iLive, iKnit, iPlay!

Testing mobile blogging

2009-04-12T21:54:00.000Z

I do love my iPhone - so now let's see if this app really does work for blogging. Hey you never know I might blog more often and load up lower quality pics taken on the go with my phone.

Anyway, happy Easter all. Hope yours was good - I'm working on the second sock and the pattern for Pudding Lane Socks.

-- Post From My iPhone

Whoops!

2009-03-31T10:18:00.005Z

It has been tooooo long since I last posted. I keep thinking "Ok I'll make a post this weekend" then the weekend comes and before I blink, it is over.

So a quick post with a very fast round up of what I've been doing:

December: 6th December saw me head up to Kircudbright (pronounced Cur-Coo-Brie) in Scotland for a knitting weekend. My boss lives up there, and his wife was doing Christmas knitting. He invited me at the last minute to take a trip up and spend a weekend just knitting.

It was pure luxury. My boss brought me tea in bed every morning (he never makes tea in the office so it was quite a shock!), he did all the cooking (I didn't know he could even cook) and at around 3pm every day he brought his wife and I a nice glass of Baileys Irish Cream followed by wine and anything else we wanted.

It was very indulgant! You can see pics from my trip here on my flickr page.

January: I went to the Midem music conference in Cannes with work, this was quite good fun but not as fun as previous years. Clearly the recession was biting hard and the numbers of delegates was vastly down.

Also in January was Parcel one of the Socktopus Sock Club 2009. Beautiful yarn from Chameleon Colorworks Evolution in colours that looked just like Bagpuss! The socks were unianimously named "Bagpuss" socks by members of the club.

Here are my Om Shanti Bed socks aka Bagpusses:

February: Was my birthday month. Very early on we had a Snow Day, which brought the UK to a complete standstill. Totally silly but lots of fun and you can see the pictures from Snow Day on my flicker

Another good thing in February was the start of the second series (or season as they now seem to be called) of Damages. Oh my I LOVE LOVE LOVE this programme. Glenn Close, lots of intrigue and as the box for season 1 says "The sopranos with a law degree" - I am avidly watching it and we are now halfway through season 2. It is gripping!

I decided during this month to complete the socks that were not to be and give them to my brother for his birthday coming up in March.

He was due to be in court the day after his birthday for the final court hearing on the division of his marital assets. Clearly he was stressed and I figured, you know, nice bamboo yarn socks, some foot soak and a card wishing him well might make things even a teeny tiny bit better. This was not to be.

He decided to throw the present, still wrapped, somewhere and he couldn't remember where he'd put it. He said he would celebrate his birthday on the 13th (the day after the judgement hearing) with his girlfriend on her birthday.

Fair enough. I had hoped that the socks and the foot soak would act as an olive branch after the nastiness last year. I figured I would wait till after his girlfriends birthday and maybe ask him again about them.

The day came and went, he popped over with his girlfriend a week later. He thanked me for the socks, and my mum asked him if they fit. He said "I dunno I've not tried them on" - 18 months ago he would have put them on straight away. I guess the olive branch failed.

In fact I know it failed because I am still cold shouldered and uninvited to everything while my mother is bullied into going to things she really doesn't want to go to. She said no to something for this weekend, was told "don't be silly, you can come along and bring your hearing aids and meet my girlfriends father" - she really doesn't want to go. So last night, he brought the big guns in and knowing she would not say not to his girlfriend (a stranger and mum wouldn't be impolite to a stranger) got her to ask mum. Mum said yes. When I asked mum if she had managed to tell them she didn't want to go she told me she couldn't say no even though she desperately wanted to.

It annoys me how mum is bullied and he doesn't see it as bullying.

March: Cookie A is in the UK! Oh yes the wonderful Cookie A came for a visit to Socktopus and did a fabulous workshop on sock design. It was an amazing day, you can see the pictures from the day here on my flickr.

I can't wait to get my hands on Cookie's Book - I preordered from the lovely Alice at Socktopus and will pick it and my second Sock Club parcel up on Sunday.

In light of doing the workshop, I'd been reading on Ravelry about some people doing a City & Guilds in Textile Design in Hand Knitting. I had been interested in this but underconfident. A week after the Cookie workshop, and progressing nicely on my own sock design (Pudding Lane Socks - named after the place the Great Fire Of London started because the socks are covered in flames licking your legs!)

I was pointed in the direction of a fabulous tutor called Loraine McClean of Knit Design Online - I had some email correspondence with Loraine and very quickly made my mind up to do Level 3. I signed up, and my education into knitting design will begin at the end of this week.

Another thing with March, the clocks went back. Oh my word how lovely it is to get home from work when it is still light outside! Yippee Spring has finally Sprung.

And finally, today I got confirmation that I'm in the Woolgirl Wizard Of Oz Sock Club. I love the Wizard of Oz, so this sock club grabbed my by the throat and screamed "Join my pretty, Joiiiiiinnnn" but I was a bit late in signing up. I was sure I wouldn't get in but today the lovely email arrived to say I was in! Yippee!

OK thats my catch up and once again I pledge to be more up to date with the blogging.

I figure short posts more often is probably the way to go. I don't want to hit you with huge walls of text too often!

- M

xx

The Best Little Knitting Gift In London

2008-10-20T15:55:00.004Z

I happened to be browsing around Ravelry when I came across a lady who looked quite interesting - Susan Crowe. I clicked on her blog link when BAM the most amazing picture popped up on the screen.

Susan had found the perfect knitting gift for the season from the lovely Sainsbury's. Of course I had to have one! I packed my mother up in to the car and took her to our local Savacentre. First stop was Marks & Spencer, where I accidentally ended up buying a dress, skirt, trousers and jacket all in the same style. A suit if you will. Woops.

Off we went into Sainsbury, did our shop then right at the end I suddenly remembered (distracted by clothes buying) the mug! I HAD to have the mug. I searched high and low until eventually I found a staff member to ask. I was dragged to the relevant aisle and there the mug winked at me from the shelf. Mum said "that looks nice" to which I replied "yeah and it's coming home with me! Those buggers at work won't be able to nick my mug anymore as there will be no doubt who owns this one!!!"

So here is the mug in question:

Isn't it just awesome!?!!

It keeps the drink nice and hot as it warms through and the ceramic manages to keep the heat in. Not only that, when you stir the hot drink in the mug it creates a strange looking swirl because the mug is a funny many sided shape. Feels strange drinking out of a 2x2 ribbed bit of the mug but its lovely. I am super happy I have one.

I missed out though - they apparently were on a 3 for 2 offer. I didn't notice that yesterday when I got it, so today I ahem well err I popped to the local Sainsbury near work and bought three more. One will be gifted, one kept because the buggers at work will probably break my one so I need a spare and the third? Welllllllll maybe I'll run some kind of a competition here some time next year when the season is over and the mugs are a rarity :)

This past weekend I've suffered a bit with stress related eczema on my hands. They have been rather sore. However I managed to join in with a Ravelry group for 10 mins a day. That is 10 mins a day spinning. I had some lovely alpaca tops from Forest Fibers which just span up like a dream. I spun two bobbins worth - then plied the yarn which has been soaked and whacked and is now drying.

Here are my spools before I plied them together:

This stuff is so soft. It is like fluffy little clouds cuddling up next to your skin. This home spun yarn is going to become Diane Mulhollands Amy from her Spin series. Can't wait for it to dry.

Spin, Cook, Knit, Rawr!

2008-10-16T12:01:00.005Z

So I accidentally ordered, paid for and took delivery of a new spinning wheel. Oops! I had been to Diane Mulhollands Superspin class and it renewed my interest in wheel spinning. I had a go on the Joy wheel and it just felt awesome. Afterward my mother said to me "keep an eye out for a cheap one then" when I talked about the Joy. I said "I don't need one I have a wheel already" and her reply was "when have you ever made do with just one of anything?"

I thought "I'll show you - I don't need no stinkin Joy wheel!" then I just happened to search and came across Wingham Wool Works which upon enquiring had a double treadle version in stock. They had the bag in stock too. Somehow my debit card took a beating and two days later this arrived:

I love it to pieces and have already spun my first 100g of Corriedale. Pictures of that to follow - it isn't great but its Okay. It will be used to make a slubby beret by the gorgeous Ysolde :)

So getting right into the spirit of making things, I had been chatting to Natalie over at The Yarn Yard and discovered she had a recipe up for Oatmeal Biscuits. This recipe is the one I have been searching for! I had this recipe years ago but lost it - I've been searching for it ever since then I came across The Yarn Yard and the recipe! Oh my god it has been YEARS since I tasted these. Mum used to make them and they were just delicious - she would throw in some museli to make up the batch and it would just add that touch of yummy.

So I set out to make my first Oatmeal Bikkies in a long time. They were too chewy, I'd added too much Bicarbonate of Soda and I had not baked them long enough. They had an aftertaste which was the bicarb - still I said to mum "I'm going to make several test batches till I get this right, we'll eat them all - test batches and all" and she said "thats the best way to find the perfect combination" so the first batch were prepared:

Butter, Sugar, syrup melting in the pot Mmmm

The oats ready to go into the melted mixture and some Museli thrown in for added taste n texture:

Raw Biscuits on the baking sheet:

The end result, melted into eachother and ran all over the pan but boy even with the Bicarb aftertaste these were good. Comfort eating at its best!!!

So in keeping with that, mums friend Kathleen came around and showed me how to make Soda Bread! Yummy rich brown soda bread made in the Irish traditional way. I'll write up the recipe and post it here but for now, here are the pictures of the Soda bread in the making:

Adding buttermilk to the mix:

Preparing the tin for baking:

Putting the bread on the pan before scoring it and baking it:

And the finished, baked, hot yummy Soda Bread:

So we paid for Kathleens time with a barter system - two fresh organic corn cobs yum! :)

I needed another quick project to do - I finished the dream in color shrug and had yarn left over. So I tackled Calorimetry and was surprised to find this thing finished in just one evening. Needs a button adding but here it is - it reminds me of a big cheesy grin!:

After all the cooking, I took a little break and who did I spy in the garden stalking along? The lovely Miss Kitty! Rawr!:

Squeeeeeee Cuteness cuteness cuteness!

2008-10-13T12:12:00.003Z

I should have posted this two weeks ago! I finally received my Karatstix in the post. Unfortunately I had to pay import duty of £13 before they would hand over my little parcel but I was so excited when I opened it up. I couldn't wait to get my hands on the lovely bamboo things, and here they are on my desk:

What is more, Karen threw in some extras! Check out the delicious stitch markers and knitting bag charm. Super cute!

In knitting news I've been working on the Dream In Color Shrug using Visual Purple colour. I have loved this pattern - just enough of a challenge to get me out of the "must do zombiefied easy knits because brain not functioning" mode. I've finished it but have yet to upload the finished pic to flickr. Here is it's progress. I love this yarn and the colour, I now want to make a sweater with it. I know that the dye lots are vastly different on every skein but I think that will make for an interesting look on a sweater. I have a pattern in mind too.

Next up I'm making another flower scarf. The last one will be given to my mother, this one will be for me and I have to make a third one for Mums friend Kathleen. Kathleen will be mentioned more in the next post once I upload the pics of what she helped me learn at the weekend!

Here is my flower scarf in progress. I'm using Evolution again but this time in Peacock. I love this yarn and I love the splashes of colour in the way this is dyed.

New laptop will arrive some time in November - sigh a long wait for it. In the mean time my friend Kev lent me a Sony Vaio to play with at home. This at least means I can play Warhammer Online with the rest of the guild! It is tons of fun too - I am quite surprised at how much I'm enjoying Player vs Player combat. Can't wait for the new laptop - it should make the screen freezes disappear :)

More soon once I upload more pics to Flickr - plenty of news to give :)

Knitting news

2008-09-29T12:17:00.003Z

So I started Baby Cables and Big ones Too a little while ago - right when the pattern was published. I've done the body and started on one arm but I must finish this. I keep looking at it and realising I need to be able to have time to concentrate on this. It has been a crazy few weeks and the panic attacks don't help with my finishing things off. My head is still fuzzy and I'm all over the place in terms of where my head is at. Here it is so far - so close but so far away:

I needed something simple. I was also working on the Waterfall Lace Scarf from Katinka Knits which is an easy and straight forward knit. I was using Posh Yarn for this and it turned out very well - I hope you agree! It needs blocking (as does the Chevron scarf) but I've no room to block right now. We are getting furniture delivered so the room I'd use for blocking is full of the stuff from the lounge while it gets decorated etc.

After I finished Waterfall I found this charming little pattern for Flower Scarf by Robyn Diliberto (look for it on Ravelry) . It was a very quick knit using Chameleon Colorworks Evolution in Jacaranda colourway. Unfortunately I sewed the flower and the button on the opposite sides (grr) but it still looks ok and is very comfy! I'm making another one also in Chameleon Colorworks Evolution but this time in Peacock colourway.

I've also dusted off my spinning wheel and have been practicing spinning. I'm a long way from being good at it but I'm going to keep on practicing till I get better. Then I'll take on Diane Mulhollands "Amy" hat from her spin 1 class.

The Damage

2008-09-29T12:02:00.003Z

I promised to post pictures of the damage the hoodies did to my car and show the parking post they smashed through the window with.

I have finally worked out that I can sort out synching my iPhone on an old laptop that is iTunes store authorised, and then get the photos off it. So here below are the pictures from that fateful night when I wished the Dark Knight had come to my rescue after seeing the movie at the Imax with friends.

This is the parking post they put through the window. Better than that around my head I guess:

Glass on my lovely leather upholstery!!!

Scuff damage and mashed in plastic fascia around by the passenger air bag where the pole hit it as it came through the window. You can see the force they used. Fuckers.

May the laptop burn the jibblies of whoever gets to use it, and may the hoodies be infested by the fleas of a thousand camels. And crabs. I hope they get crabs. That is if they don't already hve them.

I am still taking sleeping tablets and even with them I wake in the night in the middle of a panic attack. I've not had panic attacks this bad since I was first diagnised back when I was 28.

Something Nice

2008-09-16T10:51:00.005Z

To rise up from the shit storm of last week, today I received a message from Karen she of Karatstix fame to tell me that my custom order was ready.

Check this out. Cuteness of cuteness - I requested a set with my kitty Missy on, and paw prints because she is naughty and puts paw prints all over. She plays with my yarn while I knit and I often wrestle with her to stop her eating it all! So she seemed like a perfect theme for my Karatstix.

Super cute eh?

Another nice thing this week? Sunday was super spin class 2. It was, of course, awesome. Diane gave us different fibers to play with including some super soft alpaca. We worked on flick carding, full carding, spinning with the wheel and of course our spindles.

So thank you again Diane and Alice for the fantastic Superspin Class. I can highly recommend this class to anyone wanting to learn about spinning.

There will be an advanced class in November, I think I shall be going to that!

Again it was hosted at Alice's home, but she hinted that the next time it might be housed in her own shop! How exciting. From little things big things grow, and Alice has certainly created something very gorgeous in Socktopus. I'm SO glad I was there for the launch =D

Thieves in the night

2008-09-14T17:28:00.003Z

So as you know, I've learned to spin and been waiting for Warhammer Online to start. GOA, the European provider of War, have been useless and the launch was a disaster (as expected from their previous performance with Dark Ages Of Camelot and many other games). Open beta was due to start last Sunday, on Tuesday evening we finally got access.

I played a little on Tuesday evening, foregoing my "homework" from the Spin class and getting a little used to the game environment. I loved it.

Wednesday 10th I went to the Cinema with guild members from Blackadder gaming guild. We went to the iMax to see The Dark Knight. It was awesome and I had a lovely time seeing Sue, Kevin and Robert again. I left the car at the office and laptop in the office and had planned that I would go back to the office in Hammersmith, West London (the iMax is at Waterloo in Central London) and pick up the car to drive home. I've done this countless times over the last year.

It was early enough for me to get home, do a little playing on War and preparing my spindle for Thursday in the office where I'd do spinning at lunchtime.

I was going to get off the tube at Hammersmith and walk up to the office that way - the office is closer to Ravenscourt Park than Hammersmith tube but walking up King Street is a bit safer I think. I had heels on, new boots. Kitten heels but heels that I am not used to wearing all the same so my feet were sore. I decided at the last minute to stay on to Ravenscourt Park.

As soon as I got off the tube I thought "Shit this was a bad idea" I walked through an alley way but it was OK there was another woman in front of me and I felt OK but a bit unsure. I walked around the back of one way system and down towards our office. As I turned into the road my office is on, I started to feel a bit uneasy. I came to a little turning that goes into the back of where our office is, it was pitch black poor lighting and I heard something. Instantly my senses pricked up and looked around, saw no one but walked a bit swifter. However the noise of my heels was crying out "lone woman about."

My heart started to beat a bit faster, and I hastened my step along past the major road works taking place in the street with big fencing all around it (conveniently blocking views) round the corner and quickly into my office. I breathed a sigh of relief. I'd been dying to go to the loo too so I sorted that out then went upstairs to the first floor where my desk is.

I packed up my laptop, picked up my knitting bag which had my spindle, fiber and waterfall lace scarf in it (posh yarn, cashmere and silk mix mmmm). I went downstairs, turning off the lights and air conditioning which my boss had left on again. Mentally chastising him I set the alarm and left the building. Directly opposite the building are car parking spaces. Mine is less than 4 yards from the front door. I put the laptop in the front well of the passenger side of the car and the knitting bag on the seat.

As soon as I did so I realised I'd left my hand bag and phone in the office. I looked back over to the office and back at the laptop. Should I bring it back in with me? Nah there's no one around - I looked again - yep no one around it will be fine. I have a smart car, it only has 2 seats and the top half of the car is almost entirely made of glass. I COULD have put it in the "boot" if you can call it such, but I never do unless I'm going to the gym and leaving it in the car while I do a class.

So I locked the car door walked back the 2 yards, unlocked the door, swiped my alarm swiper over the thing, went up 1 flight of stairs picked up my hand bag (in the dark) walked back down the stairs and as I swiped the alarm fob across the alarm fob point I heard a loud BANG. I knew immediately what was happening. As I opened the door I heard the second bang and a shatter of glass, and as I lifted my head I caught the last glimpse of two hoodies as they ran around a wall and out into King Street with my laptop in tow.

It took no more than 40 seconds for me to go back inside, get my bag and come out again. They had been watching me. Who knows how long they had been watching. Had they followed me from the dark area behind the office when they heard a lone woman? I think they did.

I think they also knew what was around and about my car, because what they used to smash into it had been lying in front of the car for a year or more. It was a broken parking bollard. A solid metal tube filled with concrete to weight it. Two hits is all it took. They weakened the glass (and broke the window seal) with a screwdriver then BAM hit it twice with that.

They knew exactly what they were doing. The nice policeman told me I should be glad that I went back into my office or they would have gone for me. I could have been bashed over the head and left lying there till morning, because the place was deserted except for me and them.

There were two guys in another office looking out the window, I asked if they saw them they said yes and did a mini description to me. Which I gave the police call centre. When the cops actually arrived, of course, they told them they had seen nothing.

I have never seen so much broken glass in my life. It was everywhere.

The following morning I had to take the car to Fulham Police Station between 8 and 9am for the Scenes of Crime car clinic - apparently when you have a car crime in Hammesmith and Fulham now, you take the scene of crime to them the following day they don't come to you. Apparently this is because car crime is so common place in Hammersmith & Fulham that they can't cope with the number of calls.

I drove to Fulham with the window still out, feeling deeply vulnerable and shitting myself the entire way that some other little fucker would lean in the car and rip out the stereo. I didn't sleep all night, shocked, humiliated for my stupidity at leaving the laptop in the car, and scared some little fucker around hwere I live would nick the stereo overnight to just add insult to injury.

The lady at Fulham Police station was lovely. They all have been lovely actually, but she was especially nice. She dusted the car, told me there wasn't much hope but that she was grateful I'd brought it in because all it takes is ONE piece of evidence to catch the little buggers. She had hoped for blood, there was none. Fingerprints? None it was clean as a whistle which was not a surprise. Not even the "weapon" had them because it wasn't the "right sort of material" to leave dabs on. The car surfaces were no good as they are all rippled, apparently you need a smooth surface. Glass is perfect, but they little sods do this all the time, they know not to leave dabs in the right places.

I drove home, still shaking like crazy, feeling vulnerable and every time I looked to my left to check traffic I saw the awful damage they had done. I cried most of the way home. People walking past me in the street kept looking at the damage and staring at me and the car as they walked past. I wanted to yell out "MIND YOUR OWN BUSINESS!" A complete mixture of emotions was coursing through me every few seconds; fear, worry, anger, shock, dispair, rinse repeat. Emotions bouncing around all over the place.

While there at Fulham Police Station Kevin called me. I'd told Sue about what happened and that morning managed to make a post on the guild boards from my iPhone. He was lovely to me on the phone and I just ended up weeping buckets down the phone in front of the police. Kev offered to lend me a laptop so that I could at least play War. I could barely speak in response because the tears just ran and ran.

After I got home, I took the metal parking post to the dump. I had no idea where I was meant to put it. There was a guy there, so I stopped the car and asked him. He was Polish and was sorting through piles of scrap things - I vaguely remember him taking an old bed out of a black plastic sack. I stopped and asked him where I should put it. He looked at the car and then at me and said "it's scrap metal" he reached in took it out of the car for me and threw it upwards, into a giant skip. He gave me a smile and said "there, it is gone" and went back to what he was doing. Happy he had a job. Any job.

I then drove to Tesco and took the car to the Valet bit in the garage. I asked the lead guy there if they would be willing to clean it. He, also Polish, said "sure no problem but I can't clean the outside because too much water will get in" I said "No just the inside, there is lots of glass are you sure you will clean it" he said "yes no problem bring it round the back"

So I did. Within a minute he had 4 guys swarming the inside of my little smart car. Hoovering up every last shard of glass they could see. Cleaning the inside of the windows that were left. These guys work for a pittance and every one of them did it with a smile. The boss guy asked me what happened. I told him; he went off with how shitty those kids are and how rude they are etc. I told him they should be getting a job working for someone like him instead of stealing from cars. He replied that they wouldn't work for him. He is right. They want it all handed to them on a plate. "There ain't no work innit" if you ask them, but there IS work. "f'ing Polaks coming in taking our jobs" I hear that too often, they aren't taking "our" jobs they are doing the jobs none of these little shits who are too good for it will do, AND they do it with a smile on their faces.

They are happy to have a job, ANY job. Yet we in this country have raised little rats, who do nothing but leach and steal. I know some people would say "but they come from a poor background" and to that I will tell you; my parents came to this country in 1950 with £1.50 in their pockets. My father came from abject poverty in Ireland, not knowing where his next meal was coming from. They arrived here and they worked. They brought 6 kids up and they taught us to work. We in turn teach our kids to work.

Why does anyone think they have the right to not work and just live by stealing other peoples stuff. Scaring other people?

To top all of this off, the three insurance policies that should cover this theft don't. The car insurance will give £100 towards it, but the excess is £265. The computer insurance won't cover it, because it wasn't taken from inside the building. If I'd taken it back in with me and they hit me over the head and pushed me in as I came out of the building then yeah it would be covered. My home contents won't insure it because it isn't my asset. Robbed blind in the night by two hoodies - at least they had the courtesy to do it at night while hooded. The insurance companies rob us blind in daylight with a smile on their faces too!

I have pictures to post with this blog but they are on my iPhone. Until I'm properly back up and running I can't really get them off it.

All I can say is, take care everyone. Always be on your guard.

Patience is a virtue

2008-09-08T13:28:00.002Z

And a virtue I'm quite surprised to find I have! Warhammer Online Age of Reckoning went live with Open Beta yesterday. I pre-ordered the game so I'd get access to both the open beta and the head start.

The game goes live on 18th.

Unfortunately we have decided to stick to the Euro servers and they are run by GOA. GOA are not well known for their smooth starts after the poor launch of DAoC and also the hacking of game servers in Shadowbane Europe.

The registration process was to go live at 8:30am CET yesterday morning. I considered setting my alarm and getting up early but decided that it wasn't that vital to be up that early on a Sunday. Besides I had a class to get to later in the morning at getting up at 7:30am BST felt like it would be stupid O'clock. I could register later before I went to my class.

Of course they had many many issues and everything was shut down so there was no chance of registration.

Apparently during the day, while I had my class, on and off people issued death thrats to GOA employees and generally vented their frustration on message boards.

Four years ago I might have been a venter but never a death threatener. Actually four years ago I WOULD have been a venter. A very vocal venter at my anger at the incompetancy of the whole affair.

Today, however, I'm a calmer person and not so desperate to join in the online world of escapism into a computer game. I ponder today if that means my usual addiction has waned and I am no longer a gaming addict.

