Tagged!

Kristy tagged me, so here goes:


Here are the rules:



1. Link to the person that tagged you


2. Post the rules on your blog


3. Share six non-important things/habits/quirks about yourself


4. Tag six random people at the end of your post by linking to their blogs


5. Let each random person know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their website.


6. Let your tagger know when your entry is up.


I am sure that you are all bored of hearing random facts about me (and can there really be anymore?) but here goes:


1. I don't wear a watch. Except today, when I am wearing M's because he forgot it.


2. January 2009 is the first time all of my sisters and I have been in the same place for 2 years.

3. I stress and worry and procrastinate far too much.

4. Two of my friends and I won £14 on a quiz machine playing deal or no deal last night.

5. I am hoping to upgrade my phone to a blackberry to feed my addiction to e-mails and blogging just a little bit more. M of course is thrilled!

6. There are 7 other posts on this blog about my random facts and they can be found here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.

I tag: anyone up for this? Let me know in the comments box...

The Simple Woman's DayBook

For Today... (from here)

Outside my Window...the roof tops of Lincoln's Inn with blue skies and some small clouds

I am thinking...am I really up to student style partying with my sister later on today?

I am thankful for...being alive, having a job and a home, a wonderful fiance, great family, fab friends

From the kitchen...no chance to cook this week so I ate a Pret sandwich

I am wearing...black suit, Boden jumper, boots and a cardigan (it's chilly in my office today, despite the sunshine)

I am reading...old favourite novels, Tatler and work documents

I am hoping...that my migraine disappears

I am creating...wedding related things

I am hearing...workman on the development nearby, taxis on Chancery Lane, a colleague dictating some letters,

Around the house...mostly laundry that still needs doing

One of my favorite things...a cup of tea and snuggling in bed

A Few Plans For The Rest Of The Week...the aforementioned student partying with my sister, trying out The Cwtch's welsh cake recipe, catching up on some sleep

Here is a picture thought I am sharing with you... who says romance is dead: flowers which M brought to my office along with the Pret sandwich for me at lunchtime.

All About Me...

So, I borrowed an idea from CeeCee: I answered the 12 questions about myself and then chose a corresponding photo from Flickr to go along with the answer.

1. What is your first name?
2. What is your favorite food?
3. What high school did you attend?
4. What is your favorite color?
5. Who is your celebrity crush?
6. Favorite drink?
7. Dream vacation?
8. Favorite dessert?
9. What do you want to be when you grow up?
10. What do you love most in life?
11. One word to describe you?
12. Your Flickr name?

Wanna play?: Type your answer to each of the above questions into Flickr's search. Using only the images that appear on the first page, choose your favorite and copy and paste each of the URL’s into the Mosaic Maker.

Can you guess my answers?

1. Evan Rachel Wood, 2. Meze Platter, 3. AMSTERDAM: St. Nicholas church, 4. When Waves Collide, 5. Aragorn (Viggo Mortensen) from LOTR, 6. vintage tea set with cupcake, 7. Belém - Pará - Brazil, 8. Gökten dört elma düşmüş, 9. Call of the Raven (formerly Nature's Special Effects), 10. http://www.flickr.com/photos/amstersam/517386614/, 11. hollywood late night show, 12. COLD Play

MeMe

Thanks to Rachel for her tag. She asks me to list six random things about me and then tag six others. If you're really interested in random things about me there are seven more here.



1. I lived in California from 1988 to 1990 which meant I was there for the earthquake of 1989 and I also managed to experience the Teenage Mutant Hero Turtle (or whatever they were called) phenomenon twice. Once in the US and then once back in England.

2. For the 2 years I lived in America I had an American accent. No-one would believe I was English. Now, there is no doubting my nationality.

3. My comfort food is peanut butter and marmite on toast.

4. I am embracing WI cliches and am going on a jam making day in June (which I am really looking forward to, especially as the chutney went down so well at Christmas)

5. I discovered the Apprentice this series having refused to watch it before. I have actually enjoyed watching it although I cannot believe that some people lie despite knowing that they are being filmed.

