Do you think magazines are a waste of time? I mean, when you think most of your big 'n' glossies are well over the £3 mark, and you can buy a whole novel for less than a few pennies more (if you shop in the right places i.e Amazon), and magazines are full of adverts, and have some articles that really annoy you like, for example, the story of a woman who successfully got a book published because her sister's friend's auntie once used to work in a major publishing house and knew someone who liked a bit of a book she wrote and offered her a 3 book deal on the strength of a shonky paragraph or two written on the back of a coffee-sodden napkin...
('Sssssshhhh, now, says Miggins. You're starting to sound bitter and twisted.')
...so, well, I was totting up in my head the number of magazines I have subscriptions to at the moment. I had a bit of subscription frenzy just before Christmas courtesy of my Tezz-Co Club card points, so I haven't actually had to pay for these subscriptions. I would like to point out that I DO NOT shop in the aforementioned supermarket because I do not approve of their shonky practices, but I have one of their credit cards which I use as cash and pay off in fulll every month. I earn points when I use it and therefore THEY have to give ME something for nothing. That's my theory, anyway.
And a couple of subscriptions were very special offers because I was being tempted back as a 'previous valued customer' i.e gullible mug. So currently, the magazines that land ker-plop on the doormat every month are: The Home Farmer, Zest, Woman and Home, Prima and Country Living. And every three months I get a copy of a magazine specifically for women writers, called Mslexia. Mslexia smells lovely and feels lovely; I would continue to subscribe merely for those reasons.
Andy's regular reads are The Sky at Night, Interzzone (some weirdo sci-fi thing) and Doctor Who Magazine (another weirdo sci-fi thing). So between us we accumulate 25 magazines every three months. That's 100 a year!! And that's without the occasional purchase of Men's Health, or Good Housekeeping, or arty-crafty mag that catches our eye. Oh, and the Sainsbugs effort which this month has some very good recipes in it.
But I like magazines. They appear when you need them most. Yesterday, for example, after hiking to school in the freezing cold, teaching some recalcitrant teenagers who were more interested in not being there, and coming home again, there were three magazines waiting for me! So I had a very pleasant afternoon, snuggled on the sofa, safe from the blizzard that was raging outside, with copies of Woman and Home, Zest and Mslexia, every aspect of my well-being, physical and mental, catered for.
However, no more. I need to curb my magamania for the postman's sake. He is very good, our postie, but I think sometimes, when the new issues come out within a day or so of each other, he must sigh at the extra load he has to carry to our house.
Saturday, 9 January 2010
Friday, 8 January 2010
Cousin Richard
Today is my cousin Richard's birthday, so I thought I focus my blog on him to stop me writing about school again (had to go in today, in the snow, to the ONLY school that was open in our town, only to be sent home 3 hours later because it was STILL snowing. My, how the children were moaning!)
Anyway, Richard is a couple of years younger than me, or so he tells people. However, I have more hair and am FAR more attractive, so I dispute his allegations vis a vis me being the more aged. We come from a gang of 16 cousins and as the years have progressed we are the only two who have tolerated each other into adulthood. Well, apart from my brother and another cousin who tolerate each other - they have to, they work together - but they don't count because Richard and I exceed them both in intelligence, humour and all-round general tact and niceness.
Coincidentally, Richard's great-great-great grandfather invented Pimms, too. Weird, eh?
Memories from childhood include turning a Basil Brush soft toy into a Superhero, by attaching him to a long length of string and swinging him wildly from an upstairs window. Also, building a full-size wooden fort from around four hundred redundant fizzy orange crates, an edifice we christened 'Fort Orange'. Lord knows how it didn't fall on our heads and squish us like bugs, but we emerged from many happy hours playing therewithin unscathed.
Also, an attempt to bake potatoes in an old biscuit tin placed in a bonfire. Three hours later, the embers dimming, we opened the tin to find the charred and very solid remains of our potatoes. Luckily, Richard's Mum had a stand-by supply cooking in the Aga inside.
