I keep forgetting that today isn’t just the last day of the year: it’s the last day of the decade, and the first decade of the new millennium at that. It was the decade in which I got my first job, bought my first house, married my first – um, I mean my ONLY husband, and brought home my first ever puppy, who is now a full-grown wolf. A decade of firsts, then, and not all of them good ones – we could’ve done without the kidney transplant interlude, obviously, but still: pretty good decade.
I feel I should say more about all of this. Something profound. Something that would sum up the decade and all it has meant to us in a pithy little sentence. Instead, here is a picture of my dog:
(Note: that’s Terry’s modified Christmas party hat, by the way – he’s not just wearing a random red bandanna. Well, he kind of is, but it WAS Christmas…)
Tonight we’re forgoing the usual maudlin “watching other people have fun on TV” experience, and heading into Edinburgh with my parents to have dinner with Erin and David before watching the fireworks from the castle. If we’re lucky, we may even be able to hear the lonesome piper play his sad lament in person, rather than just watching him on TV, like we do every other year! In other words, we’re going out with a bang: or rather, a series of bangs, whizzes and flashes.
Whatever you’re doing tonight, I hope you have a good one: and Terry, Rubin and I all wish you a fabulous 2010!
Tagged new year
Well.
I’m pretty sure no one will be reading this today, because you’ll all be off roasting chestnuts around an open fire, or doing whatever else it is winter-lovers do two days before Christmas, but let the record show that Terry and I have returned safely from what turned out to be a fabulously relaxing holiday in the Canaries, with actual sun, and heat and everything. I, of course, fearing a repeat of last year’s winter vacation, where it was so cold I had to buy almost all of Zara’s stock over there, had come prepared, with lots of sweaters, coats, boots, etc, so naturally the weather was fantastic, and I looked like a (very stripey) Nanook of the North most of the time. I DID still buy my fair share of stuff at Zara, though. Well, it’s become a tradition…
Let the record also show, however, that although we are back, this has not been achieved without some degree of trouble, namely a 17-hour delay at Las Palmas airport, due to the huge amount of snow back home, which had closed down Gatwick airport, and left our plane stranded there helplessly, poor thing. I had planned to write one of my usual long, rambly posts about this experience*, but now that I actually sit down to do it, I find it can be summed up pretty accurately with the words “Man, that sucked.”
 Grumpy. Also strangely shiny. And stripey, obv. Like my own version of the 7 dwarves, basically.
This was taken at about 3am, and we’d arrived at the airport at 11am the previous day, so please excuse my appearance, and just be grateful you weren’t sitting next to me, because although I could’ve bought a selection of clothes from Calvin Klein and Burberry (Don’t worry, I didn’t. Don’t think I didn’t consider it, though.) there was nowhere selling basic stuff like toothpaste or deodorant, and because I was expecting a 4-hour flight, I hadn’t put any in my hand luggage. Yes, I have learned that lesson now, having been forced to make liberal use of the Fragile perfume tester in the duty free.
 Sleepy As you’ll have gathered from the lack of “OMG, I AM TRAPPED IN AN AIRPORT FOR 17 HOURS!” posts here over the past couple of days, we couldn’t actually use that laptop: there was wi-fi available, but it cost 10 euros (about $14) for a day pass, and although I did reach a stage where that started to seem like a good deal to me, if only so I could whine incessantly on Twitter about my “ordeal”, the sign-up page was in Spanish, Google translate didn’t seem to work on it, and although we did manage to get some of the way through the sign-up process, we were finally defeated by the apparent requirement that we provide a Spanish mobile phone number before we be granted access to the Internet. There were none of those computer terminals where you can put in coins and get a few minutes’ access. I don’t think I’ve ever been in an airport in my life that didn’t have those, so it figured that the first airport I should come across without easy internet access would be the one I was spending 17 hours in. Gah. You should all probably be thankful about this, though, otherwise this post would be longer than it is already, and would be in approximately 1,752 parts all of which would read something like, “Aaaargh! Am STILL stuck in airport! Woe! Woe! First world problems!”
Anyway, we finally got onto the plane and went to find our seats. We’d been the first people to check into the flight (our boarding cards were numbers 1 and 2, to prove this), so we were confident we’d at least have reasonably good seats. Where do you think the first two seats allocated on a flight would be, readers? Did you guess “Slap in the middle of the aircraft, and separated by an aisle, even although you’d specifically requested that this NOT happen?” Because if so, you win the house cup! We were separated by an aisle, and although this may not seem like a big deal to most of you, when you’re as frightened of flying as I am, and need to not only hold your husband’s hand, but also to burrow into his side during take-off, landing, and at regular intervals during the flight, it kind of IS a big deal. I doubt the two elderly ladies sitting next to me would’ve enjoyed having to deal with my in-flight histrionics much, either. (Not that Terry DOES enjoy it, obviously, but, you know, that’s what my parents pay him for.) And we thought our LAST travel ordeal was bad!
