Tickets, Money, Passport?

With the economic downturn, credit crunch, 'these difficult time's upon us and the rise of the Staycation, and the resurgence of crafts, recycling and camping; the days of chucking a pair of knickers, a tooth brush and your passport into a gorgeous holdall are all but behind me.

To be honest, they were never alongside me but you get the drift.

To that end, I'm saying farewell to Tickets, Money, Passport and saying hello to a new blog - just as soon as I can think of a gorgeous name for it. It'll be a glorious portal of all things creative, those little tidbits that keep my hands amused and my eyesight long. Including links to far more talented people, cheats and tips for sewing and knitting (maybe even the odd bit of crocheting, just as soon as I master it), cake receipes and lovely places to go and do all in ye old Blighty.

Oh maybe a little mini-break abroad from time to time, just as soon as I get the Citroen fired up and the picnic basket attached.

It's been fun. Email me at auntydrama(at)hotmail.com for the new blog details should you wish to see examples of all the above, photographed badly and executed poorly.



Adriana x

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not advocating violence on any level and certainly no acts of terrorism but the G20 protesters have thus far been a little bit of a let down. First and (certainly for me) foremost they neglected to cause enough disruption in the City this morning to affect my journey to work. Hello I was promised Bishopsgate would be closed, that the RBS I go past every day would be a focal point and that there would be major disruptions. Instead RBS put up a few crowd control barriers (not enough to stop a really angry mob) and the lily-livered Carphone Warehouse boarded up their shop. Carphone Warehouse ?! I mean they are horrid but even I wouldn’t blame them for the economic down-turn. And that was it.

So instead I find myself at my desk early, early I tell you - well 3 minutes early but it’s a technicality I claim.

We have the television on – BBC News - unsurprisingly they have a blanket coverage, building tension where there isn’t one and using their own words ‘focusing’ in on the ‘pushing and shoving (we have the subtitles on). Read: zooming in to give impression of aforementioned angry mob. However the thing that made me laugh the most and is why I love the British so much, the protesters shouted at the banks:

‘Shame on you’

Bless*

*Of course if this all goes horribly wrong, my flippant and trite monologue above should be taken in context of the 11.00am news I saw mmmkay.

And here six weeks later I've just had my last yoga class. Not necessarily last forever but last in the series. We ended up having a replacement tutor for the last two. That was a good thing, even in as much as it was a bad thing, because he wasn't very good for beginners, though he clearly was very good. It showed, therefore, that in these early delicate stages you do need a good teacher. So whilst I'm inclined for more, I'm not sure how I'll fare in the 'drop in to any level' sessions. We'll see.

I usually sleep jolly well after a lesson - though I can tell in the next couple of days I will be experiencing some discomfort from some of the comedy moves I barely managed to get myself into. Did you know I cannot balance? Have I some kind of palsy? I apparently needed to find my centre and concentrate on it. Turns out that was gazing out of the window at the War Horse billboard. Who'dofthunkit?!

Still despite the jolly sleeping to look forward to, to head off too potential aches I've just drawn a bath. And by drawn I don't mean with watercolours (no, that's the next course I've signed up to). In true Victorian style to ensure sufficient hot water coverage over self I had to boil the kettle. The hot-water here serves sufficiently for long showers and dish-washing but not for a full bath. So the candles were lit and the kettle's freshly boiled hot-water dispersed into fragrant bubbles of fruity scents. I slipped off the towelling robe, bought for just such occasions and into the delightfully warm, but not too hot, bath. At this juncture I was reminded of the inevitable fact that not only am I too big for the bath, the bath is too small for me. And yet still I must find additional hot-water. I adjusted the bubbles accordingly and realised that with the limbs at odds with the water-line, I looked not a little unlike Whoopie Goldberg in the Annie Liebovitz photo, but without the milk. Which amused me greatly.

And there I lay, dappled in candle light gently dousing my exposed parts in warm water, until such time as my sudden movement upwards caused a surge of bathwater that extinguished one candle and took out 50 pages of my book.

