Life Traveller. Been Somewhere. Going Somewhere.

One week, three extra people, and a house that wasn'n the tidiest place in the world before, now looks like a tornado has passed through it. I don't even know where to start, each room being as bad, if not worse than, the last.

I resolved before Christmas that I wasn't going to live in a house full of things I was never going to use again, any more. By Christmas 2007 this house is going to be the epitome of minimalism. Quite how I'm going to achieve this I'm not quite sure since every attempt to do so in the past has seen failure on a grand scale. But I really cannot carry on like this any more. I've got so many things, yet when I need something, it's impossible to find it.

This isn't a new year resolution. I'm not waiting until the new year. I'm starting now. That is as soon as I finish blogging about it.

My family are still with me, which is why I don't have much time for commenting. I'm trying to keep up with reading although I'm sure I've missed some posts. I might have a little more time next year. It's really lovely having my family around, particularly as my daughters are making me mugs of tea, and the younger one is doing some cooking and lots of dish washing. I feel like a queen in my castle.

Other news, the cough that I had nearly all year, and that eventually disappeared about a month ago, is back in full force. I am not enjoying it. It looks like I'll be taking that into the new year with me.

Having read DollyDagger's post of last week referring to the top 20, I again took a look at it, having ignored it for a while since I am frustrated by it. Anyway, as I say, I took a look and found a couple of blogs there that have almost no comments and very few visitors, although since they have appeared in the top twenty their profile viewing figures have gone up considerably - fourfold in the case of balmaha.

Yesterday:
http://balmaha.blog.co.uk/ @ no.6 - nothing posted since 23rd December, and only one comment on that post.
http://confessionsofaswedishgirl.blog.co.uk/ @ no.20 - nothing posted since 21st December and no comments on that post (two comments in all over the last five posts).
Today:
http://balmaha.blog.co.uk/ @ no.14
There may be others but I can't be bothered to check all the unfamiliar ones that have appeared lately.

When I first saw those two blogs I thought it must be a mistake, but they have appeared almost daily since. I'm glad to see that the regulars are still up there, so they must be getting something right, but what are the above mentioned two doing there?

We passed some man in a car today.
"You know, he reminded me a bit of Mick H...." I said to my daughter.
"Whose he?"
"A boy I went out with. Only he hadn't got a beard then."
"And he hasn't got a beard now," she said.

(The man in the car, that is. Still don't know about MH.)

We decided to make a walnut cake for Christmas - simple ingredients: egg yolk, sugar and walnuts.  The unfortunate result was quite misshapen, and as I attempted to level off the top, the whole thing collapsed, closely followed by the three of us. 
It looked more like a pie than a cake.  I cut off the 'crust' and we decided that the rest could be salvaged.  Younger daughter had other ideas and took a slice out of it. 
"'What have you done?" I cried.
"Yes, what have you done?" said the elder daughter, "you've ruined a perfectly ruined cake."
Again we collapsed with laughter.
As it was decided that we would bake another cake tomorrow, we proceeded to eat that one.  Only after we'd all had a good slice each did daughter, the younger, declare that she wasn't making any more cakes tomorrow, and that we would have to make do with the one we already had. 
"You can't do that!" I exclaimed, and the elder daughter, wit that she is, declared,
"Ooh look, a cake to celebrate the feast of St. Pacman." 
Younger daughter then needed no further encouragement to decorate it accordingly.

Henceforward, this family will refer to 23rd December as St. Pacman's day.

I wasn't looking forward to Christmas. I've had a difficult time this year, and wasn't in the mood. My daughter the younger, had other ideas. Her whirlwind of activity and excitement was infectious. She's just gone to the train station to pick up her sister. In a large part, thanks to her, I am now looking forward to the celebrations.