Give me a week or two, after the official launch date and once I'm in the game playing it and I'll let you know if I have returned to being a pasty faced, red eyed gamer.

I really don't wan't that. I really don't want to return to that world, that is where I put the weight on. Sitting around gaming and stuffing my face, raiding till stupid O'clock in the morning while playing on US servers in order to keep up with my guild mates. Falling asleep at my desk the day after because I just wasn't getting sleep.

I like who I am now, I much prefer the exercising, carrying less weight, and the patience I seem to have gained after returning to my fiber arts.

Take yer time GOA / Mythic. It's all good. Fix the issues and I'll see you in game... eventually ;)

Learning to Spin (again)

2008-09-07T19:53:00.003Z

Today I went for the first of two Super Spin classes hosted by Socktopus and taught by Diane Mulholland. Diane, who grew up on a farm in Australia, has been spinning for 25 years.

The day started with each of us choosing our spindle from the lovely jug on the table. A choice of Cherrywood or Mahogany - my choice was the Mahogany.

We started the class learning about roving and tops, and then we moved very quickly on to starting to spin.

Much fun ensued while we all concentrated following Diane's instruction, until Diane proclaimed "Alice! We have yarn!" and Alice came into the room to see our efforts and take some pictures!

A break for lunch, before moving on to learning about and plying the yarn we had managed to spin.

Three hours after arriving we had all spun and plied our first efforts with drop spindles. It felt great and very different to wheel spinning. The entire process was so different to my day a couple of years ago in deepest darkest Kent, where I learned about choosing the right bit of the fleece etc.

I much prefer Diane's approach which makes one feel that one can achieve what one wants without saying that one must know everything about a fleece before you spin it. Yes it is good to know, but you don't have to know immediately!

So this evening, sitting at home I've already started my homework from Diane. I also bought some pre-dyed tops so here is the before, during and after of Spinning with a drop spindle:

And here is the during and after:

Waterfalls and Cables

2008-08-27T22:32:00.005Z

I have returned to knitting with a vengeance!

I was looking through my stash, taking pictures and trying to visualise what I'll do with it all. I looked hard at the stash and thought "there is something missing." When I got into the office next, I rifled through drawers in my desk and there it was. Posh Yarn. Cashmere and Silk mix in aran weight, in a gorgeous lavender blue colour.

This yarn is super soft, but it does suffer because it is a silk mix. It has that smell, that slight aroma of silk. Most people can't smell it, but I can always smell the silk. It lingers, just that slight hint of silk smell. I love the feel of the yarn, but I know that the finished object will not be for me, it will have to be gifted much to my despair because this yarn is beautiful. It is a joy in the hands, it feels like the softest of down you can imagine. My hands sigh as it runs through them.

It desired a pattern of superior quality. It needed something special to show off the colour, the richness of the yarn and it needed to be turned into something that is to be worn close to the skin, maybe even close to the face. Not my face, because I can not cope with that smell no matter how slight it is. I wish it were 100% cashmere, then selfishly I would keep it, wear it and cherish it because the pattern is sublime.

While hunting Ravelry for something special to knit I found Katinka. She had created the most beautiful Fair Isle hat for the Ravelympics, it was simply stunning. I've never attempted colourwork but asked her if the pattern would be available "soon." While waiting on a response I found her site and her Etsy store and there, was the most beautiful pattern which was crying out for me to knit. The Waterfall Scarf pattern just looked stunning to me - the simplicity of the pattern and the way that it just cascades made me realise THAT was the pattern I'd been looking for - I have some cashmere laceweight crying out for a nice lace pattern.

I bought the pattern and fondled my cashmere laceweight. However, the aran was waiting to be used and it was peeking out at me every time I opened my desk drawer in the office.

So I cast on....

This is just the start, I've done more since this picture but need to upload more pictures. This thing moves along smoothly and quickly, producing beautiful cascading stitch patterns. I showed it to a colleague who gasped and said "I love that colour" then she touched it and said "wow that is soft" and at last she said "that is gorgeous, it really is an art what you are doing." I think I just found the recipient of my first Waterfall Scarf. I'm jealous! I want to keep it, but the silk just won't do!

Meanwhile, Autumn is approaching. Yes I know it's just August - it's still summer! Well it is, but in a week it is September, the kids return to school, the roadworks in London (which should be ending but aren't because they have overrun on their schedules) should be drawing to a close. All these things are triggers which indicate the start of Autumn.

So Autumn is coming, the air will begin to chill. This means one thing and one thing only. I need a sweater. Something soft, warm and most of all something comforting. Something to comfort me. Something to wrap myself in and stretch the sleeves slightly so they cover my palms - palm warming sleeves which serve to protect my hands from the scalding hot of the mugs my soup is in. Soup to warm the soul, and a sweater to curl up in.

This is it. Simple, elegant and warming. The start takes some concentration and a whole heap of stitch markers! It is worth it though, once it starts it flies along too. Knit from the top down raglan style with a simple and easy to follow design.

The only problem I've had so far is that this colour is an absolute pig to photograph. None of the pictures I have taken have really done the yarn or the colour justice. It is Jaegar Extra Fine Merino, soft and smooth delicious yarn to work with. The colour is Coal Dust.

Here the first 90 rows are completed, the biggest cable is done, and the body just need some length adding before waist shaping can take place.

Again, the simplicity is good. It is similar in style to the simplicity of the Bombshell Sweater from BGK - I like knitting in the round. I like that the front and the back are done at the same time and I don't have to worry about seaming. I love the fact I can try it on as I go.

Now I'm on the "boring" bit though, endless rounds of knit knit knit only, but this sweater is lovely. The yarn is lovely. This is going to comfort me!

Out of Hibernation

2008-08-12T10:40:00.002Z

This weekend I had a clear out. I needed to make some room and tidy things up, so my stash had a little organising spree.

Still not really able to do much lifting and like with my muscle spasm filled back, I was content to at least do something positive this weekend and get stash organising.

I have a few bits of leftover sock yarn and other yarns stuffed into jiffy bags and tissue paper and then in plastic bags and then into a set of wooden boxes but this is rather full. It was time to ditch the excess jiffy bags and plastic bags and tissue paper, and to organise!

I pulled everything out and started laying it out on the floor in piles. Ripped up the jiffy bags and screwed up the more straggly raggy bits of tissue paper and began to put things into some kind of semi order.

In the process of doing this I came across a bunch of yarn an old lady who lives close by and is a friend of my mothers gave me. She can't really knit any more so she gave me the yarn. I've not done anything with it. Along with the yarn she gave me a drop spindle and some rollags.

The yarn is in pretty colours but I really don't know what I'm going to do with it. I do have some vintage patterns maybe I could use it to make some vintage accessories? Check out the Patons Piccadilly "With the Mohair Look!" Such cute vintageness!

I found a plethora of sock yarn in my stash. Now either I make a ton of socks (which I could do as I'm especially enjoying doing 2 socks on 2 circs - yay for having a PAIR of socks at the end - I may change my mind on this when I get to the heel turns and gusset pickups but for now it's fun!!) or find something else to do with it. Gloves maybe. I've yet to attempt gloves, this could be an interesting challenge!

I found sweater yarn, and a WIP for Tomato sweater but I've lost the plot as to where I am on that. I was making it in the biggest size too - so I think a ripping back is necessary for that then a re-start. I have a nice purple/pink contrast for the colour work on that.

I was looking at my projects on Ravelry the other day and thinking "where on earth did I put that Chevron and Halcyon scarf project bag?" and lo! I found it. Halcyon was not making me feel joyful at all, however the Chevron I was LOVING.

I'd been to the Socktopus launch at the back end of last year and came away with some Chameleon Colorworks Evolution. This yarn is sooooo soft and so nice to work with. Anyway while stash organising I found it and a spare ball of the Peacock colourway. Nowhere could I find the skein of Purple Rain - the other colour. Disaster! I rushed onto the Socktopus site and thankfully managed to get the last skein in this colour! She had no Peacock colourway so I was VERY lucky! Phew.

I fondled the scarf lovingly and thought "I meant to take photos of this ages ago to put on ravelry." So I started taking pics and thinking "Why did I leave this hidden away for so long?" I started it in January of this year then lost my knitting mojo while I concentrated on shedding some lard.

Yesterday I took a day off. Back in Feburary my colleagues bought me a birthday gift of a voucher for a place called Relax. This is a tranquil massage parlour in central London. I could have had two half hour massages or I could have one full hour massage. Or any other treatment they offer there too. I chose to have a one hour deep tissue massage. I was hoping this would help with my back problems.

I arrived at Relax to be met by a friendly Australian girl, proffering water and taking me upstairs to the "Haven" where I had to fill in a form to make sure there were no medical issues with me having the massage.

Next I was taken into a relaxing tranquil room, full of purple decor and lovely mild floral scents. Then a very nice Asian lady talked me through the process and left me to get undressed and up on the table.

An hour later (and I wish I had extended it to be a 2 hour massage) I was lying there feeling like jelly. She got to work right on my back pushing and easing the knots out of the muscles in my back. It was an experience not to miss. I really really really regret not taking the extention for another hour. I think she could have done wonders for me with another hour.

Today I feel looser, but my back still hurts - I think basically she unknotted it and it was so used to being tense while holding everything together that it is now so relaxed the bones ache because they aren't being pulled every which way by spasms in the muscles.

Anyway, on the way to the massage I brought along Chevron for a little light tube knitting. I pulled out the knitting from Wimbledon to Earls Court and not a soul even blinked in my direction - this is good, I was comfortable and happy knitting away.

I switched to the Piccadilly line and pulled out the needles. Immediately a couple sitting opposite me started whispering to eachother and giggling. I carried on. Two young (ish) girls got on the train then, one had to sit next to me and was complaining to her friend that she always had to sit next to the freak on the train. Yeah, thats right. I was the "freak" on the train. I didn't care though, I had soft as butter evolution in my hands and was going to be pummelled into the most relaxed state I'd been in for a long time.

Anyway, I managed to get a few rows done on the way there, and again on the way back. So here it is, in progress and no longer hibernating, I give you Chevron in progress:

Close up of the stitch detail and colours

Goodies!

2008-08-09T22:42:00.008Z

OOh lots and lots of goodies!

OK so 26th July, I go to my flat and start clearing some stuff out. I have a LOT of clearing to do, and threw out 10 bags of old clothes and various bits and bobs of rubbish. During the clearing out process, I'm bent over tying closed a bag. I pick the bag up, still bent over, and twist to move the bag to one side. As I did it I knew I shouldn't be doing that at all and yep, as I did so, I heard the inevitable crunch and felt the muscles in my lower back tighten.

I was OK though, it didn't hurt TOO much. Till Monday morning, when I woke up and couldn't move. I managed to drag myself out of bed, and onto the scales. Bent over on the scales I just couldn't straighten up. I realised that an old injury had decided to revisit big time.

So a week of absolute discomfort followed. I couldn't sit for more than a couple of minutes before my back started screaming. I'd then lie down, and my back would sigh with relief for all of a few minutes before it started screaming again, so I'd stand but I couldn't hold my own body weight upright as the muscles were in spasm.

Ice packs, boredom, more ice packs, more boredom. Mineral Ice - Ooh I discovered a pot of mineral ice balm for the body in one of the rooms upstairs, mum had bought it for herself some time ago and never used it.

I slathered it on, to find it smelt very nicely of mint. Oops... to Missy the mischievous monster cat I suddenly became the world's biggest piece of catnip. Not only was I the giant catnip yumminess I was the giant catnip that fed her! I can't describe well enough how she had this demented scratching at my t-shirt bottom, trying to get to the strong minty stuff underneath while drooling in this freaky way. My T-shirt became soaked not only in Mineral Ice but in cat drool. Lovely.

So no gym or exercise of any kind for two whole weeks. I'm missing the endorphins and I'm worried that the weight will whoosh back up. I know ultimately that it won't whoosh back up but it is annoying that I was SO close to getting into the next stone range down. I was really looking forward to being in the 11's I feel like I've been in the 12's forever! I know that's not true, and I know it is totally mind over matter, but deep inside there's a little bit of me having panic attacks over this.

The morning of the day my back cracked, I'd been getting my nails done. On the way out of the shopping centre I walked past Carphone Warehouse. They had a sign in the window; 8gig and 16gig iPhone 3g in stock. I've needed a new phone since my contract ran out in January and I've been eyeing the iPhone for a while now.

I popped in for a chat and about an hour later walked out with a new contract and shiny new and FREE iPhone 3g. At least while prone I had something to play with ;) Here it is next to my old Samsumg:

I gotta say, this thing is pretty damn nice. I've had time to play around a lot with it now, and I think my favourite thing (and the thing that makes it oh so worthwhile) has to be the stupidest thing ever. A picture of a lego Indiana Jones, which, when you flick the phone with your wrist, makes a series of whip cracking noises. Now I just need my boss to come back from Holiday at the end of August so the next time he yells "TEA NOW" I can say the usual "the kitchen is right there go make it yourself" and follow it with a Crrrrkkktshhhh from the phone ;)

So after a week prone, I returned to work on Monday 4th. At least when I got in I had a nice rubber cover for the iPhone waiting (I'd ordered it over the weekend).

I was on the verge of finishing Charade, and decided that I've wanted sock blockers for an age, now was the time to buy them. I ordered from Get Knitted and knew they would come fast. While I was at it I also ordered two books from Amazon. Big Girls Knits 2 and Knitting Circles Around Socks. I also got The God Delusion. That's a whole other post in and of itself.

So here are my lovely new books:

Here are my Charade Socks on the new Sock Blockers!

And a nice close up of the herringbone ribbing on the feet section:

I guess this means I got my knitting mojo back!!

Getting my head around the two socks on two circs has been something I've wanted to do for some time. An online tutorial I found was a little hard to get - so I got the book in the hope that would help.

The pattern in the book calls for thicker yarn, larger needles and two circs of different lengths. So I've adapted it - using the Simple Sock in 3 Sizes by Cat Bordhi from Socks Soar on Two Circular needles, and using two circs the same length (because that's what I have in my sock knitting needle case).

So far so mindblowingly good! I am LOVING this experience. I'm really excited to think that when I've finished learning this method, I'm gonna have a pair of socks! I won't have to cast on again to make the second one.

Here they are so far:

28 Weeks later

2008-07-29T10:22:00.004Z

Well here we are, 28 weeks later and I don't look like a mad rabid zombie desperate to eat! My weight has gone down, up, stayed the same week in week out. I've been at war with the bulge!

I've yet to see "28 weeks later" the film. I've seen "28 days later" and thought it was a fairly amusing zombie romp. In the 28 weeks that have passed, my world has changed vastly.

Last weekend I popped into Marks & Spencer with my mother. We had gone to look for furniture but the shop she wanted to look in was closed on Sunday. We were at a loose end so went to Savacentre where they have recently put an M&S next to Sainsbury. The sale was on. We popped in and I spotted a rather nice Autograph line top. It was in a lovely deep blue, somewhere between midnight and petrol blue. It had cut out flower detailing around a slashed neck opening and little silk tie sash.

It was a size 16. Mum suggested I try it on. I snorted at the idea and said "you are nuts I'm not gonna fit into size 16 yet!" She held it up against me and said "yes you will." So I tried it on. I also tried on a pair of size 14 jeans for a laugh (traditionally my top half has always been bigger than my bottom half) which didn't fit at all, but surprisingly they did go over my hips. So I slid into size 16 jeans that were not stretch denim, and to my surprise they did up wihout vast amounts of sucking the apple shaped belly in.

Next came the turn of the top to be tried on. I held it up and just thought "I love this top - if it doesn't fit I will likely weep as there isn't one in an 18 out there" I was also feeling fragile and didn't need a top to not fit me in a changing room - it is humiliating enough just being me already without adding the defeat of trying to fit into something that just won't fit.

To my absolute surprise it fitted! And it looked pretty good! There was no huge bulging belly creating a massive muffin top explosion over the top of the jeans to be highlighted by an ill fitting but baggy top. I actually had some shape, and the colour! Oh the colour of that top.. I love that colour so much. I used to have something similar in colour years ago that I loved and cherished and wore till it fell to pieces.

Anyway so last Monday, I got into the jeans and the top and wore them to work. I looked pretty slick even if I say so myself. Not one person commented *laugh* People are ultimately so unobservant, and I realise now that unless you actually blow your own trumpet they just don't notice. Unless they haven't seen you for aaaagggess (like 28 weeks) then they go "wow you lost a ton of weight since I last saw you."

I've never really been one for blowing my own trumpet, I guess I've been brought up to think that kind of behaviour is vulgar and show offy. So since this is the year of change, I'm going to break the mould and trumpet my triumph over the bulge (though I have won many battles on a weekly basis the war is far from over!). Here then below are the 28 weeks of weigh ins so far.

Weigh in 28) 28 July 2008 1lb lost 12st 4lb
Weigh in 27) 21 July 2008 2lbs lost 12 st 5 lb
Weigh in 26) 14 July 2008 1lb lost 12 st 7 lb
Weigh in 25) 7 July 2008 2lbs gained 12 st 8 lb
Weigh in 24) 30 June 2008 3lbs lost 12 st 6 lb
Weigh in 23) 16 June 2009 2lbs lost 12 st 9 lb
Weigh in 22) 9 June 2008 1lb gained 12 st 11 lb
Weigh in 21) 1 June 2008 2lbs lost 12 st 10 lb
Weigh in 20) 26 May 2008 N/A 12 st 12 lb
Weigh in 19) 19 May 2008 N/A 12 st 12 lb
Weigh in 18) 16 May 2008 1.5lbs lost 12 st 12 lb
Weigh in 17) 9 May 2008 1.5lbs lost 12 st 13.5 lb
Weigh in 16) 2 May 2008 2lbs lost 13 st 1 lb
Weigh in 15) 25 Apr 2008 1lb lost 13 st 3 lb
Weigh in 14) 18 Apr 2008 2lbs lost 13 st 4 lb
Weigh in 13) 11 Apr 2008 N/A 13 st 6 lb
Weigh in 12) 4 Apr 2008 4lbs lost 13 st 6 lb
Weigh in 11) 28 Mar 2008 N/A 13 st 10 lb
Weigh in 10) 21 Mar 2008 1 lb lost 13 st 10 lb
Weigh in 9) 14 Mar 2008 1 lb lost 13 st 11 lb
Weigh in 8) 7 Mar 2008 1 lb gained 13 st 12 lb
Weigh in 7) 1 Mar 2008 1 lb lost 13 st 11 lb
Weigh in 6) 22 Feb 2008 3 lb lost 13 st 12 lb
Weigh in 5) 15 Feb 2008 1 lb lost 14 st 1 lb
Weigh in 4) 8 Feb 2008 3 lb lost 14 st 2 lb
Weigh in 3) 1 Feb 2008 2 lb gained 14 st 5 lb
Weigh in 2) 24 Jan 2008 3 lb lost 14 st 3 lb
Weigh in 1) 16 Jan 2008 N/A 14 st 6 lb

Here they are!

2008-07-19T11:00:00.002Z

My stitches are working it baby!

Thanks to Needle Liberation, I have broken the knitting haitus and present to you "Charade" socks.

The yarn is very strange - I didn't go with the Cherry Tree hill for this because I couldn't find my ball winder and was too lazy to do it by hand. So I picked up this ball of yarn that had been sitting around for about 18 months. I got it from Ebay but I have no idea where it is originally from. Russia? Poland? Or could it even be Greece? If you know, let me know!

So here in progress is Charade:

Where's my stitches at?!

2008-07-14T16:09:00.004Z

Where is all the knitting? Well I've not done much as you can probably tell. I'm still working on some socks for one of the many brothers I have. They were due last Christmas, then for his birthday in March.

Now I dunno.. I want to finish the socks sure, but things are not right. When I knit, I am putting love and warmth and caring into the item I am making. However, with these socks, I've poured love and caring and warmth into them in buckets, but now I just feel like it was a wasted effort.

Don't get me wrong, making socks is not an effort, but the person who they are for IS.

A complete breakdown in a brother / sister relationship. Much water under a bridge of shittyness which included his decision to cross a line and interfere in my life beyond that which is decent. I asked him to back off, politely and respectfully asked him to leave things alone and to back off. He refused. He crossed a very big line, dragging his girlfriend into the fray and another brother.

It ended very messily with me kicking him very hard in the hoobajoobs (metaphorically speaking of course). It was not undeserved but I did not feel good about doing it. He was asked to back off and warned that should he not back off he would regret it. He took that to mean I'd never speak to him again, which was naieve to say the least.

Anyway so what is left now is a dead relationship with a brother I've not known for 20 years because he always had the same view of me as an angsty teen, he got to know me a bit for 2 years and then he crossed the line and got his balls smushed.

I could have gone into vastly more detail here. I chose not to. I wrote the whole thing out and it just dragged me down and I felt would not make good blog reading. Airing ones dirty laundry in public is never good. One of the saddest things to come out of it all was that his girlfriend, prior to the ball kicking, pulled out of doing the RFL with me. She didn't even have the courtesy to tell me herself. He didn't even have the courtesy to tell me himself either. He just did what he has done repeatedly over the past couple of years, leave someone else to do his dirty work for him - so I got that garbled 3rd hand message that she was not doing the RFL. Her loss though thats for sure.

And what else is left? A pair of bamboo yarn socks. One finished, one still on the cuff. I don't want to finish those socks. They represent something vastly different to what they represented at the start. And annoyingly, I want the needles back - I have some groovy Cherry Tree Hill yarn I've had for 18 months which is crying out to be loved on some sticks.

Motivation

2008-07-07T11:40:00.004Z

Someone asked on a forum today, "What keeps you motivated" to keep losing the weight. What motivates you to keep going?

Weight loss is a really funny old thing. I have spent years being unhappy, and wearing my heart on my belly. I would use food to deal with emotions. My response to the "what keeps you motivated" question is below:

What keeps me motivated is the thought that when I am done with this, the blubber will be gone. I will no longer be the whale that I am.

This for me is about more than just the fat loss, its about re-taking control of my life, stopping myself from abusing myself and moving on with my life. For too long I have shut out the outside world, lived in morbid self pity and eaten myself stupid in the name of "comfort."

Last Friday I had a pizza at a work lunch, the first since starting this. It was delicious and hot and crusty and salty and cheeesy and all the rest of it - a 10" pizza, I ate the entire thing and afterwards felt fit to bust.

I felt sick. My stomach was so full it felt like a water melon; all taut. I spent the afternoon feeling horribly uncomfortable at my desk.

I couldn't resolve with myself why, before starting this weight loss lark, I had wanted to do that to myself. I used to eat myself stupid to GET that feeling and I associated that full to busting feeling with warmth and comfort. I honestly have no idea why I associated that feeling with warmth and comfort.

I spent the afternoon in the biggest amount of discomfort, feeling rough as hell from all the salt and cheese, unable to concentrate properly on work. My mind fogged over and I became irritable and snappy with my colleagues.

Oddly, that helped to spur me on some more. Today is weigh in day for me and I'm 2lbs up on last week. It's also TOTM and I know from my food diary I have not eaten the 7k calories over maintenence in this last week which is what I would need to do to actually put on 2lbs of fat. I also lifted the heaviest weights I've ever done in BodyPump yesterday. All these factors combine to help retain water. Also I had a big salty roast dinner yesterday that I did not weigh or count properly at all.

After Friday, I realised I never want to feel like that again. Why the hell did I ever think that was "comfortable" or "warming" to do that?

When I would have a bad day at work (and there were quite a few bad days for a while there!), I would drive into Tesco on the way home, stop and buy a 12 pack of Fresh Cream Chocolate Eclairs to have for pudding. I'd go home, order a take away pizza - a mammoth 15" pizza with pepperoni, mushrooms and extra cheese, garlic bread or breaded mushrooms, and breaded chicken strips as a "starter". I'd scoff the lot and then have the eclairs in a kind of ritual after. I'd open the first box and take out the first, shiny chocolate slicked choux pastry and slowly savour the taste. I'd scrape the chocolate stuck to the lid off with my finger and carefully suck my finger to get every last drop of chocolately goodness. Then the other 11 would just go in one after the other without even pausing for breath, barely chewing and hardly touching the sides.

Sometimes, just once in a while, I'd cry too. I hated the crying bit though, it was self indulgent and I was being selfish and not thinking of all the starving little children in Africa or wherever. Not able to just "pull myself together" as my mother would think I should. Or "just get on with it" as she would too. I would not think of the people worse off than me, and that was a terrible thing to do - selfish, self indulgent. I was a failure.

What motivates me? All of that does. I don't want to go back to that place. I don't want to be that person any more.

I just want to be "normal" whatever that is. Normality I guess is what motivates me.

