Noooooooooo I missed a day! Bugger! I'm blaming the wine. It was birthday party weekend and everything, surely this is enough of an excuse?! Anyways, I'm back now and what a blummin' fab weekend!
Yesterday was basically party central. Well, I say party, I think gathering is more of an appropriate term. Nearly all of Dave's family and my parents (had to have some Jennings representation against all that lot!) came round our house. We ate too much party food, definitely drank a few too many glasses of vino, enjoyed sparklers on top of the most fabulous cake and all round had an absolutely lovely afternoon/evening. By the time the majority of people had toddled off home it was just me and Dave and his brother and wife, which was simply fab. They fell big style hard for the Bobster so there was lots of cuddles and play fights which ended up in Bob deciding to climb on top of them and settle in for the night, which can be a bit of a shock the first time all forty kilos of him lands on you, but they loved it really!
Shortly after they'd gone I decided it was still early enough for me to head off into town and catch the last couple of hours of Cat's birthday party! As you do. Just like a student, past 10pm, I got into a cab and headed to the second party of the day! It was really nice to see lots of familiar faces (and many I didn't know) as well as get to see the birthday girl in her poshy-posh dress and fancy fascinator - so glam! Drink a bit more wine, catch up with some people, see people that I haven't seen for absolutely years and pick right back up again...deffo worth leaving my toasty warm house and braving the cold weather!
Sidenote: one lovely lady that I used to work with was there with her husband and when I came in he said to her, who's that ginger bird, I know her! She reminded him that I'd been at their wedding *chuckles* but it made me laugh all evening. I'm choosing that as the new description for myself: ginger bird.
Came home just after midnight, so that I didn't turn into a pumpkin. Went to bed. End of Saturday.
Sunday - the big birthday day! We slept in til 9! Shocker! Been to the beach with Bob, eaten some more birthday cake (anyone want any? We've got HEAPS!) I've been to the supermarket for the big shop and now we're winding down into a chilled out birthday evening - a tasty pizza for tea, cheesecake for pudding, maybe another cheeky beer or two, happy birthday to you!
All in all, a rather fabulous weekend.
But now we're all verrrrrry sleepy...
Over and out!
I'm making the assumption here that everyone knows what a gritter is...? But just in case, the gritters are the trucks that drive round chucking grit salt all over our roads when the weather is icy and cold. And today I went on one. Yep, Friday was Gritters Day!
Me and two of my team mates headed off to the depot around about lunchtime. First of all we got a massive tour of all the cool places to see there, including sheds full of seasonal vehicles and the 2000+ tonnes of salt all stacked up ready to fill the trucks. We asked loads of questions, met all the gritters and basically had the time of our lives all in the name of work. We took loads of photos, we did a Boomerang video for Instagram and we did our very first live tweeting. It was all pretty cool, and the best thing of all was that it got loads of really good and positive engagement and showed people exactly where some of their money goes.
Then we all got to go out on a gritting route! Mine was all through the town, over the border, past some of the best sights that the town has to offer and basically in and out and all around, totalling up 30 miles! And in that time we dropped about 7 tonnes of salt - totally cool! I did more live tweeting, including jumping out of the gritter at the bus station so that we could do a drive-by down the ramp. I loved how on board the gritter drivers were, everyone at the depot really, it was proper ace!
In total we were all out of the office for about three hours, which is mental considering our crazy looming deadlines, but also totally brilliant and very well received. Driving home we were like excited kids at Christmas, stumbling over each other to say whose grit route had been the best and we did this, and we did that...so much fun! When we got back to the office everyone wanted to know what it had been like, where did we go, oh and maybe we'll need you to go out on Monday with a team that are doing a major clean up operation...YES! What with that and the cold of doom finally starting to shift, Friday was a tip-top day!
Tomorrow is party time! And Sunday is the big birthday day, although let's face it we'll probably be sleeping through most of that due to some social beverage drinking or two tomorrow...
Happy weekend everyone!
It's been a funny old start to the year. The Evil Death Cold, I think, has certainly affected my perception of things and my patience has not been so present, which has subsequently led to some very important life lessons.
First of all, people are weird. Truly they are. This has been brought to my attention mainly by working in the world of social media. Perhaps that should be amended to people in the world of social media are weird. My basic point is that I think a lot of people don't always stop and think as they tweet/vent out in anger on the socials that there is a real life person on the other end who will have to deal with it. I get it, you're pissed, and the whole venting on the socials thing is your way of dealing with it, but give a girl a break. Hammering out 5 tweets in a row with the same message might just make said girl die inside a little bit...
Can I admit that it worries me ever so slightly that I'm going to become disillusioned very fast with the human race...?
Life lesson/motto: people = weird.
I'm still working on how I deal with that one.
Another life lesson is one of gaining understanding. It can sometimes be hard, when people have ailments that they talk about constantly to have patience and try to be a little bit compassionate. I do try very hard but here is another example of when the Evil Death Cold has come into play. Please don't think for a minute that I'm comparing more serious ailments to my stupid cold, but over the last couple of weeks I have experienced how it can become all consuming when you are feeling rubbish. And you want to tell people about how rubbish you feel. In addition you have very little else to talk to people about as you've not been able to do anything or go anywhere due to feeling rubbish. I feel like all I've done since the beginning of the year is moan to people about my cough and cold and I'm quite bored now so I'm sure everyone else is too - sorry!
Life lesson: feeling rubbish can easily become all consuming.
