Today - Farewell Douggie

So today is the one year anniversary of the OFFICIAL date the Douggie died.

In reality its a year since I found him on the floor in his flat. To be honest, we don't know if he died on the 18th or 19th. We suspect 18th.

Douggie, you were at the very least, a character! A mysterious one at that. You lived your life in boxes and not many people got to know the real you. Even after 28 years I'm not absolutely certain that we did!

You were a hard taskmaster - mistakes were not tolerated - but if I could deal with you teaching me then I can deal with anything. Thank you for preparing me for life!

You were a good step-dad most of the time and a good partner to my mother, who doesn't seem to be coping too well without you. You were an exceptionally good grand-dad to Jade and I know she misses you terribly.

I miss your war stories and tales of bravado and conspiracy. I regret that I didn't spend much time with you in your last few years but I'm glad I did see you in the couple of months before you died.

Douggie as a young soldier. The Army was his life. He lied about his age to get in early and he carried on working for them as a civilian for years after he'd completed his service.

Douggie with Jade. You could usually find her perched on his knee reading a book or watching TV; from the day she was born until she got too big to sit on his lap any more.

This will be the last time I recognise the date of your death. I'd far rather remember how you were in life. 

You are missed and you are loved. Rest in Peace and be happy, wherever you are now.

Goddamn Anniversaries

Hmmm

I thought I would be OK this weekend; it being the first anniversary of Douggie's death.

Apparently I'm not.

I just have to get on with it by myself though because everyone else is busy.

Half day today then a few hours sitting at home by myself. Time to curl up in a ball and think about all the other parts of my life I am not happy with or which are causing me stress.

It's all just a bit shit really.

ConDem Fox Hunting

Mum's Angiogram Results:...

The good news is the main artery they built when they did the bypass is functioning well and has a good blood flow.

The not so good news is that the other two are blocked. Because the main one is working they have decided that they won't operate because her odds of surviving anaesthetic are so low, so she will have to take meds to keep her blood thinned to help avoid clotting in the lungs.

They are now having to start weaning her off the oxygen, mobilising her again and try and get her back on dialysis.

They will need to keep a check on her lung function to make sure she's not retaining fluid but the upshot is that she will always be breathless - her breathing may not improve much from what it currently is, her mobility will not improve and she remains at risk of having a heart attack at any time.

On the plus side, the last four or five haven't managed to finish her off! So she will have breathing issues but will at least be able to get back home and carry on for now.

Wintercraft

Shopping in ASDA is usually a pretty good way to numb my brain cells into boredom and requires a compulsory detour around the book section to get them going again. This week I happened to spot a very interesting looking book by an author I'd never heard of. I almost didn't buy it because of the recent spate of teen vampire / werewolf / witch books flooding the market but the synopsis looked good and I am glad I did.


Wintercraft by Jenna Burtenshaw was a brilliant read. Complete escapism and totally blows books like Twilight and The Vampire Diaries out of the water. This lady can write! I didn't spend half the book sub-editing in my head and spotting grammatical and spelling errors, which was very refreshing.

When Kate Winters' uncle is taken by the Wardens of war-torn Albion, just as her parents were ten years earlier, she is determined to rescue him.

But Kate is being hunted by a far more dangerous enemy. Silas Dane - a killer with a haunted past - has recognised Kate as one of the Skilled who have the rare ability to see through the veil between life and death. He's determined that she'll help end his own personal nightmare; unfortunately, he isn't the only one with plans for her...

As the Night of Souls approaches, a secret hidden deep beneath a graveyard city holds the key to the fate of Kate, those she loves and even Albion itself... the lost book of Wintercraft.

Move over Harry Potter! Who needs a wand anyway?!


If you get time, check it out.


Hopefully there will be more where that came from as I now want to know what happens next with a few of the main characters. Undoubtedly it will be snapped up and made into a film at some point.

Hospitals, Gallstones and Cardiac Insults!