Luckily for everyone, the flight crew managed to find us two seats together. Actually, they managed to find us THREE empty seats together, and they managed to do this because there were LOTS AND LOTS OF EMPTY SEATS. TOGETHER. Why they’d tried to seat us apart, then, is anyone’s guess, and by that stage we were too tired to care. We were grateful to have the extra seat to spread out in, though, especially given that this was how much legroom we had:
 Legroom, lack thereof No room to swing a cat. Which was a shame, because we enjoy swinging cats:
 Cat swinging (These guys lived at our apartment complex with their five brothers and sisters. I would’ve brought them all home with me, and thus started my career as a Crazy Cat Lady (I know it’ll happen one day, so why not now?) if I possibly could have, but Terry wouldn’t let me. Gah.
Anyway. We made it home. And then, as we pulled into our street? We drove straight into a huge pile o’snow and got stuck in it for 30 minutes, finally being freed only when a neighbour (NOT Nigel) arrived to help us push/dig the car out. And THIS, my friends, is why I don’t like winter. And why every time I hear someone say “Ooh, I hope we have a white Christmas!” I want to drop to my knees and say, “Are you on crack? Please don’t wish more snow upon us, it traps us inside airports, and makes us worry that we’re going to miss Christmas altogether because if it.” Which could still happen, of course: today we’re more or less snowed in, and not planning to budge until tomorrow, when we’ll be driving to my parents’ house for Christmas. Or at least, we HOPE we are.
Needless to say, I have lots and lots of holiday stories, and even more photos, to share, but those will have to wait until after Christmas. For now, I hope you all have a good one, however you’re spending it – hopefully not in an airport!
* Um, looks like I DID write one of those long, rambly posts after all. Sorry. Happy Christmas!
Tagged flying, gran canaria, holidays, travel ordeals
Well, folks, at last it’s that magical time of year! No, not Christmas: my cheap winter-sun vacation in the Canary Islands, duh!
We fly out early tomorrow morning, and, assuming that our plane doesn’t drop like a stone into the ocean, which is the scenario that’s been running through MY head every night for the past month (thanks, brain!), we’ll be gone for two weeks. Were taking the laptop with us so I can continue to delete dozens of spam comments and death threats from The Fashion Police while I’m away, but I’m not going to be updating this site : I’ve acually been thinking about taking a bit of a break from personal blogging for a while now, and this seems like the perfect time to do it.
So! I’ll be back either after my holiday, or after the Christmas/New Year break. In the meantime, here, have a picture of Rubin dressed as Santa:
 Yo, ho, ho! Don’t worry: he probably WON’T sneak into your house one night and leave you gifts. Unless, of course, you understand “gifts” to mean something else…
Well, we’re off on holiday on Monday, and I’m pleased to announce that so far I haven’t fallen prey to some kind of debilitating illness. You know, like I did last year?
I’m less pleased to announce that in preparation for said holiday, I seem to have totally screwed up my packing. You know, like I did last year?
This time, of course, I don’t even have the excuse of the aforementioned debilitating illness. I haven’t had so much as a head cold (Watch one come and claim me now that I’ve said that, though!), and I’ve also managed to keep my workload under control, so, in theory, I have plenty of time to pack without all of the STRESSSTRESSSTRESS that usually accompanies the thing. Last year, I was so ill with flu that I was forced to leave it all until the last possible minute and then I basically just opened my suitcase and threw things in at random, meaning that when we arrived at our hotel, I realised all I’d brought with me was 25 black tops, a handful of black shorts, a couple of black cardigans, an evening dress, and the shower curtain. (OK, maybe not the shower curtain, but definitely all the rest.) Almost every single item was black, and actually, black isn’t really my colour, to be completely honest with you.
(I’d also apparently assumed that the weather on holiday would be permanently BOILING! HOT!, so when it was overcast and a bit chilly all the time, I was pretty uncomfortable in my little black shorts and tank tops, let me tell you. )
“This will never happen again,” I muttered grimly to myself, as I got dressed that first morning (Well, the first morning AFTER the three days in which I got the flu AGAIN and had to stay in bed, moaning piteously and clutching a Coke Zero bottle filled with boiling water which I was using as a makeshift hot water bottle.) in the shower curtain and a pair of black tights. “Next year I will be totally prepared, and will bring clothes that are suitable for both warm AND cold climates, and which are any colour but BLACK. I have an entire year to prepare for this: what can possibly go wrong?”
