Everyone eats when they come to my house

On 4th September 2009 I became the proud possessor of my present home. Today (almost one year later) I had the house warming party. I'd invited about 50 family and friends plus the people from work and tried to cater for about 35 hungry people. In the end about 20 turned up and no matter how hungry they were, they couldn't finish the food!

On top of this the weather decided not to co-operate. Yesterday was sunny with a light wind, today we had gale force winds and torrential rain. Admittedly it did stop raining around 4:30 but only because the blisteringly cold winds blew away the clouds and with them one of the gazebos providing shelter. My poor dad and my cousin-in-law M spent their afternoon cooking in the smokey but freezing cold garden while everyone else relaxed in my living room. Of course, there was a lot of movement once the food was ready and, for a short period, people sat or stood in the garden eating and talking.

Now everyone has gone home, most of them with doggy bags, the washing up is done and stuff is sorted out. All I have to do tomorrow is cook and freeze all the leftover food!

New Blog

Just a quickie to tell you about a new blog, started by my cousin's dog Milo.

Now she calls him a dog, I call him a rat dog. He's a cross between a Jack Russel and a Chihuahua and has not inherited the best characteristics of either breed but he's bright and playful and he has a point of view.

Read about it at It's a dog's life!

Enjoy!

Walking redux

You may remember some time ago, I told you about my plan to complete the Playtex Moonwalk (an overnight, walked marathon). I have been training to this end.

Now, being more than a little overweight, I can't leap into walking ten miles a night with an extra ten on Saturday - my knees and hips wouldn't allow me. However, I have been walking 4 miles at a go and, for the last couple of weeks, doing that twice a week. I've been greatly helped in this by my friend R who 'persuades' me to go for a walk, even when I don't want to. My time isn't getting any faster (I still walk at about 3 mph) but I do feel less terrible afterwards.

The first couple of weeks entailed me not being able to walk properly the next day, and having all my lower joints creaking in protest. That has definitely eased up and I can now walk to the point of being breathless but able to carry on a conversation for most of the hilly four miles we cover. Believe it or not, I do enjoy these walks, though it is an effort to get out of the house once I'm home.

This week, however, has been a little troublesome as I seem to have picked up a tummy bug which is going around the school (although I haven't taken time off work - finances say NO). This means I've only done the one walk due to my need to be near a toilet! Thought you'd like to know that.

The other sad thing (for me, that is) is that R is moving on in few weeks time, now obviously that is great for her (and something she really deserves) but I'll be left to my own devices (and powers of persuasion). So I've bought a small mp3 player and I'm loading it up with songs - about eleven hours worth - to keep me occupied on the walks that I will be doing!

Keep your fingers crossed for me.

The Hairiness of Cars

Some time last year my dad gave me his car. It is a P-reg Polo and I call her Little Red. She's not so little and more pink than red but I love her and she loves me.

Since getting her I've had to pay a fair amount of money on the MoT and tax. I haven't had to pay for insurance yet as the car is still in my dad's name and I'm a named driver - however that is due to be renewed soon and that's when the official handover of ownership will happen (I've been saving me pennies, 'onest guv).

To the hairiness. I was out with my friend R a couple of weekends ago, we went to a DIY store to buy a garden fork as R was going to help me with the garden (more on that in another post). As R was putting some of her things in the boot she asked me whether my car had sucked up a dead cat. I looked at her, I looked at the back of the car where she was pointing. Coming out of the exhaust pipe was what looked like half a dead cat (or squirrel or possibly small hairy dog). Feeling a little worried - after all I live on an ASBO estate and anything could happen - I pulled said hair out of the exhaust... and it kept on coming, like the thing from the black lagoon. It looked like hair extensions - maybe there was a dead chav up there, who knows?

After pulling out about two metres of hair, I began to get worried, maybe all this hair was supposed to be in there, so I phoned my brother S. "Push it all back in," he said, "it's probably part of your catalytic converter." "Um..." said I. "Don't worry if you can't push it back in, the car will still work." he reassured me. For the next few days I drove around with a pony tail of hair trailing from my exhaust. Other cars kept a respectful distance, being not quite sure what was going on.

However, I couldn't continue like that. While Little Red was still working well, she was becoming more noisy and more reluctant to put up with my driving, so last week I went into the garage. Turns out the hair was the sound insulation from the back box of the exhaust (hence the increased noise). One day later the problem was solved (no sweeties for me that week), although the reluctance to put up with my driving does have me worried - maybe Little Red is letting me know she needs valeting!

My life is not interesting at the moment...

Again, it's over a month since I last wrote. Shame, deep shame, on me.

So, here are a few of the subjects that I will be updating you on over the next few days:
my power walking
my garden
my car (and it's apparent hairiness)
my plans for the end of August
my plans for September and beyond
my photos
the taxman
dating

Well that should keep me going for a week and, who knows, something interesting may happen by then!