Spreading gravel on a driveway. Richard misjudged a spadeful, and his shovel came up sharply and wacked me in the eye. And it bloomin' well hurt! My one and only black eye.
Uncle John setting off fireworks without a nod or a wink to health and safety at our annual family bonfire get-together.
Millionaire's shortbread. A wild bike ride from my house to his, down some pretty dodgy hills. And somehow, the journey was a lot longer than our childish optimism allowed for.
Being sent by Grandma to 'go and play in the Nursery' whenever we went to visit, where we froze to death, and slid up and down the lino to keep warm.
Spaniels Ben and Monty, and Jeff who ate raw Brussel Sprouts and trumped and fluffed to share the breeze with all.
Sliding toboggan-style down the stairs in sleeping bags. The stairs were narrow. And steep.
Playing at Nannie's in the Womble house. Fruit picking. Heaving great wodges of slimy pond weed from the brook at the end of the lane. Our dad's (God rest them both) chewing the fat over a pack of King Edward cigars.
And much, much more.
So, Cousin Richard, many happy returns of the day. Here's to a good 2010.
And shut yer face!
Anyway, Richard is a couple of years younger than me, or so he tells people. However, I have more hair and am FAR more attractive, so I dispute his allegations vis a vis me being the more aged. We come from a gang of 16 cousins and as the years have progressed we are the only two who have tolerated each other into adulthood. Well, apart from my brother and another cousin who tolerate each other - they have to, they work together - but they don't count because Richard and I exceed them both in intelligence, humour and all-round general tact and niceness.
Coincidentally, Richard's great-great-great grandfather invented Pimms, too. Weird, eh?
Memories from childhood include turning a Basil Brush soft toy into a Superhero, by attaching him to a long length of string and swinging him wildly from an upstairs window. Also, building a full-size wooden fort from around four hundred redundant fizzy orange crates, an edifice we christened 'Fort Orange'. Lord knows how it didn't fall on our heads and squish us like bugs, but we emerged from many happy hours playing therewithin unscathed.
Also, an attempt to bake potatoes in an old biscuit tin placed in a bonfire. Three hours later, the embers dimming, we opened the tin to find the charred and very solid remains of our potatoes. Luckily, Richard's Mum had a stand-by supply cooking in the Aga inside.
Spreading gravel on a driveway. Richard misjudged a spadeful, and his shovel came up sharply and wacked me in the eye. And it bloomin' well hurt! My one and only black eye.
Uncle John setting off fireworks without a nod or a wink to health and safety at our annual family bonfire get-together.
Millionaire's shortbread. A wild bike ride from my house to his, down some pretty dodgy hills. And somehow, the journey was a lot longer than our childish optimism allowed for.
Being sent by Grandma to 'go and play in the Nursery' whenever we went to visit, where we froze to death, and slid up and down the lino to keep warm.
Spaniels Ben and Monty, and Jeff who ate raw Brussel Sprouts and trumped and fluffed to share the breeze with all.
Sliding toboggan-style down the stairs in sleeping bags. The stairs were narrow. And steep.
Playing at Nannie's in the Womble house. Fruit picking. Heaving great wodges of slimy pond weed from the brook at the end of the lane. Our dad's (God rest them both) chewing the fat over a pack of King Edward cigars.
And much, much more.
So, Cousin Richard, many happy returns of the day. Here's to a good 2010.
And shut yer face!
Thursday, 7 January 2010
Snow bound
At 6.20 this morning, the phone rang. It was the snow-line tree from school, informing me that school was closed today. 6.20! I ask you.
Well, I called the person below me in the tree who, sensible woman, let her answer phone take the message, and then, because my heart was pounding so hard with the sudden noise shock and there was no way I was going to get an extra half hour kip, I went downstairs and made a cup of tea.