6. I re-read my favourite books over and over again. (I won't elaborate more as I have a post in the making regarding this)

And now I tag: Echo/Suzi, James at the Ink, Upside Down Annie, Legally Blonde, and any one else who wants to be tagged please make themselves known in the comments box.

A is for ...

I have been tagged again by Diary of a Young Horse:-

The rules are...

• You must post the rules before you give your answers.


• After you've been tagged, you need to update your blog with your middle name and answers.


• You must list one fact about yourself for each letter of your middle name.


• Each fact must begin with that letter.


• If you don't have a middle name, just use your maiden name/last name.


• At the end of your post, you need to tag one person for each letter of your middle name. (Be sure to leave them a comment telling them they've been tagged and need to read your blog for details).

When Echo attempted this, she described characteristics for each of her letters. She only has 3 whereas I have 9. I am going to give actual facts as I cannot and do not want to start thinking about 9 attributes I could label myself. Good or bad.

C is for cartwheels. I spent the vast proportion of my childhood turning cartwheels, whether it be at gymnastics on apparatus, in the garden or on the beach for pleasure, there was something satisfying about the precision and rhythm of a cartwheel - the hand placing, the head alignment, the speed at which one could gain given a long enough space and the way that my hair would brush the floor as I went, one foot, one hand, second hand, one foot, linking them together in long chains.

A is for arriving on time, something which I am notoriously bad at. I used to pride myself on my manners. Now I have realised that I need to update them rather.

T is for Tea, surprisingly enough. My favourite drink be it made the English way or the Moroccan. Both are good; just not at the same time or a mixture of the two. Too much of the Moroccan version would surely rot your teeth.

H is for holidays. Hopefully France and Italy this summer, although both M and I would also like to go to Greece and put some of my studying of Classics into perspective. H is also for hindsight; mostly I wish I could employ the same information as foresight. Life would be a lot easier.

E is for envy. An emotion which is far too easy. Which is another E. I am more envious than easy. I would like to be neither.

R is for rain. The sound of rain pitter-pattering against material makes me think of holidays; the smell of rain in summer is the smell of summer holidays. In my mind's eye, it is always sunny. In my mind's sensory bank it is always raining. And Flanders and Swann always playing. The trusty tardis of a Volvo's windscreen is fogged up by too many occupants and several cups of tea resting on the dashboard. We are damp and salty from sailing and playing on the beach. There are sailing waterproofs and damp towels lying over every seat. Those are the kind of holidays I want my children to look back on.

I is for igloos. I have never seen a proper one or been to the North Pole. I would like to see the Northern Lights. When we were in Finland we were too far south (and in a city).

N is for not being able to get out of bed. I feel this is directly proportional to my inability to arrive anywhere punctually.

E is for eggs. I can't eat eggs cooked in their pure form. I am extremly able to eat eggs once they have been made into cakes or pancakes. I am unable to eat omlettes. I am definitely able to eat chocolate ones.

According to the rules, I have to now tag nine people. If anyone would like to take up this challenge please leave me a comment and I will add a link to you.

Seven things you might not know about me...

... and probably wished you still didn't know. Yes, I have been tagged by the lovely Echo at Diary of a Young Horse. Actually, Echo is the horse and Sz is the writer/rider/trainer but I shall let that slide for now.

So, here goes:

7 facts people might not know about me.

1. I have never had a pet. Unless you count the goldfish I won at a fair in California and who died after 2 weeks (not my fault). I am fond of both dogs and cats although I believe London (flat size, main roads, long hours) to be an unsuitable place to start. We have an adopted cat which comes to visit every now and then (with his owners consent - we are not allowed to feed him). That will have to be enough for me, for now.

2. We live fairly near the Arsenal stadium. I despise it when there is a match on as all the supporters are loud and miserable looking and seem unable to pass by places without dropping large volumes of rubbish. The tube station is practically afloat with beer cans, sandwich packets and discarded newspapers by the time kick-off occurs. There is however, a man who sells the sort of sweets usually found in pick&mix at 2 bags for £1. Every time there is a game and I am in the area I always go and buy the same sweets from the sweetie-man (fizzy cola bottles and white choc buttons with hundreds and thousands - these are the combination of sweets I have bought since I was a little girl with pocket money from Granny and I see no reason to change my selection now).

