Scrappy news

For lack of something intelligent/ controversial/ funny/ angry to write today, I've plumped for snippets of drivel...

Corr but it rained yesterday! It thundered and lightninged, too, so I'm not expecting many eggs today what with oviducts being easily startled by sudden bangs. Or at least I am bracing myself for eggs with funny bumps in the shells. I thought, all that rain, the courgettes will be the size of marrows, so I went to the allotment first thing and discovered the courgettes were the size of small courgettes. Ah well. There were some runner beans to pick and I got a big old Tupperware box of blackberries, too, so the journey wasn't entirely wasted (although the large courgette/marrow carry-bag was.)

Back home I gave Pandora her first taste of catnip chocolates. She and Tybalt shared a healthy scattering between them and then lay on the kitchen floor, totally spaced out and batting their paws at each other, only they kept missing. Whilst Tybalt is a big hefty Tom cat and can handle his catnip,Pandora is still a delicate (although rapidly growing) kitten and she is now reposing on the top of the scratching post tower looking like she has the cat equivalent of a heavy hang-over. Still, all the while she is doing that she isn't launching herself at my legs and adding to the scars that are already there!

I've spent a couple of hours on Authonomy, trying to avoid aggressive Americans marketing their books and people deliberately trying to wind each other up on the Forums. Another nine chapters of Indigo Antfarm, Violet and Blue were added at the weekend by my publicist (i.e Andy) and the book is chugging its way nicely up the ratings. I'm doing my best to read five other books a day (not whole books, you understand - that would be CRAZY -but the synopsis and three chapters) and to comment as constructively as possible. I can't think I'm ever going to get to the Editor's Desk but it's not my modus operandi. A top 100 place would be nice.

Er...what else? Oh yes, doing some planning to start a web-site! This seems to be the next obvious step for Much Malarkey Manor. I've also started another blog (currently Top Secret as I want to see how it goes before I reveal its whereabouts and whyabouts) which is giving me practice in doing IT stuff for myself instead of looking pitifully at Andy and saying 'Andeeeeeeeeeeee....I can't dooooooo this....can you heeeeeeeeeeeeelp me.....pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeze,' which is what I usually do re: interwebbly techno-stuff and is very, very pathetic of me. (But I am a girl).

And finally, my Achilles tendon is playing up again. This is my own stupid fault. On Sunday, after we'd done three hours at the allotment, I said to Andy, 'I'll go and unlock the top gate' (our usual gate being blocked by a lorry) and he said, 'Okay, but stop faffing, I want to go home,' and I said, 'I'm not faffing,' and he said, 'You are. I'll get to the top gate before you at this rate.' So I said, 'No you won't,' and I RAN to the gate which is quite a way away, and Andy chased after me in the car.

I won, of course, despite being on foot. I won because I zig-zagged in his path with my arms outstretched and he didn't feel he could run me over because I had Sunday lunch to cook when we got home which included the promise of a blackberry and apple crumble. And I had the gate key, so even if he had overtaken me which he says he could have done easily (yeah, right!) he'd have had to wait for me to undo the padlock.

And the upshot is that I've done my lower left leg in again.

Will I ever learn?

Unlikely.