Psst....wanna know a secret...?

These guys are are great. I have laughed a lot, drunk too much, eaten well and slept in the blue room.....Blog camp rocks. Seriously.

5 (random) favourite things

I was tagged by the mere mortal Molly at ohfortheloveofblog with her 5 random favourite things meme. So here goes:

5 favourite films:

1. Lost in translation
2. Husbands and Wives
3. Now Voyager - I'm a soppy romantic at heart.
4. La Vie en Rose - I sobbed through the sub-titles.
5. Little Miss Sunshine - the weird dysfunctional family feels like home.

5 favourite songs:
This is hard. I tend to like whatever I last heard. So these are favourites because of the associations they have for me...

1. Doorbell - White Stripes (cooking Christmas dinner a few years ago when all the family was together)
2. Money Money Money - Abba (youngest sings "if I found me a healthy man" which seems like a good plan once you reach 40)
3. Got to be a hustler if you want to get on - Sue Wilkinson (early on with Prince of Darkness going through his record - yes I do mean record - collection and playing them all)
4. Common People - Pulp (just because the song is brilliant)
5. Park Life - Blur (lying on a beach in Greece)

5 favourite crushes

1. Lance Armstrong - weird but I have a thing about cyclists.
2. Prince of Darkness - I know I know. Get a life girl.
3. Daniel Craig - yes I so would.
4. Almost any man in a uniform - watch out sailors.
5. George Clooney - boring but true.

5 favourite books

1. Love in a Cold Climate - Nancy Mitford
2. Crossing to Safety - Wallace Stegner
3. Love in the time of Cholera- Gabriel Garcia Marquez
4. Les Liaisons Dangereuses - Choderlos de Laclos
5. The Night before Christmas - Clement C Moore (only to be read on Christmas eve!)
   
   

5 random favourite things

1. my tattoo
2. pointless little notebooks - I buy more than I know what to do with.
3. pinot grigio - you didn't think I would leave it off did you?
4. fish, chips and mushy peas
5. my shelf of random stuff - see below. It looks like crap but it all means something to me.

I am tagging a random 5 of my regular favourite reads:

Iasa at Blissfully Unaware Lounge Singer, RxBambi at A Day in the Life of a Would be Bambi, Jules at Just Jules, The Fragrant Muse and Jelica/Ruslan at Budapest Bits

My last will and testament

Wednesday is the day that stepson #2 comes over to spend the night. I really look forward to it. He is a very entertaining 15 year old who gets on really well with eldest daughter. Plus they make me laugh by doing crazy stuff like msn-ing each other in the same room.

So today we are talking about blog camp, whilst I am also trying to make some valid points about internet safety:

Me (to stepson): "If I haven't texted your mother by Friday evening you can assume that I have gone to stay with axe murderers. Please instigate a search party immediately."

Stepson: "If you haven't texted won't it be a bit too late?"

Me : " Well .....yes maybe.... but you can at least come and recover my body..."

Eldest daughter: "Mummy..."

Me: "Yeeessss.....?" (sensing the direction this conversation is going)

Eldest daughter: "If you do die can I have the puppy?"

Me: "Well ....ok"

Stepson: (sensing an opportunity here) " Well can I have half your money?"

Me: "Only debts there my boy" (I say rather smugly, thinking I have foiled him)

Stepson: (without hesitation) "All your electrical equipment then?"

Me: (giving up) "Deal."

So thats all sorted then. I can rest easy in my bed tonight knowing that my affairs are in order.

Things to marvel over on a Tuesday

• White horses carved into the hillside. I'd be hard pressed to draw that on a piece of paper.
• Impromptu acts of kindness. My new neighbour bringing me a bunch of sage from her garden this evening.
• The genorisity of those you have never met. Like Jules who is sending graham crackers and julochka who is putting up a host of bloggers for Blog Camp.
• A burgeoning sense of community. My street has decided to organise a street party this summer. Road closed, bunting, sausages, homemade cakes, kids activities, music - the works.
• A burgeoning sense of belonging here. In the blogging world that is. Looking forward to reading your comments and hearing what you are all doing, what you are laughing at, what games you are playing, what is making you sad or happy, what creative things you have been up to.
• Growing stuff. How something that looked so dead I was going to throw it away can now be so green and full of life.

• And how amazing the raindrops are on the leaves.

Ultimatum Friday

I'm not sure that this is going to be a regular feature like, for example, VEG (who has Eco Monday and Wipeout Wednesday) or the Fragrant Muse who has fragrant Friday.

Ultimatum Friday basically consists of telling the Prince of Darkness, otherwise technically and legally known as ones husband, that enough is enough and really there has to be some sort of conclusion to the attempt at a relationship that has been ongoing for the last couple of years. Or put it another way its the girlfriend or me, baby. Time to place your money/cards on the table to mix a metaphor.

The rules of Ultimatum Friday are that the the Prince is allowed a good couple of weeks to ponder the situation. He must either come up with a decision as to what he wants to do or at least a plan as to how he is going to make a decision. Other than that there really aren't any really any rules. There just has to be a decision at the end of the day.

I can't keep my life on hold for ever. I can't keep waiting for a man who doesn't know whether he wants to be with me. Its a thankless soul destroying job. Many times the easiest thing would have been to walk away. But I haven't because in our history he has waited many months for me to make a decision to be with him when I couldn't find the courage.

As I say not a regular feature I think (I hope). But just knowing that something, anything might happen is good. Some news is better than no news. And I am honestly looking forward to it, what ever it is.

So tired I forgot to give this a title originally

As I write this post my feet are in a bowl of salted water. My brain has officially already gone to bed. I walked all day today. I ate two breakfasts, one lunch, one cake(I mean a whole cake not a slice of cake or a cupcake), one bag of crisps and I drank more than my own body weight in water. I have four blisters. I saw a white horse carved in the hillside, two lighthouses, some partridges (I think) and fields of poppies and daises. I am so tired that I can hardly think but I have all the happy endorphins rushing round so I am a little blissed out.

In this happy catatonic state I give you a short video clip of our very own Rambo hamster practising his maneouvres taken this weekend .

More coherent thoughts and words tomorrow.

My rainbow

Yesterday there was a rainbow in the evening. Right outside my window. There is something inspiring about those colours, especially if they are set against a slate grey sky. I'm not superstitious but I think they are lucky for me. And hopeful, which was just what I needed yesterday.

Wednesdays are a very long day for me. I work all day in London, leaving home at 7am and getting back at 7pm having collected youngest from her childminder. At home, eldest and step-son are waiting for me. The opening conversational gambit of at least one of them will be "what's for dinner?" shortly followed by "how long will it take?". To be fair I should say that at some point later in the evening, usually after their appetites are sated, they will usually ask how I am and what sort of day I have had. I am not sure they listen to the answer but you can't have everything.

I have become an expert at uber quick Wednesday night recipes. As well frenzied chopping and stirring in the kitchen youngest needs to be bathed, fed a snack (by this time she will already have had two meals after school but she demands this snack as she knows I am cooking for the other two and she doesn't want to be left out), read a story and put to bed.

Added to this yesterday was one and a half hours of walking in London thanks to the tube strike. So I finally when I got to sit down and the rainbow appeared as if on cue right in front of my window I felt as if it were all mine. I also lay claim to the pot of gold at the end of it if anyone comes across it.