And people get paid to write this?

According to Shane Watson in the Sunday Times, by aged 25 I should have achieved the following:


- Achieved party notoriety/a groovy look — like Alice Dellal
- Travelling stripes (outside Europe)
- A tattoo or nonregulation piercing
- Have talked to a genuine celebrity
- Have DJed, gone out with a DJ or sung backing vocals
- Had at least one serious boyfriend
- Worked as a waitress/in a bar
- Proficiency in an instrument or sport
- Discovered your best feature
- Got serious about photography

And want people to say: “You’ve done an incredible amount for your age”

I am 27. I have a hole in my tummy button where I used to wear a bar until it got too annoying banging into my desk which was the same height (how middle aged) and I obviously have had at least one serious boyfriend given that I get married in three months time. I have travelled outside Europe and done well at things but it seems I have failed because I have not dated a DJ, discovered my best feature or talked to a genuine celebrity...

And what do I have to look forward to? Well, by 35 I should have:-

- Been head-hunted for a new job
- Been taken to lunch by your boss
- Been on a business trip abroad
- Lived abroad
- Bought your own flat
- Been bought jewellery by a man
- Socialised outside your age group
- Hatched a plan for your own business
- Successfully negotiated a pay rise
- Discovered your signature style
- Discovered the importance of women
- Established a shoe collection

And want people to say: “You could do anything you set your mind to”

Well, I have managed 3 of them. Looks like I have got a bit of work to do...

Seriously, I can't believe people get paid to write this. And in The Times as well.

One quote, 2 ways

Now, I may have watched the X-Factor once or twice but in general I do not care who wins nor the news/entertainment stories which surround it. I was interested in this though, which I am sure I first noticed on the BBC but can find no mention of it anymore. Quite why last years winner cares which singer wins is beyond me, but it seems odd that she is quoted as saying something in two different ways... (and for the record, I am sure that I read the Heat version on the BBC on Monday although their article mentions nothing now)

“It was a real shocker this week,” says Leona Lewis. “I wasn't outraged, screaming at the TV and stuff, but I was surprised.” (Heat Magazine)

Leona Lewis, last year's winner expressed her surprise at the outcome saying: "I was outraged, screaming at the TV and stuff. I was surprised." (Daily Telegraph)

And Leona Lewis, last year's winner, and Lily Allen have expressed their surprise at the outcome, with Lewis saying: "I was outraged, screaming at the TV and stuff. I was surprised." (Press Association report).

Or maybe I shouldn't be surprised at all. I'm sure newspapers edit quotes to fit their stance. It would just usually, to my mind, be Heat that sensationalised something rather than the Telegraph.

Sunshine and housewives

When is the last time I saw some sunshine? I need some sunshine in my life. Everything is so grey, even the jumpers I am wearing are grey. It is cold, chilly, too chilly for the second week of September. Where is the Indian summer that we were promised to compensate for the greyest August on record?

I am practising being a house wife. We picked blackberries at the weekend, two bagfuls. Thankfully we had Lily the dog with us. Dogs = plastic bags (unused). We brought home, well, back to the holiday cottage, two large food bags bursting with sweet smelling carefully picked purply-black ripe blackberries and I made them into blackberry goo. Perhaps it has a proper name but I do not know it. The blackberry goo is now in the freezer. Back in London I made applesauce. Two carrier bags of Shropshire garden apples. I cut and cored and peeled and persuaded M to help as well. We made a pressure cooker full of apple sauce. The apple sauce too is in the freezer, in small Tupperware boxes. Next weekend when friends come for Sunday lunch I shall make some pastry and fill it with home made apple and blackberry goo. And make custard to go with it. On Tuesday I made banana and ginger and chocolate muffins with some left over bananas, a bit of ginger and the ends of two packets of Green & Blacks dark chocolate. I went to open the cake-tin to put the cooled muffins in but it was already occupied by some white furry mould and what might have been the end of something else I made a few weeks ago. The muffins are now in a Tupperware jug. I think I need some more practice.

Not feeling terribly inspired this week, I have to say. One of those weeks where work is a little dull and you feel rather tired all the time. This cross blogging is also a little strange as I am not sure where I should place this post. Perhaps I will be lazy and cut and paste it onto both...