The last couple of weeks have been insanely stressful and tiring. Keith went to have his gallbladder op on Thursday 13th May and so started my almost daily trips to hospital. 

Keith had his op in Springfield Hospital, Chelmsford. A small hospital in the middle of nowhere. His op went well, although not quite the keyhole surgery that was planned due to complications, namely his gallbladder being embedded in his liver! Still, he now has a lovely zip-shaped scar on his tummy. He went down to theatre at 4pm and Linda and I nipped out to Frankie & Benny's in Chelmsford for dinner. We had a good meal and got back to the hospital by 5.30 as we'd been told Keith would only be in surgery for about two hours and we wanted to make sure we were there when he got back. As it turned out, we needn't have rushed. Keith wasn't wheeled back up to his room until around 8.30pm, by which time I was climbing the walls!

Keith was still very drowsy and not particularly lucid, having been given a lot of anaesthetic so Linda and I decided to stay at the hospital with him overnight. It was a very long night. Keith didn't come round fully until about 3am. At about 4am I went to straighten his bedclothes to find a rather large puddle of blood where his wound and dressings were leaking and running down his side! Fortunately Keith wasn't aware (he is more than a bit squeemish!). After a bit of repackaging by the nurse (who was also called Keith), Linda and I finally managed to squeeze in a couple of hours catnapping in the chairs. 

We had expected Keith to be discharged home but the surgeon decided he should have a second night in their care. After dropping Linda at Keith's, grabbing a quick shower and bite to eat, I came back to the hospital to spend Friday night catnapping in a chair beside Keith's bed.

At 5.45am I got a phone call from Aaron saying that they were calling an ambulance for my mum as her chest infection had got worse and she was having difficulty breathing. Fortunately my sister, Leanne, was able to go with her so I didn't have to tear myself in half to be in both places at once. 

Keith was discharged on Saturday evening and I took him home with the intention of calling my sister and racing back to London if necessary. My body had other plans though and exhaustion took over. I stayed awake long enough to eat then promptly zonked out on the sofa.

Racing back to London happened at 8am on Sunday morning after a call to my sister to find out that my Mum's heart had been affected by her diabetes and she was struggling to breathe. First stop, Mum's house to grab some of her things. Next stop Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Woolwich to see Mum. She was switching between a nebuliser and an oxygen tube. She looked very ill and the decision was soon made to transfer her to Kings College Hospital in London as the QE didn't have the dialysis equipment needed. Leanne went with her to Kings to get her settled and I went home for a sleepless night.

Monday I went to work. The joys of being a locum mean if I don't work, I don't get paid. I am lucky that I have a very good manager who agreed for me to go home early to get to the hospital each night. 

Monday evening, Ed drove me to the hospital where Leanne met us before we went into the room. Its not often my sister is visibly upset; she's a nurse and very practical, however she dragged me off to a side room to talk to me before I went in and explained how bad the situation was.

Mum was on haemofiltration, a more gentle form of dialysis which takes 24 hours to complete a cycle. Mum's body is not strong enough to cope with normal dialysis. Mum has pulmonary oedema (fluid on her lungs), pulmonary embolism (blood clots on her lungs) and the diabetes has affected her heart muscle. 

We were stopped by the doctor on our way to see Mum and taken back to the side room to talk. Never a good sign. Anyway, the doctor explained that my Mum had suffered a massive coronary insult (cue inappropriate laughter from me, wondering if her heart had been calling her names - stress does funny things to me!), in short, a massive heart attack. The oxygen in her blood was dangerously low, despite the oxygen mask and the fluid on her lungs was stopping her from being able to breathe properly. 


The doctor advised that they need to do an angiogram to see whether or not they would have to redo her triple heart bypass. Bad news in itself as Mum was not well enough to have it done plus the fact that she has a very low change of surviving an anaesthetic.

Crap all round really.

So after tears followed by pulling ourselves together, Leanne went back to see Mum and left me with the task of phoning people. 


Honestly, we thought that was it. We thought we were going to lose her.