Yesterday, we were sent home an hour early as the snow clouds gathered. I was one of a handful of designated staff asked to be prepared to come into work today, in case it was decided to partially open the school for Year 11. But as my services were not required on site, I thought I would use my directed time at home to work on my scheme of work for 'Romeo and Juliet' which I have just started with Year 10 for their coursework. I would also have a designated slot mid-afternoon to watch more of my DVD of 'Jam and Jerusalem.'
'Can't we do something other than Shakespeare?' asked one boy.
'Something other than Shakespeare for your Shakespeare coursework?' I said. 'The clue, dear child, is in the title.'
'So we have to do Shakespeare then?' said he, catching on quickly.
'Indeed,' quoth I.
'Well, do we have to do Romeo and Juliet?' he said. 'It's boring.'
'Oh,' I said. 'So you've done Romeo and Juliet before then, have you?'
'No,' he said.
'Then unless you can come up with an alternative Shakespeare play for which you have a preference, I'm afraid we're sticking with Romeo and Juliet,' I said.
Both the boy and the rest of the class failed to come up with an alternative. One child said, 'What's that one with the witches?' and another said 'To be or whatsit thing.' But that was the best they could manage. So wish me luck with the whole Shakespeare thingy doo-dah.
So before I started school work, I went and dug the chickens from the snow drift that had gathered around their pod. And then they refused to come out unless I held their layers pellets breakfast in my cupped hands for them to eat from, and I'd supplied them with warm drinking water, some sunflower seeds and a whole cabbage.
And then Andy and I did a walking raid on Sainsbugs, as the local radio station said were going to suffer a blizzard over the weekend and I developed an irrational fear of running out of tea bags and apples. But then I did dream last night that we had a rabbit the size of a ping pong ball, so am clearly suffering some sort of snow induced brain freeze.
Wherever you are, I hope the snow isn't causing too many disruptions to your day, and that if it is, you are enjoying your bonus time. Things will return to normal all too soon. For happiness can sometimes appear through a door you'd forgotten you'd opened.
Well, I called the person below me in the tree who, sensible woman, let her answer phone take the message, and then, because my heart was pounding so hard with the sudden noise shock and there was no way I was going to get an extra half hour kip, I went downstairs and made a cup of tea.
Yesterday, we were sent home an hour early as the snow clouds gathered. I was one of a handful of designated staff asked to be prepared to come into work today, in case it was decided to partially open the school for Year 11. But as my services were not required on site, I thought I would use my directed time at home to work on my scheme of work for 'Romeo and Juliet' which I have just started with Year 10 for their coursework. I would also have a designated slot mid-afternoon to watch more of my DVD of 'Jam and Jerusalem.'
'Can't we do something other than Shakespeare?' asked one boy.
'Something other than Shakespeare for your Shakespeare coursework?' I said. 'The clue, dear child, is in the title.'
'So we have to do Shakespeare then?' said he, catching on quickly.
'Indeed,' quoth I.
'Well, do we have to do Romeo and Juliet?' he said. 'It's boring.'
'Oh,' I said. 'So you've done Romeo and Juliet before then, have you?'
'No,' he said.
'Then unless you can come up with an alternative Shakespeare play for which you have a preference, I'm afraid we're sticking with Romeo and Juliet,' I said.
Both the boy and the rest of the class failed to come up with an alternative. One child said, 'What's that one with the witches?' and another said 'To be or whatsit thing.' But that was the best they could manage. So wish me luck with the whole Shakespeare thingy doo-dah.
So before I started school work, I went and dug the chickens from the snow drift that had gathered around their pod. And then they refused to come out unless I held their layers pellets breakfast in my cupped hands for them to eat from, and I'd supplied them with warm drinking water, some sunflower seeds and a whole cabbage.
And then Andy and I did a walking raid on Sainsbugs, as the local radio station said were going to suffer a blizzard over the weekend and I developed an irrational fear of running out of tea bags and apples. But then I did dream last night that we had a rabbit the size of a ping pong ball, so am clearly suffering some sort of snow induced brain freeze.