I raced for Life

2008-07-02T12:26:00.004Z

Well I did it!!! Phew what a day!

I'm bloody knackered this week but it was well worth it. On Monday, the day after the RFL event, I went to the gym to "carry on as normal," as I told my mother, because I need to keep up the momentum. I did a BodyPump class followed by Circuits. I thought I might not make it all the way through circuits but I did manage it. Even if I was a melted, exhausted wreck at the end haha

I must also point out, after such a long absence from here, that this week I hit a milestone. I have lost 2 stone (28lbs / 12.72kg) since starting the weight loss journey in January 2008. I have around another 42lbs (3 stone) to go though another 2.5 stone would be lovely.

The only way to describe the RFL event really, is to paste below the email I sent to all who sponsored me:

Hello,

I thought you might like to know that I have completed the Race for Life at Epsom Downs Race Course this morning. I can't possibly convey to you the atmosphere at the event, it was very emotional! 4,500 women & their families & friends stood still for a minutes silence, followed by a warm up & then on to the start line. Standing there with 4499 other women, all of whom have been touched by cancer in some way or another, was really quite something. Back plates on every person told their personal stories. It was an incredibly emotional moment and I was easily moved to tears.

The gun went and we surged forward. Like all beginners, I went off too fast and was out of breath by the time I hit the first grassy slope in the course, I had to slow down to walking pace. In the end it took 47 mins to walk/jog/sprint my way around the course. I got low on water 3/4 of the way around, but had another bottle in my small backpack. I told myself I'd stop for a water change at the next Marshall point, and then when I reached that, I'd tell myself I'd stop at the next, then the next and the next right until I could see the finish line, when I gained a final surge of energy to sprint to the end.

All around the course, complete strangers were cheering, clapping and yelling encouragement to every single person on the course. It was quite moving to find complete strangers were giving such wonderful encouragement to every one taking part.

When I faltered at points where there was no one to encourage us, I thought of each and every one of you; for your kindness & support and remembered the wonderful research you have helped to fund. Each year more and more people survive cancer, due to the funding and research that helps us to understand this nasty blight.

I can’t tell you how good it was to walk away from the finish line with a medal in hand, knowing that I have completed the course you all so kindly had faith in me to complete.

With your donations, together we have managed to raise and awesome £515.00 for Cancer Research UK.

In memory of my wonderfully cantankerous fighting Irish father, my heartfelt thanks to you all.

best wishes,

The Alien lives inside my chest

2008-04-17T17:23:00.007Z

Oh yes it does. I know this because, for the first time last night I did an aerobic class. Not just any old aerobic class but Circuits.

I knew a bit about circuits and read a bit and thought yeah this is gonna be tough but NOTHING could have prepared me whatsoever for what I went through last night. I really thought the instructor would do like all the other classes and start with "hi my name is xx anyone here not done circuits before?"

Oh how wrong I was. He walked in, this short foreign man (not sure if he was Spanish or Italian but he was certainly Mediterranean) built like a brick s**t house, with a big grin and a clap of his hands the music started and that was that. A full hour of NON STOP stuff, moving from station to station doing exercise at each station, then group exercise then stations over and over. All the while my body was screaming with lack of oxygen as I tried to keep up.

A very kind lady from Australia who also does body pump partnered with me for the circuits. She showed me what to do and nodded to the instructor that I was new - he got it already he noticed I was new and when things were impossibly hard he looked at me, nodded and showed me a different exercise to do from everyone else.

The hour was up before I knew it, though all the while I thought "this is never going to end - could this be my room 101?"

Afterwards I felt great - out of breath, extremely red faced but great. So I decided to stretch it all out in the pool with a swim. It was during this 20 length spree of swimming that my chest began to scream at me and I felt like The Alien was inside trying to burst out of me hahaha

Wow that was one hell of a class - I'm gonna do it again next week! Also next Thursday the swimming lessons start Yipppeeeeee! I'll finally be able to do more than just flouder around in the pool in a bizarre drowning cat like fashion, and finally be able to breathe properly and put the arms and legs in all the right places to make me move through the water smoothly!

So now for a little light entertainment for you, a couple of pictures from My Virtual Model web site. These are me now, and me how I want to look (at my ideal weight that is) - I'll never actually look as smooth skinned and toned as this MVM looks but still - the body shape / weight should be about right. The one of now is scarily accurate in the way it looks. My weight is all on my belly and boobs.

So without further ado here's a giggle for you; the left is (obviously) as I am on this very day - that is 16lbs lighter than when I started and the right is the me I am aiming for. That is another 53lbs to go - not too far eh? ;)

6 weeks later

2008-04-06T21:21:00.002Z

To the day. 6 weeks ago I had my induction at the gym on the Saturday (it was a nightmare - I amost fainted and the inductor wasn't very nice and a bit like "oh god not another idiot with a new years resolution who won't last 2 weeks" but anyway, on the Sunday I went for my first body pump class. I was pretty impressed - I had an induction with a lady called Jane who told me at the end she used to be bigger than me.

Then she ran the class and was brilliant, very good at leading with clear instructions. I loved it and have been going 3 - 4 times every week for the last 6 weeks. After each class I do something extra, either walk on the treadmill (today I actually jogged for the first time in my adult life) or swim.

I've signed up for swimming lessons which start in a couple of weeks time for a 12 week course. I can swim but these are adult improver classes - its to remind me how to breathe etc when swimming - its been years since I was swimming and as a kid I was very very good at it. I used to swim sponsored swims and the like. Its amazing how one forgets how to do something.

In January I started "dieting" or rather, changing my lifestyle and cooking proper food instead of pissing around with ready meals or processed crap. I now only use fresh ingredients or tins of foods that have no added sugars etc.

I now read food labels as a hobby LOL

I use a website called Cook Yourself Thin and I also now have started using a site called Weight Loss Resources these both have food diaries but WLR has more, it has exercise diaries and various articles and tools for use in weight loss / maintaining weight.

I weigh in every Friday morning and I am very happy to say, 10 weeks after starting to change my eating habits and my relationship overall with food, I have lost 14lbs (1 whole stone). For the last 6 weeks its been slow but that was to be expected. Our bodies need 6 weeks to get used to exercise so until they are used to it they hold onto water and fats. Yes they let some go but they really hold on in case you stop. When our bodies realise we are serious about this exercise lark they start to let go, they stop being panicked into thinking "I need to keep this in case of emergency" and realise that we are putting fuel in to help expend energy.

I have a very very long way to go, but I am SO happy that my first goal has been reached. I'm here, 1 goal down 9 more to go!

Racing for Life

2008-02-28T12:51:00.003Z

OK so I know this is a trixy thing and I should probably not post it here but I'm going to anyway.

It has been an AGE since I posted. Much much much has happened since we last made contact here, but heres where I'm going to tell you what 2008 is bringing me. January, I went away with work and a photo was taken of me. It was horribly unflattering and basically shocked me. I saw how big I am, for the first time. I mean I knew I was big but crikey, I never knew I was THAT big. My Christmas Party pictures made me look like a fat Mrs Claus instead of a slinky santa's helper. Then came the pic of me at a conference looking larger than life.

So, what started happening? I made the decision that I have to change my lifestyle. I HAVE to do it. I have never been this big in my life - my mother was always huge but even she was never this big. I am obese and sedentary. I drive to work, I sit at my desk all day, I drive home, I sit on the sofa all night, I lie in my bed, rinse repeat.

So in the middle of January I began following a program I'd seen on TV during the Channel 4 "Food Week" it is called Cook Yourself Thin - horrid name for a show but the principles behind it are actually very good. Substitution is the key. Instead of spuds full of carbs and yummy, have Jerusalem Artichokes. Instead of buying ready meals and take-aways, learn to cook and know what goes into the food.

I started following this, keeping a food diary (part of the CYT website) and began to take control of my kitchen. So far, I've lost 11lbs. Last Saturday I had an induction at the gym, followed on Sunday by a body pump class. Tonight I have another Body Pump class and will attend gym 3 x a week.

I am shockingly unfit. The guy doing the assessment didn't believe me when I said "No really, I AM sedentary" he was pretty shocked when he saw how unfit I am. Anyway, I am determined, I'm going to get my weight down and to give me something to aim for - I'm going to run the race for life on 29th June 2008.

I am doing this with my brothers lovely girlfriend. Together, we are taking on the race for life and in memory of my father who died from Non Hodgkins Lymphoma in 2001 I am going to at the very least JOG the course.

Please sponsor me :) You can do so by clicking my widget (oo'er) and also if you select gift aid, cancer research get more money!

Thank you in advance for your support and sponsorship.

Which dæmon is yours?

2007-12-10T18:16:00.000Z

The madness of the human condition

2007-09-26T12:56:00.000Z

Burma 1988, protests began due to the government cancelling a bunch of currency notes and instantly wiping out people's savings.

London 1988, I was temping for a music company after being made redundant from a job working for a band's management office. I decided then that I wanted to travel. I had redundancy money and started to save from my temping jobs which back then in the booming 80's were rife.

I started to plan where I wanted to go. Australia of course was on the list as my brother lives there. Two places more than anywhere stood out for me as places I wanted to visit. Vietnam was one, and Burma the other.

The borders closed and somewhere in the region of 3,000 deaths were reported. Hundreds more protesters were driven away in trucks never to be seen again.

Needless to say, I never got to Burma or Vietnam.

Now here we are almost 20 years later, the price of fuel has been raised massively in Burma which has sparked peaceful protest.

Today, the news reports at least 1 monk is dead. Looking at the blog of ko-htike it would appear that the one person that is definitely confirmed dead is not a monk at all, but a civilian sitting in a coffee shop where the police drove by and shot at them indiscriminately.

Reading this reminded me of stories my old Irish relatives would tell me about the Black and Tans sent to keep rule in Ireland who would kill indiscriminately. Clearly the comparison is nothing to what is going on in Burma.

I am appalled at the human condition that allows for this kind of thing to happen. I have talked of this before when talking of the Abu Ghraib atrocity.

I saw something on the TV the other night. Anthony Sher was reading Primo Levi - it was fascinating and interesting. One line stood out more than any other. "I no longer believe in Humanity having seen the Holocaust"

I did not see the holocaust first hand, I have read of it and seen the pictures, we all have, but I have also seen atrocities since then reported in the news that beggar belief; that make you wonder how can the people committing these acts even be human.

I hear people say they don't believe in any god but that they are "Humanists." I am agnostic, but I was born a catholic and raised in the catholic faith. There are people who argue with me about that, and claim themselves to be Humanists; they are fully paid up members of "the Humane Society." I can't help but smart or even raise a wry smile when I hear that - when I have seen what humans can, and do, do to other humans. I could never be a "humanist."

Today, Burma, I feel for you and I feel for your people. My thoughts are with you and my heart goes out to you. I hope that you succeed in diminishing the military Junta that is ruling you.

Socktopus!

2007-09-19T21:35:00.000Z

Friday 14th September 2007.

Yep thats the day I took my life in my hands, swallowed my fears and went along to the launch of a new online yarn store. Socktopus is the name and it certainly socked it to me! There I met several great ladies from Ravelry and snarfled myself a copy of Cat Borhdi's New Pathways for Sock Knitters. I also came away with a skein of Smooshy dream in colour and a skein of Cherry Tree Hill, both in blues my favourite colours! (photos to follow later - I'll take pics tomorrow along with my current WIP and other bits!)

Anyway so off to a little side street round the back of Powis Square to a Spa who's name I have forgotten (I will correct this later when I check the invite) whereupon I was met with wine and nibbles and yarn and good company. What more could a girl want?!

Alice, who has started Socktopus, did a great job on the launch. Prizes were given in the form of hand and arm massages (mmmmm I won one of those!) and goodie bags. I surprised myself with the willpower to say no to chocolatey goodness and left feeling quite pleased with myself that I'd finally ventured out and met some fellow knitters!

Tuesday 18th September.

A busy day in the working life, I've temporarily been made Facilities Manager for the company I work for. There are only 5 of us and we are moving office, but the new office needs TONS of work doing on it. I was tasked with finding and directing builders, electricians, data wiring people, networking people, phone people, air conditioning people, alarm people, fire people etc etc etc

Phew it has been crazy busy sorting all this stuff out and I've never done anything like this before. It is a HUGE learning process but the nice thing is I get to spend some time liaising closely with a very very very nice man ;) In amongst the stress of it all, trust me, its very nice to deal with someone that makes yer knees weaken!

I got home last night, had dinner and was watching TV when mum went off to potter about a bit. She had said she would be nipping up for a pee then back down to watch the 10:30 news. 10:15 I hear her call out as if in pain and then a thud. I raced upstairs to find that she had been in the loft, and had fallen down the loft stairs. Now let me explain. First, she is 80. Second a room upstairs is in the process of being decorated so the stairs to the loft conversion (which are wood and slippy and hard) have tons of stuff on them; boxes, bags etc.

She had been up in the loft, drying some clothes in the tumble drier, when she was carrying the basin with clothes in down stairs and it caught on a banister. She lost her balance, twisted and came down hard on her back.

When I got up there, she was lying on her back semi conscious with her legs up the stairs and a basin of clothes thrown all over her. To say I got a shock of my life is an understatement. What did I do first? Ask her wtf she thought she was doing going up to the loft and why she didn't ask me to do it. Second was "are you ok?" - she had complete memory loss and was wondering what she was doing on the floor.

It was as if she had suddenly developed Alzheimer's, she could not remember a thing before or after the fall and couldn't remember what she was doing tomorrow (today). When I reminded her that we were going to a memorial service for Dad this morning, she said "no, why would I be doing that?!" - sadly I got the feeling she thought I was mad and that Dad was fine and that she was fine and that I was some strange person telling her a bunch of BS.

I got scared. In fact I got very very scared. I wanted to call an ambulance, she refused "I'm not going out of here in an ambulance if you call one of those I'll be really mad at you." So I called my brother - he has done a first aid course for work. Over he came and thankfully he knew what to do. She was in shock and had temporary amnesia, he drove us to casualty and there we sat until 2am this morning.

She was examined and sent home, since then she has of course been stiff as hell, is going to have a HUGE shiner on her left side, and complains she is cold a lot. She is still in a bit of shock I think.

It totally scared the pants off me. I'm not ready for her to be hurt, I'm not ready for her to be invalid and I'm definitely nowhere near ready or prepared to lose her. This will sound crazy for someone of my age to say, but I'm going to say it anyway because I still feel like a 16 year old kid, I'm not ready to be an orphan.

So there it is, a long post, without pics (yet) and a catch up to whats up with me. I once again pledge to post here more often!

We finally move office next week, the builders are still working like mad, theres a TON of things to do (not least of which is my basic day job) and I have to figure out a way to catch Mr Nice's eye. It's the first time in a very long time that I've actually been interested in someone. Mr Nice doesn't seem like a good enough name for him, I'll have to think of something else. McDreamy has been used far too much since Grey's Anatomy so I need to think of something else, something appropriate....

~ M

Mna Mna

2007-09-06T11:46:00.000Z

I needed to raise a smile for myself after a few things have gone on these past few days to make me sad. I hope this brings a smile to you too =D

Nobody's Diary

2007-07-26T16:00:00.000Z

I am having a mad week of Yazoo. It started when a colleague played a 'mash up' of Nobody's Diary and it has not stopped since. I have scoured my CD collection for my Yazoo CD's but can I find them? Not a hope. I've been desperately reminded of the early 1980's when I went to see them live at The Dominion Theatre in Tottenham Court Road. I got a badge from the gig that was a flourescent green and had a cartoon of Alf and Vince on it. I loved that badge with all my heart.

Around that time I was hanging out in High Street Kensington Market as one was want to do back then, looking at all the 24 pleat "Bowie" trousers and frilly shirts that were 60's originals, not to mention the Chelsea Boots. Oh the Chelsea boots.... kitten heeled Chelsea boots I SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO wanted a pair of those but couldn't afford them. How I wish now I had them - I did eventually end up with a pair of suede flat Chelsea boots but they were never the same as the kitten heeled pair I coveted for so long.

Anyway, there I am hanging out in High Street Ken thinking I was the coolest thing since sliced bread, practicing my dancing steps for the edgy tunes that were synthpop, when some chap came up and asked me if I wanted a free haircut. It turned out he was working for Vidal Sassoon and they were looking for "models" for the students at the hairdressing school.

I jumped at the chance! Off I went to get my hair cut and I ended up with THE coolest ever hair cut I've had in my life. It was short and spikey all over (I love short hair, its so easy to manage ;) ) with this wicked fringe that came down in spikes like stalactites and had to be moulded into place daily with soap. Yep plain ole soap; wet yer hands lather up and then run your lathered hands down the spikes to make them stay in the correct place. The student hairdresser ran out of time unfortunately, or she was fully prepared to colour it too. I was so excited at that thought. I knew I'd be murdered on returning home but I SOOO wanted her to do it. It would have been electric blue and black. The spikes would have been electric blue and the tips of various spikes in my hair would also have been electric blue.

I looked the coolest I'd EVER looked in my life and I loved it so much. So there we were at school me with THE coolest look in the year and our school photos were taken. In my school picture (which I might just scan for the fun of it) I am shown with the haircut and wearing the Yazoo badge. It is one of my favourite pictures of me. The following day mum threw the sweater in the wash with the badge and all, then shoved it in the tumble drier only to melt my badge! Oh how mad I was and how I hated her for it in my teen angst. I had been stabbed in the heart by my own mother who had RUINED my badge! *laugh* When I look back at how angsty and angry I was it makes me laugh so hard. Thankfully Mum can also laugh with me.

Dad of course detested the hair cut. Mum however LOVED it but she kept that secret because she knew if she disagreed with dad their parenting skills would have been affected. They had agreed long ago when bringing up my 5 older brothers that they would never disagree with each other in front of us. It showed strength to us and would stop us from attempting to play them off against each other. If they did disagree they would do it in private.

Anyway finally today, having been going mad all week desperately seeking more Yazoo to listen to, I laid hands on Upstairs At Erics and You & Me Both. Wow what memories listening to these is bringing back.

Crying in my room over the break up for my first ever relationship to "Only You" and playing it over and over and over and over and over again (as I had also done with Heart Of Glass by Blondie my first ever piece of vinyl that was mine not my brothers or the family copy) and driving everyone completely and utterly bonkers with it. I remember my dad threatening to smash the record up if I didn't listen to something else. So then I got given a copy of "Don't Go" remixes on 12" for a birthday from my best friend - wow that one was worn down to nothing the number of times I played it and danced around my room (or rather crashed around my room). Dad was always going spare about my music choices *laugh*

He couldn't understand why I couldn't like a nice band like Abba instead of these freaks with spikey hair and just making *noise* Funny he sortof didn't seem to mind the punk and ska phase I went through before I hit on electronic music with the likes of The Normal, Naked Lunch (never to be heard of again lol), Fad Gadget, Tik and Tok and many many many others who would do all dayers at the Lyceum.

I used to sneak into gigs at The Venue in Victoria to see one of my favourites - Depeche Mode back in the day when Vince was in the band. I used to go to their residency gigs with regularity, plastering myself with make-up and stillettoes to make myself look old enough to get into the evening shows.

A brother once bought a ticket for one of the shows for me, and stupidly he told them I was 14 and they sold him a ticket to the Matinee show! The idiot! I had to make him go change the ticket and tell them it was for his "other" sister who was 19 *laugh*

Oh the memories, the memories =D

OK lets see if I can stick in the Video for "Don't Go!" here:

My new baby

2007-06-25T21:27:00.000Z

Here she is =D The lovely lovely Smart Brabus Four Two! I've done around 112 miles now, it arrived from Berkshire with 52 miles on the clock. I want to spend hours and hours in it - I love it! The Brabus is soooo much fun to drive, it goes like a rocket when it needs to and cruises around nicely with people thinking its a plain ole smart. Then BAM away she goes and they can't keep up!

SMART!

2007-06-22T11:44:00.000Z

I am SO excited.

I got to work this morning to find a chap waiting for me. He was here to deliver my new car, a Smart Four Two Brabus in river silver.

It is GORGEOUS!

Now the story behind how I got the car. About a month ago I got head hunted by a rival publishing company. They called me and asked me to go see them. Now, thats fine but I don't particularly want to leave where I am. Specifically not since we moved office because the problems we had before have just evaporated. The people who wanted to get me fired are suddenly no longer bothered and I fully believe it is because we now have lots of space between our desks and room to breathe.

Anyway - when invited to go meet people it would be rude not to look, so off I went. I honestly figured these guys are nuts, what do they want me for? They did the whole sales patter on me and yes, they do look interesting. Anyway they never came back to me after the meeting but I went and told the boss that they were interested. They did say that. I left him to draw his own conclusions and it wasn't really my fault that they offered me a car to keep me.... they knew I was looking to buy one.

Anyway, the deal ended up being they put 2/3 in and I put 1/3 of the cost in and got a brand new Smart Brabus river silver. As a surprise to the chairman who approved it (god bless his cotton socks) I put a personalised number plate on it. The plate spells out the name of our company =D It is just so super cool!

Pictures to follow but I wanted to blog this now because I am bursting with excitement! Today, naturally, I am super super super happy =D

My poor neglected blog!

2007-06-19T09:29:00.000Z

Oh My! My poor poor neglected blog. Before I knew where I was it was 6 months since I last posted.

Well news today is that I've been invited to Ravelry.com! YAY I signed up in May and the invite came late last night. I had been waiting with baited breath for it - I'd mailed Casey and been told there were 250 people ahead of me. Now all I have to do is find all the pics of my projects and organise my stash =D I love it already!

This morning I have an upset stomach so I am late for work, and writing this while I try to settle my belly and head in for another busy day.

Lots of news to tell about work and about other stuff over the last 6 months, but no time to tell it right now!

On the needles: Socks for my lovely boss and Tomato from No Sheep for You!

Happy 12th Night!

2007-01-06T00:38:00.000Z

Aha it is the 6th January - the well known 12th night.

Welcome to 2007. Welcome to 12th night when the decorations should all have come down by (or they have to stay up for the entire year). Oddly, Jools Holland's Hootenany is on the TV - its a repeat from New Years Eve and I didn't watch it then either ;)

Well briefly, Father Christmas brought me flu on Christmas Eve. Apart from that I spent Christmas day with Mum at Mum's place. It was much like any other day except I'd taken mum to midnight Mass on Christmas Eve and toasted the day in with a baileys.

I've pretty much been sick since then and have barely left the house. Today I began working on a sock design. I was inspired by a number of things; first the Sockitines Swap on Knitting Help and the realisation that I have to knit two pairs of socks very soon. A neighbour popped in to see mum in the week, and brought some old 1940's knitting patterns with her. She brought three, one for mens socks, one for family socks and one for a gillet. I was flicking through the family socks one and came across a pattern for a girls sock. It had a pattern that was perfect for the Sockitines Swap, however I had no idea how I would incorporate it into a modern sock which would be knit on two circulars in an adult size. Tonight, I fiddled about with some acrylic "testing" yarn and tried various ways in which to use part of the pattern.

I failed to do what I wanted to do but what I did achieve was a quite surprising result, and something I think I can possibly use. Thankfully I made notes of what I did on each row and I think I may have created something!

Anyway, this was supposed to be a fast post to say "hey all I'm not dead, I'm still around and my new years resolution is to post more and to catch up on some seriously lacking responses to emails from friends who are from afar"

So with that said, I'm off back to the warmth of my bed!

Excuse me!

2006-11-21T11:32:00.000Z

But where exactly DOES time go? I mean, it was a minute ago that I updated the blog and put all the info about the HBOS farce but suddenly its actually one month and three days since then!

What on earth happened? I blinked and here we are!

Well actually I blinked and got my eyes tested for the first time in about 3 years. I have new specs! I have also started using contact lenses. I'd post pics but for some odd reason I can't seem to load them up. I'll have to sort that out at the weekend.

So here we are, its cooled down a lot and the nights are drawing in. No heating at home, so I've been staying at my mothers for warmth and sociability. Poor mum has suffered from a bad dose of flu - she will not have the jab - quite rightly she feels that we should fight these things off with our own body defenses. Except that she is closing in on 79 years old and fits in the "vulnerable" group.

Some other family shennanigans have gone on in the last month, but I am not allowed to speak of these as yet. Lets just say there has been some more upheaval at Mums and some chaos too.

Knitting has been happening, although not in great quantites. The Road where I work has been shut for the last two weeks (and has another week to go) for resurfacing so I've been coming in on Public Transport. It is as bad as I remember it to be, overcrowded, slow and generally not up to the standard it should be. On the plus side, I get on at the start of the line and don't have to change trains at all, so in the mornings I get a seat. This affords me some much valued knitting time!