Daughter, the younger, has phoned to say that her plumber has just left. Her gas boiler is broken so she has no hot water and no central heating, and it can't be fixed until after the New Year. This is very disappointing, as we were going to have Christmas dinner at her house for the first time ever. Now she and her child will be moving in with me until her boiler is fixed. Daughter, the Elder is arriving tommorow evening and staying for a week. Looks like I'm going to have a house full, and very little time for blogging. I've had some great comments to recent posts that I haven't been able to answer yet, and it looks like it may be even more time before I'm able to do so. There's no way those daughters of mine are going to let me sit up here tapping away. At least, not much.

HAPPY CHRISTMAS, EVERYONE.

I was chatting to my younger daughter yesterday about how sometimes when I need help, she or her sister don't offer it.

Being a no nonsense sort of person, she said,
"If you don't ask, you don't get."

I explained that I really didn't like to ask them when it was quite clear what I needed, that they should just offer to do it. She responded that this was not how normal people behaved.

"There's obviously a design fault there," was her final say on the matter.

Maybe there is.

I have of late found myself thinking in blog post format. That is to say everything I think about I'm already writing a post about it in my mind. For the most part that is where it stays, but I must confess that this is a little disturbing. I fear I may be spending far too much time hanging around blog.co.uk. But I'm not going to stop - I enjoy it far too much.

Truth is shifting sand. GS

My younger daughter knows an actor who occassionally appears in Coronation Street. Most recently, he was seen pushing a bicycle across the screen. She informed me that the reason he was pushing it was because if he'd been riding it, they would have had to pay him extra.

It's amazing, the concern over the word prostitute. Some people are using the euphanisms sex worker or vice girl, and probably some others as well. There's nothing wrong with the word prostitute. I think sex worker or vice girl actually sounds worse. It really makes no difference what these women are called. We shouldn't be thinking up euphanisms. What we should be doing is trying to change attitudes.

I'm very glad to see so many bloggers adopting a more postive stance towards prostitutes. Until people see them as being the same as any other member of society and treat them accordingly, it makes no difference what they are called.

Why does befriending here have to be mutual? Because I don't want a lengthy list of blogs that I can't keep up with (actually, I'm having difficulty keeping up with a relatively short list) I've had to deny invitations of 'friendship' and it makes me feel terrible. But I just can't accept everyone, there has to be a chord that strikes within me when I read their blogs, and sometimes that doesn't happen. This isn't a judgement of them as people, or of their blogs, but I don't have time to read everything, so I have to draw the line somewhere.

I wonder why blog.co.uk doesn't let a blogger add whoever they like to their friends list, and then if that person wants to, they can add them back - all this without having to approach someone with the possibility of rejection. That way one could freely read another's blog without having to search for it every time, or make special links as I have done in my bloglist section.

At the very least they could make it possible to see who has posted in groups. I know there is a friends' groups facility, but I can't figure out how this is useful, other than to allow me to make private posts for specific groups of people. It doesn't allow me to see people's latest posts in these groups. (If this is possible, someone please let me know how this is done.) In this way I could put everyone into groups - those I read daily, those I read weekly, monthy, never. That way my friend's list could contain everyone's blog on this site and it wouldn't be a problem. Not that it would contain every blog.

So, blog.co.uk, please consider befriendings that don't have to be mutual, or failing that, please at least make it possible to make groupings of friends for the purpose of reading their latest posts.

Addendum - I think I'd better make clear that the ideas are not my own. I came across them on another blog site and they work very well there. I prefer this site, but would like to see it more user friendly.

Blog.co.uk has found new tricks to play on me. I few minutes I ago I was entitling (new word, maybe?) a post I'd just written, when it disappeared. Just like that ... as Tommy Cooper used to say.

I rewrote it. Well, not exactly, because I couldn't remember exactly what I'd written. I've just been back to my main page to click on lastest friend's posts and I find that the disappeared post has somehow posted itself. It's enough to weird a person out.

My life is uneventful. I sleep less than I used to. And yet I find there still are not enough hours in the day.