Wherever you are, I hope the snow isn't causing too many disruptions to your day, and that if it is, you are enjoying your bonus time. Things will return to normal all too soon. For happiness can sometimes appear through a door you'd forgotten you'd opened.
Wednesday, 6 January 2010
Nick Names and Sellotape
Today, a child tried to convince me he would prefer to be called 'Cow Pat' rather than his given name which neither looked nor sounded like Cow Pat.
I declined his request. I said, 'I shall call everyone in this class by the names I have in my register until I know you well enough to call you anything else.' And I suspect I shall never know this small child well enough to feel comfortable calling him Cow Pat.
Of course, if a student called Joshua, or Joseph, or Benjamin for example, asks to be called Josh, Joe or Ben, then I'll do that. Mostly because I think it is effective to re-lengthen the name in order to show disapproval about something. My son, Chris, certainly knew when he was younger that if I called him 'Christopher' he'd probably committed some kind of misdemeanour.
My nick-name when I was a child was kindly bestowed upon me by my fairy god-mothers aka my aunties Pollie and Nece, who called me 'Sneezy.' I don't know why. I suppose it rhymes vaguely with Denise; I don't remember being a particularly sneezy child.
At primary school. Jeremy Saunders called me 'Pink Elephant.' Only once, though. A dead arm was called for and duly delivered. I wasn't very practiced in self-control at that age.
And then I was nick-nameless until I got married for the first time and my then husband's family took it upon themselves to call me 'Den.' I didn't like it. No-one had shortened my already short name before then, and no-one has shortened it since. 'Den' indeed. Ha!
Odd request of the day goes to a Year 11 girl who bounced into my classroom Period 2 and asked if I had any sellotape.
'My tights are covered in bobbles and fluff,' she said.
I duly provided her with some sellotape and watched as she tore reams of it from the roll, and used it a la leg-wax style to de-bobble and de-fluff her 40 derniers.
It's odd, some of things youngsters worry about these days, isn't it?
Meanwhile, the snow here is now Pandora and a half deep. I have been requested, because I am within walking distance of the school, to be ready to go in tomorrow as one of 8 skeleton staff to teach Year 11. Now, walking distance is 45 minutes at a brisk trot on clean and dry pavements. Factor in eight inches of snow covered in ice, and with a nasty gale blowing, I'm thinking I may need to set off at 6 am to arrive by 8.30. This is one instance where a bunch of 15 year olds may prove to be more sensible than us adults.
Wish me luck, then, as I struggle to work in the morning. I may be gone some time...
I declined his request. I said, 'I shall call everyone in this class by the names I have in my register until I know you well enough to call you anything else.' And I suspect I shall never know this small child well enough to feel comfortable calling him Cow Pat.
Of course, if a student called Joshua, or Joseph, or Benjamin for example, asks to be called Josh, Joe or Ben, then I'll do that. Mostly because I think it is effective to re-lengthen the name in order to show disapproval about something. My son, Chris, certainly knew when he was younger that if I called him 'Christopher' he'd probably committed some kind of misdemeanour.
My nick-name when I was a child was kindly bestowed upon me by my fairy god-mothers aka my aunties Pollie and Nece, who called me 'Sneezy.' I don't know why. I suppose it rhymes vaguely with Denise; I don't remember being a particularly sneezy child.
At primary school. Jeremy Saunders called me 'Pink Elephant.' Only once, though. A dead arm was called for and duly delivered. I wasn't very practiced in self-control at that age.
And then I was nick-nameless until I got married for the first time and my then husband's family took it upon themselves to call me 'Den.' I didn't like it. No-one had shortened my already short name before then, and no-one has shortened it since. 'Den' indeed. Ha!
Odd request of the day goes to a Year 11 girl who bounced into my classroom Period 2 and asked if I had any sellotape.
'My tights are covered in bobbles and fluff,' she said.