I have knitted the Irish Hiking Scarf for my boss for Christmas. I've made it with Plymouth Indecita Alpaca - it is so soft in the palms of my hand but put it anywhere near the tops of my hands, my face or my neck and I itch like I've been invaded by an ant farm. I'm pleased with how the scarf has turned out and I really hope he likes it.

I've made socks! I made mum her socks, then using Regia mini ringel I made myself some socks in lovely blues. I snapped up some more regia very cheaply from Ebay and I know why it was so cheap. It is the most garish of colours but you know what? The socks they made really do brighten up the wintery days!

I have started another pair of socks in a garish green but they while away the tube journey nicely!

I have made the head and body of an Alan Dart gnome from Simply Knitting December 2005 - I am ambitious enough to think that I'll get 3 of these gnomes done in time to give to my other three colleagues with a mini bottle of booze each. I think I may have overstretched myself. The pattern needs full concentration!

This coming Wednesday is the Nordoff Robbins annual pop quiz. This is a charity quiz for the music industry and I'm going to be helping with the scoring. Should be a fun night - it was the last time I did this.

Next Monday, I am going with the lovely people from my MMOG guild to see Spamalot at the Palace Theatre. I've not seen them in forever and it will be really fun to catch up with them and to see the show.

So that is all for now. Pictures to follow as soon as I can work out WTH is going on with this uploading to my machine from my camera!

Also coming soon, my review of Hiltop Spinning and the lovely Bill & Sue Chitty who taught me to spin back in August. It has been a long time coming but as you can see from the HBOS farce I've been somewhat preoccupied!

Hope you are all keeping well

- Mully

Halifax BOS break the data protection act and admit liability

2006-10-18T17:25:00.000Z

Yep you read that right. Halifax BOS (Bank Of Scotland) have broken the Data Protection act and admitted it in a letter to me. In this day and age, where Identity Theft is at the forefront of the news, a member of staff at my local branch of Halifax gave information about one of my accounts to a man. I'm a woman. Here below is the timeline of events. I'm publishing this here because I want people to see it.

Oh and in addition to the below check this out: Times Online interesting article apparently our data is being sold off from Indian call centres for as little as a fiver.

Anyway, here below is my sorry tale of how Halifax BOS got caught with their pants down around their ankles;

On Tuesday 8 August 2006 I went and had a jab for Tetanus, Diphtheria and Polio (for my new hobby as a hand spinner). I was laid up for a couple of days after and returned to work on the Friday 11th August for half a day. When I got there, I called Halifax insurance division in relation to a problem I was having with a buildings insurance policy that was a block policy. They had not noted another property by address on the block policy which was taken out in 1997 (the property is the flat above my own) - they told me that they were not insuring anything other than one property and they said "we did tell you all this on 8th August."

Cue my concern that I didn't speak to them on 8th August - so who did they speak to? I was still rather poorly and let it slide till Monday 14th when I was back to full health.

I called them on 14th and asked who they had spoken to on the 8th as it certainly wasn't me. Apparently "someone" had gone into my local branch and had spoken to a member of staff there, who had called the Insurance division on two separate occasions over some time from 11:55am. The staff member, who's name I won't reveal initially though I am sorely tempted to do so, was a woman who had worked for Halifax for some time and was a very experienced staffer - so much so that she was the front of house contact person.

As it turns out, the person who walked in was a man. I am a woman with a rather feminine name, and frankly never in my life have I ever met a man with my name. I don't honestly ever think I will either.

Apparently, this man had some kind of letter from a solicitor - the letter has never been produced by Halifax BOS, therefore it either doesn't exist or they didn't bother to take a copy of it to help back them up when they were caught.

So it transpires that the man who did this was the man who lives upstairs from me. He admitted this to me on 1 September, where he laughed in my face and said he hadn't broken the law but the bank were at fault as they shouldn't have given him the information, he didn't care though as he had what he wanted. The information they gave him was that the building he lives in is not insured (and they gave him details of the premiums paid on the insurance), this was incorrect information and Halifax insurance have since assured me that the building IS insured and has been insured since 1997. They changed underwriters at one point and therefore they no longer offer block policies but that they would honour the policy but not renew it in October (as it happens they sent me a renewal letter just this week!).

The man owed me insurance payments for the last four years and in light of the information they gave him, he refused to pay what he owed.

I tried to call Halifax on 14th August; some 40 telephone calls later (in which I was asked my security details twice only) where you call a number that takes you through to a call centre who then connect you to the branch (they won't give you the branch telephone number) yielded nothing but a ringing phone repeatedly.

Eventually I extracted a fax number and branch manager’s name. I sent 5 faxes asking them to call me urgently as there was a possible fraud / ID theft going on on one of my accounts (at this stage I didn't know who had got the info just that someone had). I received silence in response. The call centre assured me they had sent emails to the Manager and to the staff member who had given out my information asking them to call me.

I had no choice then but to take 15th August off work. I'd wasted an entire working day on phone calls and faxes and now I was forced to take a day off to go and deal with this.

I went into my branch and the first person I met was the staff member in question. I asked her if she recognised me, and when she said no I presented her with my passport and asked her if she recognised my name now. Her face paled a little and then I hit with the burning question "could you explain to me why you have given out information on one of my accounts last Tuesday morning to someone who was not me?"

She went to get the manager. She then came out and offered me a cup of tea or coffee in the nicest possible way but her face gave away that she was rather scared and upset. She knew she had done wrong.

The manager finally came out and I requested that we establish a) was it a man or a woman who had come in b) I wished to view CCTV footage and c) I wished the police to be involved.

I was sweet talked nicely and told I had to give them 5 days and that CCTV footage is not held on the premises and that I shouldn't involve the police just yet.

I left rather incensed and still with no explanation. So I took a trip to the police who told me that I should give them the five days they requested and then review how I felt.

Five days came and passed. I called the manager (she gave me a number for the branch finally) and asked what was happening. She said she'd passed it to head office "haven't they contacted you?"

She then composed a letter admitting liability and offered me £50 as a gesture of goodwill and hand delivered the letter on her way home that night.

I wrote back thanking her for the gesture and pointing out the very real and actual cost to me in terms of finances (two days salary) and in addition the worry that my personal data was now floating around with some random stranger who walked in off the street.

I was told it was to be passed to head office.

8 weeks later on 10 October 2006, I finally get a scrawled letter saying "sorry you aren't happy we can offer you £150 as full and final settlement" and here’s how to contact the ombudsman. I've not replied to that, but I chatted to the nice chap in customer services who was dealing with the insurance side of things.

He asked me how everything else was; I told him what they had said in the banking division. Interestingly he was rather shocked himself and said he thought it was appalling and that it seemed a bit stupid to just offer £150 which doesn’t cover my costs, and suggest I go to the ombudsman when it will cost Halifax £380 if I go to the ombudsman irrespective of whether they are found at fault or not!

Anyway so here I am, with an offer of £150 in full and final settlement - I don't want to accept it as "full and final settlement" - I'd hoped they would go after the guy as it is the guy who lives upstairs from me and he has openly admitted he did it. His solicitor tried to fob it off as "oh his mortgage is with Halifax thats why he did it" when the reality is, he bought his place for cash outright - he doesn't have a mortgage.

So I guess I'm taking a nice trip to the Ombudsman and wondering how I go about contacting the Information Commissioners Office.

Ultimately for me it isn't about the money side of things, it is entirely the principle of the thing; that a random person of the opposite sex can walk in off the street and just get detailled information about policy or account documents without challenge from the staff at Halifax.

So since they were nice and understanding and helpful about this, I'm going to stick a SAR (Subject Access Request under the Data Protection Act) in next week when I've finished putting together my Nat West claim ;) They will have 40 days to comply and at this point in time I don't feel inclined to offer them the additonal 7 days after the 40 that I offered to Nat West.

Tonight I'll be putting together the final bits I need to move my account from Halifax. I'll be starting with my current (checking) account and moving on to savings, credit card and last but by no means least, my Mortgage. After that, when its all done and dusted, expect to see a very very nasty post here naming the individuals involved.

EDIT 19 October 2006:

This morning I returned a call to a customer services executive who had telephoned me in response to the Insurance divisions customer relations manager calling them. I've just had a chat with the representative who told me she had taken it to the DP dept in Halifax (thats the Data Protection Department). Apparently, the DP department don't believe there has been a breach in the Data Protection Act. This is a complete farce, how can it be that a man can walk in off the street, get information about a policy that is in MY name only, a female name, from a member of staff in the bank and it not be a breach in the data protection act? They gave out personal data belonging to me and about me to a random person that walked in off the street. I find it incredible that the Halifax Data Protection department really do believe that - I can't in all honesty believe they actually have any understanding of the situation whatsoever.

Edit 2:

Interestingly, another fraud was committed at my branch of Halifax two months before this happened to me;

"Lorraine Burt, 41, appeared at Wimbledon Magistrates'Court on Tuesday last week on charges of attempting to defraud the Wimbledon branch of the Halifax Building Society by pretending to be a woman named Ruby Donoghue. She was charged with attempting to obtain property by deception, using a false instrument and possession of a false identity document on June 16." Source: Fraud Centre Website

So they managed to notice the documentation she produced was false but they couldn't manage to notice that a MAN walking in and gaining access to personal information about a woman is OK?

The Last Knit

2006-09-27T17:36:00.000Z

I have much to add to update here, but alas I have a lack of time right now. In the meantime I thought you might like this ;)

A Decision...

2006-09-01T16:17:00.000Z

I'm trying as best I can to stay chipper and happy and calm, but it is proving impossible. I spoke again with my neighbour, the errant tenant, this morning. I spoke to his solicitor yesterday and asked if he had spoken to him - he told me he had not. This morning, my neighbour says he spoke to his solicitor on Tuesday!!! ONE of them is not quite telling the truth.

Anyway in the discussion with my neighbour this morning, he is either extremely clever and deciding to pull the "I'm not the full shilling" route of getting out of the situation or he really is several shrimp short of a BBQ. Frankly I think the guy really IS a bit of a sneaky fucker. He tried to claim this morning, that his solicitors were withholding things from him. I asked him what things? He replied that he didn't know but he was sure they were hiding things from him. He does sound somewhat like a paranoid idiot - first he doesn't believe the paperwork I sent so he goes to my bank and extracts info from them. Then he doesn't believe the paperwork sent from my insurer and thinks that I have faked the paperwork. Now he says his solicitor is "hiding" things from him?

I stared blankly at him. He also said he didn't understand any of the letters from my insurer which explained fully that he was insured. So, I pulled one out of the file and asked him if he could read it. He said he could. I asked him if he understood the english language and he said he did. I then asked him what exactly it was in the letter he didn't understand - it was very clearly and plainly saying "both places are insured on a block policy." He said he understood it so I asked him what exactly was it that made him think he wasn't insured. Again he said he'd been told that when he went into my bank and asked them.

Again he said he was leaving it up to his solicitor to pay it. So I left for work angry and frustrated again.

When I got into work, I tried to contact his solicitor - he refused to take my calls. I told them he had till 2pm to deal with the issue or I would take it further. Of course he just sat on his fat pathetic arse and didn't do anything.

So I called the purchasors solicitor, advised him that under no circumstances would I be prepared to enter into any discussions either now or in the forseeable future for re-negotiation of the lease and nor could I allow the sale to take place without the payment of the outstanding insurance monies owed to me.

He agreed and asked for it in writing. I faxed it over, put it in the post and copied my neighbour and faxed a copy to my neighbour's solicitor. Needless to say his solicitor ignored it.

My next move now is to issue a Unilateral Notice at the Land Registry. That way if he does find another buyer, as soon as they do a land registry search they will see a dispute is still outstanding.

In addition to all of this, while this has been going on, a tree has been planted in the back garden outside one of my windows. It has grown extremely fast and is now blocking light into my property. ARGHHHHHHHHHHHHH I'm going to have to ask him to remove the tree. I know I said earlier that it was all rather kafkaesque but frankly now it is beyond that.

Oh yeah - do I now complain to the Law Society about his solicitors refusal to notify the purchasors solicitor (as is required in law) that there was an outstanding dispute? He was legally obliged to do that and he didn't bother.

I've also written to the bank pretty much indicating that they should cover my costs for litigation in this matter due to their incompetence. Thankfully the manager suggested I fax it through and that she would pass it on to head office - who STILL have not responded to my earlier complaint.

I feel sorry for her, I really do. She is going to be even more pissed off when after this is all settled I go after them for excessive charges on my current account when I went overdrawn ;)

I am exhausted. Totally and utterly exhausted. My solicitor returns from holiday next Tuesday and she isn't going to like the huge freaking mess she comes back to. She is going to have to dig through the entire thing and then she will tell me again, she does not and will not litigate. I will have to search for a litigator.

I've been close to tears all day, I've tried to stay calm I really have, I've tried hard to not let it get to me, but it is - it is creeping under my skin and stabbing at me.

I keep thinking of the good things, like yesterday the car passed its MOT test, and I breathed a HUGE sigh of relief to have one thing out of the way - a monkey off my back. I paid for the road tax for 6 months so in February I'll pay for 12 months and I won't have to go through the hell of trying to get the car serviced and passed its MOT in time. However, new MOT rules mean its all centralised and I will have to get the MOT done before the current one expires. At least I won't be going crazy about the road tax at the same time!

I keep re-reading Yarn Harlot - its funny. I quite honestly want everyone around me right now to just GTFO of my way and let me just bloody be - I want to be able to sit, veg out in front of a soppy Bogart & Bacall movie and just knit my heart out, without ANY interuptions at all.

Aftermath

2006-08-30T11:42:00.000Z

It is two days since the Notting Hill Carnival. I work in the area - well ish.. on the borders. Every year I see the aftermath of it. Walking along the road where I work to get a sandwich at lunchtime saw the pavements stained every couple of steps with puke and beer. Broken glass littered the street where people had dropped beer bottles and I picked my way along. The smell of stale piss in every shop doorway and nook and cranny made for a horrible walk.

Outside our office, there is a little brick wall enclosure, which is filled with earth and plants grow in it. Usually you get a Monday morning drunk aftermath there of empty beer cans (red stripe is popular - its cheap and strong for the homeless drunks) and occasionally you'll get a fast food package stuffed in there where a non homeless drunk has staggered home eating a kebab.

Yesterday, it was filled with broken bottles, beer cans, puke and even human poo. The stink of pee was overwhelming. Later in the day it rained a little and from our office on the top floor where the window is open to let in some air, the rising smell of stale now wet again pee, stale beer, puke and poo was too much.

Today the smell isn't quite as strong but its still there. I didn't go to Carnival, I was busy this weekend altering my spinning wheel to have a double treadle kit on it, taking mum out and about and generally reading up on points of law to see how the hell I'm going to continue to deal with the quagmire that is my upstairs neighbour.

There is much to tell, including his admittance to me that he went into my bank, obtained information about my insurance account by deception and used that information to withhold close on £600 from me.

It is increasingly looking like I am going to have to claim the money through the small claims courts. I've told his purchasers solicitor that we can't progress till this dispute is settled and that we'll be going at the pace of the courts. Lets see.. this could take a couple of years to sort out. He was not best pleased to say the least!

In addition to this, do I go back to the police with the evidence I have? Do I go and tell them what he did? I've requested CC TV footage of the guy going in and the bank member of staff has admitted she shouldn't have given the details - the bank even offered me a very small sweetner to keep my mouth shut. I told them how insulting this was, it didn't even cover my actual costs. They are looking into it *laugh*

Hmm I realise now I'm rambling a little - I need to consolidate this and put it all into a readable tome for you, my dear dear readers, to read and understand properly.

Oh and another thing for the British readers - you and everyone you know should go read The Consumer Action Group web site - did you know you can reclaim unreasonable bank charges for the last 6 years plus 8% interest? There was a recent court ruling that ruled the charges as unlawful :)

On 18th August I sent of my S.A.R (Subject action request) to my old bank - 5 years ago they charged me charges on charges on charges when I was made redundant from my job and came very close to bankrupting me. This site has all the information you need and step by step instructions, template letters and a fantastic support system of people who have been through the mill too.

I'll be linking to the CAG in future posts too - I highly recommend them. They don't just help with bank charges, there are credit card charges, consumer issues with holiday companies, shops and insurance companies and also a section for Landlords and Tenants. I love them. I found them by accident in looking for "action against xx bank" when trying to deal with the issue of my tenant extracting info from my bank by deception.

Anyway I MUST now get on and try to do some work. I've barely done any since all this kicked off. Oh I've also lost 1/2 a stone in worry alone. I've been comfort eating through all of this (I wish now I hadn't) and I STILL lost 1/2 a stone. Imagine if I could have not comfort ate - I'd probably have lost a couple of stone by now!!

Where are you!?

2006-08-18T11:12:00.000Z

Why, here I am!

OK where have I been and where is my post with pics on my spinning lesson?

The pics are still in the camera alas awaiting me to write up my story of the day in Folkestone with the fabulous Sue & Bill Chitty.

This is a brief run down of where I've been / what has happened. My life feels incredibly Kafkaesque right now...

I go to spinning class - love it

I go to work on the Monday, book a tetanus jab for the Tuesday morning as advised by Sue.

I get the jab, it is a combined Tetanus, Diptheria and Polio jab - I assume this is all that is available these days, since the advent of the MMR - I assume triple jabs are the thing nowadays.

I get sick. I get VERY sick. I get so sick in fact that I am floored with a temperature of 102 (and that was taken when the temperature was at a low point) and a headache like nothing I have ever felt in my entire life. It felt like the entire staff of Conway Construction (who happen to be updating some roads in London at the moment) are inside my head tapdancing and juggling with pneumatic drills. My entire body is a weak mess, unable to stand my muscles will not hold me up, in fact my muscles are screaming with agony every time I roll over onto my side or move my legs. I am housebound.

Meanwhile, cue someone (a man) going into my bank and procuring information they had no right to procure from a member of staff. Serious error of judgement on her part - long story on this but I discovered this entirely by accident.

Involved in this is the fact I'm a Landlord, I own the freehold to my building. Guy upstairs is selling, I paid buildings insurance - he refuses to pay. It is now disputed. People buying upstairs want to make substancial changes to the property, they need my permission. I'm not sure I'm happy about the changes, the guy who currently lives there threatens to take me to court for obstructing his sale!

Cue him saying the building isn't insured, my insurer (also my bank) appear to have told him he isn't insured. Funny that, wonder how he got that information - Oh wait lets go back to someone (a man) going into my local branch of my bank and procuring information on an account he had no rights to. The account is in my name, I have a particularly girly name (not my nickname that everyone knows me as since I was at school but my proper given name). How many men do you know with a proper very girly name? Uhh huh - none.

I of course can not accuse him of this, since he has not admitted this is how he procured information about the insurance policy that he should not have. The only time I will be able to accuse him of this is when I see the CC TV footage from the bank. Understandably, they are kakking their pants because they have breached the data protection act and are unlikely to ever let me see the footage since it implicates a member of their staff of gross misconduct and breaking the law.

I spent an afternoon sitting in the local police station waiting to report this as a crime. It is ongoing.

Cue the insurance arm of the bank, finally dealing with the issue, and admitting full liability and telling me the entire building was insured from 1997. In 2002 when the guy upstairs moved in, I called and told them of the change of tenant and that I wanted to add his property to the insurance (I am not actually legally obliged to insure the entire building - long complicated lease but it states the tenant must insure and produce insurance documentation for me - I insured out of courtesy assuming that he would pay me half the premiums). The premiums jumped up to almost double. Funny that. If it was already insured from 1997 why did the premium leap in 2002? They have seriously cocked up. They have told me they will no longer insure the building when the policy runs out - hardly surprising since their underwriters will not underwrite the policy if anything happens they will have to cover the costs themselves.

So cue me heading home relieved that ONE of the legal nightmares ongoing is resolved. I find a letter on my doormat, its from someone I don't know. They are telling me the neighbour next door wants to put in a loft conversion and that they feel I should be informed because it will affect me. Damn straight it affects me - I own the building they want a loft conversion but the wall between their place and my building will require having beams attached to it. I've not even seen the planning consents for this. I have to stop them from doing this since theres a HUGE dispute currently as to whether I own the loft space or just the walls. If I own the loft space, I get to sell it to the buyer of the upstairs flat. If I don't own it then I have the right to a consideration fee since the new owner wants to put a loft conversion in too.

I hope some of this legal stuff is making sense - to me its a huge quagmire. I'm about to incurr legal costs and I need someone to stand up and pay those costs. My solicitor is saying she will do the work but is away till the beginning of September. She will ensure that someone else pays the bill - I spent an hour on the phone to her and My God, shes the absolute dogs hoo has - she came out with so much stuff and is all riled up ready to fight my corner. Brilliant just the sort of woman I want to represent me!

Anyway that is where I've been. That is where I'm going to be for a little while longer while I try to resolve this, get my work done at work and go back to see the doc - I've just not picked up properly after having that jab and being sick with that jab.

Ah well, life goes on!

A LYS, A LYS My kingdom for a LYS!

2006-07-31T15:31:00.001Z

I want to start a LYS. I found one near me that stocks SOME stuff but not really a decent selection or even enough yarn to make a sweater. I had to have the owner scrabble around for about 30 minutes before she found some yarn to make Bombshell. Everything else she had 2 - 3 balls of and in not very interesting colours either.

She DOES have something I can't mention here because it is what I have sent my lovely swap pal (Debbie from KH.com) and don't want to give it away. She is the only UK stockist of it apparently.

What would I stock?

Plymouth Yarns - plain and simple I would stock the Bamboo and Encore for afghans. Lion Brand no doubt would be stocked and they have recently started selling in the UK too. South West Trading Bamboo, Corn and all the other ecologically friendly yarns - why? No not because I am an eco warrior or a vegetarian but because these yarns give a FABULOUS alternative to acrylic to those of us who have issues with natural yarns. I am currently using the Plymouth Bamboo I got on ebay for a snip - My God, this stuff is like heaven to knit with. It is stupidly slippy so it will not go well on the new Knitpicks Options needles, but it works like a dream on Denise needles which have that slight grab.

I would sell a selection of needles, including denise and the Plymouth little sister set. Man that thing is so suhweet! I snapped one up off ebay for a very VERY very good price, brand new unused and it arrived this morning. It is fabulous!

I am going to learn to spin next weekend, I HOPE that I can manage it fine and that with practice I could even produce enough decent spun hand spun yarn to sell. I would hand dye it too and I would sell that in my little shop.

I would have an area where people could sit, chat and knit. I would have a small library of books available, and for a deposit (to avoid damage) and small fee (and leaving CC details) people could borrow knitting books from me. If they didn't turn up with the books when they should, they would have a short period of grace (say one week) and then their CC would be charged the full cost of the book.

In my fantasy LYS I would also have a small coffee / tea / cold drinks / sandwich bar. I would hire teachers to come in and do knitting / crochet / sewing classes.

I would have all the yarns out on the needles for people to try out, and I would either list alternatives to each yarn and/or I would have a computer available that had access to Yarndex so people can compare yarns. Perhaps just two skeins of each yarn - one on the needles so you can see how it feels to knit with, and another one to just plain feel up. Then you bring your choice to the counter, with the requested number of balls required and I'd bag it up and sell it to you. That means the yarn you actually buy is fresh and free from being felt up by everyone who comes into the shop. New, untouched, un sticky fingered, fresh yarn.

I would have an ordering service. I would do mail order and have a web site too for the store. Oh yeah, I'd also open on Saturday AND Sunday - the two days of the week most 'normal' people don't work. What IS the trend with LYS's to open on Tuesday to Saturday from 10am or later to 5pm or earlier? How do you expect to have customers when you aren't open at convenient "off" hours - ie when most people are actually NOT working!

Anyone wanna fund me to do this? =P

Shiny, shiny, shiny boots of leather

2006-07-26T16:56:00.000Z

I can't stop singing that - it is venus in furs by The Velvet Underground and it is currently being used in some ad for some trashy tv show to appear on BBC soon, autumn schedule or something. The ad is so memorable I have no idea what the program is. I do remember that being used in a tyre or car ad some years ago and LOVING the track.

Aha! I remember the show is to be called something like "Shiny Shiny bright new hole in my heart" or something - no idea what its about nor do I care but the track is washing round my head over and over. Must admit I never read the lyrics till just now, didn't realise what it was all about in my youth when I dashed out and bought it *giggle*

Anyway what news!?

Funeral Blues:

Phew where to start? OK so the second funeral went OK - we set out early in the morning of the funeral and I drove Mum down to Bognor on the south coast. We arrived with about 20 minutes to spare and I shoved the black dress on as best I could with as much modesty as I could in the car, while parked in the car park that was next to an office block. By that stage I just wanted it to be all over.