Motto/action: Try to practice more patience and understanding and empathy.
My final life lesson is that even at the grand old age of almost 42, there are still life lessons to be learned. This gives me great comfort. We should continually evolve I think and adjust and continue to 'move with the times' - old person phrase alert!
Don't be too alarmed by the more serious tone of this post. Nothing wrong with a bit of learning and pondering in the early days of the year. Normal nonsense service will resume from tomorrow. Over and out.
Wow! Have you watched The Fall? We finally got around to watching the final series this last week and I'm not going to lie, I watched the very last 30 minutes hiding in my jumper - it was that terrifying...and yet absolutely bloody brilliant!
In case you've not seen it, very briefly, Gillian Anderson plays a cop who is brought over to Belfast to solve a case. Jamie Dornan, yep him of that 50 Shades bullshizz fame, plays a serial killer. There's all kinds of other massively complex and scary characters, there's 3 series, and by the final one it's all about whether he will go to jail or not. I haven't really done a great job there of selling it to you, but trust me, you HAVE to watch it.
The first and second series were honestly some of the best television I have ever seen. Both Gillian Anderson and Jamie Dornan are amazing and hugely compelling to watch. She's all tight skirts and silky blouses and withering glances, and he's all brooding and deeply dark and twisted with his dark brown eyes that are like pools you could drown in whilst living in absolute terror for your life. The chemistry between them is immense! It must have been incredible to be on set when they were filming...I wonder if they just used to burst out laughing sometimes to break the tension...?
The third and final series was also amazing as you basically watch everything crumble in front of your eyes, not forgetting the nail biting penultimate episode, and the terror and shock as events finally unfold in the very last one.
It's obviously not some light entertainment. It's serious stuff, but if you're into seriously excellent television then I can highly recommend. I don't binge watch very often anyway but I'm honestly not sure you could binge watch it without needing some sort of therapy afterwards - it's intense viewing.
Have you seen it? Did you hide behind your jumper too?
Tuesday is tricky. Come in from work, make tea, scoot the dog round the park, and then clash back out to go and build stuff at theatre.
I'm taking the few minutes while the kettle boils for a flying cuppa to do a quick update. Nothing fancy, nothing deep, but I don't want to miss a day cos I'm ten days in and doing so well!
Still coughing.
Still sniffing.
Today was tolerably better - I resisted the urge to hide my head in my shoulders - always a bonus.
Onwards and upwards for the rest of the week!
Thanks to everyone for reading so far! I'll be back tomorrow with a better post I promise! Bye-ee!
Everything was absolutely fine until I went to work today. I woke up early, the dog did super good on his walk under his new training regime - easy, easy - traffic was barely there...and then I stepped into the furnace. From that point onwards it was downhill. Cough cough cough, sniff sniff sniff, the cold of doom is not helped along by the furnace it would seem. Add in a giant spreadsheet full of tasks that literally took all day long and Monday was pretty shite.
I am super bored of being such a grumbler. Grumble grumble grumble. Come on cold of doom, feck off and leave me be! I just want to feel healthy again!!
Even my lunchtime stroll, in the rain no less, did little to soothe me as I started coughing as soon as I stepped outside. I have had it! Had it!
In other news, apparently we might be getting snow later this week - yasssssss!
And we just went food shopping and bought new slippers that are frankly the most fluffiest, warm-iest, granny-iest things you may ever see. And I don't care! Warm feet for liiiiiiiiiiiife!
Over and out. Grumble grumble.
I feel like we need to start with a hallelujah! For the first time in about 12 days I actually feel like Claire again. Woo-flippin-hoo! Don't get me wrong, Queenie's cold is still lingering, I'm still coughing and going through more tissues than your average human, but I don't look so much death warmed up anymore and I definitely don't feel death warmed up. I actually felt a tiny sparkle today. Man did that feel good! Even my hair looks less ill! I'm hoping out of the other side is in sight and that it wasn't some sort of weird feel good day before a set back. Fingers crossed!
I think it's safe to say that you guys will be happy to see the back end of it too! So much moaning to start off my year in the life - pah!
All in all, Sunday was a pretty good day. I spent most of the morning in the kitchen, which is one of my favourite places to be. About once a month I go and do a big meat shop (vegetarians, look away now!) and then I spend a few hours making lots of different meals out of it all. Today I made up 4 servings of chilli, some yummy meatballs and a couple of spicy burgers. I also used up some veg that was in danger of being thrown out to make some tasty butternut squash and sweet potato soup, and then two black bananas were turned into a banana and chocolate chip slice. Yum-mo!
The freezer food thing works really well for us as it means that we get to eat home cooked meals that can be heated up super quick when we don't have time to linger over dinner. I think it's that frugal upbringing of mine shining through, but my mam taught me well and I can make some basic ingredients go a long way! And knowing that I have a tasty dinner waiting for me at home helps me get through the day sometimes! Girl is ruled by her stomach, completely and utterly.
I also finished one book and started in on The Goldfinch. It's mighty at 834 pages! I'll let you know the verdict at the end, whenever that might be.
I also finally saw my parents, after avoiding them since Christmas so that they didn't get the evil cold. It was nice to catch up with them, chit some chat, put the world to rights, the usual parents get-together.
And now I'm off to watch the penultimate episode of series three of The Fall. I read somewhere that the last two episodes are genuinely terrifying so I've got my cushion ready to hide behind!
Until tomorrow...