I duly provided her with some sellotape and watched as she tore reams of it from the roll, and used it a la leg-wax style to de-bobble and de-fluff her 40 derniers.
It's odd, some of things youngsters worry about these days, isn't it?
Meanwhile, the snow here is now Pandora and a half deep. I have been requested, because I am within walking distance of the school, to be ready to go in tomorrow as one of 8 skeleton staff to teach Year 11. Now, walking distance is 45 minutes at a brisk trot on clean and dry pavements. Factor in eight inches of snow covered in ice, and with a nasty gale blowing, I'm thinking I may need to set off at 6 am to arrive by 8.30. This is one instance where a bunch of 15 year olds may prove to be more sensible than us adults.
Wish me luck, then, as I struggle to work in the morning. I may be gone some time...
Tuesday, 5 January 2010
I'll ask the questions, thank you
So here I am, two days back into my teaching career. I'm still breathing, I haven't fallen asleep on the sofa half way through the evening through sheer exhaustion, and I haven't locked any children in my stationery cupboard.
So far, so good.
Yesterday, a couple of year 8 boys declared I looked like Susan Boyle. I said, 'I wish I had her singing voice and money.' I did not say, 'And you look like a pile of doggy doo,' which, I confess, flit into my mind, but I managed to remember that I was the grown-up in this situation, so didn't actually say it, for if I had, that way lay fisticuffs.
And yesterday, a Vicki-Pollard sound-alike year 11 girlie scowled at me for pretty much the entire lesson. I was very good; I did not scowl back. I thought, ah well, she'll be gone by May, into the land of GCSE never to scowl at my door again.
And then this morning she appeared, all sweetness and light, and conversing like a proper human being. Apparently, she'd be 'talkin' to 'er mate,' who attends the last school in which I taught and who remembered me, and 'er mate sed I woz a ledge. (A ledge, I hasten to add, is short for a legend and not the thing many teachers consider jumping from from a great height at least once during their career.)
I resisted the urge to engage Vicki P. in a discussion vis a vis the definition of the word 'legend,' and that I was not a legend because my existence is beyond doubt. I thought, I'll quit whilst I'm ahead. Me and Vicki? We're like this now. (Crosses fingers - you'll have to imagine that bit!)
Questions I have been asked in the last two days :
'Ma'am, have you ever been drunk?'
'Ma'am, have you ever been stopped by the police?'
'Ma'am, are you religious?'
'Ma'am, is Susan Boyle your sister?'
'Ma'am, how much snow will be enough to stop us coming to school?'
(The answers were : No, yes, I believe in God, are you related to a pile of doggy-do, a bucketful.)
But the thing that really made me smile to-day was a Year 7 who solemnly informed me that William Shakespeare came from Stratford on Haven.
So THAT'S where he went for his holidays!
So far, so good.
Yesterday, a couple of year 8 boys declared I looked like Susan Boyle. I said, 'I wish I had her singing voice and money.' I did not say, 'And you look like a pile of doggy doo,' which, I confess, flit into my mind, but I managed to remember that I was the grown-up in this situation, so didn't actually say it, for if I had, that way lay fisticuffs.
And yesterday, a Vicki-Pollard sound-alike year 11 girlie scowled at me for pretty much the entire lesson. I was very good; I did not scowl back. I thought, ah well, she'll be gone by May, into the land of GCSE never to scowl at my door again.
And then this morning she appeared, all sweetness and light, and conversing like a proper human being. Apparently, she'd be 'talkin' to 'er mate,' who attends the last school in which I taught and who remembered me, and 'er mate sed I woz a ledge. (A ledge, I hasten to add, is short for a legend and not the thing many teachers consider jumping from from a great height at least once during their career.)
I resisted the urge to engage Vicki P. in a discussion vis a vis the definition of the word 'legend,' and that I was not a legend because my existence is beyond doubt. I thought, I'll quit whilst I'm ahead. Me and Vicki? We're like this now. (Crosses fingers - you'll have to imagine that bit!)