We found the church and waited there. The service was better than that for my Godfather but hey I don't think you could have gotten worse! After, we followed the funeral cortege to the crematorium. A short service was held there and one of Jim's nieces read a piece she had written. Then it was all over, just like that. Very different to a burial.

We went back to the house after, met a few people I'd never met and then we headed home. When we got back to Mum's we both had a lie down for a couple of hours. Then we went to dinner to try out this new Tapas bar that had opened in the area. I have to say it was very good - we were rather cold though (yes cold!) as we sat outside and the weather was not the hottest then. Since then of course we have had no let up and the weather has been boiling hot!

knitting news:

On 5th August I am heading to Folkestone in Kent to learn how to spin in a one on one tuition with Sue Chitty from Hilltop Spinning I am so excited I can't tell you. I really can't wait to try this out - the fantasy of spinning my own yarn and being able to then produce a finished object with it is possibly going to become a reality (at least some time in the next year maybe!!). I am told one should practice for 15 mins a day until one gets it as one wants it. I was looking at an Ashford Joy wheel - it is very small and portable, it fits into a special small sized backpack which you can take anywhere. As space is a premium here in London that seems my best bet - though I am told that the Ahsford Traditional is really one of the best to learn on. I guess once I've spent time with Sue I'll be able to make a decision as to what would suit me best and go from there.

I really am SO looking forward to it and writing about how it went after!

Swap Pal news:

So the wonderful swap pal who sent me two amazingly soft and fluffy clouds of Debbie Bliss alpaca silk has sent my second package. In it were three balls of the most gorgeous coloured yarns I've seen - I foresee these being put to use in a gorgeous wide scarf that will show off the colours brilliantly. Not only that, I was sent two stitch markers in my birthstone which is Amythyst and last but by no means least a copy of Yarn Harlot by Stephanie Pearl McPhee! I had seen the book at Amazon and had considered getting it several times but it remained on my wish list - I'm so glad to have a copy of it now!

Anyway so THANK YOU CRISTY from Knittinghelp.com swapathon for the gorgeous gifts *hugs*

So during the family crisis I have actually managed to knit a little. I finished soleil but it is a HUGE disaster cake. I have totally messed up the short rows - not to mention the extremely messy wrap and turning - I should have watched Amy's video first /sigh. It will have to be frogged but I have put it to one side in dispair for now.

My brother lives in Sydney, Australia and it is rather cold there at the moment what with it being winter and all. He used to have red hair - alas like the rest of us with age it has lightened somewhat and got rather more smudges of grey in than any of us would like! Anyway I have knitted him half dome from the new Knitty. I was not overly happy with the pattern - my guage was spot on but I needed more than one ball of the red and the decreases seemed to not match up with the number of stitches. Could just have been me not concentrating but I was SURE I had concentrated and counted correctly. I'll make another at some point and alter it slightly - will make the grey border 2" tall instead of 1.5" and I will begin decreasing at 4" instead of at 5 - I made the large adult size.

Anyway in all its glory once it was shoved on my head it looked ok - my seaming is horrible but hey you can't see that if you put it at the back =P

No time to knit!

2006-07-10T11:59:00.000Z

Arghhh, I am living in non knitting hell! I've got yarn, I've got needles (I've even just ordered the knitpicks options set - which I have to have delivered to someone in the USA who will then ship it on to me). However, I have no time!

I have on the needles Soleil from Knitty. I sortof hoped I might finish it before the end of the world cup - no hope not with my family stuff taking up the time. I did, however, manage to complete the short rows over the boobage area this past weekend in between everything else. However, I find it annoying to knit a few stitches here, another few there. I'd rather do complete rows at a time.

Friday 7th July was the funeral for my Godfather. I stayed over at my mothers the night before (its just easier to do that when having to get her out of the house in the morning), and picked my brother up along the way before heading out. We arrived at the church with about 5 minutes to spare. The funeral cars and the funeral director were standing outside. I passed him some cards of sympathy for his wife and her family and in we went.

Well, OK one should probably never criticise a funeral or anything like that but frankly I've no idea where they dug that priest up from. He was dreadful. He had clearly not done his research, Kevin had helped to build the church and had been a founding member. None of that seemed to be mentioned, it was just glossed over. Not only that this priest was painfully slow at speaking - I guess he thought he was putting on a soothing voice but it was incredible! He would say 3 words of a sentence, then pause in a heavily pregnant manner, then say another 3 words of the sentence and pause again in the same heavily pregnant manner.

Quite honestly, I wondered if we would ever actually reach the end of the service. He was also extremely difficult to hear. The organ player was.. well.. erm... unable to hit the right notes? I think this probably best describes it. The melody part was note perfect, but the main composition of everything he played was like a child bashing randomly on a keyboard.

Anyway, Kevin lay in his coffin and I managed to stay just fine, no tears, no pangs, no heartstrings tugged at even when I remembered him being at Dad's funeral, coming out of the church straight to me, with tears in his eyes he embraced me in the biggest hug he could muster. It was only after the funeral mass, when I went outside and saw his wife, giving her a hug I welled up and was unable to even utter the usual "I'm so sorry" and "If there is anything we can do" - I couldn't speak.

He was always there, always. He was my dad's best friend, he rewired the house with my dad using a 2 shilling booklet they had borrowed from a library - I believe the wiring still holds to this day! He organised for us to get a bath - we moved into the home I was to know for the rest of my life, and my parents wanted to get a new bath. Well the church where he was to have his funeral mass, was being built and they were also building a new presbetary. The old presbetary had a cast iron bath in it - it was to be thrown out. He suggested that my parents buy that bath - they did and Kevin organised a man with a van to deliver it. That bath stood in our hall way for several years after. Our school bags and shoes and PE kits would all be thrown into the bath when we arrived home.

It was 2 or 3 years later before Kevin helped my father install the bath. We missed it being in the hall as a catch all for our baggage as we came in from school.

Kevin had been married, and had 4 children. Three boys, one girl. His wife had suffered from some mental health issues and had passed away in the '70's. One of his sons, Johnny, was a downs syndrome child who spent much time in a facility in Sussex where they cared for him. Kevin would take him home for weekends at a time, and often they would come to visit us.

Of the two elder boys, one was diagnosed as Schizophrenic. He later committed suicide. This was followed not too long after by the other son doing the same. He would have given anything to have had his sons back. It was an extremely sad time for him.

He had been to Dunkirk during world war II - he rarely, if ever, spoke of this. It had affected him quite strongly.

His daughter, Catherine has a son of her own. Kevin re-married in the late '70's to the widow of another friend, Julia. They had become close over the years, Kevin had helped to care for his friend Tim and took him to church regularly.

What I found one of the saddest things was that Catherine was pushed out, and made to feel unwelcome by his new family. Catherine very much speaks her mind, a bit like me I guess, which doesn't go down well (as I well know!). At his funeral, she was pushed out and not even told of the wake being at a local pub. This was the first time I'd met her - or at least remembered meeting her and she seemed OK to me - a little outspoken but she seemed alright.

In his later life, in the last couple of years, Julia couldn't cope with his failing health and age so Kevin was shipped off to a home. My opinion of this is that it was unnecessary. Dementia was the reason given. However, when going to visit him my mother showed up carrying an old stick he had brought for her from Ireland many many years ago. It was a piece of blackthorn, not dissimilar to a shillelagh. She walked up to him and he was sitting down. Looking at the stick, before he even saw it was her, he said "I brought that stick back from Ireland for you!"

He recognised her immediately and they talked for quite some time. My brother, who went with her, said that it was a horrible place a place of no stimulation - a place to rot away. He apparently had taken a fall at Easter and had been in hospital for some time. Mum had been calling his wife to arrange a time to visit - she had not returned the calls. Finally, two weeks ago, on Wednesday evening (28th June) she called to tell my mother that Kevin had passed away.

We never got to see him alive. It was a sad day, we went on to the burial and stood over the brief ceremony before heading off. We did not go to the wake in the local pub, Mum decided it would not be something she could face going to so we went to Morden and had fish and chips for lunch instead.

We went back to our family home, had a cup of tea and talked much of Kevin and our memories of him. I shall miss him dearly but I do have a great deal of very fond memories of him. As my mother said - last Friday was the end of an era.

They come in three's don't they?

2006-07-02T13:55:00.001Z

First, Wednesday evening the call comes through. An old lifelong family friend, a second father to us kids, passed away. We'd not even known he was ill - his wife (second wife) had refused to return calls my mother had put in to her for several weeks since Easter.

Second, Saturday morning, the call comes through. My cousin's husband (always known to me as aunt and uncle because they are close to my mothers age) passed away. He had suffered from Lung cancer. I'd seen him at Easter, and said to my mother "I don't think he will last out this year" - he looked very grey, it reminded me of how my father had looked in his last month or so. It's funny, once you've seen that look in a cancer patient you never forget it. You know the time is near when they look like that. Hard to explain how it looks, its just.. something that stands out.

I've at least 6 emails and 3 private messages on message boards to respond to, and I've got to spend time helping my mother undo the sterile eye drops they have put in packages impossible for people with even slight arthritis to open. Even I find them hard to open, but they are a necessity after her cataract op in May. I don't know where the time is going, it seems to be running away like a tap left turned on.

Time to go get some groceries for my mother and spend the afternoon / evening with her. Gah WHEN am I going to have some time for me!

New Shoes!

2006-06-26T16:31:00.001Z

So another obsession I have is shoes. My mother claims I am as bad (if not worse) than Imelda Marcos with my desire and liking for shoes. In another life, I'd be a shoe designer / maker. Maybe one day I'll get to go to Cordwainers and train in shoe making and design.

For now however, I feed my obsession once in a while with a pair of fabulous shoes. This month in Simply Knitting magazine a pair of shoes was shown in a photo. For a knitting magazine I found this quite surprising however, I fell in love with the shoes. They have everything a girl could want, reminders of childhood ballet classes, pretty glittery bits and flats so I can get around in them without falling over and breaking my neck!

Yesterday, I went to the store to get them alas they had none! When I got home, I logged on to their web site and ordered the dreamy girly shoes. 9am this morning, a ring on the doorbell and the shoes were delivered by courier. I was astounded! I wanted to wear them but of course, it being the first day of Wimbledon Tennis, London is drenched in drizzly rain!

C'mon give us back the warm dry sunshiney weather so I can wear my new shoes!

Edit: Gah the link isn't working ok so heres the pic!

And yet another edit to say these came from Next. I tried to get them in the Wimbledon branch at the weekend without luck so got them from the Next Directory Online

Gooooooaaaaaallllllllllllll!!!!!!

2006-06-25T11:53:00.000Z

YAY I finished Bombshell! This was such a challenge and a great project to do - my first knitted garment and it fits like a glove. I'm so pleased with how this turned out, I have learned SO much from making this.

I have learned about shaping and fitting knitting to match the sizing, I've learned a valuable lesson about choosing yarn (I love the feel of the cotton angora but frankly I don't think I will ever knit with that again) and choosing colour (I don't like that green on me *laugh* after all that work!). This really was a fabulous project to do and I'm so grateful for Yarn Monkey's Knitting World Cup because without that as inspiration (and a kick up the bum) I don't think I'd have attempted this project yet. I would still be doing scarves and plugging away trying to work on socks.

Doing this has also given me the confidence to try a couple of other things that I might have put off for a while longer. I also have in the back of my mind something I want to create from scratch. I have a strong inspiration from something that is made from material and is from the 1940's - I'll not say too much just yet, I've yet to work out how to make the thing in knitting =D

Anyway, without further ado here are the pics of the completed World Cup Knitting Project - Bombshell from Big Girl Knits (excuse the state of my hair it was shoved up to weave in the ends and the pic was taken in a rush I forgot to let it down!):

A day of bleh!

2006-06-23T14:28:00.000Z

I am in such a funk today. I don't know why.

Yesterday was pay day and I ordered and paid for a pair of Addi Premium needles from ebay. They weren't hugely cheap but it was a good deal and they arrived this morning. My hands are hurting like crazy.

I completed the sleeves on Bombshell earlier in the week, but the only size 3 I had was from the Boye set. Now I've used the Boye to do straight knitting and I quite liked it but I have to say, using it to do the sleeves was a nightmare.

The cable was and still is too stiff so it was stretching the underarm area (using a smaller cable wouldn't have worked either), which I'm now going to have to try to repair. Add into this the strain the boye put in my hands was incredible. I really didn't think I would end up suffering like this but I really feel like someone has been pounding my hands with a sledgehammer.

The knuckles on my forefingers ache so badly that it has completely taken my mind off my gammy knee! A blessing in disguise maybe?

Anyway, so yesterday I was also in a bit of a funk but stupidly busy at work. I decided to cheer myself up this weekend, I am going to get my hair cut. I have a deep seated fear of hairdressers from years ago when one completey ruined my hair - but since before that incident (and after) I've always got a very decent cut at Vidal Sassoon. It costs a fortune to go there but hey, the cuts every time have been perfect. With luck tomorrow will be the same and I'll come out with a fabulous cut. If all goes well you'll see it when I model Bombshell after doing the neck!!

Today also is a day when I've managed to get a copy of a sampler CD of new songs about to come out. I have a rather eclectic taste in music, but never really been a fan of rap. However, that kinda changed in recent years and certain things make me sit up and listen. One of those making me sit up and listen is The Streets, another Audio Bullyz. Now, on this sampler CD is a track called "Sheila" by Jamie T, I can't stop listening to it. It just seems to sum up London life these days. I like how they have used street talk interspersed with the old BBC style voice especially where it says "Good heavens you boys, blue blooded murder of the English tongue" Check him out here and watch the video for Sheila and bear in mind the other stuff there is demo quality (poor!) but you can get the idea: Jamie T on Myspace Another good review and links to demos can be fond here. Someone said it well though - can only listen in small doses or your head would esplode! ;)

Tonight is a major leaving party for lots of people from work. Part of the company is making 15 redundancies so instead of having 15 leaving do's they decided to do one big one. I was intending to go but I'm just in such a funk I don't feel like going at all. Wondering how I can get out of this one, since everyone will be heading there at around 5:45 - might be able to pull off an "I've got loads to do will pop in later" and no one will notice when I don't show.

It is an odd day - boss is out of the office playing in a golf tournament, and the office bitch is being well, a bitch again. Can always tell the second I walk in, in the morning. I say "hi" and get silence in response - clear sign today she is gonna be a beatch!

Its only 4pm.. I need it to be later in the day already! I wanna get out of here, get to mums have some nice dinner do a bit of knitting and chill out watching TV and chatting with her. Then go home, feed the cat get into bed and wake up tomorrow with no work. Hurry up end of the day already will ya!

We're through to round two!

2006-06-19T23:23:00.000Z

Oh yes we are! Through we go.. and onto the bottom seam of the lovely Bombshell. She's been tried on and fits like a glove so far - my mother commented "that hides your belly you know" which is a big victory score since that was the whole idea ;)

So lets start first with the yummyness that is the Knitting Help Swap Pal package, here she is in all her glory the fluffy clouds of gorgeous deep red yarn and the fabulous sweater keychain:

I really wish you could feel this yarn, it is just sooooooooo soft.

So moving on, today in the post arrived "Creating Knitwear Designs" the companion book to "Making Knitwear Fit" - both of these books are excellent, giving good, straightforward, easy to read details on both the subjects. Illustrated examples help greatly, and both are giving me assistance in learning more about the art of making knitwear work and fit. Hopefully these will give me the tools to adapt some patterns, and in the future present my own designs. I already have something specific in mind, after the KWC is completed and my swap pal's beautiful fluffy clouds are put to use, I'll be working on something special.

So now while on the subject of the KWC - here is the progress on Bombshell. I have to say I've totally surprised myself with the speed of the progress. I feel like it is slow but then I looked at the other photos (the ones I didn't get to post) and realised that I'm moving pretty fast on this. This is probably due to the fact that every waking hour when I can is spent knitting. I've been spending evenings with my mother to avoid "cat"astrophy from Missy attacking the yarn. She has been missing me terribly and is currently sitting here mewling loudly while staring down at me from on top of my monitor.

Anyway, yesterday I reached the end of the ribbing and was ready to put the finishing touches to the body - the seed stitch border. Alas, when trying it on it didn't cover enough of my belly and another inch for the border wouldn't have been long enough. I had to continue in the pattern to add another couple of inches. Finally, this evening, I am starting on the seed stitch border. I got 3 rows of it completed after the photo was taken and now at 12:30 alas it is time for me to stop knitting for the night and fall into bed.

So here, in all her glory, is the luscious bombshell. Welcome to my first proper garment fit for human wearing. Not bad for only picking the sticks back up in late March this year (even if I do say so myself, but I'm amazed I've managed to do this and proud that I could follow a pattern for something that is going to fit!!)

Schweet!

2006-06-14T14:28:00.000Z

A number of sweetness things to post. First, yesterday my KH swap pal package arrived - two gorgeous deep red balls of Debbie Bliss Alpaca Silk - this stuff is sooooooo soft. It's like two fluffy little clouds in a jiffy bag! I can't stop cuddling it, it is so gorgeous - the colour is beautiful and I've never ever touched anything as soft in my life.

Also included in the package was a gorgeous lantern moon keychain with a little tiny sweater on it - so cute! So to my dear dear secret swap pal, thank you so much! I'm so pleased with the package and it was a lovely surprise. She mailed me to say it was on the way then suddenly it was here!

Pictures for this post will follow when I get home this evening - need to take them and get them onto the PC ;)

Also in the post yesterday; On Monday I ordered some ultra cheap Rowan All Season's Cotton from an ebay seller - I ended up getting 3 packs of the stuff as it is a gorgeous dusky midnight blue colour (one of my favourite colours) and I will find something to make with it (if not another Bombshell - I have to get to the end of making this one though and it is problematic now I've started working in the round, purl stitches showing on the knit side, I've got it upside down after joining so it has to be back knitted a row and a half to correct).

I also picked up a pack of Rowan Cotton Glace from the same seller in a deep red wine colour. This will be used to make a Soleil from Knitty when I'm done with Bombshell.

This last week has been a good week in the post. I received another great book, Knitting Plus: Simple Stunning Techniques For Embroidered Knittin by Montse Stanley. Today I also received Making Knitwear Fit by Pat Ashforth & Steve Plummer - this is going to help me in my quest to re-size existing patterns and to help me in the future with general adaptations. I'm waiting on Creating Knitwear Designs, and also Knitting Your Own Designs For A Perfect Fit by Montse Stanley.

Also, the Knitting World Cup has made it to the national press! Check out The Guardian article about it.

Bombshell!

2006-06-12T23:23:00.000Z

Well here she is, in all her glory! Here is what Bombshell from Big Girl Knits looks like:

First the yarn substitution. Suggested yarn is impossible to get here in the UK (at least at the short notice I had and besides its a silk mix - the smell of silk makes me feel a bit sick) so suggested substitute of Rowan All Seasons Cotton was the choice. Alas there was not enough in stock of any one colour, and I needed to start on Saturday!

So what came in its place is Debbie Bliss Cotton Angora blend in a gorgeous sage green colour. It is as soft as soft can be, but my god does this stuff shed! Today I was wearing a black t-shirt. This evening after a couple of hours knitting, my black t-shirt is a hairy sage green colour!

So I cast on on Saturday evening and settled down into it. I got 1/2 way through the first ball of yarn when I realised I'd made a HUGE glaring mistake. It had to be frogged, there was nothing I could do! I was increasing in ONE stitch at the markers instead of two stitches either side of the markers. Argh! Frogged she was =( Luckily the yarn frogs quite nicely and wasn't a shedding tangled mess of pilled yarn. Instead the yarn was just a little kinked.

I cast on again, knitted frantically back to where I was and today, this is what the gorgeous bombshell looks like on the needles:

With several miles of knitting left to do, at least I am thankful that I have until 9 July to complete! Wish me luck - I'm gonna need it to know where I left off the cashmere lacey scarf and pick that back up after! *laugh*

Mamma Mia! RED CARD!

2006-06-10T10:33:00.000Z

Woah poor Mia! OK so I chose to do Mia for the knitting world cup - I've just given her the red card that naughty naughty lace shrug! Why you ask? Well as the referee I have the final say and that bitch was just not cutting it for the Cup, she was being naughty and nasty and as my first garment (I've been doing scarves and scarves and more scarves oh and some pocketbook slippers since knitting again) she wasn't pulling through.

So, last week from Amazon I got delivery of "Big Girl Knits" - woah this book is lusher than lush and I glanced at it. Last night I poured over it finally having time to actually look. Therein the pages lies the new team for the cup. Her name is Bombshell and she is delicious. She looks like a total challenge for me; a T-Shirt knitted in the round - they say use Lorna's laces Lion & Lamb 50% silk 50% wool but I can't wear wool it itches and the smell of silk makes me feel a bit sick so cotton she shall be!

I'm off to Creations in Barnes to visit Jean and pick up Bombshell's team colours ;)

Its the World Cup!

2006-06-09T15:41:00.000Z

Argh! ARGH!!!! It starts today! I thought it started tomorrow. OK so I have a month - I'm in for the Knitting World Cup, I have chosen the Mia shrug as I think it will be a challenge for me to put together - its a lacey knit shrug - I'd like to do the Grumperina version - this will mean also doing Odessa so I get to understand the circular rib for the cuffing.

Anyway so there I was thinking it starts tomorrow evening - I planned a stash expedition (sex) for tomorrow to pick up something nice to knit with. Now I'm all in a panic and thinking "did I pick the right project?" Maybe I should pick something from Big Girl Knits (the book arrived earlier this week from Amazon). I may have to show Mia the red card and pick something else. GAH! There are SO many things I want to knit / complete, including the lovely lacey scarf I've started this week in Colourmart Cashmere (lightning shade).

So much to do so little time!

Edit: and why the f*&% don't my links work - They have been problematic since putting them in weeks ago and I can't get the freaking things to work. CHRISSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS HAYLP!

Fuerzabruta

2006-06-06T16:43:00.000Z

Oh boy, did I ever spend a night last night of sensory overload!

A friend invited me to go to the press evening opening of The Roundhouse, a venue in London that closed some 15 or so years ago. After much fundraising and work, it has finally re-opened. The old Roundhouse was a gritty very down to earth venue. Today's Roundhouse is somewhat more glamourous.

I had no idea what I was in for last night, I somehow thought I was going to a sort of party that was a press launch of the Roundhouse - a re-opening event. I didn't expect to go into a show and see something so spectacular that today I am still in awe.

I took a cab to the Roundhouse and the cabbie was full of stories of his youth and how he had spent time there. On arrival we went inside, met a friend of my friend who gave us VIP passes and off we trundled to the VIP bar.

Once there champagne was on tap, I only had one glass though since I was the designated driver for the night (I'd left the car at the office to collect later). We briefly star spotted and chatted a little, then we were ushered into the theatre. In we went to find a big open space (and passing Eddie Izzard talking about hotels in New Orleans) and an announcement going off that emergency exits were marked in green, and if any of the sets were to touch us, we were to touch them back with the palms of our hands only. We were told that we would be required to move around during the show, and that we should move quickly if the crew asked us to do so, so that the show may continue smoothly without interruption.

This was intriguing. Then lights went up to our left and out came a conveyor belt with a man walking on it (treadmill). This extended and moved around the room, and sped up when he ended up running. The music was pounding out as he ran in time.

The show continued with visual and aural sensations, including a giant swimming pool descending from the ceiling which had a clear bottom. We looked up into a pool of moving bodies, and as the pool descended to just above head height of the audience, with palms outstretched to touch it, the girls inside interacted with the audience. "Touching" us back.

Words really can not describe the amazing show that went on for around an hour and a half. Acrobatics and pounding music - it very much reminded me of Circus Archaos, whom I had seen in a tent on Clapham Common many years ago.

This show is a summer "must see" - If I'd known what to expect before hand I'd have dressed down and not worn heels (standing all night in heels with a dodgy knee is not to be recommended!).

Check out the links and get to Fuerzabruta if you can!

Lucy locket lost her pocket!

2006-05-31T23:44:00.000Z

So I made one for her!

YAY I've finished my Lucy Bag I started this bag this past holiday weekend. I stayed with my mother again, and began knitting it on Saturday night. More on Sunday night and more again on Monday afternoon (while watching The Sound Of Music) and a bit more on Monday night. I finished putting it together yesterday, between having physio in the morning and seeing Joshi in the afternoon.

Tonight, I raced to mums after work to see a family friend who arrived today from Ireland (and is staying with mum) and of course to shove dear Lucy into the washing machine to felt! This is my very first ever felted project and I've loved every second of it. It isn't perfect, my kitchener stitch on the "long" handle was on the wrong side so there was a lumpy line where there should not have been, and the long handle shrunk far more than the short handle for some odd reason - maybe there was a tension issue there, I'm really not sure. Anyway the first pic is before felting - the other two are of the bag stuffed full and drying!