3. I read lots of blogs about parenting - it started with Alpha Mummy and Wife in the North. Now it has been extended to The Potty Diaries, A Way Ahead and Bub and Pie. I also read Petite Anglais which is, strictly speaking, a parenting blog but it has such wide readership that most would conclude that it is further reaching than it's main subject. It does not, for example, have posts entitled "Done a Poo, Mummy!" which some of the others have been known to have (although to be fair to the author of that post, the subject is actually worthy of consideration as it brings up the issue of how much children are influenced by what they watch and therefore what they should be allowed to watch and at what age). Actually, even Petite has it's fair share of what I would term 'I'm only interesting to read because I write about my child' syndrome.

Why do I read them? Well, information, I suppose. I like to be informed about things. Parenting blogs are not the only blogs I read. I would like to have children at some point and I find it is something that one really knows little about until it actually happens. It also makes me think how lucky I am not have children at the moment and how I would need to be very sure and financially settled before even thinking about having a family.

4. When I moved house I moved every copy of Vogue that I have bought in the past four years to my new house. They filled a dustbin (which is where, my friends who helped us move, suggested they should remain) and are currently performing an excellent duty as posing as a side table in the sitting room. And yes, I do re-read them. Occasionally.

5. I dislike spiders. Years of being rescued by my father have given way to being able to capture the silly things in a glass with a postcard and deposit them outside. And the funny thing is, abstractly, I rather like spiders. Charlotte for example has done wonders for the PR of spiders. It's just in reality, they appear too suddenly and move too quickly and there doesn't appear to be a surface or plane they cannot or won't walk on. They are also prone to leaping off things near my head and dangling there looking menacing.

6. I am a fan of free-cycle. I have also just discovered e-bay. Now I need to de-clutter and give away or sell on an equal number of things to the new additions. It would be fair to say that I have hording tendencies. It would also be fair to say that our house has limited (i.e. none whatsoever) storage. These two facts do not make a happy situation. We do, at times, look like we live in a souk. In fact, one friend on coming to our flat peered round the folding doors which separate our bedroom from the sitting room and asked "is that a room, or the world's largest cupboard?".

7. I carry around far too much stuff in my handbag on a daily basis. Today, whilst looking for my phone (which incidentally turned out not to be in there) I found the following: a novel, my diary, address book, notebook, pen, A-Z, make-up bag, small bag with tablets and so on, purse, hand cream, full sized bottle of perfume (4/5 empty) miscellaneous toiletries, a small wrapped Easter egg, a packet of hairgrips (the card was empty and all the hairgrips were at the bottom), about £2 in very small loose change, rail card, oyster card, i-pod, work keys, house keys, a tea-bag (un-used and wrapped), a conker, 2 lip-balms, 2 lip-glosses, umbrella, packet of nail files. That is a lot of stuff to replace if I lose my handbag. And I dread to think what it is doing to my back.

And in return, I tag: James at the Ink, Cumbrian and Admin Girl.

Desktops

Thanks to James at The Ink for his instructions as to how to take a screen shot of my desktop. Obviously in my version the two people have faces but I think they should remain anonymous.

Apparently this is something of a meme and should be accompanied with some discussion of computer history. My relationship with computers goes back a good long way - as a child we had various mac computers and have had the Internet for as long as I can remember. I was bought my first own laptop when I went to university (an i-mac clam shell in turquoise) which I still use at home now for writing articles and on which I have written every essay and dissertation. It is rather old now (my version of i-tunes will not recognise the old i-pod shuffle that my sister donated to me when she upgraded, it is that old) so I use M's laptop for accessing the Internet.

Working life forced me to get to grips with PCs which were previously uncharted territory. After macs which seem to work so obviously and so straightforwardly, I found it quite a task to become PC literate. Although some things still fox me (screen printing and so on!) I can drive it satisfactorily although I cannot do anything flashy. Blogging has forced me to master some html knowledge (I know I could update to the version which does this for me, but I am afraid I will lose some of my blog). I know I should also back up my blog but I just don't know how to. Any ideas?