Questions I have been asked in the last two days :
'Ma'am, have you ever been drunk?'
'Ma'am, have you ever been stopped by the police?'
'Ma'am, are you religious?'
'Ma'am, is Susan Boyle your sister?'
'Ma'am, how much snow will be enough to stop us coming to school?'
(The answers were : No, yes, I believe in God, are you related to a pile of doggy-do, a bucketful.)
But the thing that really made me smile to-day was a Year 7 who solemnly informed me that William Shakespeare came from Stratford on Haven.
So THAT'S where he went for his holidays!
Sunday, 3 January 2010
Computer Mania
Yesterday was a bad day. Yesterday, ever single computerised system in our house misbehaved itself. By the end of the day, Andy and I were both convinced we had a gremlin in the system somewhere, a nasty, disease-ridden, germy gremlin that had decided to play havoc with our attempts to get on with doing what we wanted to do because it was a Saturday.
For one, I wanted to do some more preparation for the start of my new job on Monday. But my laptop decided to stop working. I switched it on. It coughed. It spluttered. It gave a minor clunk. And then it stared at me, blank-faced and defiant as if to say 'Ha! You know your life's work, all the writing you've done on me in the last year and a half, INCLUDING all the prep for school? Well, I've got it trapped and I'm not giving up, no never, ever, not a chance ahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!!!!!!!!!!' It was like it knew I am the world's worst for saving stuff regularly on a memory stick.
And then Andy appeared from where he'd been working upstairs on his computer.
He said, 'My computer is playing up.'
'So is mine,' I said, giving the dead laptop a rattle. 'It's expired.'
Andy spent some time poking my laptop about. He took bits off the back, removed a fairly substantial amount of fluff and cat hair, he bashed buttons, and turned it on/off/on/off/on/off/on/off/on/off etc etc ad infinitum
Still nothing.
'My i-pod is refusing to work, too,' said Andy, morosely, as he sat in a defeated heap on the living room floor. He got up and returned to his study to have another go at getting his computer and his i-pod to co-operate.
'I'll pop back down and see if I can surprise your laptop into working,' he said.
Unable to access the documents on my laptop, I resorted to using my mini netbook. Work still had to be done. I thought, I'll put on the DVD of 'Jam and Jerusalem' I got for Christmas to cheer me up whilst I work. So I popped it in the X-Box (our DVD player gave up the ghost months ago), and the X-Box refused to play, too. Well, it played, but not properly. It was doing bizarre things and clearly had no intention of co-operating with my DVD.
Andy re-appeared and swore at the X-Box until it eventually did as it was told. He then tried to take my laptop by surprise but it still wasn't going to work.
I tried to start work on a document using Microsoft Office. Mini netbook wouldn't let me do it unless I inputted the '25 character access code.'
It took us ages to locate the code, which pitched up on a sticker stuck to the bottom of the netbook. We input the access code. The netbook refused to accept it. Eight times. We gave up.
And this is why I tend to hate computers and love the simpler form of pen and paper. It's a bit like cars and electric windows. We had a Fiat whose electric window would, on occasion, go down and then refuse to go up again. This usually happened in the middle of the night/ a cold snap/ a monsoon/ during a full moon when the risk of werewolf attack is at its greatest.
I never had that sort of trouble with the wind up/ wind down handles on my old 1976 Mini.
Technology isn't always necessarily better. Nor life enhancing.
For one, I wanted to do some more preparation for the start of my new job on Monday. But my laptop decided to stop working. I switched it on. It coughed. It spluttered. It gave a minor clunk. And then it stared at me, blank-faced and defiant as if to say 'Ha! You know your life's work, all the writing you've done on me in the last year and a half, INCLUDING all the prep for school? Well, I've got it trapped and I'm not giving up, no never, ever, not a chance ahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!!!!!!!!!!' It was like it knew I am the world's worst for saving stuff regularly on a memory stick.