A week later and she is still in Kings. Somewhat improved. They've drained a lot of fluid from her but on Sunday night had to give her a blood transfusion as her haemaglobin levels were so low.

Today they are doing the angiogram. We wait with bated breath for the results.

Watch this space.

Change of plan

Ooops! Keith fucked up! Didn't prebook tickets for the gig tonight and now they've sold out. FAIL!

On the plus side the change of plans means we are now all sodding off to Chelmsford to see Iron Man 2.

Update.....

Fucking Awesome!

I managed to get hold of the builder.

He forgot so isn't coming today.

I am fucked off!

Growly start to the bank holiday weekend....

Well I'm starting to get on the grumpy side of pissed off now.

Last night was the first Friday in the best part of a few years that Keith and I have been apart. The reason? I had to be in London because the builder employed by the landord's agents arranged to come round by 9am today to finish fixing my ceiling. Keith couldn't stay because he's taking Sam and some of his friends out to a gig tonight and they stayed over last night and he had to be there. Personally, I think it has more to do with his iPhone being delivered but we'll leave it at that!

So, I am getting grumpy because I didn't get to spend last night with Keith AND because it is now gone 10am and the sodding builder hasn't arrived and I can't get hold of him on the phone.

All I can say is he'd better be bloody well driving and not have forgotten this job and pissed off for the long weekend!!

So anyway, the weather is shitty, the kids and I are stuck indoors waiting for the elusive builder so we can't go out anywhere. I've run out of gluten-free breakfasty stuff so there's nothing for me to eat (and I am hungry!) and to top it off, I won't get to see Keith til about 11pm at the earliest, so no point in me making any effort to leave London until tonight

Grumble, grumble, grumble, grraaaaaaaaarrrrrrrr!

Beltane Blessings

To all my pagan (and non-pagan) friends

Beltane Blessings this April's eve

Silly pics from around the net....

WTF?

That's pretty specific....

How...? Why...? When would anyone ever...?

Springstival Break

That's the new official term for Easter, gratuitously and unashamedly stolen from KT!

Had a fab four-day break. Friday was busy. Spent the day hoiking Aaron's stuff over from Nick's to mine and then having a massive sort-out / chuck-out and tidy up followed by yummy baked salmon dinner then earlyish night.

Saturday morning KT, me and the small ginger one drove down to Bexhill-on-Sea to visit Nan. It was lovely to spend some time with her. I haven't seen her since boxing day. We had lunch then spent a couple of hours strolling on the beach-front as it turned out to be a sunny rain-free day. Dinner at a local fish n chip restaurant where they do the best grilled plaice. Then home to mine in London.

Sunday morning was another earlyish start and this time KT, me and the two ginger monsters headed off on the train to Wimbledon to see KT's dad, his wife Stephanie and her two children, Ned and Joy. It was lovely to see them all and give them their Christmas prezzies (yes, it has taken that long to arrange a meet up!) We had a lovely roast beef lunch followed by a dessert of cake (even gluten-free one for me!), all home-made as Stephanie is a baking whizz, meringues, fruit salad, yoghurt and cream. It was a delicious feast and we were barely able to move afterwards! We took our time strolling back to the station to catch the train to mine, then packed up, jumped in the car, dropped the boy at Mum's the KT, me and the small ginger one headed off to SWF.

Today has been the only lazy day of the Springstival break. small lie-in (til 9.30) sodding typical really but we were both wide awake! KT made a lovely cooked breakfast then we pottered off to ASDA for some essentials before picking Sam up from his friends then parking ourselves in front of the box to watch The Story of Anvil, followed by a few interesting but upsetting documentaries on the Nazis and WW2.

The small ginger one and I eventually headed back to mine this evening for a relaxed night of doing bugger all!

Flats, Salmon and Scanning Frenzy

Insanely busy day at work today, which included supporting a client to view potential flats to move into. We came out from viewing the final flat to find that the car had developed a flat of its own! I have a compressor which runs from the cigarette lighter... only snag, the cigarette lighter doesn't work! Damn!