I guess that’s why I now find myself the proud owner of no less than FOUR stripey dresses. And about a kazillion stripey tops. I even have a stripey jacket, and I WOULD have bought a pair of stripey shoes, but… Oh no, wait: I DID buy a pair of stripey shoes, didn’t I? Whoops.
These stripey items are what constitute my holiday wardrobe. I could lie down on the road and pass for a zebra crossing, it’s that bad. And the thing is: I can’t seem to stop myself. No matter how many stripey items I own, I still want more. It is a hunger that is never satiated. I will see a stripey dress/top in a shop. It will be virtually identical to one I already own. Hell, most of the time it will actually BE one I already own, given that I own all stripey items of clothing ever made. “Ooh, lookit that stripey thing that looks exactly the same as the stripey thing I’m wearing rightthisverysecond!” I will think, a sweat breaking out upon my brow as I gaze upon the stripeyness. “I think I will buy it!” And then I’ll have ANOTHER stripey thing. I look like a pirate most days. Aaaar!
Such is my way. If it’s not green dresses, it’s Things That Are Grey. If it’s not Things That Are Grey, it’s the Suitcase O’Blackness. And if it’s not that, it’s apparently stripes.
WHY CAN I NOT SHOP LIKE A NORMAL PERSON? WHY?
(Most of the other components of my holiday wardrobe are… navy. Which is, of course, DRAMATICALLY different from last year’s All Black, All the Time fest. Only a few of the navy items also have stripes. And by “only a few”, I mean “most of them do”. GOD.)
Tagged shopping stuff, stripes obsession, things that are stripey
Well, after three years of barely even thinking about Nigel, the International Man of Mystery Next Door, let alone writing about him, I now find myself writing about him TWICE in the space of just a few days. Just call me Magic Amber, Super Sleuth Extraordinaire. Or, perhaps more accurately: Girl Who Answers the Door in Her Dressing Gown With Jogging Pants and a Hoodie Underneath Because She is SO FREAKING COLD All the Time.
Or even “Girl Who Capitalises Too Much”. You decide.
Anyway, there was no super-sleuthing involved in this morning’s Nigel incident, but I DID open the door in my dressing gown (look, it’s REALLY cold here. Also, there is something wrong with our heating, apparently. It’s probably that a dead body has been stuffed inside the pipes or something.) to find a man from Scottish Gas standing outside, holding a clip-board and squinting at me suspiciously.
“Hello!” I said, trying to look like, why, I ALWAYS dress like a homeless person! (And actually, in winter I almost always do.) Whereupon he asked me if there was actually anyone living in the house next door.
“Not living, no,” I said, glad to have yet another excuse to talk about this. “But possibly lying dead on the floor, or inside the walls?” Then I embarked on a breathless tale of how Nigel hasn’t been seen for years – YEARS – and how this one time he turned up and then left in a hurry, and I think he is maybe with MI5, but if he isn’t, then maybe a dastardly villain of some sort, or dead?
(Of course, if he IS with MI5, they will probably come round now and “silence” me for blowing his cover on the Internet. If this is the last ever post here, you’ll know why. It’ll also mean he was a bit of a rubbish spy, though, to be honest, I mean, way to raise suspicion, Nigel! If that’s even your name.)
The man from Scottish Gas was most interested in all of this. It’s the way I tell ‘em, I guess. When I’d finished he raised his eyes to the heavens and thanked the Lord said “Really? REALLY?” but in a tone of voice that suggested, “Well, we’ll be doing something about that then, don’t you worry your pretty little head about it.” Then he made a note on his clipboard, which I assume said something about Nigel, but which may well have said, “Woman next door is mad” or “Homeless people have broken into house next door and are squatting there making up outrageous stories”.
He did spend some time after that walking around Nigel’s property and making further notes, so perhaps something has now been set in motion, which will lead inevitably to an exciting denouement involving everyone in the street standing out there in their dressing gowns while police surround the house and hostage negotiators try to talk Nigel down, using one of those loud-speaker things. And then Terry and I are rewarded handsomely for our role in the whole thing, which has been… er, nothing. (Although, to be fair, Terry does sometimes mow Nigel’s front lawn.) I hope all of this doesn’t happen while we’re on holiday next week. I also hope it doesn’t lead to a less exciting denouement, in which there is some prosaic explanation for the whole mystery, and Nigel’s house is sold to a noisy family of fifteen with ten TVs and five sound systems, which they proceed to blast music from all the live-long day, while throwing endless house parties and whistling.
I bet it’s the second one.
Tagged International Man of Mystery
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