Overheard...

... in Argos.















Woman buying a bracelet....

"If I get it engraved, can I still bring it back?"
"Erm, no."
"But it'll only be a name..."
"NO"

The Day After Tomorrow...

... is Back To The World Of Work. Although seawater getting into the streets of New York over the past few days does seem a bit familiar too...

What have I done to prepare for re-entering the World Of Hectic? The life that is getting myself into a fit, presentable and coherent state, and managing to prise 2 similarly prepared offspring out the door at an unholy hour of the day? Which I have not had to do since early June? Well, not that much really.

• Last night I dreamt that the 13 year old's friend, who will also be at his new school, was driving a milk float whilst trying to learn Polish by linguaphone. The friend has autism, and the multi-tasking was not going well.
• Tomorrow is the day the 13 year old becomes 14. Having a birthday the day before going back to school is a bit bleurrggghh at the best of times. It being the day before, when he hasn't got a settled sleep pattern, a teetering inclination to go to the new school anyhow after dropping out for a year, etc, is perhaps not the best day to fill him with chocolate, birthday cake 'n' all that. Luckily he hasn't discovered booze or drugs yet...
• So we have a Sort Of Plan. Yesterday we went out and did some lovely spending on things that currently make him happy - hoodies, lego, lunch... so we can spend tomorrow a bit more quietly (but still stuff ourselves with cake). And I will keep my fingers crossed.

As for myself, my sort-of plans to sell, sell, sell lots of vintage loveliness during the summer panned out into procrastination, as I ignored the plastic crates piled high that prevented me from getting to my wardrobe area, and thus forced me to create even more piles of not-put-away clothes. Not a good scene. All that I managed to tick off the list was some speedway badges from the 70's, a wooden chair, and a book. Not much of a dent in the mess that has overtaken my room...

With typical good timing I have, at the eleventh hour, gone into decluttering overdrive, and decided Its All Got To Go. Now. I've spent 2 evenings brutally sorting out what to get rid of. 3 bags for the charity shop, and a 4th ready to fill today of more stuff I don't wear.

Oh, and I did some stupid thrifty fence mending on Saturday too - which involved creating a support for a rotten fence post out of a plastic dustbin filled with bricks from a skip. The neighbour is American, and likes his yard Tidy. Part of his fence leaning into my garden was not doing it for him. And given the hurricane conditions over his homeland, I thought having the fence nice'n'straight would give him a bit of zen. 

So I'm a bit tired, have muscle fatigue, and will probably oversleep on Thursday. Or not be able to sleep a wink in a blitz of over-exhausted insomnia.

Sunny Morning

Who's In The House?

The Very Big Important Occasion of channel 5 relaunching Big Brother is only one sleep away now (insomnia permitting). I have peeked at footage showing previews of the house. Ample opportunity seems to have been made for some of the celebrities to climb up onto the roof. The diary room is technicolour and I'm praying the celebs will think of us, the poor viewers who will be enduring this colour-fest, by co-ordinating their outfits accordingly... But the one thing I'm most looking forward to (in that way where random trivial crap fits into your general everyday life of sophisticated culture doing a stocktake of the freezer and paying the window cleaner) is seeing Jedward's hair in the mornings. Unless they both hide industrial-sized hairspray under the duvet, they could be emerging looking like a pair of Draco Malfoys.

       

*****************************

Meanwhile................................. Since when did they give rosettes to small children who might possibly want to become adhd-lite pop stars?

Good Timing

What a good weekend for this image to be the front cover.

D'ya think it gave anyone ideas?

Guardian Weekend magazine, Saturday 6th August

btw the tagline for the story was "the people vs the supermarkets"