And then Andy appeared from where he'd been working upstairs on his computer.
He said, 'My computer is playing up.'
'So is mine,' I said, giving the dead laptop a rattle. 'It's expired.'
Andy spent some time poking my laptop about. He took bits off the back, removed a fairly substantial amount of fluff and cat hair, he bashed buttons, and turned it on/off/on/off/on/off/on/off/on/off etc etc ad infinitum
Still nothing.
'My i-pod is refusing to work, too,' said Andy, morosely, as he sat in a defeated heap on the living room floor. He got up and returned to his study to have another go at getting his computer and his i-pod to co-operate.
'I'll pop back down and see if I can surprise your laptop into working,' he said.
Unable to access the documents on my laptop, I resorted to using my mini netbook. Work still had to be done. I thought, I'll put on the DVD of 'Jam and Jerusalem' I got for Christmas to cheer me up whilst I work. So I popped it in the X-Box (our DVD player gave up the ghost months ago), and the X-Box refused to play, too. Well, it played, but not properly. It was doing bizarre things and clearly had no intention of co-operating with my DVD.
Andy re-appeared and swore at the X-Box until it eventually did as it was told. He then tried to take my laptop by surprise but it still wasn't going to work.
I tried to start work on a document using Microsoft Office. Mini netbook wouldn't let me do it unless I inputted the '25 character access code.'
It took us ages to locate the code, which pitched up on a sticker stuck to the bottom of the netbook. We input the access code. The netbook refused to accept it. Eight times. We gave up.
And this is why I tend to hate computers and love the simpler form of pen and paper. It's a bit like cars and electric windows. We had a Fiat whose electric window would, on occasion, go down and then refuse to go up again. This usually happened in the middle of the night/ a cold snap/ a monsoon/ during a full moon when the risk of werewolf attack is at its greatest.
I never had that sort of trouble with the wind up/ wind down handles on my old 1976 Mini.
Technology isn't always necessarily better. Nor life enhancing.
Friday, 1 January 2010
Welcome to the New Year
And so the year 2010 dawned at Much Malarkey Manor. Unfortunately, I was unconscious and didn't realise it had arrived until I surfaced this morning at 7 am.
Now, I want you to know that this wasn't because I was a drunk. I don't drink, as you know (although I did partake of a glass of Buck's Fizz with last night's celebratory dinner. I knocked it back pretty much in one hit, figuring that if I did that, I wouldn't have to taste it.)
No, it was because I had been up since the crack of New Year's Eve dawn, faffing about with one thing and another. I'm an early bird, you see, and come 9 pm, Mr Sandman is placing sandbags on my eyelids, and bloomin' heavy they are sometimes.
The day culminated with my cooking of a celebratory dejeuner a deux for me and Andy. I had originally planned to cook quail, but in the absence of said bird at the butchers, I was forced to settle for poussin. I ccoked them Italian style, with potato batons, baby onions and mushrooms, with caramelised carrots and a rather nice shredded ham sauce. And for pudding I made a firm, if unsophisticated favourite - apple crumble.
Have you ever had poussin? They are tiny chicken. So you get to have a WHOLE bird to yourself. Part of me thikns it looks a bit sad, a whole tiny chicken sitting on your plate. But I think Andy appreciated the whole concept of being able to demolish an entire fowl by oneself. Anyway, by the time we'd finished our meal, we were both stuffed and I was struggling to saty awake.
And with nothing stimulating enough on the telly to encourage wakefulness, I said an early au revoir to 2009, and went up the wooden hill to Bedfordshire ( as my Mum used to say.)
And what of 2010? So far, it has been very promising. Lovely, sharp and icy, sunny weather. Lots of activity in the brain department (planning a set of drama lessons to teach to the 100 eleven year old who are passing through my portals next week), and in the physical fitness department (Wii Fit Plussing and getting very narky with an evil looking mole that kept popping my balloons - don't ask). The chickens are happy; they all laid an egg today. The house is tidy; New Year's Day is my day for denuding the place of its Christmas vestments.