Thankfully someone at the flats I was viewing was kind enough to park alongside me and let me use their cigarette lighter to power the thing and reinflate my tyre for long enough to get the client back to where I had collected them from!

Panic over, I had to search for a garage to do the job properly before heading off to collect Gemima from after-school club then going to pick Keith up from the station.

Quick trip to ASDA for stationery and bad stuff. Posh dinner of baked salmon, new potatoes and green food followed by ice lollies!

And then for the scanning frenzy. Its been somewhat overdue but I have made some small headway into scanning in the small mountain of paperwork which has built up over the course of my two-year squabble with Bastardcard. Two hours of solid scanning and I am about 1/4 way throught he correspondence folder... then onto the statements and then the stuff that they sent in response to a subject access request, which does not contain any signed documents from me asking for the sodding balance transfer they made - no fucking shit! It doesn't exist!

And All Change Again!

Yeah, OK, so I just can't do lots of colour.

That didn't even last a day!

So I've gone for a little bit updated on the old look rather than total overhaul.

Maybe I should remember to blog more frequently too!!

New Look!!

OK, so as if the last overhaul wasn't enough, I decided I was utterly bored with it and that it needed a complete new look...

... so here it is, replete with new URL!

Still not sure about it but maybe it'll grow on me!

Happy 40th My Glitzy One!

Happy, Happy, Happy Birthday to my gorgeous, wonderful, fabulous sexy man!

Love you LOADS

xxxxx

The Ladies Prayer....

My vibrator
Which brings me heaven
Rabbit be thy name
You make me cum
You bring such fun
On Earth... or is it Heaven?
Give me this day my daily thrill
and forgive me my screams of pleasure
As I forgive those who sold me dud batteries
Lead me straight into temptation
Deliver me from frustration
For thine is the vibration
The power and rotation
For ever and ever
No men!

Birthday Celebration Part 1

KT's 40th birthday is looming up fast. The actual event is on Tuesday but I decided to invite a few friends around on Saturday evening to celebrate. It was a nice semi-surprise for him - he knew something was up and I am rubbish at keeping things quiet!

We were joined by Mike & Moira, Hazel & Shane and Sammy Grimwood in addition to our collective brood of Sophie, Sam, Aaron and Gemima. Jade and Pete were supposed to come but weren't able to make it. Not really a party as such, more of a raucous gathering.

Sophie and Gemima made a gluten-free cake and I put together a bunch of nibbles on the table. Fun, food, drinks, music, dancing about and pink balloons! We had a great evening, which came to a close at about 1am when the last guests left and the last child staggered up to their pit!

KT and I stayed up until just after 4.30am listening to music, dancing and singing, which was lovely... despite a brief break to sort out one particular child who had snuck a few mixed drinks too many and decided to treat the toilet to a technicolour yodel!

Tuesday will likely be a somewhat quieter affair. KT's Dad is popping in to do the prezzie thing and naturally I'll be heading over for the night.

A Brief History of Just About Everything

Fantastic!

Best Valentine's Day EVER!

Happy Valentines Day Keith!!

I had the best Valentine's Day ever today.

We exchanged gifts at just after midnight, which was great because it involved lingerie and pretty things for both of us!

The rest of the day was a little unorthodox; after a brief lie-in we had breakfast then made our way to London to spend the afternoon at the London Fetish Fair. Needless to say we had great fun and spent a little bit of money!

Dinner was a delicious affair back in Greenwich at Prezzo, a lovely Italian next to the cinema. A perfect way to round off our day.

Happy Valentine's Day my gorgeous, fabulous, wonderful, sexy man. Thank you for making it so special.

I love you LOADS!

Looooooong day

I've had a very long and very busy day today. I'm completely knackered and losing the will to live!

I've also been having one of those insane self-doubt days re the bastardcard farce. You know the type... did they put stuff on the form I signed and I just didn't notice... why didn't I get a photocopy at the time... did I actually request the balance transfer and lose all memory of it. One of those days.