So let me tell you the Lucy story; it started last week when I ordered the pattern from Blackberry Ridge, who were wonderful I must say. The pattern arrived very quickly from the US to the UK - I was amazed how fast it was! I excitedly opened the envelope, and whipped the pattern out of its plastic protector bag. Reading it I realised I needed another set of DPNs. Not only that, I really needed 5 DPN's. I realised I had not got 5 DPN's (I barely have any DPN's at the moment) nor did I even have 4 in the right size. So next came my call to the not so local yarn shop in Barnes, West London.

I looked Creations up on the web, and put a call in. After a couple of seconds the phone was picked up and I got chatting to a lovely helpful lady. She told me she had some DPN's but they were very long and that I should come in with the pattern (and my sock that I am knitting too after a chat about working on DPN's and mentioning that I wasn't sure I was holding them right) and she would have a look and advise me.

She was about to close for lunch, so I decided I'd potter around a bit then head out there to her. Well, when I got there she was ready and waiting. She had all the DPN's she has in the store out and was willing and happy to give much advice; from helping with the crochet cast on method (and in fact showing me a knit on method that worked just as well) to advising on good felting yarns .

We chatted for quite a while and she was very taken with the pattern. It turns out, that she runs a knitting circle in Dorset in the South of England, where she 'weekends' with her retired husband. He wants to move there permanently, but she says she can't leave her yarn shop - she set it up years ago and refuses to leave it! Her daughter raises funds for Cancer research. She, and her knitting circle, knit bags which they sell and give the money to Cancer research.

I was so happy to have the advice from this lovely lady and to hear of her project I told her I would be happy to donate my Lucy to the cause. My father died with Cancer in September 2001. I've known many people and relatives with Cancer and I know how much is still needed in the line of research for drugs to help this horrible disease.

If caught early enough, things can be done and the knowledge that if caught early enough things can be done has come directly from researching all the hundreds of different types of cancers and working towards curing or at the least, extended remission to give a longer life.

I got some needles from the store and she threw in a 5th needle in a set of 4 so that I'd have all I needed to make the bag. This lady, Jean, was adorable. So helpful and totally and utterly honest. Had the needles been too long for the project, she had told me she would not sell them to me - it would be a waste of my money and a mark on her reputation.

So anyway, Lucy is felted, stuffed with plastic carrier bags and drying on the airer in my mothers loft. When she is dry, the pocket will be donated for sale and the profits will be given to Cancer Research UK. I finally found a purpose.

More on knees

2006-05-25T13:49:00.000Z

Hurruh! My knee is beginning to repair.

So Tuesday I went to see Dr Joshi again, he put me up on the couch and had a look at the knee. Next, quick as a flash (after oiling it) he whips out a cup, puts the flame in to take out the oxygen and BAM slaps it on the knee - same place it was before.

This time however, it didn't make me scream or grip the couch or even feel like I was going to throw up. After, he did ultrasound treatment on it again. I could feel the heat going in to the cartildge and again he asked if I had private health insurance. /Sigh not I!

I returned to the Doctor last week who said I was a candidate to be referred to Physio. Ok so I take the form along to the hospital opposite where I live, hand it in and get told the Administrator would contact me on Monday for an appointment. Monday comes and goes. As does Tuesday and Wednesday - I have the realisation that I'm going to be waiting a long time and that by the time I get seen the knee will be better.

Joshi suggested Physio with his referral - £120 for an initial consultation then £60 for 30 mins thereafter. This is out of my reach financially, so I have to wait.

About 10 minutes ago, I get a call saying the Physio department have a cancellation and would I go at 8am on Tuesday of next week. 8am! That is ungodly an hour for me! However, it is all that is on offer so take it I must. Apparently they have written to me too - I was listed for an appointment in 6 weeks time. SIX weeks!

Alas, since Friday of last week I've had a nagging cold trying to come out. Today it has hit with a major vengeance - HOW do we manage to produce so much goo? I mean I've gone through an entire box of tissues already!

No other news, except that I am now searching desperately for a way to make knitting patterns fit bigger people. I am not a small size and rather more endowed in the chest department than a size 38" chest. Jaegar patterns only come up to size 38. People with bigger boobies are not allowed to have nice patterns made for them apparently.

So if anyone knows how to make a pattern fit a bigger size person (I KNOW it has to do with tenion / stitches per inch but thats fine on a square how do you then shape sleeve holes etc???) let me know!

Hurruh!

2006-05-22T16:56:00.000Z

Big thank you goes out to Chris! Thank you!!! OK so now I know how to put this stuff / where to put it I now just need to get some peaceful quiet time to do it and search through the template code to add it in ;)

Today has been a busy busy busy day! I did want to get my thank you in here though =D 3 *cheers* for Chris!

Now I just have to work out the myspace blog dealio ;)

A quick ARGH and a personal reminder

2006-05-08T16:52:00.000Z

Argh where is Chris when I need him! How do I enter this:

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A drooling day!

2006-05-03T17:38:00.000Z

Wooo I've spent most of the day drooling and in joy at my fabulous find. So browsing ebay the other day, I came across some mohair yarn that had sequins pre-added into it. I looked at it, blinked, looked again and thought - there has to be some con to this.

Anyway, it was from a Turkish yarn company but it was SUPER cheap. I ended up buying 12 balls of yarn - 6 in one shade and 6 in another. It came in lots of 6 and I paid £2.99 for one lot and £5.99 for the other (some git was bidding against me). So today they arrive.. oh my! WOW they are GORGEOUS - this yarn is super soft, the pictures don't do the colour justice on the pink but it is a beautiful fuschia pink colour.

Anyway I'll post more later.. right now my computer just told me I'm running out of diskspace EEEP time to go clean up some crap ;)

Look after your knees, you'll miss them when they are gone

2006-04-29T15:01:00.000Z

Seriously. Look after them. I am a testament to that.

In 1996, new into a job in management three of my colleagues were to go to New York on business. The business affected me too, so I went all out to justify why they should allow me to go. I won the justification war and was allowed to go. We planned for the trip, which was in July.

The night before the trip, a friend of a friend had a birthday party in Dorking. Deepest darkest Dorking, Surrey. I was engaged at the time, and my fiance and I went in the car with two friends (they drove). We get out of the car, its pitch black. Jayne is pregnant (heavily too) and so is not drinking for the night. We walk along this pitch black road, when a car starts coming toward us. I said to Jayne, "hold on best we step in from the road a little" thinking of her safety. I take a step sideways and slip right down into a ditch. In the process my knee twisted horribly.

As the night wore on the knee swelled to the size of an elephant (no I'm not exaggerating either) yet Jayne wanted to enjoy the party so there was no hope of being given a lift to casualty (ER) and I didn't want to cause a fuss and call an ambulance. Besides, I had no idea where I was anyway and my fiancee was being a complete arse about it.

I sat with bottles of ice cold beer held against my knee as it continued to swell.

The next morning, I took the plane to New York. I couldn't cancel, I was new in the job. That would have been ridiculous. I figured we'd get cabs everywhere anyway and I'd be ok. The first day, someone from the US office decided we should go to South Street Seaport. That was fine, and all well and good, but he walked us there from Broadway. A good 40 minutes of walking while he showed us Wall Street, WTC and various other things. He was a proud New Yorker and wanted to show off his town. This was all well and good but again I kept silent and suffered.

Eventually, towards the end of the week the knee ceased up completely. I flew home in agony, my fiance wanted to meet me at the airport but the relationship between us by that stage was very very bad and I just didn't want him anywhere near me. Not only that, I arrived back at around 6am and he said he didn't see why he should get up at that time of the day on a weekend as well as weekdays.

When I got home, he announced he was going to change and that it would make the relationship better. By this stage, the relationship was too soured to ever survive. I'd been seeing a therapist and been on anti depressants. His constant putting me down publicly and privately had reached the point where I really did believe I was a worthless individual.

Anyway, I digress. The morning I arrived home, I went in had some coffee; he hauled ass out of the pit and announced he was to change, that he'd been to see the doctor and he was now seeing a therapist too. Not only that, he was seeing MY therapist. He had to invade every single part of my life and control it, he had always been that way. I couldn't have a bath without him walking into the bathroom but if I did the same he would scream blue murder. I'd even end up having to pee with the bathroom door open so he could keep an eye on me. Again I digress slightly, but anyway he had invaded the one bastion of space I had finally managed to create for myself after 7 1/2 years.

I asked him to take me to ER so I could get my knee finally seen to. He wasn't in the least bit keen and thought I was faking it. Eventually he agreed and took me. I sat and waited with terrible jet lag. After several hours of being told I was next on the list, having a tiny boy next to me in a cubicle with horrific asthma and unable to breathe, who was also not being seen I finally thought it better if I just went home and slept through the jet lag.

I left the hospital and it never got treated.

A couple of years later, it manifested as bursitis and achillies tendonitis in my heel. I had cortisone injections and various treatments but my foot / heel has never been right since.

This week, my knee started to swell and as I stood up on Tuesday afternoon, it felt like someone had put a red hot 9mm diameter nail to the inside of my knee, and used a mallet to bash it into the joint with one big hit. I threw up.

Wednesday morning I managed to get an emergency appointment to see the doc, she gave me some diclofenac (anti inflamatory) told me I had bursitis in the knee and that we needed to get that down then investigate further. 10 years on something was going to finally happen with my knee.

I take the diclofenac and have an upset stomach as expected. Every time I move it feels like the knee cap is floating above the joint and is just wiggling around without anything to keep it in place. Well, basically that is exactly what is happening, theres a hug sac of fluid under the kneecap that is inflamed and pushing the cap up, so yeah it is floating. Everytime it moves I feel nauseous.

At the same time I've been seeing an holistic, ayervedic 'quack' called Dr Joshi. He is the guy who treats Gwennyth Paltrow and does Egyptian 'cupping' to get things flowing. Joshi is detoxing me and sorting out my weight issues. He's doing a fine job, the weight is coming off. He wanted me to move from walking exercise to running. I hate running, maybe my knee subconsciously knows this!

I had forgotten I had an appointment with Joshi for Friday (yesterday) so it was a last minute rush to get there by cab and make the appointment I'd forgotten about. I arrived and Dr Joshi was in the reception area. He asked me how I was, I said "mmm not so good" - he frowned a little and said ok go up to room 8. As I stood I said "I've done me knee in" - he said we'd look at it.

Up I go to room 8, wait for him to arrive. In he comes and I admit I'd stopped taking the supplements he gave me and fallen off the wagon of his treatment. He told me off suitably and said "lets treat that knee for you then."

First came the acupuncture. I'm not sure how I feel about acupuncture, I've always been a bit hrmm this way that way about it. But in the needles went and I could feel them. He said I shouldn't feel them, but the knee is THAT tender that I could feel the needles. I relaxed as best I could and over 10 mins he would tweak the needles every so often while he was on the phone.

After this, while on the phone, he rubbed and massaged the kneecap with oil. He had his back to me, and was on the phone and I wanted to scream out "It fucking hurts and its making me want to spew stop it!" but being the polite quiet person I am I didn't and just winced hard and bore it.

Next thing he turned around, picked up one of the Egyptian glass cups (a big one at that), put the flame to the cup as my face showed that I realised what he was going to do. I wanted to stand up and run screaming from there, he was going to cup my knee. For those that do not know, cupping is an ancient chinese / Egyptian herbalist thing. A glass bowl (cup) has a flame inserted to burn off the oxygen, then the cup is placed on the skin. The vacuum created sucks the skin up into the cup and it gets left on for around 10 minutes. Afterwards, when it is removed (often with a loud pop noise like you make when you pull your finger in your cheek) you have a circular wheel bruise that looks like a love bite (hickey).

The pressure in the cup sucks damn hard.

He puts the flame in the cup. My face begins to give away the sheer horror of realisation that he is going to put that think on my knee. I thought maybe he would put it on the inside where it felt like a nail was driven in, but no. He put the thing right onto the side of my kneecap. The kneecap then slides across the bursae (fluid sac) and up into the giant cup. I screamed. Yep I actually screamed. He was still on the phone, and gently tapped me on the shoulder and mouted the word "relax" then left the room.

Relax? RELAX? My fucking kneecap is being sucked up into a glass cup in a place on my knee where my kneecap should not be, I am gripping the sides of the bed and trying hard not to spew. Oddly after 5 minutes it hurt a lot less, or maybe it was that my body got used to the pain. I began to relax. Then, stupidly, I looked down at my knee. Oh boy, I wanted to hurl there and then but there wasn't anywhere I could hurl and I couldn't move from the bed anyway. All I could think of was how much this was going to hurt when he came and pulled it off me. He came back in and in a tone my mother would use to say "offer it up for your sins" he said "think of it as character building."

Another 5 minutes goes by and he comes in and removes the glass jar with a pop. It was a fleeting moment of sheer agony, and then it was done. He pulled a machine across that he'd used once before on my ankle (on the same leg) which did some kind of heat thing to it. Told me not to use heat at all, to put ice packs on twice a day for 30 mins a go and sleep with my leg elevated.

I have a big red wheel bruise on my knee from the cup, I have no ice (my freezer is busted) and planned to go to my mothers today and use her frozen peas. I had a terrible night, couldn't sleep - it is so fucking painful. My knee feels like its on fire. No wonder it needs ice. I can barely move with it, so theres no hope of me going to my mothers for the ice; I can't drive like this!

I have to go back in a week to see him and a week and a half to see my GP. If between the two of them they don't do something to fix this damn knee I dunno what I'll do. In the mean time I'm here with my leg elevated and feeling sorry for myself. I want chocolate!

While invalided in my bed, I've finally finshed my first ever sock. It was knit as a test sock - the photo sucks monkey hoo ha's because the lighting in my sick room is sucky, but here it is.. my first ever sock!

I have some Regia sock yarn ready to make my first proper "pair" of socks =D I think I'll cast on now I'm done writing this ;)

Ready to Felt!

2006-04-28T22:37:00.000Z

So, I've been trying to think how I can go about felting (without having to do it by hand) when my washing machine is busted and I can't seem to get the guy who has promised to fix it to actually come and fix it.

First thought of course was steal my mothers washing machine. Problem 1) it is a front loading machine. Problem 2) it locks when in use. The locking is a real issue, it locks the door for a good 5 minutes after draining, so I wouldn't be able to whip out what I've felted quickly, check it and re-felt it if needed.

Everything I see on felting is on US sites, which of course is the land of the top loading washing machine. I LOVE top loaders, I used them a lot in Australia when I was there for a year and absolutely loved them.

So I started to do some research. The Wonderwasher came to mind, a funny little invention that works a bit like a pressure cooker and gets rave reviews. However, I wasn't sure about it. Next thing that came to mind were a host of things that looked like a bucket with a motor in the bottom part. However, that one required hand filling and emptying - seemed a bit like hard work to me (much like the wonderwasher).

So after much searching across the intarweb, what did I discover right under my nose? Yep a portable washing machine for next to nothing. I got me a Tefal Washboy! This thing is a mini washing machine that you fill by attaching a hose to the hot tap (or cold tap or even mixer taps), turn the water on, load in the items to be washed, set the cycle and away you go! It is a top loader, it automatically stops when you open the lid, sits on a draining board (made for Caravan use), AND it cost next to nothing!

I saw another one on Ebay, the same make / model with several days left to go on the auction. It seems they are everywhere! Well, I put it in the car, drove it to my mothers house, put it in her conservatory and headed home. Tomorrow comes the proof of the pudding - we turn it on and see if it works *laugh*

The pictures are stolen from the Ebay auction that is up, but mine is exactly the same *beam*

beck's blog: Hogwarts Castle

2006-04-28T22:36:00.000Z

beck's blog: Hogwarts Finished

You HAVE to go see this blog. It is utterly amazing that someone can craft something so intricate! This is probably the single most awesome thing I've seen crafted in a lonnnng while! Blue Peter should be ashamed, not even their outstanding Tracy Island could match such an amazing piece as this!

Combining blogs

2006-04-25T17:01:00.000Z

I have been trying to work out, or think about, how I can combine this blog with another. I'd really quite like to take my blogs from Myspace and put them on here.

It would seem though that I can not put specific dates on posts here =( What a bummer! I'll have to think of something else. In many ways, I wish I had continued to blog here instead of over at Myspace. If anyone has any insight in to how to date posts here without it being listed as a "new and recent" post I'd appreciate it. I'd like the posts to archive in the usual way here.

My first ever hat!

2006-04-21T23:43:00.000Z

Hooray! I've finished my first ever hat! I started it on Tuesday and finished it today. Alas, at the end I couldn't find a needle anywhere in my house to thread the end through, so I had to improvise with a bit of plastic wrapped wire. It worked fine ;) The only bummer was finding a dropped stitch right near the end. I managed to pick it up and 'sew' it in with the left over tail.

The other thing I did today, since I needed them to finish the hat off, was to make my own double point needles! I watched the video on KH and ran to the hardware store over the road from the office. Got myself the smallest dowell available which was unfortunately 6mm - the needles for the hat were 4mm, so this meant the top of the hat was slightly out of kilteer with the rest of the hat. Since this was a practice run, I didn't feel it mattered greatly, and I'm just super proud that today, I've made needles and a hat!

The pattern was from Headhuggers. Let me know what you think!

~ Mully

So excited!!

2006-04-19T15:28:00.000Z

I'm SO excited!!!

I can't tell you really how excited I am. So I dragged myself out of bed today, went to the gym this morning. I dragged myself into work, not looking forward to it since the boss is away and the bitch is in full swing of, well, being a bitch.

Anyway, I've ordered a bunch of stuff to be sent to work; A set of Denise interchangeable needles, a set of Boye interchangeable needles (yes two sets by different makers - one has a bigger range of sizes and is aluminium and the other is a plastic style resin set suitable for use on aircraft), a full set of Pony straight single point needles (very VERY cheap on Ebay - a fraction of the price they would have cost in the shop), Stitch N Bitch Knitters Handbook, Stitch N Bitch Happy Hooker guide to learning crochet, an afghan sampler pattern booklet by Annie's Attic and some Sirdar Firefly yarn.

Anyway, today I arrive at work, to find the Denise set and the Full set of Pony have arrived. I was stunned, I didn't expect them for another week at least since we just had a 4 day weekend for Easter. I'm giddy with joy at the Denise set - it is exactly as expected and only one or two rough edges on a couple of the larger needles, I bought some sanding paper to sand them down at the recommended 600 grit.

So I went to lunch, and at the local Age Concern charity shop they have new yarns. They are DK yarns in Acrylic which are ideal practice yarns. Fine I might like to work with Worsted weight yarns but I'm happy for now to practice with DK acrylic. They were super super cheap so I bought 100g balls one of which I am going to use to attempt my first hat, which will be knitted on my new Denise interchangeables! The Hat pattern is here

It is a basic hat, but I can't wait to try it. I have a choice of Pistachio, deep purple or cornflower blue to make it in. Initially I'm going with a single colour until I get the feel of working in the round. Can't wait to get home and cast on the first 100 stitches!

So I arrive back from lunch, to see the post has arrived, bringing me my Annie's Attic Sampler Afghan pattern book. 25 different squares, I'll be doing that in proper yarn and I think that is ging to be my mothers Christmas gift.

Next thing I hear the "you've got mail" bing noise on my computer, and there is a message to say I have a package from Amazon on reception. Lo! My Stitch N Bitch books have arrived! Again I am stunned at the speed of delivery of all of these items. I only ordered the books yesterday and selected the free postage option. It is supposed to take 3 - 5 working days with the free post option!!

So I'm like a kid in a candy shop, super excited and all revved up rearing to go. Roll on home time!!!

Clickety Click!

2006-04-18T16:57:00.000Z

So, what made me decide to knit again was Mothers Day. I needed to get a gift for my mother that was something special. I wanted to thank her for many things but I knew that flowers were out, since my lazy brothers would all send flowers and she would be inundated.

I have made several attempts to make several "furry" scarves for her, but I have failed. I failed in so far as I dropped stitches and its next to impossible to pick them up again using that yarn. At least, it is for an inexperienced knitter as I am.

I have found umpteen yarns I've fallen in love with and tried to make scarves with them. I finally settled on a scarf made of Sirdar Foxy and it has a split in it, so that you cross it over, shove one end through the split and the scarf stays in place. I started it on Easter Sunday, and finished it on Easter Monday. My first "proper" knitted item in 20 years.

In addition I decided to make a card for my mother to go with it. I'd seen a little book about knitting cards, and I'd read it from cover to cover in Waterstones. It is a TINY book, but I felt it wasn't worth a fiver. Anyway, I took in what I'd read and thought about adapting what I'd read to make a card.

The results of both items are in the pictures!

18 months later

2006-04-12T11:44:00.000Z

and I finally log back in to this and think about writing again!

I've been writing over on MySpace which while it IS ok, I realise that no one else writes on there. They just kinda.. create a profile and do nothing with it.

I've some ideas for this blog.. something I have been thinking about a lot lately. I may begin anew yet!

This was meant to be my blog on current affairs, but when I hit a large dip in July 2004 and started taking the pills again, I just lost motivation. A fair bit has happened since then, including being repeatedly ill and each time not recovering as well as I should have, so getting another dose soon after.

I started seeing an Holistic Ayervedic practitioner in late January, and things have been looking up. I've had a couple of bouts of illness since seeing him but nothing like before. The length of illness was less and the recovery complete and MUCH faster. I've discovered an intollerence to Wheat and yeast products and have discovered that much of the source of my depressive illness could actually be caused by Candida.

OK so doctors generally don't admit the existence of Candida but yeast infections and over production of yeast are accepted. Thrush is well known and I've suffered horrendously from this on and off since my mid 20's. Around about the age of 28 I was diagnosed as manic depressive.

Having been sent to see a Colonic Irrigator by the quack oops I mean "doctor" we discussed my medical history in detail including the depressive illness I've been having. The colonic practitoner suggested that Candida *could* be an issue and that we would have a look see what is going on inside my gut.

Sure enough, I appeared to have a large amount of Candida in the gut. Over 3 months, with a diet tailored to reduce the gut infestation of Candida, to promote the re-balance of healthy gut flora; I've lost weight, and my insatiable sweet tooth has waned. I even ate a sandwich the other day (it was all that was available - I was out and hungry) - it was a free range egg sandwich on wholemeal bread. It tasted like someone had added 10 spoons of sugar to the bread. I'm assuming the sugar was added to make the yeast ferment to cause the bread to rise and frankly it was probably one of the worst tasting sandwiches I've ever had. What makes this worse is that I used to eat this stuff with regular abandon and I didn't even taste the added sugar.

I used to live off up to 4 litres of diet coke a day - looking into aspartame and its properties made for some horrifying reading. Since quitting coke in January too, I've had a complete change in health. It has been a weird journey and I'm still only just starting it. I've basically poisoned my system for years - and I wondered why I was lethargic and depressed!

Anyway I think I'll be writing here a little more often again. As I say I've got some ideas that I'd like to put down in writing soon.

Go Go Greg!!

2004-08-29T08:09:00.000Z

*cheer* Greg Dyke is publishing his memoirs! To quote "What is really frightening is that Blair still doesn't believe or understand that what he did was fundamentally wrong" I'm afraid I'm a subscriber to the Greg Dyke view.

Meanwhile, Mr Bush completely snubs Michael Howard. (see: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3608006.stm ) This is an interesting move and I wish I still had the link to the "my name is georg bush" flash created by Dr Parsons (genius but extremely strange satirical internet cartoonist) because it about sums it and him up! In my opinion, whist I don't specifically subscribe to one parties views or anothers (I am a mix of different policies / opinions), in this instance Micahel Howard represents my view. In the same way that Greg Dyke represents my view of the whole affair. Now, Michael Howard is a political representative, and he represents MY view as a citizen of the United Kingdom and Bush snubs him. Bush, bless his cotton God fearing socks, has by way of a snubbing Mr Howard, snubbed me and my political view.

So, what will Bush do if he gets into office and we vote Blair out? Is he going to be rude and snub all the people of this country because we dissed "my friend Tony"?

So, while writing this, I do a good long search and finally find the genius that is Dr Parsons saved on another site, here for your viewing pleasure is how I would sum up Mr Bush and his relationship with Mr Blair, enjoy! http://www.milkandcookies.com/links/4082/

Thank you, Doctor

2004-08-25T13:39:00.000Z

Today is the day that I saw my doctor, my own doctor. It's been, hmm as she said, around 3 years since I last saw her. She said that she was impressed I had managed to last three years without medication and that, as a manic depressive, its pretty impressive I've been able to manage my own illness without too much difficulty (with the exception of now). When I said I should have come to her 3 months ago when I first started to go down, but that I had hoped I would pick back up and after a few weeks of not picking back up I just continued to slip, she agreed. She said that at least I had managed to recognise the slope and whilst I had gone down it, I had obviously not quite reached the bottom and it was a good thing I had been able to recognise my state, before I slipped lower.