We did manage to do some more to the flat this weekend though, in amongst some dinners and a birthday party. We have reorganised what we call the 'garden' room (i.e. it opens onto the garden and there is no other obvious use for it) so that it flows better and I have a space now to do wedding (and hopefully not wedding related) craft and diy projects. We have also done a lot of de-cluttering - we have got rid of another 2 bags full of old clothes on free cycle as well as a bread bin and we threw away another 2 boxes of paper recycling and some assorted odds and ends which were not in good enough repair to be passed on.

The bedroom looks more like a proper room too now. Previously we have had both the doors open but one of them blocked off by a chair. We eventually decided this weekend to just close the door and use the space for storage, placing the chair in front. I hadn't anticipated what a difference it would make but the room looks much larger now. We have also put all the books back in the sitting room, recycled a good proportion of our 'sentimental' wine bottle collection and put up a print on the wall as well as bringing in some candles and finding places for all the clothes. Where once someone commented "is that a bedroom, or the world's largest cupboard" on peering round the folding doors which separate the bedroom and sitting room, it is now clearly a bedroom, and a relaxing one too.

Our next task I think will have to be the bathroom. Sorting out all our clothes meant that there is a huge mound of laundry as you cannot put something in a drawer which is not clean. Sadly we have had a rainy weekend so I didn't manage to dry any washing outside and the dehumidifier has already pulled 2 and half litres of water out of the air (recycled straight into the watering can) so it might well have to be a trip to the laundrette at the top of the road. Alternate weeks of hot and then rainy weather have doubled or even tripled the mould growth on the ceiling above the shower, so we need to clean it all off and then paint it with some anti-mould paint. Once the washing has gone and the mould, I think it should feel emptier and lighter in there. Larger than our old Primrose Hill bathroom, but it is still definitely tiny.

This & That

Our house guests might have departed but reminders of them remain; I used my clothes brush to remove an entire fistful of fur from the arm chair in the sitting room and every time I sneeze at night previously invisible hairs rise off the bedspread in a cloud. A freshly washed, ironed and clothes brushed pair of navy suit trousers still covered in white hairs. Stray pieces of litter behind the wine boxes in the hallway, a remnant of Louis' over excited digging; a discarded biscuit behind the bin in the kitchen.

Our feline house guests may have departed but it was a busy weekend for human ones. A quiet roast dinner on Friday evening with BestFriend turned into her sleeping over on the sofa. We spent a companionable Saturday morning cleaning and turning chicken bones into stock before she departed for some flat hunting mid afternoon. As one guest left another arrived, this time for a dinner party we hosted in honour of a university friend leaving to join his girlfriend in Stockholm at the end of the month. M cooked a beautiful if time consuming beef in borollo dish. Sunday saw him turn the stock from Saturday into demi-glas which has now been frozen in an ice cube tray - the basis for many more lovely meals in the future. Another dinner on Sunday, this time at someone else's house and an opportunity for M to finish watching The Wire in preparation for the delivery of the OC (series 4) this week. Tonight M is watching football and I shall be hiding in the bedroom for The Apprentice followed by as much OC as I can fit in before bed.

Overheard at lunchtime...

On trying to ingratiate oneself with the partners of a law firm: "I attended University of Columbia, before that the Spence School. Of course, I was at school with Gwyneth Paltrow. I'm a year older than her." "Are you friends with her then?" "We see each other at Spence School functions...could get her as a client. Their marriage is good though. He, Chris Martin, is really down to earth...cares for the kids". "Well, I'll certainly bring it up at the next partners meeting."

On finding adult children too needy: "He rang me when we were on holiday to say that he'd punctured the fridge with a knife whilst he was defrosting it, and what should he do? We can't even go away by ourselves without them ringing up. The other one rang from her honeymoon in the Maldives to say that she was worried she was depressed. She doesn't know the meaning of depressed..."

Playing Detective

Reading the Times AlphaMummy blog has convinced me that I know one of the regular commenters. She has given enough detail about her life (divorce, number of children, some of their ages, high paid job, being back at work after only 2 weeks after the birth of her first child) that I am sure that she is a lawyer with whom I used to sing in the London Lawyers Chorus. If she is, and I am right, it is further proof that it is a small world. The most annoying thing though is that I will never know whether or not I am right.