Its ridiculous, I know. I know I didn't ask for a balance transfer. But two years of fighting these bastards can get to you a bit.

My wish for 2010... karma to come kick those buggers in the arse.

Early night tonight methinks!

Credit Rating is cleaner than a clean thing!

Hell Yeah! I have a top credit rating according to Experian.

I knew it! Bastardcard have not followed up their threat to cause problems with my credit rating because the fuckers know damn well they are in the wrong!

Subject Access Request has been written and emailed to my mystery helper (who at their request shall remain nameless at this point).

Tomorrow, provided all is OK with it, I shall send it recorded delivery and keep an eye out for the £10 statutory maximum fee cheque being cashed.

Take that Bastardcard! Let battle commence fuckers!

And the battle begins

I have, with support from Keith, got some third-party help in my long-running battle with Bastardcard.

Today I am checking my credit report and writing a Subject Access Request to Bastardcard. Incidentally the consumer action group have a really helpful website for just this sort of thing!

Also, this evening I had a half hour call from Mercers, the debt collection part of Bastardcard, during which they suggested I still have to make a payment even if the card is in dispute! Needless to say they didn’t get anywhere with that.

Watch this space!

Goddamn Bastardcard!

Yeah. Fuckers are still up to their old tricks. I repaid EVERYTHING I owed and they are still insisting I pay the money they transferred in error.

This dispute has been ongoing for more then TWO years!

The debt collectors are back on the phone again and informed me (my fault for not checking my statements sooner) that Bastardcard took £78 from my account in October without my knowledge or consent and without a court order.

That is theft!

This means war!

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

Chilled weekend...

...well sort of.

It WAS relaxing in so far as we didn't go out or race about anywhere or have to do anything in particular.

It WASN'T relaxing in the sense that the house was full of noisy children!

It was however a very nice weekend. Keith was supposed to have come and stayed with me this weekend but during the week he received a last-minute call from Sophie, who wanted to come and spend some time with him. She is staying at Keith's for a week with Scarlett, so we had a change of plan and the kids and I trekked up to SWF on Friday evening.

It was good to see Sophie. Its been a while since I've spent any time with her. It was also lovely to see Scarlett. Other than the odd half-hour visit over at Shane's, its been a very long time since I've spent any real time with her since Sophie moved back to Nottingham last August and I think she had pretty much forgotten me.

Gemima was besotted, as expected. She is one of those kids who is very good with babies and will happily play with them for hours on end. She spent most of the weekend entertaining Scarlett or running about getting nappies, toys and other bits and bobs as they were needed!

Sam vanished off over to Livvies for the weekend. Other than a brief appearance for an ASDA trip and to collect some clothes, I didn't really see him this weekend. Not sure if his staying away was pre-arranged or if the thought of a house full of kids was just a bit too much (not that I'd blame him on that score!!).

We spent much of the weekend watching BBC1's Merlin (series 1). I really liked it. The series focuses on a young Merlin finding his feet and learning to get along with a young prince Arthur. It was a good take on an established subject.

As usual, the weekend was over far too quickly and before we knew it, the kids and I were loading up the car and scooting back to London. I'm fast developing a dislike for Sunday nights. Knowing I have to rush off and spend the night in my cold bed by myself does put a bit of a downer on the afternoon. Not to mention the fact that I really miss Keith when we're apart. I don't like that empty feeling I have when he's not with me.

*sigh*

Happy Birthday Granddad

He would have been 85 today.

Happy Dance

Had a nice long phone call with Keith this evening and it has put a big smile on my face and a happy dance song in my head!

Yay!

All Change Please!

OK, after thought and some suggestion from KT, I have decided to use the butterfly image, which was the inspiration for the big tattoo on my back, as the header image for this blog.



The tattoo symbolised change and was a reflection of the new me and it seems appropriate that I use it to represent myself on this blog.

So, its goodby to the dark and scarey forest that was my mind...


... and hello to my bright new self!