She asked me a ton of questions, the usual kind of thing that they have to ask you as standard "are you feeling suicidal? Do you feel like there is no hope?...." etc etc. This time, however, she didn't suggest that I go see the "quack" straight away. Usually they shove you off to see the head shrink witch doctor immediately for assessment which determines if they will continue to feed you with the drugs that you require to restabilise your mind or suggest that you "take up a hobby to help settle your mind" instead.

I'm quite glad I don't have to go and see the quack. I'm overly mean, I think, about psychologists. I know that many of them do a great job and that they help a lot of people but I have to say that the ones I've dealt with so far have all been completely and utterly barking mad. OK so coming from someone who is diagnosed as barking thats a bit rich but, well, they are! They are a bit like teachers, if you have ever socialised with teachers you will understand what I mean :P (no offence to any teachers out there but I was talking to a friend last night on the phone who has been entertaining teachers for the last couple of weeks and I offer great sympathy to her!). I've also taken matters into my own hands, and today I am swining the lead myself - I called in to say "I have to go for an x-ray they don't re-open till 2pm so I won't be in today, see you tomorrow!" Sod it, they can all do it and get away with it all the damn time, its about time I had a day off for myself.

So here I sit, eating my Tesco sandwich (another story to tell about Tesco too but that can wait) and today begins the start of a course of Fluoxotine (Prozac).

The last time I didn't initally get to see my own doctor, I saw another in the practice (but then subsequently got an appointment with my own doc) and I was given Seroxat. I have to say, in my humblest of opinions, that drug should be removed from the face of the planet and never ever prescribed to anyone ever again. It was horrible. I know that it has helped some people but by God what that stuff did me was awful.

It made me feel lousy ALL the time, I had blinding headaches, I had somnolence (sleeping ALL the time) and when I tried to stop taking it, I had horrible withdrawal symptoms. I didn't know what they were until I was finally off the drug, when the penny dropped. I went cold turkey too, I realised they were doing me no good, but the Doctor had said "this is much more effective than prozac" when I had asked for Prozac again. I had tried to push for Fluoxotine but had been brushed aside and given what I was given. I wasn't very happy with that particular doctor for the way she treated me - I felt she just wanted to push this new drug on me and she has since made similar decisions where my mother is concerned. I did wonder if she was on a back hander from the drug company!! Anyway today I said to my doc, "ok that IS prozac right?" she said "yes, fluoxotine" and I said "thank God, I couldn't bear to go back on that other stuff!" She asked what it was, and I told her Seroxat; the response made me very happy "ahh no we don't prescribe that so much any more"

Anyway for information about one of the forms of depression (to which I can answer yes to all but one of the questions on the "if you score 5 yes on this you are depressed" list go read this http://www.nimh.nih.gov/publicat/bipolar.cfm#bp6

The Plastic Land Bringeth Joy

2004-08-24T16:04:00.000Z

It's really funny how one simple phone call can actually lift one's spirits. Everyone is away on holiday (vacation) right now, I'm in the office with my "new" assistant - the "old" assistant (and one half of the trendy two) is off sick. Funny how she is too sick to come to work, yet apparently she has a gig tonight *rolls eyes*.

Anyway, while the boss has been away, he has completed negotiations and finalised a contract with a band. The band (American) signed the contract while on tour in Europe and now we have to pay them the money from the advance. Well, part of it is legal costs which have to go to a lawyer - to cut a long story short, I can't authorise payment until the manager of the band instructs me as to how he wants this dealt with and the instruction has to come from him not his lawyer. This is a stupidly tricky piece of legalese. Surely, if the lawyer is representing the band, then the lawyers instruction is enough? Apparently not. So after much scrabbling around I finally find the telephone number for the lawyer.

I call him on a number I assume is an East Coast number. The answering service tells me to call another number with another area code that I instantly recognise as an area code for the wonderfully opulent LaLa Land. I call the number, to be answered by this broad West Coast accent (including overuse of the word Awesome! or should that be ahhhsum!). The first thing that comes out is the "OMG I LOVE your accent!" /sigh yes dear I am merely a non specific home counties English accent, surely you have visited this land and heard it before?

The next thing that comes out is "OMG You are an Angel, I'm gonna buy you a car!" /sigh yes dear you can buy me whatever the hell you want but just email me the confirmation OK?

The third thing to come out is the "OMG I love you sooo much I'm on the line with my business manager who is telling me the band have to stop spending money because I can't afford this any more and now you have just told me we are getting $xxx amount of dollars! Thats just ahhhsum!" /sigh riiiightt ok whatever, just send me the damn instructions so I can clear this crappy work off my desk so I don't have to be stuck doing every other bastard's job for them while they are all swanning it away on holiday or swinging the lead off sick and let me get on with my own bloody job! I hang up the phone after giving him my details while hearing him yelling “OMG that’s just so ahhhsum, what an angel an annnngeeelll.” Tee hee! As fake and false as La La land is you have to hand it to them, they keep each other happy over there with all that false “You are awesome” crap and I have to admit the call did lift my spirits briefly so maybe there is something in it!!

Road Tax And The Manic-Depressive

2004-08-24T12:11:00.000Z

Which of the two categories below do you fit into?

Scenario:

It is the first day of the month your car is due to get a new road tax disc at the end of the month. One week before the road tax is due, the MoT (Motoring Organisation Test for road worthiness – its illegal not to have passed this test in the UK) is due on the car. Therefore, to buy the road tax disc (illegal not to have one in the UK too) you need your certificate of insurance, a valid MoT certificate and the log book (legal documentation proving ownership of the car) belonging to the car.

Normal Person:

At the start of the month, ensures they have the insurance certificate and car log book together ready for the arrival of the renewal notice (also required to buy the road tax disc with). A few days before the MoT is due, they book the car in, take it and have it tested. If it fails, they have 2 weeks to do the repairs and have it pass before the car is deemed an outright fail. So, they then have time to book it in for repairs if it fails. If it passes, they just have to sit tight until the renewal notice comes in the post.

Once the renewal notice arrives, they go to the post office taking with them the insurance certificate, the MoT Certificate, the Log book and the renewal notice. They hand the money over, and get a nice shiny new tax disc.

Manic Depressive Person:

At the start of the month, begins to think “ok shit I have to get the MoT and tax sorted this month but its ok I’ve got 4 weeks to do it in.”

The month moves on, and it gets to around the 19th and this is when the following starts to play out: Shit its the 19th, where the hell did the month go? The MoT is due in 2 days I’ve not even booked it in – crap if the renewal notice arrives before the 21st I might be able to get away with the old certificate. Wait. Where is the old certificate? I know I put it on the bedside cabinet last year so I would know where to find it this year. I think the logbook is with it too.

On the 20th; Shiiiit I really have to do this, I know I can do this – its fine calm down, you can do this, you know you can; take deep breaths and stay calm. OK so bedside cabinet, look there first. Ok its not here. Shit its not here. Shit shit shit shit shit where the FUCK did I put it? It HAS to be here, if I don’t have the logbook I’m completely and utterly fucked they will come and clamp the car and tow it away. If they do that I can’t get to work, if they do that I can’t get to Mums and take her shopping and she can’t cope without the support and help of my driving. It’s Dads old car, Christ he would turn in his grave if he knew this is how I was treating his car he wouldn’t let me drive it when he was alive and now I know why, its because he was right I am just a total fuck up of a person and I don’t deserve to be alive let alone have something as responsible as a car or a mortgage. Fuck, he was so right I really am a total and utter fuck up of a person, what the hell can I do to change that I need to change that I can’t go on living like this my life is a huge fucking mess what the fuck am I going to do now? I can’t change, I am just me I just have to accept that I am a complete fuck up and incapable of doing something so fucking simple as getting myself organised to do something as fucking simple as renew the road tax on the car. I hate that he was right, I hate it, I spent all my fucking life trying to show him I was not a total fuck up and then in the last year of his life I proved him soooo fucking right that even on his deathbed he was telling me what a fuck up of a person I am. I’m screwed. Oh wait, there it is. PHEW. Ok so here’s the log book, the old MoT cert.. now where the fuck is the insurance document – this is last years document. Fuck it I have to call them and get a copy, argh tax office won’t accept a fax copy as proof of insurance for renewal. /sigh ok well there is that theory of use the old cert and the insurance cert to get a new tax disc then sort the MoT out next week. OK ok you can do this, you can cope, just take deep breaths, deep breaths, right ask John at work what the name of that garage is up the road and take it there for the MoT test. Ok so it’s booked in for 2pm today. Right. Fingers crossed it passes, maybe if it does I won’t feel like such a total waste of human space on this planet.

So, which one of the two do you think I am?

Well all I will say is, I have to sign off now, the MoT test is in an hour, keep your fingers crossed for me that it passes or I have no fucking clue how the hell I’m going to deal with having to find a mechanic to do the work at a reasonable price before Friday when the tax disc is due. Oh and the copy of the insurance certificate still hasn’t come in the post *sigh* welcome to my world, the world of a manic-depressive; Oh and yes, I really DO think that fast and in sentences of that length when in the middle of a panic attack.

And neither do we...

2004-08-09T16:42:00.000Z

I had to add to the posting, seeing as I am here; this has to be immortalised and posted here to remind me of the humour of it. So, sleepily coming to in the morning with the radio blaring at me with its music and speech and undertone of “WAKE UP” last Friday morning, the voice coming out of the radio was not that of the male DJ but that of President George “Dubya” Bush creating his latest gaffe in a speech about terror;

"Our enemies are innovative and resourceful - and so are we," the US president told a high-level meeting of Pentagon officials.

"They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people - and neither do we."

Oh how I laughed. He really IS a dork isn’t he? OK so public speaking is not an easy thing to do, and if you find it hard you damn well stick to the script, you do not piss around and decide to ad lib at will – especially when you’ve done it so many times previously. He is running for another term in office and that’s the kind of gaffe he makes? If he makes that kind of gaffe in a speech what’s he like in the office eh? "Bring me a cawfee" coffee arrives to be followed swiftly by an "I meant TEA!" - what happens when he gives the order to press the big red button? "Press the big red button now!" *presses the button to nuke China* "Damnit I meant the GREEN (send aid to China) button you idiot!"

How does he expect people to believe he is an effective communicator in the office when he can’t even read a bloody speech from a pre-prepared paper carefully put together by his PR gurus (wonder if it’s Alistair Campbell’s brother working for Bush *grin*).

The US Election trail does amaze me; I was listening again to the radio and all the mud slinging from both sides the "Kerry didn’t really earn his purple hearts he just applied for them himself!" and the "Bush is on anti-depressants and is a megalomaniac" (like we didn’t already know he is a megalomaniac?) to then discover that the actual election isn’t until November! It’s only bloody August and we’ve already had almost a month of this “campaign trailing” and gesticulation over each camp. Christ alive we have another 3 months of this mud slinging crap to go through yet. I don’t know that Kerry would be any better in office than Bush, but I do know that I’m sick of that grinning twat we have in office here in the UK sticking his head up Bush’s arse and licking it while ignoring the people who voted him into office to represent them. I’d like to see Bush go, I’d also very much like to see Mister Blair go too, even though I’m not sure the opposing parties are anywhere near ready to take over.

I’d also like to see Miles Copeland re-incarnated and Mo Mowlam to have a meeting with Mr Bush, Mr Blair and Mr Copeland – just to have Mr Copeland and Ms Mowlam discuss the ways to deal with terrorism in the 21st century. Yelling “bomb the bastards” sure as hell isn’t working – you just have to see the video evidence from the beheadings to know that.

See! I said see you Monday or Tuesday!

2004-08-09T16:02:00.000Z

Sigh, another week passes without a completed piece of writing here. Well, I did say “Monday or Tuesday” I just didn’t say WHICH Monday or Tuesday *grin*

OK I’ve been threatening to tell what my triumphant news is for the last few weeks. On 15th July 2004 I dragged my boss off to a dingy office in South West London hidden in the back of a car park near a post office. Inside the staircase led up to a grotty reception area, where we were instructed to “fill in this questionnaire and help yourself to tea & coffee. Once complete please return the questionnaire to me and your method of payment”

We duly filled in the questionnaire, downed several mugs of coffee and smoked about 10 cigarettes each while scribbling down our inner secrets on the “questionnaire.”

How long have you smoked? How many a day do you smoke? Why do you want to quit smoking?

Yup, we were sitting in the offices of “Alan Carr’s Easy Way” (to quit fags and be free from the evil weed forever – it’s a miracle cure!). We handed over our credit / debit cards to be drained of £195. Soo working roughly that it’s a fiver for a pack of tabs.. that’s oooo 39 packs.. or 780 fags.. or roughly depending on how many you smoke a months worth of fags. Working on the basis that you smoke 20 a day the other 8 or 9 packs a month are the ones that are for 8 or 9 nights out in the pub where your pack of 20 gets diminished by the “occasional” smokers who just want to “cadge a fag – I’ll buy some in a minute, honest!” Or even for the odd night when having drunk like a fish, staggering around in the early hours of the morning and the sad realisation that you didn’t just “drop your fags and lose them” you smoked them all so you need another pack. Yup a 20 a day-er will easily do 39 packs a month.

We gulped our coffee, sat nervously in reception, which had roughly enough space for about 5 people – the “class” or “session” could have up to 12 people in it, and smoked our cigs wondering if we had enough fags with us to last the session (I had ¾ of a pack and another full pack in my bag “just in case”). Then we were off! Sent down the stairs to an oddly large room (looking at the outside of the building one would not imagine that room was that big!) with reclining chairs in it. Down we sat, were handed copies of the book “Alan Carr’s Easy Way to Quit Smoking” with several pages and paragraphs duly highlighted in orange (appropriate considering it matched the colour of the nicotine stained walls) and instructed to read the relevant paragraphs.

We all nervously looked around at each other, lighting up and wondering WTF we were doing there. Some late arrivals came in (3 together!) and then the session began. We were told to smoke as we normally would; to make ourselves at home (my home does not have a recliner chair or walls THAT colour!), kick our shoes off if we wanted (shyeah right I’d let my bare feet roam free on that nicotine stained sticky carpet!) and most of all, to relax. Relax? RELAX? I’m about to have my comfort stick, my reason to take a break away from my computer at work, my one hand playing at Player V Player computer games (take a toke and smoke that Albion caster till it’s toast) was about to change forever.

So, we were told this would last 5 hours. 9 of us at £195 a pop.. that’s £1755 for our session alone, there was another session on the go at the same time. Do I begrudge the cost? At that point in time, I didn’t. Now, I actually do and wish I’d bought the video instead – maybe that wouldn’t have worked as well, who knows, but maybe I should have spent that much money after I’d tried with the man himself via video.
We had an Australian “girl” telling us that she used to smoke 40 a day and that she believed in the Alan Carr method so much she had made it her career. Somehow, I just didn’t believe her. For a start the way she was holding the cigarette in her hand simulating smoking during the session just seemed so completely unnatural to her.

It made me doubt the validity of what she was saying when she was talking about the stuff that all smokers know about and that anyone who has never smoked has completely no idea about (the outright panic when you want a cigarette and can’t find your packet or can find the fags but can’t find a damn light!)

Well 5 hours later, we stubbed out our last cigarette, threw our fags onto the pile of cigarette packets (I even emptied my bag and took out the “just in case” unopened full pack) and threw our lighters into the big square box full of lighters and walked out of there as non smokers.

I felt great, and then I went home, sat in front of my computer and instantly had a major craving. That was the place in my home where I smoked the most. I had a choice, get off my arse, walk the few hundred yards down the road, buy a pack and a lighter and smoke or not. Well I’m a lazy bitch; I couldn’t be bothered to do that, so here I am today still a non-smoker.

Do I recommend it? Sure. It’s a pretty good method and the stupidity is that it’s a logical and straightforward approach. There isn’t any of the “don’t smoke you stupid dork” approach or the “how stupid were you to start in the first place!” or any of the “here is what your lungs will look like when you die! You selfish bastard your lungs could have looked like this *insert picture of clean lungs* and you could have donated them to some other poor unfortunate bastard who smoked so much they had to have a lung replacement!”

I’m sceptical by nature, and even though I instigated the boss and myself spending 5 hours in a gross place, it was worth it. The craving has mostly gone, sure I get the odd whiff of smoke from others in the office that smoke and think Mmmmmm (not bisto!) but I know that if I take even one drag on a cigarette I’ll be doomed (besides I need to at least get 31 days out of this program to get my money’s worth!!!). The boss called last Monday on his way back from Scotland yelling down the phone at me “You’ve been smoking haven’t you!?!?” to which I replied “I take it you fell off the wagon then?” At least he had the decency to say “yes” and not lie. He refused to go back for a back up session (you get 2 free back up sessions as long as you fail within the first 3 months) and has now buggered off to Scotland for 3 weeks holiday.

I’m considering buying the video from Amazon and having it delivered to his Lairdship in Scotland *grin*

So there you have my triumphant news! I’m no longer a smoker! HOORAY! If you are interested, the place to go see is Alan Carr's Easy Way web page (right click and open in a new window.. of course I STILL have not worked out how to make it do that for you itself) They have offices around the UK and in other parts of the world too.

~ Mully

P.S: Oh and the funny stuff IS coming, as soon as I can work out how to scan these pictures and make them smaller…

Flakey... flake.. flake.. flakey me

2004-07-23T18:42:00.000Z

Flakey - that'd be me! I have triumphant news and I have STILL not posted it! I have asked an American friend if I may use their response to "Choices" in a post on here, indeed I have their consent to do so, and I have STILL not posted it! I have more tales from the Crypt that is my office, yet I have STILL not posted them! I am resigned to the fact that right now, in a hot humid balmy London broom cupboard that I share with 2 others and call an office, I am a flake.

Apologies for my flakey self. I have Monday and Tuesday off work, and I have a post and a half to make which involves scanning things in - now I just have to tear myself away from my current computer game addiction to do it. The current game addiction is something I very much want to write about too, but at this point in time I can't so it will have to wait. However it is that good that tearing myself away from it is going to be much harder than tearing myself away from any other addiction.

So.. see ya Monday or Tuesday then ;)

- Mully

Working with idiots can kill you!

2004-07-21T11:34:00.000Z

Here I am this fine muggy Tuesday morning in the kitchen waiting for the stupid kettle to boil. It is a stupid kettle because it is a monstrosity of a thing, that seems to have a vast capacity for water. Great in an office eh? However, the element in the kettle is half way up the kettle, and unless you fill it over the element the water sadly refuses to boil. You lift the kettle it "feels" heavy enough to have enough water in, you flick the switch on and wait.

So while waiting on the kettle that "felt" heavy enough to have enough water in I leaned against the counter top to see the folder on the noticeboard that says "Press this week" and contains all the press cuttings for the last week where any of our companies acts or the company itself have made the news. Pinned on top of the "Press this week" folder was a photocopied article with the title "Working with idiots can kill you!"

As I stood, back to the counter, staring at this headline, the thought crossed my mind of "sheesh how bloody long did it take the press to catch on to this revelation?" I mean it isn't like there are no idiots working in press. Trust me I spent enough time in the offices of The Sun & The Times to know that there are a vast number of idiots in the press world.

So I realise that the kettle is not going to boil, because it isn't full - I fill the kettle, switch it on again and lean against the counter. Staring again at the article, I decided to have a read. Apparently, a Dr Anderson in Sweden, has had a whole team studying 500 heart attack victims. Who pays for this kind of study? I mean WHO pays to have someone conclude that "idiots are bad for your health"? Not only that how the hell does a Doctor not already know this?

Maybe, just maybe this is where I can say I am more educated than a Doctor who went through years of training and university exams to eventually conclude, after months of study, that idiots can kill you. The University of Life is my education and I tell you, one of the very first lessons I learned was that idiots can kill you.

I photocopied the article but it doesn't show which of the presses published it this week, so as the kettle boiled, I filled my coffee cup and walked back to my desk. I searched the web and found a link to the article in full... you have to read this its really quite stunning (right click and open in a new window - I've not worked out how to make it do that for you automatically yet) http://www.weeklyworldnews.com/features/science/50720

There we are, and I take a mouthful of my cold coffee realising far too late that the kettle didn't boil after all. I'm off to see if I can get this kettle to actually boil and make me a hot cup of coffee!

Shop your mother! Err I mean shop WITH mother!

2004-07-19T17:30:00.000Z

Well here I sit in the office with the office Jerk hovering around my desk. Once again it has been a while and here are the musings of the previous week more to come in more posts, I have triumphant news! However, I really had to do this shop with mother post after corresponding with a hilarious friend from the USA and this story was something that I told him.

Hrm where were we? Ahh yes July 9th and the diet coke break. Friday 10th was a usual dull ole workday. We usually go to the pub with the boss for Fish n Chips on a Friday; beer battered fish and skinny fries with homemade tartar sauce however this week, we didn’t. The boss had to race home to see his wife, who was not feeling too well. This involves him taking a 10-hour train journey from hell with Virgin Trains. He has drafted a hilarious letter to them, he just has to tweak it a bit more.

The weekend arrived and I decided to help my mother out and take her food shopping. She is getting on a bit and she finds it hard to get the shopping stuff in. She has cataracts (which are not due for removal any time this decade) and gets a bit scared of going out on her own. She hates the thought of having to depend on other people, and there are so few people left in our old street that would have been from the old tradition of looking after each other.

Anyway I love my mother dearly, she is hilarious in many ways, she has a wicked sense of humour (maybe one day I’ll write about how my mothers humour kept us going through the very difficult time when my sister in law came to stay while suffering post pural psychosis, didn’t sleep for 10 days kept us all awake and had delusions that she was the virgin Mary, her new born daughter was Jesus Christ and my brother, her husband, was God). She has a great sense of fun and she often will cut little pieces out of newspapers and just hand them to me. Always, ALWAYS they are relevant and humourous.

On the flip side to my absolute love for my mother and her humour, she also manages to drive me completely insane. In fact it is beyond insane. So I regularly take her for her “heavy” shopping to the local Superstore supermarket. This place is HUGE and it has everything in it you could ever want (except when you need something specific you’ll be guaranteed they have either sold out or not been bothered to restock the shelf yet). This escapade usually lasts around four to five hours. We stop and look at everything in the superstore and gradually mark things off the list. The trolley always ends up with more in than had been planned (those clever people at the store and their marketing plans and offers of “2 for the price of 1!” etc).

Since it is me that does the trolley driving, the packing of the bags at the end of the checkout and me who carries the bags to and from the car, I tend to keep control of the trolley. I like to split it in half (or even just reserve ¼) and take a section of the trolley for my own shopping goods. Hey I’m not going to take Mum shopping and just stand there and buy nothing! I have my list too!

So there we are two women, one sadly filling her section of the trolley with the “meal for one” and the other buying in bulk saying, “the more you spend the more you save! I’ll stick it in the freezer – would you like half?” Several hours later we arrive at the checkouts – first the ordeal of picking the right checkout (she has her preference to which checkout employee serves us because some are just plain slow and others are too fast).

We get to the checkout and split the trolley, so her stuff goes on then the little "next customer please" thing goes on the belt, and my shopping goes on next. I then scoot down the end of the checkout to pack the bags. I prefer to do the packing, as I spread the weight evenly across the bags, as when we get out at her place, I'll be carrying the bags. I like to have the weight even so I can load up bags on each arm and not be crippled by one side being heavier than the other. This week, the joy of the checkout, was that the belt wasn’t working so the food wouldn’t move down the belt towards the scanner. The majority of the stuff was already piled onto the belt so we had to go with the checkout that had no moving belt at the back end. So she stays at one end hand pushing the goods down the belt while I bag them up at the other end.

Now I regularly have an issue with the way in which I pack the bags / deal with the checkout end of the supermarket after spending 4 or 5 hours inside there and ALWAYS at this time my nerve ends are fraying and I’m about ready to scream my head off. I like the checkout process to be smooth and hassle free but regularly it is not. Herewith is what can be expected at the checkout of a supermarket when my mother has been taken shopping:

So there we are at the checkout, I pack the bags and start seeing stuff I have in my groceries coming down the belt towards me. She stands up the other end and decides she’s going to randomly pay for some items in my shopping, so she scoots them into her bit on the belt. Sometimes I notice other times I don't, and when I don't its a total pain. I get my groceries bag them up, take her home; drop her and her groceries off MAYBE have a cup of tea (but she will suddenly start to shovel food at me and it adds to the stress - I mean what? she thinks I'm going to waste away or something; with THESE hips?!?) then I toddle off home. Of course I then get home and unpack my groceries to find a bunch of 'essential' things missing.