Hospital Tales Part 3

Back to the hospital for another scan today. Same hospital; different department. Last week I wrote about the problems with administration which I encountered. Over the weekend I went for a drink with some friends, a group which included one who works for the NHS. "How do you find the administration in your hospital?" I asked her, explaining that at the hospital I go to I had found it lacking. "Appalling" she replied cheerfully, considering the wine list in the bar that we were in. "Last week", she continued, pointing to a bottle, "we had a live donor op. You know, kidney passing from mother to daughter, or whatever". I nodded, both in agreement to the wine and also concurring that I was following her story. "Well, the donor was on the table in theatre when suddenly someone realised that the donee had a temperature and was still on the ward". She ordered the bottle and the bar man handed me the glasses, "someone had forgotten to write it down and pass on the message". We went to sit down and she ended, "still, at least they hadn't started cutting" and poured the wine.

So it was with some surprise that I found myself back on the street a mere 10 minutes after the scheduled time for my scan. Granted, the department was much larger than the one I visited last week, being an entire outpatients department rather than simply a clinic, with a much more ordered reception desk, queuing system, note system. In fact, the whole system seemed far superior to that of the clinic upstairs, perhaps simply because these staff appeared familiar with theirs and knew (or appeared at the very least) what was going on. Anyway, I arrived with ten minutes to spare, presented my letter, my notes were found and details checked. I had just sat down to read whilst waiting and I was called in. It was over and done with in ten minutes and I was free to leave. I was so surprised I didn't know what to do with myself.

So I called a friend who works from home and went to his house and am sitting drinking tea, playing with his cats and waiting for him to finish work so we can go and watch another friend's band this evening.

Ladybird

It is what seems like another day in an endless stream of grey and rainy days; cold, damp and miserable. Walking home last night it could have been November were it not for the sudden strong scent of wet blossom glistening in the orange light of the street lamps. This small reminder that spring is on her way provided a small amount of compensation for my wet muddy feet which left little sock prints all down the hall when I finally returned home.

Yet Saturday will not be remembered solely for the rain or the fact that I went all the way to the Tate to sit in the members cafe and count the cranes on the sky-line. No, Saturday for me will be remembered as the day I ate a ladybird and realised just why they are so brightly coloured.

More hospital tales

Arrived at hospital for appointment at 10am at 9.55am. Waited at reception counter for a few minutes until it was my turn. There were several administration staff at the desk, all equally incompetent, rifling pieces of paper attempting to look efficient but becoming increasingly flustered. "I've got an appointment at 10am" I said and she finally found my name of a piece of paper and started filling in the form. "Can I check your details?" she asked and proceeded to reel off my personal information, all correct. Until she reached my GP surgery, which was the old one. "Sorry", I said, "that's the old one. I wrote a letter to you to tell you the new details". She looked annoyed "I wasn't here that day" she replied, although I had said nothing about when I sent the letter. I gave her the new details although given the early time of day and my tired state I accidentally said "x x surgery" instead of health centre. I was instructed to take a seat and wait for my appointment so I asked how long the wait would be. Obviously I wasn't expecting a precise time but I was a little surprised to find that they were still on the 9.05am appointments and it was now 10.10am. I called work, explained the situation and sat down to read my book. After a few minutes the administrator accusingly called me to the desk: "You said x x surgery but it is actually x x health center. I have found it now" (implication that this was my fault although I had attempted to update records via letter), "we have updated your hospital record but not this scan clinic record. I have updated it now for you". Which is presumably why my GP never received the results of the last scan and why, after the scan which finally happened at 11am or so, I asked the consultant if I could take the letter to my GP myself. He agreed. Presumably he too has witnessed the inefficiency of the administrators.

Laughter

Bought some new liquid soap type thing for the shower. Laughter, it says, "conjures up the early evening paseo, when bathed and refreshed after a day on the beach, locals enjoy a leisurely stroll along the Spanish sea front. An uplifting blend of lime, rosemary and juniper enlivened by an unexpected sweet, spicy bite of ginger carried in the breeze".

Sounds a lot better than plain old body wash, non?

Little Miss Rachel

Little Miss Rachel - It came directly from my comments box, but I decided that it fitted rather too well. All week my blog has been bothering me; the line between anonymity and the personal too close for comfort. "Anonymity is the personal blogger's best friend. Lose it at your own peril" warned Petite Anglais, far too late for it to be any use to me.

I haven't achieved notoriety, fame or a book-deal but I haven't exactly managed the anonymity thing very well either. All my family know of it's presence (lurking rather menacingly in the background, providing a slightly irritating self conscious commentary on things, as I know people read it and everyone knows I write it). My name is in fact, my name. Rather dull, rather personal. Little Miss Rachel still involves my name (as I can't really escape it now), but it is more than my name. It conveys, somehow, that it is all about me. Which it seems to be, more and more these days. Not in a good way though, not in a way that I attempt; to give an 'interesting' insight into my life. My posts come across more as rants or insipid descriptions of parties attended, books read. I need to inject something more interesting, something which is more worthwhile reading back into the text.