Dilemma

Hmmm....

I am torn. I have been thinking about changing the header image on this blog.

I created that image some time ago when my head was definitely in a dark shadowy place. My head's not there any more so I'm thinking time for a change... but to what?

Hmmm....

Oops... Catch up!

I'm working from home today so I thought I'd take advantage of my "lunch break" and do a catch up on my blog as I have been particularly rubbish at keeping up with it again.

We have had a lot of snow this winter. I would say "YAY!" as it is all very pretty but it has been an utter pain in the arse in terms of getting to and from work. This country seems to fall apart at the seams when it snows. I don't remember there being any weather-related problems when I was growing up in Germany and it snowed there pretty much every year! I wish our government would do some fact-finding stuff into how they cope with winter in Europe and Canada then maybe I wouldn't be losing money by not being able to get into work!! Grumble, grumble!

On 21 December the weather was so atrocious that it took FIVE HOURS to drive home from work that night... its usually about a half hour journey! I also had a few days where I just couldn't get in at all. This morning I tried for three hours to get in but gave up and came home to do work from here instead.

It is very pretty though. Here's some pics....

The view from my living room (at the back)




The view from my bedroom (at the front)




Talking of home, the house is lovely and I am all moved in properly now, however since I have moved in I have discovered that the windows don't close properly and that the under-floor-heating doesn't work properly either! Much grumbling and complaining was done to the estate agents who after a fashion did supply me with four panel heaters. All well and good but with drafty windows it was a pretty pointless gesture and the house was always cold, especially in the recent weather!

I spoke to the girl at the estate agents again as I'd not heard anything further about getting someone in to repair the heating. She let slip that the previous tenants had mentioned the heating not functioning properly and that the maintenance people had looked at it and said it was a very old system and may not be repairable! They are now trying to source another company to check it out before contacting the landlord to have the heating replaced. Also, the tenants association have decided that the windows are all being replaced with double-glazing this year! Yay! Maybe next winter won't be like living in a fridge!

Yesterday they sent round a handyman who draft-proofed all my windows and packed / sealed up the ones that don't close properly. There was an instant noticeable difference and although the house isn't warm, its not freezing either! I've stuck on a couple of the panel heaters today and I can actually feel the heat! Hurrah!

We had a great Xmas / Yuletide celebration. The best I have had in a long, long time. The 25th was lovely. Just me, Keith, Aaron and Gemima for the main meal. Jade was at her Dad's, Sophie at her Mum's and Sam decided to go to a friend's. Lots of cooking, which Keith helped with. It was nice not to have to do everything by myself. Jade and Pete joined us later on, where Jade had another dinner and a few glasses of Baileys and she and Pete opened their prezzies from us.

Jade made the most amazing gluten-free mince pies, which went down a treat. Most gluten-free stuff you buy in the shops is very crumbly and has little taste. Jade's were pretty much indistinguishable from the normal ones and didn't disintegraate into a pile of crumbs the second they were bitten into. Fabulous! Thank you Jade!

The 26th was noisy and fun. We were joined at my house by most of my family and some friends, including Jodie (who I fostered for three years), who Gemima hasn't seen since she was about 5 and was very excited about seeing again. Jade and Pete came over with Pete's parents and brother so Keith and I got to do the meet the parents thing for the first time. They seemed to enjoy themselves and stayed for a few hours so hopefully we didn't scare them all too much!

This was followed by an excellent New Year's Eve party at Dan and Laura's where Keith and I got thoroughly pickled and stayed over, sleeping on their living room floor.

Yours Truly all bunnied up and ready to go out


The Glitzy One with his unreasonably fabulous legs on display!


Uber-scrummy sparkly pink gluten-free cakes made for us by Laura:


Tomorrow I am heading off to SWF to go with Keith to have an ultrasound done. We think he may have gallstones. He has all the symptoms and has been in quite a substantial amount of pain on and off since 9th December. Fingers crossed that it's nothing more sinister and that its easily treatable. Watch this space!