And I have a set of cunningly chosen resolutions because I am an optimist and I like a challenge. Sadly, I failed in my resolution for 2009, which was to do the splits. I might be an inch or two closer to the ground than I was this time last year, thanks to all the walking and swimming I managed to do, but I think my hip sockets are too creaky to push them too far at this moment. Still, never say never, eh?
This is what I'm hoping to achieve in 2010:
1) have piano lessons and learn to play a tune with more than one hand that isn't 'Chopsticks.'
2) have a go at bell ringing. Apparently, bell ringers are in short supply and as I come from a family of bell ringers (well, several of my family are bats! Aha!) I thought I'd have a go myself
3) see if I can come up with 4 subjects to study so I can enter Mastermind. I've got one so far, which is the life and times of Oliver Postgate. Three more to go and I can put in my entry form for the big black chair!
And I think that will do for the moment.
And if you have chosen to face a challenge yourself in 2010, be it personal of something more global, then I wish you well in your endeavours and a happy and successful outcome.
Now, I want you to know that this wasn't because I was a drunk. I don't drink, as you know (although I did partake of a glass of Buck's Fizz with last night's celebratory dinner. I knocked it back pretty much in one hit, figuring that if I did that, I wouldn't have to taste it.)
No, it was because I had been up since the crack of New Year's Eve dawn, faffing about with one thing and another. I'm an early bird, you see, and come 9 pm, Mr Sandman is placing sandbags on my eyelids, and bloomin' heavy they are sometimes.
The day culminated with my cooking of a celebratory dejeuner a deux for me and Andy. I had originally planned to cook quail, but in the absence of said bird at the butchers, I was forced to settle for poussin. I ccoked them Italian style, with potato batons, baby onions and mushrooms, with caramelised carrots and a rather nice shredded ham sauce. And for pudding I made a firm, if unsophisticated favourite - apple crumble.
Have you ever had poussin? They are tiny chicken. So you get to have a WHOLE bird to yourself. Part of me thikns it looks a bit sad, a whole tiny chicken sitting on your plate. But I think Andy appreciated the whole concept of being able to demolish an entire fowl by oneself. Anyway, by the time we'd finished our meal, we were both stuffed and I was struggling to saty awake.
And with nothing stimulating enough on the telly to encourage wakefulness, I said an early au revoir to 2009, and went up the wooden hill to Bedfordshire ( as my Mum used to say.)
And what of 2010? So far, it has been very promising. Lovely, sharp and icy, sunny weather. Lots of activity in the brain department (planning a set of drama lessons to teach to the 100 eleven year old who are passing through my portals next week), and in the physical fitness department (Wii Fit Plussing and getting very narky with an evil looking mole that kept popping my balloons - don't ask). The chickens are happy; they all laid an egg today. The house is tidy; New Year's Day is my day for denuding the place of its Christmas vestments.
And I have a set of cunningly chosen resolutions because I am an optimist and I like a challenge. Sadly, I failed in my resolution for 2009, which was to do the splits. I might be an inch or two closer to the ground than I was this time last year, thanks to all the walking and swimming I managed to do, but I think my hip sockets are too creaky to push them too far at this moment. Still, never say never, eh?
This is what I'm hoping to achieve in 2010:
1) have piano lessons and learn to play a tune with more than one hand that isn't 'Chopsticks.'
2) have a go at bell ringing. Apparently, bell ringers are in short supply and as I come from a family of bell ringers (well, several of my family are bats! Aha!) I thought I'd have a go myself
3) see if I can come up with 4 subjects to study so I can enter Mastermind. I've got one so far, which is the life and times of Oliver Postgate. Three more to go and I can put in my entry form for the big black chair!
And I think that will do for the moment.
And if you have chosen to face a challenge yourself in 2010, be it personal of something more global, then I wish you well in your endeavours and a happy and successful outcome.
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