But somehow, it just doesn't work. So whilst I try and recover from my blogger's block I thought I'd update the template instead.

Highbury Barn

A late finish at work last night so arranged to meet M for a drink. We had thought we might try out the Highbury Barn pub on Highbury Park as it had been listed among the gold award winners for a beer and pub award in the Evening Standard. We were sorely disappointed. It lacked any atmosphere, had surly looking men occupying tables individually, the bar maid was using the back of her hand to wipe her nose and in response to my request she shouted "Maa-rrk, how do I make a bloody mary" across the bar. We left. And then stumbled upon a lovely Italian restaurant where we managed to get a starter, 2 main courses and beers for about £20 between us which we ate quickly, hungrily and companiably.

As we left the restaurant at about 10.30pm the rain began. Slow spots at first, but it was pouring by the time we reached the house 5 minutes later. With the rain lashing and the wind howling we made a dash for our door. Only to realise that the morning brought recycling day and we needed to get our Christmas tree to the edge of the property. We dragged it outside and M walked to the shop to buy some milk whilst I tidied up. As M dried off I made milky coffees with our new coffee machine and we settled down on the sofa to watch Breakfast at Tiffany's (for research purposes only, you understand, for the hen party that I am organising). Actually, it is one of my favourite films and I am only to happy to have an excuse to watch it again.

End of the Year

It is my birthday tomorrow. I could get used to three day weeks followed by a weekend of parties involving all of my friends. Work has been busy but it has been nice to be back (and even nicer knowing it was only three days). It is the sign of the right job I think when you are pleased to be there. Obviously I very much enjoyed my time off but it would not be special if it happened all the time. I am now back at work until the first week of February whereon we are off to Finland for a week for a wedding. It is becoming something of a trend (if 3 years in a row can be termed a trend) of taking a holiday in February or March. In 2006 we went to the French/Italian border to go snowboarding. In 2007 we spent 2 weeks in Morocco. In 2008 we shall spend a week in Finland. It is rather nice having something to look forward to in that dull patch between the excitement of Christmas/New Year/Birthday and the arrival of spring. It is also nice to get some sunshine, winter or otherwise, or at least a break from the London rain. We didn't even get a dusting of snow as promised by the weatherman here in London yesterday, just some bloody cold drizzle around lunchtime.

Now, since this blog is supposedly about parties and book reviews I perhaps should get round to writing some more. Christmas has always traditionally been a time in our house where many books are exchanged and read. This year has been no exception, although so far I have read far more non-fiction than fiction. My stocking contained several books including one from the Caper Court series by Caro Fraser which I had not read. As she also published the 7th last November I shall be trying to track that one down too. I used some present money to buy Debrett's Etiquette for Girls (Fleur Britten) and A Girl for All Seasons (Camilla Morton) both of which were enjoyable reads, the former being a lot more accurate than the latter (Morton appears to think that 1918 was during the Second World War, which didn't exactly endear me to the remainder of the text). Last night I finished reading The Insider by Piers Morgan (tag line - the private diaries of a scandalous decade). It was an interesting read and I couldn't decide if Morgan was simply embracing his role as a tabloid editor or was in fact an arrogant p***k. Or a combination of the two. Without reading the combined diaries the Blairs, Campbell, Murdoch, Wade, various members of the Royal Family and many many others it is hard to say whether or not he portrayed private meetings accurately but he seemed to embody the phrase "if you don't ask, you'll never know".

And for his next trick...