I got to wondering about the Bloscars and if Paddy was going to be doing them again this year. Googled it, and sure enough he is - the star. There's a special site here to register on, which I will be doing sometime soon. There's a forum too. I don't get on very well with those things, but I will make the effort. Anyway, people, if you haven't visited the Bloscars site, I highly recommend you do so. The Bloscars are great fun.

I don't understand. Why take over someone else's abandoned blog when you can start one of your own? Also I'd like to know why the powers that be at blog.co.uk permit this. Seems totally stupid to me.

I'm pretty fed up of the internet today. I've discovered that over the past few days some e-mails have not been reaching me, nor have some I've sent out reached their destinations. I think it may be the fault of Outlook Express, but can't be sure. Now, do I try and get in touch with everyone I've written to recently to see if they got their emails or if they have replied, and everyone else I know to see if they have written? Bit tricky that.

After our far from satisfactory meal yesterday we decided to go for a walk. We drove around for a bit until we found a car park (by a pub) and decided to follow a Public Footpath. After no more than 30 metres it disappeared. We were in stitches. Why it had been graced with the description of Public Footpath is anyone's guess. At right angles to it was a sort of track wide enough for a car and no longer than the path itself, that led back onto the main road. We took that track and spotted a canal. We walked alongside it for about thirty metres, until the wide path turned into a tow path that was puddled and muddy. The sun was low in the sky by then and a row of cottages cast a huge and cold shaddow. We'd had enough, returned to the car and went home.

A friend had recommended a pub in the village of N. Sol., called The Uni....
Don't ever go there.
We ordered pannini and were presented with sort of small French sticks.
My daughter, "We ordered pannini."
Owner, "These are pannini."
Who was he kidding? We've eaten pannini in Italy. We know what they're like. Mine was supposed to have mozzarella cheese in it. Ever seen Mozzarella that was yellow, the consistency of Cheddar and cut up into small cubes? No, me neither. And it was cold. But I let it pass. Daughter decided she'd like some of the home made profitteroles at £4.50 for dessert. They were stale. She took them over to the publican, who was behind the bar.
"These are old," she said.
"They're new," he said.
"No they aren't," she said, "my mother and I have both had a piece and they're old."
Begrudgingly he refunded the £4.50 saying, "They're new."
"No, they're not. You try them."
"I don't eat sweet things."
Then as my daughter suggested he get someone who does like sweet things to try them, he strode off into the back somewhere.

It started off badly and continued in the same fashion. I stumbled out of bed later than intended, and daughter arrived for a day to be spent together. She checked cinema times on the computer, as this afternoon we were going to go and see .... something, (I've forgotten what - with Emma Thompson, anyway) and it isn't on anymore. We spent a good twenty minutes, and believe me, I do not exaggerate here, riding round car parks trying to find a parking space, all the while being desperate for a wee. Eventually parked in Sainsbury's car park, where you have to pay £2 for 2 hours (get it back if you actually shop there). We put our £2 in and the machine quite happily accepted them, but didn't give out a ticket. An attendant had to be found etc. etc. Anyway, instead of a day's shopping (remember we weren't going to the cinema any more) we now had two hours. We were starving too, as we hadn't had breakfast, but no time to eat now. Shop, shop, shopping. Back to the car.

I've had a look at the Top 20 Blogs four times today, and each time they have been different. As far as I was aware it changed every morning at around 9 am. Now it appears to be changing hourly. What is going on? Has anyone any idea?

It's 9:25 am, I have 37 people on my friends list, and not one of them has posted this morning yet. It feels as though I've arrived too early somewhere. Or that something has happened that everybody knows about but me. Feels weird.

Both of my daughters read my blog, and tonight I was speaking to the elder one, who has noticed that these days I'm Going Nowhere (on my header), and she said she'd like me to change it back to Going Somewhere. Although I have felt for some months that I am going nowhere, she insists that I am, in fact, going somewhere. Maybe I am. I just haven't noticed.
I'll get round to changing it soon, dear daughter, but you do know that everything has to acquire the weight of time where I'm concerned, so it might be some days.