C'est la vie.

Labels: bath, yoga

I just went to my first ever yoga class and enjoyed it very much, even if I was rather useless at it.


*falls over laughing, gets up, does downward dog*


I have a sneaky feeling that I'm going to be very sore tomorrow.

I'd dearly love to revamp this blog. It's so primary, so lacking in style or class. It's like some technologically inept fool had a play with a palate of 4, some fonts and a few stolen images from the web. Oh yes, that'd be me.

I want to keep the archive for posterity but I'd like it to look, well, you know better.

Actually that's a bit like me darlings. Ha ha ha ha *fade to silence*



I'm not doing New Year's Resolutions, I'm calling it Quarter 1, 2009 Things To Do. Snappy I think you'll find. Keeping it short, sweet and manageable. Ideally number one would be one week of leave to do chores and flap all around the flat but as I get time to do that in the evenings and weekends and fail spectacularly *stares shamefully at the still not put away suitcase from the recent India jaunt* I don't deserve it. The real number one is 'sort out photos' and to this end I have bought some albums and other acoutrements needed to do this task. Number two is paint the hallway and get more wallpaper samples for the sitting room. I can't remember number three.

Oh yes, number three is don't get distracted by other things and stop yourself doing one and two. Other things which may include:

1) watching television
2) watching dvds
3) going out all the time
4) knitting
5) thinking of other things i'd like to do (like sorting balcony/planting things; buying pictures/hangers and frames; thinking but not doing proper cull of clothes; do sewing/repairs/making things; more knitting projects; write novel; work on blog; consolidate all silly online things like Twitter, Facebook, Blog; think about what course I'd like to do; consider working part-time; never, ever take a serious look at finances....)
6) trying to read books but mainly napping
7)baking
8) doing a list of everything I did last year *yawn - how very smug*

You get the picture.

That's why a Quarter 1, 2009 Things To Do plan is manageable. Check back with me on March 31st.

Well another late night post, fraught with procrastination. I should at the very least be in bed or if not, packing. Yes this time tomorrow night we'll be saying Happy New Year somewhere over the Mediterranean en-route to India. India darling, I think finally I am excited about it. It all came about relatively quickly and now it's here. In that time I've managed to get my passport back (complete with my residency visa), have innoculations, get my Indian visa and buy new luggage. Because I am too old (and too much of a lady) to carry a rucksack these days.

It will hardly come as a surprise but I embrace the old and I must say I am excited about Kerala - for that is where we are off to - and the old colonial charms it will hold. Say what you like about the British invasion of half the world but the legacy remains. 1) English speakers 2) Somewhere glorious to have G&T's, probably with a sunset. I am shallow I agree. I am also very excited about all the other delights that Kerala has to offer and am packing several cameras and a big fat journal to record it all.

I am taking Mrs Dalloway, the 4th Tommy & Tuppence book and hopefully a Somerset Maugham book so you can see I'll be embedded firmly somewhere between the wars. Well when you're wearing linen and floppy hats when else will you be?

Labels: holidays, sunshine

I don't know why I'm not more tired, I haven't been to bed before 1.30am in days, I've drunk so many units I lost count before the week had even begun. And whilst I had a bit of a lie in this morning, I've been on the go since I woke up.

My tree is a thing of beauty, understated beauty I think, well apart from the giant Angel. I'm listening to Elaine Page who is right this second playing 'I've Never Been to Paradise' which I haven't heard for years and is a anthem of classic proportions. I've baked a cake, just taken it out of the oven, all lovely chocolately perfection. And I'm wearing an apron. Of course. And I don't quite know what the point of this post is other than to brag of domestic achievements and general contentment.

Had a lovely Christmas supper with the girls last night, oh and you know what, that's why I'm baking. I have a new hand mixer. Coupled with my lovely ceramic bowl and jug it was just begging for a cake to be baked.

So that's why I'm here. And on Facebook and on Twitter. Goodness is there no end to the recording of my life?