... he will perform the same one that a friend of his did at a wedding which caused a Bishop to have a heart-attack and be wheeled out of the reception. Last night I went to a friends house for a pre-Christmas meal. One of the other guests is a magician. Over a glass of mulled wine in the kitchen he mentioned the Bishop story and I asked him which trick the friend had done. Actually, he said, the trick was part of his routine and would I like to see it. Of course I said yes. So, after the meal (beautiful shepherds pie, just in case you were wondering) Magician Friend began his routine. He asked me to pick a card and he made it appear from various places. He then asked me to sign it and made it jump around all over the place, including appearing from inside a zipped compartment of his wallet, which was inside his coat pocket. Finally, he got me to hold the entire deck of cards between my hands, extracted my signed card from between my closed hands, showed it to me and then casually remarked that actually, he'd turned all the cards into a block of glass. No really, he had. Would I like to open my hands. With a distinct sense of dread and adrenaline, I opened my hands. No cards but a block of perspex. No wonder the Bishop had a heart-attack. I almost had one myself. Amazing. I was filled with a mix of wonder (apparently I watched the whole routine looking like a small child) and humiliation that I had sat in front of a room full of people and allowed myself to be tricked. Magician Friend gave me my signed six of clubs and I have pinned it to the notice board to remind myself of the day I went out for supper and someone managed to swap a deck of cards for a block of glass within my closed hands under my very nose and I didn't even notice.

Christmas Preparations (Part 2)

A fleeting visit to Shropshire this weekend. Returned to London late last night having spent the weekend looking after M's Grannie. His parents are away on the other side of the world visiting relatives so it was decided that buying them a Christmas tree would be a good use of the afternoon and that it would be a nice thing for them to come home to. We got into the car and drove towards Shrewsbury, hoping to come across somewhere selling trees. With surprising ease we found somewhere and helped M's Grannie across the rather uneven ground. If she had started gesturing with her stick I wouldn't have been surprised. We were after one which wouldn't shed it's needles but it was hard to spot them among the motley collection of spruces which were already showing signs of going brown and dry at the bottoms. We sized up a fair few before we settled on the one we bought. The polar opposite to the tree which we chose for our own house - where ours is a deep green fir, bushy and rotund the tree we bought yesterday was a much paler greeny green, tall with dense but sparse branches which will make decorating it much easier. At over 7 foot high it just managed to be persuaded into the car; in situ it looks rather fine, reminiscent somehow of a desert plant.

Christmas Preparations

We bought our Christmas tree yesterday, from a Christmas Tree 'forest' near Highbury. We went there on the off-chance, the tail end of a busy 24 hours. We had a meal with friends on Saturday night, complete with crackers and silly hats. B made the roast, M provided the wine and I brought some home made mince pies (mince meat and all). We drank wine and talked and played poker and ended up sitting round drinking vodka and coke from pint glasses and watching the Hatton fight. About 7 hours later I ate 'breakfast' in the Hummingbird Bakery in South Kensington before going to the Golden Age of Couture exhibition at the V&A. After meeting M after he finished work we passed the Christmas trees on the way home and went in. We wandered up and down the rows of trees wondering which one was the one for us. A teeny tiny one? Not much value for money. An enormous one for our enormously high ceilings? No, too heavy for M to carry home. We ummed and ahhed over sizes, varieties, stands and the overall costs. Should we have the one that looked rejected. Should we have a living one? In the end we chose a medium sized one with bushy branches which M was able to carry home with (relative) ease. We managed to screw the base on and clear a space by the end of the sofa and I even managed to plug the lights in before the tree was in situ. Once the lights were on and the 5 decorations which we own were hanging on the tree I felt positively Christmassy and even heated up some mulled wine.

Tonight I plan to make some more decorations for the tree by drying slices of orange and hanging them with red ribbon. I will be doing this just as soon as I have bought a punch bag.

This & That

Hopefully I will have some more time next week. The Fulham WI Ball which I have been mentioning all year is this Saturday evening - the past week or so has been manic trying to tie up all the loose ends but I think we are winning and it should be a good night and raise lots of money for our chosen charity at the same time.

Also this week I have been writing for ETPMagazine where my article about ethical jewellers Ingle & Rhode was published on Monday. My second article for the current affairs section should be published on 12 December.

Oh, and if you are looking for a beautiful Christmas present or simply a chic treat for yourself, have a look at Eric Bompard cashmere, cashmere all the way from Mongolia, styled in Paris. They are, apparently, the number one cashmere supplier/designer in France and will deliver items free to the UK. And, if you order before the 1 December they will deduct 20% off your bill. I have a beautiful pumpkin coloured set of hat and gloves which are very soft - even on the tube my head did not itch - and just right for an English winter (warm and cheerful). Something to smile about on a rather dull London Friday.