Laughter and happiness are not synonymous. GS

I've always loved walking - to work, to college, to uni, about an hour or so each way for all of those, and others, of course. That is a lot of walking. And whilst walking I've done a lot of thinking - mostly about sex and my family, and quite a bit about life, too.

I don't suppose for one minute I've come up with anything new. I keep meaning to check up on all those famous philosophers and find out, but haven't got round to it yet. I thought in the meantime, I would share with you what a lifetime of thinking has produced. Hence my series of GoingSomewhere Philosophy. It'll be a short series, but I hope to expound on each entry at some point.

Your thoughts on any of it, as always, will be most welcome.

Originally posted Monday, 18. Dec, 2006 - 11:41:08

For all of you who have been waiting to hear the outcome of my giving into desire earlier, it was a disaster. The union of apples, and defrosted puff pastry was not a success. The pastry caused the apples to steam which in turn caused the pastry to be soggy and thus undercooked. I did bravely attempt to eat it, but had to admit complete failure and most of my effort ended up in the bin. Not much good at desserts, me.

Suddenly and inexplicably I’m overwhelmed with the desire to eat tarte tatin. Why this should be so is anyone’s guess since I’ve never had it before. Well, I’m certainly going to have it now. There are still some of my home grown apples in the fridge and I’m just defrosting some puff pastry “made with creamy Jersey butter … it tastes just like you made it yourself.” Well, I hope not, since pastry making is not my forte. In fact I have never made any yet that could be described as a success. I’ll let you know later how successful the tart making process is, or if indeed it progresses any further. I’m sometimes suddenly filled with the desire for some culinary delight, only to find myself just as suddenly devoid of any inclination to make it.
Maybe I should just nip down to the supermarket and buy one. But no, I’ve already defrosted the pastry.

I like Nigella Lawson, but what is she on about when she suggests that people who have something other than a turkey for Christmas dinner are being pretentious? As far as I am aware, the traditional turkey is a relatively recent introduction to the Christmas table, the previous traditional roasts being goose, pork, beef and for poorer families, chicken. It was disappointing that she should have been ignorant of this. Just because something was considered traditional when someone was a child, doesn't mean it was always so.

We haven't had turkey for over twenty years because I really dislike it. We've had goose a couple of times, and that is my favourite. We've also enjoyed duck, chicken and pork.

Although I may seem quite miserable at times, I'm not really one for regrets. One of the few I do have, is that I wasn't a founder member of blog.co.uk. What annoys me is that I could have been one, having been invited by a friend, but I didn't even bother to have a look then. If I had, I'm sure I would have joined straight away. It would have been nice to have been in at the start of something. Well, I have only myself to blame. And that is probably why this is a regret.

It used to be that I couldn't keep awake, now I can't get to sleep. But whichever it is, too much sleep, not enough sleep, I'm always tired (except on very rare occassions) which is why these days I'm Going Nowhere.

Fifty-three visitors to my blog yesterday. What can have attracted them? Unfortunately they didn't stay long enough to let me know.

The blogs I enjoy most are the humourous ones. I don't mean the joke ones; I mean the ones written with humour, the ones that make me laugh at life. I think some of my posts are humourous, at least they made me smile when I wrote them, but I do wonder. In September I posted something that I thought was rather amusing, but only one person commented. Now, whilst I appreciate that people comment or not for many reasons, I had thought that more than one person would have commented on that particular post, and I said as much to my daughter. I read the post to her. "That's not funny," she said, and we both fell about laughing.

Link to Must Look Where I'm Putting My Feet

Is what I have written amusing or not? Or am I deluding myself? I wonder, is my sense of humour so far out as to not be amusing at all? I don't think that is the case, but sometimes I do have my doubts.

It's 4:30 in the morning and at last there is no one else around at blog.co.uk. The wind is whipping the branches of the silver birch against the windows. I'm tired but I don't think I'm going to be able to sleep.