I have a recipe for new potatoes boiled then crushed drizzled with olive oil, sea salt, crushed black pepper and fennel seeds and then baked. So I go to make it and of course Mum decided she would pay for the fennel seeds and I am without any fennel seeds. Do you think I notice this at the time? Or before I start to make my dinner? Nooo of course not.. I only notice it when the potatoes are smushed and smothered with the oil salt and pepper and ready to be baked. The Fennel seeds are kind of important; they add the oomph to it.

I swear that old people do this as some kind of devious way to ensure their beloved children do actually stay in touch with them (and go see them during the week as well as at weekends). I think there is some kind of OAP conspiracy out there. She attends a "club" every Thursday for OAP's at the local church. Now don't get me wrong, she doesn't go along to the "club" to partake in the activities and to meet other OAP's - she goes there to "work." My mother has worked all her life, now is the time for her to relax, and she can't. She still feels the need to work and so she does. Not that this is a bad thing, she enjoys it far more than socialising with OAP's she vastly prefers the company of young people to "old fogies." However I do think she is rather cunning with the sneak the items on the belt trick. I can't wait to get old, just so I too can be a cunning sly eccentric old fox in the supermarket!

So there you have what it is like to shop with Mother. When I was a kid I would “Watch with Mother” at lunchtimes on my mothers knee while the good old box would show some silly kids thing that was interactive with mothers too. Now I have my own interactive entertainment of “shop with mother” and the interactive part is to watch the sneaky old dear like a hawk or she will filch your shopping!

Diet coke is for fat people....

2004-07-08T13:38:00.000Z

It's been a while again since I have written, I had posts half hashed together to publish but they just didn't seem right somehow.

So, yesterday in the office, the boss came out of his office and declared "Diet coke is for fat people!" in his usual eccentric way of just blurting something out of the blue. I, who was drinking a diet coke at that very moment, picked up an eraser and threw it at him while declaring him to be a cheeky fucker with an invite to visit the car park. He laughed raucously and said "well I'm only repeating what Paris Hilton said when someone offered her one".

I had been thinking about writing a "fat" post here anyway, so it seemed appropriate to tear the delectable Ms Hilton down a peg or two for that comment alone.

When I was a wee young lassie (read 16 - 22) I was a size 8. That is a UK size 8, if you want to go into GAP US sizes knock 4 points off that and call me a size 4. In some ways I liked it, but in many many other ways I really detested being that thin. I had sticky out hip bones and when I wore dresses I looked skeletal. I detested my body and had little to no boobs to speak of. Fried eggs. I thought of myself as horribly unattractive (not least of all because this had been indoctrinated into me from childhood when people discussed me while I was in the room and referred to me as "that horrible child"). Little did I know then what I know now!

So there I was from 16 - 22 a gangly size 8 and as stick thin as the delectable Ms Hilton, but with one big difference. I was never rude and nasty about other people's size or looks. To me, everyone else was simply beautiful. Curvaceous girls with wonderful hour glass figures and ample chests and beautiful straight hair were what I aspired to be like. There was me gangly stick thin, no curves or figure, and with horrific hair that seemed to curl in every damn direction except the way I wanted it to go.

Take for instance Kate Moss; undoubtedly beautiful and the older she gets the better she looks; who looks a tad rough around the edges and not unlike my school bully in her looks (with the exception that Ms Moss is tall and the bully was a shortarse bitch from hell). The thing with Kate is, while facially I looked nothing like her, my body was not dissimilar in that it was all sticky out hip bones and ribs. I look at her and am reminded of that body I once had and I am bloody glad that body is gone.

I would have done anything back then to put some weight on. What I did to try to get the weight on, was eat like a horse and drink lots and lots of 'full fat' coke. I drank oceans of the stuff. At 22 I was living in Sydney and on a tight budget, my usual rum and coke from the bar was much more expensive than a schooner of fosters and so I drank schooner upon schooner of fosters for AU $2 each. And lo! The weight started to go on.

I went out to Australia a size 8 and returned from Australia a size 14 (once again knock 4 off those numbers to get the US Gap Sizes). Almost overnight I went from a 36a to a, well I didn't know what. For the longest time after I got back from Australia I assumed I was a 36b - then I had to be measured for a bra a few years later (actually it was around 1996 and I was in aus around 1989). I was astounded to find I had shot from a B to an E.

Having not given a rats bottom about my weight after realising that I was no longer the gangly sticky out boned thing of my earlier years, and having not really been able to afford new clothes for the longest time; I also discovered at the time of the E cup revelation while buying something to wear for a Christmas party that I had ballooned out to a size 18.

I got a bit upset at that, but not so much because of the size, but because of the total lack of clothes available for people that size. It was all crimpolene and elasticated waist bands; the kind of thing grandmothers wear. So I dieted down to a size 14 on the bottom half, but no matter what I did, I couldn't shift the boobs. These mountains on my chest remained and I discovered a new horror; buying pretty bra's for a large chest is next to impossible unless you visit Rigby & Peller, otherwise you end up with an over the shoulder boulder holder that looks like something that should be attached to a sherman Tank and used as a sling shot. Not only that, the back problems caused by lugging two large bumps on the front of your body are endless. The muscle in my right shoulder has wasted away due to the pressure on the spine in the middle of my back, which is a direct result of lugging these things around with me.

I used to dream of having ample chests, and I tell you this, be careful what you wish for because if you too want bigger boobs trust me, it isn't worth it.

Anyway I digress somewhat, but it is for good reason. To the delectable Ms Hilton, please do continue to drink "full fat" Coke and make your 'oh so witty' remarks about fat people. I shall be at the front of the queue when you balloon in weight from either childbirth or an overdose of your 'full fat' coke and I shall point my finger at you and laugh my arse off. You will have to feed that rat of a dog you lug around with you plenty to make it up to match your future size Ms Hilton, because it happens to the best of us. The only drawback is this, you will no doubt have surgery to remove every last ounce you put on as you can afford such things, but hey when you get old and wrinkled your skin will be so thin from all the stretching it has had to do in your 'youth' from the plastic surgery that you will look like a bag of bones coated in filo pastry.

Careful now, I wouldn't want you to choke on your 'full fat' coke while I, a fat person, sip on my diet coke simply because I prefer the taste.

~ Mully

9 days!

2004-06-25T17:32:00.000Z

9 Days since I last posted! Where ever does the time go?

Well the t-shirt was a resounding success. The boss knew exactly why I was wearing it and pissed himself laughing when I walked in. Laughing too, I just about managed to get out the "It's the story of my life!" line and the artsy fartsy trendies just stared blankly. Not long after, they both snuck off to the kitchen to have a bit of a whisper session ("do you think she knows what we've been saying about her?" "nooo she can't possibly!") were the two lines that were recounted to me by a.n other :P

Anyway so, what else has happened over the last 9 days. Well I went to a reunion of sorts on Wednesday. My old boss from a company I worked for a few years ago (and was probably one of the best bosses I've ever had) called me and said "look it's been ages let's have a beer". So I went along down to sunny Fulham to meet her and another ex colleague from the time who was another manager on the same level as me but in a different department. He and I worked very closely together and at one point, we both fancied eachother like mad, but nothing ever actually came of it.

At the time I was living with my shitbag of a fiance, and although that relationship was coming to a very very swift close, I couldn't have cheated on him (even if he was cheating on me). So, the great fancying eachother thing never came to more than that.

Anyway, over the years we've all met up on and off with irregular abandon. So, I turned up at their office bar and we had a couple of beers. Was nice and also strange at the same time seeing them again and various old colleagues leaving for the night going via the bar to get out the door.

It turns out, that she is leaving her job and going to live in Singapore where her husband has got a new job working for an International Bank. I had no idea about this at all, and had to suffer the cries of "I'm sure I told you!". I got fed up of trying to arrange meeting up, as I'd never get a response other than "yes let's" and I'd say "when are you free?" (bearing in mind she has 3 kids) only to never get a reply. I'd then hear on the grapevine that I was the one being difficult about arranging things /sigh. What more than "OK cool - let's meet! When are you free?!" could one do really? I could perhaps of suggested dates "Ok let's meet on the 23rd?" to get "no can't do that won't be able to get a baby sitter on that day".

Anyway it was a bit like getting blood from a stone to get a date, and it was the same with the colleague that I'd had this fancy in passing with. He is also a bit of a trendy and can be flaky at times.

A few years ago, I was in dire straits (not the band! the situation) and had no job, no money etc was about to be repossessed and declared bankrupt when he called me out of the blue to offer me some work. He wanted me to audit a band's royalty statements, since his are of expertise was Copyright and mine was both Copyright & Royalties. So, I took the job with gratefulness and audited about 4 full years of accounts over one day at his house.

He wanted me to show him how to audit, which I did (stupid me eh?). Turned out he couldn't pay me immediately, until the manager of the band paid him. But he was due to get the money in the middle of the following week and he'd pay me then. So anyway I showed him how to do audits and explained what I was doing and why things stood out as questions and other things stood out as being fine.

So he takes the audit and the statements back to the band's manager, presents it all to him, and the manager is happy. The manager then has the ammo he needs to go back to his record label and demand more money (they had been underaccounted to and paid at the wrong royalty rate for something like 3 of the 4 years worth of audit). So the manager is very happy, and of course highly recommends my friend to others to get work for them. Of course I'd shown him how to do the audits and what to look for, so now he felt it was a piece of cake and he could do this without my assistance again in the future.

Well he got paid by the manager, and not wanting to sound like I was begging I just never contacted him again for the money. A few weeks later he called to say there was a delay with the money but that I'd have it soon. Somehow I just knew at the back of my mind I was never ever going to see that money.

Sure enough, the money never materialised and I didn't call him. About a year and a half later, having gone through my hell and got back on my feet (without his or anyone elses assistance for that matter) I bumped into him at an industry "do". He was rather embarrassed and said he was sorry but that at the time he really needed the money and he'd spent it. I asked him what he'd really needed the money for, bearing in mind that I was desperate for money (I couldn't even afford food) and that I was about to become repossessed and made bankrupt. Well the answer was, that he had arranged to go out clubbing that following weekend and he was waiting for pay day to come in a couple of weeks time. Well he got given this great offer on some drugs and he couldn't resist. So he needed the money to buy happy tabs to take while out clubbing that weekend. Charming.

Well, what goes around comes around as they say. Just before I met up with him and my old boss, he had been told his temp contract with them was going to end in July. He was being pushed. So my old boss had just given him this spectacularly (not) unexpected news (he did know it was coming - the company he is working for currently has many changes afoot. However, he was very upset and very worried about his future. He recently got engaged ("I swear to god I did tell you!" was the reply to "wow it's all happening, one going to Singapore and you getting married what a shocker!") and was applying for a mortgage.

So anyway he's very very upset and suggesting that perhaps I could help him and put him in touch with my contacts and the people I used when I was about to lose everything. I'm not vengeful, perhaps I am stuid, but I did give him some contacts. However the thought did cross my mind of offering him work and not paying him, then perhaps telling him that I'd spend the money on a night out. Nah I wouldn't be that much of a shit to someone.

Anyway, it turned out to be a strange but interesting evening, was semi-fun remembering and recounting old funny stories from "back in the day". Was nice to see them both despite it being a bit strained and odd. I am supposed to be going to her leaving do on the 15th July (if the invite ever turns up with details of where it actually is). That could be an interesting night seeing lots of old faces again.

Well time to sign off on this post, I have more drafted but lots of editing needs doing on news events from over the last week or so. Soon. Very soon!

The Far Side

2004-06-16T15:09:00.000Z

I do love the Far Side cartoons. Gary Larson is a genius! Every day in the London Evening Standard newspaper, a Far Side cartoon is published. So now on to slight digression before I head back to the original reason why this post is called the Far Side..

I do royalty accounting as part of my job, I'm the weirdo in the office, the two trendies think I'm unhappy with life and that I'm a geek. They don't talk to me much except to take the piss out of me (I don't know how to explain "take the piss" to Americans, so if you are an American reading this I guess the closest to it would be "rag on"). Anyway, I find it all quite amusing and as a result I tend to keep myself to myself; in other words I refuse to tell either of them anything at all about my life. This gives them hours of entertainment making up stories about me and gossiping about me with others in the building. The "she's very unhappy in life" line seems to come up a lot. Last week in the kitchen making a coffee, someone popped in and asked me "are you alright?" my reply was "yeah I'm really good thanks, how are you?" The response I got from them was "are you sure?" curious I replied "I'm absolutely postive, why do you ask?". The reply was the not unexpected "Oh I heard that you were having a really shit time in life and just wondered if you were ok". I laughed like a drain and told the person not to believe everything they hear!

Last Saturday I nipped out to the shops in Wimbledon and happened to be in Debenhams department store. There sitting on a low table piled with T-Shirts by "Anthony and (something or other like) Anna in the Department store" designers at Debenhams section was a greeny yellowy t-shirt. Emblazoned across the chest in colourful sequins is the phrase "VERY HAPPY". Well what was a girl to do, other than buy it!?

So, Thursday night sees the launch of some side project album from one of the trendies (actually truth be told I'd rather call them the artsy fartsies - they remind me very much of the loony lefties of the '80's and those people who think a pile of dog poo is actually art) has created. So there are drinks and canapes at some bar or other, and I have decided that I shall waltz into work tomorrow wearing the T-Shirt and announce that it is the story of my life!

Anyway, back on topic as to the reason for The Far Side as the title of this post. So I'm an accountant of sorts I guess. When I was super trendy and superficial back in the early 80's I was a semi punk and certainly a new romantic and probably many other labels could have been stuck on me (except artsy fartsy - I could never bring myself to think that a pile of dog poo is art). So Today in the Standard the Far Side is "Punk Accountants". I shall try to describe it as best I can; 2 guys standing at the back of a lift (elevator for you Americans who don't speak English :P) a woman in front of them with her back to them. Guy on the left wearing a suit jacket and tie, has 2 pens pierced through his nose and a propelling pencil through his ear. Guy on the right has short sleeved shirt (with the arms rolled up) with stripey tie glasses and a moustache, caclulator hanging from his pierced ear, bare arm (holding a briefcase) with the tattoo "Add, subtract and die!" emblazoned on it.

So maybe describing it isn't quite the same as seeing it, but I have chopped it out and stuck it on the wall behind my desk. I shall keep up the appearance of the "eccentric" person in the office and yell "ADD, SUBTRACT, AND DIE!" at all who pass by! :D

Ahh how I love the Far Side!

~ Mully

Choices? an old post revisted

2004-06-16T14:32:00.000Z

The below is taken from a post I made on a message board on 13th May 2004. Unfortunately it got completely railroaded immediately by someone who took this post to be just another American bashing post. I tried to point out later, that had I used 2 different scenarios as a comparison of people who have made choices to do extreme things perhaps it may have been better understood.

Instead, the other poster continued on the same vein, totally missing what was represented therein. If you don't want to read this as the two specific extremes below, take in it's place the murder of Jonbennet Ramsay and the case of the woman who was unable to conceive but so desperate for a baby, she killed a pregnant woman in her garage and cut the unborn baby from her. Or substitute the two examples with two other prominent cases of people making very extreme choices in life.

Anyway, the post isn't made to deliberately offend Americans (irrespective of my own anti-war views) or indeed anyone else. It is merely conjecture on my part and the shock of seeing that video, just made me wonder exactly what the hell it is that makes people make choices that lead them along life's path to end up where these people did. Yes the post is repetetive and I hope you can bear with it long enough to reach the end.

Anway enough of the introduction / disclaimer part and on with the original post:

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This is a long post. Apologies in advance if any of you can stand to read it.

Choices.

The world is full of choices.

How do I begin even putting this down into the written word? I have no idea other than to just let my fingers run over the keyboard and put forth what is in my mind right now. It may come across as disjointed, I hope it doesn't.

I watched the video of Nick Berg’s murder. He sits there and calmly tells us who he is, who is parents are, his brother, his sister and where he lives. What was going through his mind at that moment, none of us will ever know. Hopefully what was going through his mind was a nice memory of each of the people he names and the place that he names too. The video cuts and shows us his captors crying out in the name of Allah, their truths. Why do I say "their truths?" Because to them what they are saying is true. They believe it 100%; to them it is true. Then they murder him, in the name of what they believe in. They took the life of another human being in a barbaric way in the name of truth. They treated him like that, and they believe that by treating another human being like that, it was helping their cause; that it was just and right.

Now I switch to the recent pictures and stories of what went on at Abu Gharib jail.

The pictures I saw, showed Private Lynddie England with an unnamed Iraqi citizen on a dog leash, dragged along the floor. Another showed her, with a cigarette hanging out of her mouth and a wide grin on her face, pointing, as if she were holding a rifle, at the genitals of another Iraqi citizen, naked and hanging his head in humiliation. A third showed hooded Iraqi men, naked and piled on top of each other in contorted positions and Private Lynddie England and another male soldier grinning with their thumbs up in a "right on!" gesture. I was unable to see from the photograph if the pile of bodies were dead or alive. They believed that what they were doing was 100% right, that it was all part of the cause and that treating other human beings like that was helping the bigger picture. They believed that what they were doing, by treating other human beings like that, it was helping their cause; that it was just and right and true. That was their truth.

The two issues above are fact. There is no disputing that.

The Al Quaida members that decapitated Nick Berg had some choices along the way. Take one single one of those individuals and look closely. He is a human being too. Now look very very closely at how a human being can behave the way that he did. How does a baby grow into a boy, then into a man and then go on to commit a barbaric act? How does this happen?

From childhood to manhood that person made choices. Every single moment every human makes choices. Each choice takes them on a different path until they reach the next choice, which carves out a further trail along a path, until eventually we end up at the end of our lives. WTF led him to make a choice that extreme?

Take a look at Lynddie England, how did a girl from a small town in the USA end up photographed committing acts and admitting on film to much, much worse that she could not discuss. How did a baby grow into a girl, then on into a woman and then go on to commit a barbaric act. How does this happen?

From childhood to womanhood she made choices. Again every single moment every human has and makes choices. Each choice taking them on a different path until they reach the next choice, which carves out the trail along a path that leads us to the end of our lives. WTF led her to make a choice that extreme?

You may cry out "oh but what Lynddie England did is in no way barbaric by comparison to what they did to Nick Berg!"

Think hard before you say that. Think very very hard. The key to that is "by comparison".

Both the acts of the reservists in Abu Gharib jail and the captors of Nick Berg were extreme. There is no comparison. Extreme is extreme no matter how you look at it.

OK so next the excuses start coming.

The excuses of Nick Berg's captors is that "well we tried to offer him up in exchange for some of the captives inside Abu Gharib jail and we were refused so we killed him to make a point"

The excuses of Private Lynndie England are "well we were ordered to do that so we did and we didn’t know what the Geneva Convention was."

Ultimately, no matter what excuses are made for either act; there are no excuses. There are NO excuses for making the choices we make. There is no one else to blame other than the individuals involved in both cases. They had a choice, they could have said no, but they didn't. The blame lies squarely at their own feet.

I don't give a shit WHO you work for. Whether you work for a terrorist organisation or an army, every single individual has choices.

The choices of Nick Berg's captors were to keep him, let him go or kill him and revel in the glory of being video'd committing that act while whooping and cheering at "helping the bigger cause". They chose the latter.

The choices of Lynndie England were ask for a transfer, bring the despicable acts going on inside that jail to a higher authority, refuse the orders and take her chances with a court martial, or follow the orders and revel in the glory of being photographed committing acts while whopping and cheering at "helping the bigger cause." She chose the latter.

What would you have done in those circumstances?

Are you going to say that you wouldn't have done either of those acts? Are you really going to be able to say with 100% conviction that you, under the right circumstances, would not ever commit an act of barbarian proportions?

I know that I can't. I know that I cannot guarantee that under the right circumstances that I, as a human being, would not ever commit a barbaric act. Whether it is in the name of protecting someone I love, or in the name of anti terrorism or some other truth that I believe in 100%.

And it is this, which shakes me to the core.

None of us know truly how we would act under certain circumstances. Oh yes, we can all say "I'd never do that, that's horrible!" but not one of us will ever know until we are in those circumstances. Thankfully, the majority of us will never know and will never have to face a situation where we will find out for sure one way or the other.

I don't believe the most dangerous weapons of mass destruction are Nuclear, Chemical or Biological. I believe the most dangerous weapons of mass destruction are Fear, Hatred and Anger. Jealously can fit in there too, as it is as destructive as the other three. You just have to look at the events over the last week or so to see what Fear, Hatred and Anger have created.

Mans capacity for inhumanity to man knows no bounds.

I walked around today, looking at people at work and wondering how they would behave under certain circumstances. Would they too behave in a barbaric manner? I don't know, but what I do know is that my sadness over mans capacity for inhumanity to man is deeper than any well on earth. It makes me want to lock myself away, and never have human contact again. It scares me that, under the right circumstances, I too could act in such a way.

The only thing I know for sure in all of this, is that it is going to get much worse before it gets better.

~ Mully

Hooray for iTunes!

2004-06-16T00:45:00.000Z

Today, after a rocky path, sees the launch of iTunes for Europe. Well ok, not ALL of Europe; but the UK, France and Germany.

The service was originally due to start back in April, but due to some technical hitches (they hadn't begun to seek licensing for the downloads) it was pushed back. So the last couple of weeks saw a totally mad rush for them to get the service finally sorted out.

A friend in a record label was working ungodly hours to prepare the product into the correct format for iTunes (including cover scans) and assured me June 15th was THE day. Then finally, at the back end of last week, Steve Jobs decided to visit the Performing Rights Society in London for a meeting with the PRS board to discuss the licensing. Well what a palava that was! They hashed out a deal and arranged central licensing, when SACEM (the French society) got wind of the negotiations and decided they wanted to be part of it. So right up to the last minute things looked shaky for the launch on 15th June.

Finally a deal was agreed and YIPEEEE the launch was today! I've been waiting for this for a while now. I bought an iPod in January after returning from a Christmas holiday in Australia and suffering iPod envy as everyone in Sydney seemed to have one. I already used iTunes, but finally managed to buy a 40gig iPod to stuff my music onto. I'm so fed up of buying complete albums that have some songs on that I detest. Out of principle I would never download for free using the whole napster / limewire peer to peer thing, since it would be immoral for me to do so. My job is Copyright protection and Royalties management, therefore I couldn't justify to myself that I am working to recover money for songwriters and stealing their music at the same time!

Having lost my will to play vinyl records (and not even owning a turntable anymore) I can finally replace my oceans of vinyl with tracks from iTunes music store. My first purchases were 6 tracks by Big Audio Dynamite. So tomorrow on my journey to work, I shall be rocking along to B.A.D! Oh the memories of those tracks from the '80's! I can't wait.

~ Mully

Welcome to Blogdom

2004-06-15T18:23:00.000Z

So, today I finally decided to start my blog. Shame really, I should have started this back in March when I just started out playing Lineage II. I was full of awe and inspiration from a new game on the market. L2 was inspirational, a joy, something fresh and fun.

Not only that, I discovered I had hidden deep inside me a monster of a sassy personality that made this woman ROAR! Someone was killstealing from me? I would MAKE them apologise! Someone was cursing at me, I'd make them wash their mouth out with imagined soapy water. I suddenly had very large cajones!

It was exciting and funny as hell when I'd put someone in their place to see them whimper and cower; something that was a first for me. A very odd feeling. I had thought back then that I should write a diary of my game times, the good the bad and the downright filthy, dirty, ugly! However, I failed to begin it.

So here I am almost 2 months later, having written to the Better Business Bureau about the marketing ploy that suggested NCSoft would release Chronicle 1 after the open beta. Having submitted a petition to be treated shabbily by a CSR, then to put in a complaint about the CSR's response and to ask for further information in relation to my petition; a month passed by and I thought "hmm ok so they are busy, they will get to me soon". Another month almost passed and the only response was from the original CSR to pick up the email saying "sorry we are swamped, apologies for the delayed response".

Stonewalled by customer services. I love the game, really I do, but I refuse point blank to continue to line the pockets of the shoddiest customer service I have ever had the displeasure to deal with.

Even British Midland Airlines customer service was better than that (and trust me I had a terrible time with BMI in January of this year - 48 hours to return to London from Nice in a Kafkaeske situation of monumental proportions!).

Even UBI Soft's customer service was better for that disasterous game Shadowbane. Maybe you can't relate to the BMI CS but most gamers can certainly relate to the Shadowbane farce.

Anyway, welcome to my blogdom!

~ Mully