Yorkshire

Arrived back in London last night on the 11.58pm train into Euston from Yorkshire. We drove the first part of the journey, winding across the Yorkshire Dales along narrow one laned roads, white metal fencing along some of the fields just visible in the glow of the headlights. There was that same safe feeling which I had as a child, cosied into the back of our trusty Volvo with my two sisters, Mum and Dad in the front, Dad driving, Mum navigating and handing out cups of tea and sandwiches, when we were all together and could have been going anywhere, a voyage, an adventure. Last night was much the same, only now, still eldest but now smallest, I have to sit in the middle seat and the third occupant of the back seat was M rather than my other sister. As we drove, the snow started, softly at first, as if it hardly meant it. Sleet turned into snow and as we left the Dales behind and headed down the motorway it started to strengthen and settle. Annie's friend in the RAF had left behind his GPS navigator in her care whilst he was posted overseas and so 'Brucie' attempted to guide us southwards. He was persistant and adamant that we should use the M6, despite the warnings that there was slow moving traffic and an accident further south. "in three hundred yards, turn right" he directed. "Turn right". Pausing only to recalculate he started up again as Mum tried to direct us via another road and Annie desperately tried to work out which buttons to press to avoid motorway junctions, all the while Brucie insisting that we should "turn right". Once we decided to rejoin the motorway we were surprised he didn't applaud when we finally chose to follow his directions but there was a final test for him, when Dad wanted to drive past the slip road, over the bridge to check the traffic was flowing and was then going to turn round. We all looked over the bridge and saw that the traffic was flowing albeit reasonably slowly and there was a moments silence. "What shall I do?" asked Dad. "Turn round" replied Brucie, followed by gales of laughter which embraced the car and carried us along the slow moving traffic to Stafford as we raced against snow and time to reach the last train which would take M and I to London, which we caught in the nick of time, jumping on board just as the train was ready to depart, brushing what felt like unseasonal snowflakes off our hair as we walked the length of the train to find solace in the quiet carriage.

The snow stopped somewhere round Milton Keynes and the rain started, lashing against the side of the train. I drank tea and read my book and London rushed closer and closer. The occupants of the carriage seemed resigned to the baby crying and after a while even he fell asleep under his mother's coat, lying on a table, perhaps lulled by the rain and the gentle rocking of the rail carriage. I sat there watching his face and hands in the reflection in the window, thinking of the reasons for the sudden trip northwards and the illustration of the cycle of life which had been so bluntly laid out for us: my aunt lost her father on the first day, her husband lost his mother on the second and his daughter gave birth on the third.

London seemed very light last night when we arrived. Despite the light by our door not coming on as usual I could see almost as well as in the daylight. The sky did not even seem to be dark, more an odd yellow hue and even at 12.30am there were sirens in the distance. There were no stars. How different to the night-time air in Yorkshire where accompanying my uncle on his nightly check on the animals at his farm I had not even been able to see a foot in front of me nor see my own feet. Pausing for a moment in the garden last night the air even smelt different - I could almost taste the pollution, could feeling it replacing the clean sweet air which I had greedily drunk in whilst climbing and walking on the fells only that morning. There may be a lot of things which London does better than Yorkshire but clean and dark night air is not one of them.

Friday musings

It's been rather a quiet week in terms of going out although tonight I shall be attending
The Islington Contemporary Art & Design Ethical Fashion Show 2007. I am attending in the dual capacity of wanting to go myself and being asked to go on behalf of the new ethical fashion magazine for which I am doing some writing. Further details on the magazine when it is up and running, and I shall let you know when you can read my first piece.

Sadly, not all of the week has been as much fun as I hope tonight will be. London Underground are refusing to refund my ticket for the days when I couldn't use it due to the RMT strikes as it doesn't come under their 'customer charter'. It has annoyed me no end but I really can't see any way of making them pay up.

The house saga continues further into disarray - we've had boiler troubles, trouble with the boiler people, electricity issues and then just when I thought it couldn't get much worse, I saw a mouse. We have identified some potential holes underneath and behind a unit in the kitchen but are now locked in negotiation with the landlord as to how it should be sorted out. The (adopted) cat shows interest but when I try to persuade him to find the mouse he looks at me disdainfully.

Very little funds at present so I was pleased to receive a package of perfume and shower gel (with pearl extract) from Roxy last week. The perfume smells nice if a little young for me but I am sure that I will wear it come the summer as it smells of holidays and sunshine. The shower gel has cheered up a morning shower and has even been used by M. It's certainly far better than the Biotherm one which should be much nicer than I have found it to be.

And as for the weekend - some more chutney making, rugby watching and perhaps an autumnal work on Hampstead Heath.