There are NICE people out there.

Have a read of this and it will show that there are nice people out there.

Disco Penguin

One of my fabby Christmas Prezzies!

Not a New Year's Eve Party

Last night we went to Mark & Tracey's for what is fast becoming our annual 'group' get-together. The group constitutes Dan's buddies from school days - Mark, Julian, Choc, Chud, Rizz and Paul. Choc and his wife, Julie, where the only ones not there last night. But the rest of the guys were all there. Julian & Karen, Chud & Mandy, Rizz and Paul & Kirst and of course Mark and Tracey our hosts. They're fab, generous hosts, we had great hospitality, pizza, loads of beer and wine, a game that went BZZT and a pop quiz! What more can you ask?
Pictures will be in the sidebar over here for a bit ------------------------------------->
but the permanent link to them is here

Cooking Stress aka 'Prawnettone'

It's been a lovely Christmas, quite quiet, and 'at-homey' which is nice given that we've not had any holidays left to take! Christmas Day itself was lovely - and (even though I do say so myself) the dinner was FANTASTIC. However, when cooking the dinner, Dan and I did find it a bit stressful. There are just so many PARTS to a roasty dinner, and they all have to come together at the right moment in order to make it all work! It did come a bit close to failing when I smelled something fishy once or twice, then realised that Dan, in his keenness to get the prawns defrosted, had placed the bag of frozen prawns on top of the boiler, and the bag was leaking prawn juice on to all the things underneath....bottles of wine, knives, a chopping board, the panettone for the bread and butter pudding! Fortunately most of the things were washable - apart from the panettone which was totally soaked - fortunately the cake itself was double wrapped in cellophane and it was only the box that was prawnified. It DID give us a little bit of extra stress on the day - and we managed to have a laugh by renaming the panettone to PRAWNETTONE! Who knows, it may catch on!

3 Christmas Eve traumas

Well here's how it nearly went horribly wrong on Christmas Eve - a triple whammy.......

1) What's the 1st thing you do on Christmas Eve morning when you get up and you know that you have guests coming to stay in all your spare rooms? You strip the beds. So that's what we did. What's the 1st thing you do once you've stripped all the beds in your house? You put a load of washing on, that's what. What happens though, if you turn the washing machine switch round to select the right program and it goes, click, click, click....spin? Well first you twiddle it a bit, then you push it a bit, then you switch it all off and then on again. Then you phone your sister for moral support, as you take the top off the damn thing. Then you work out how to take the front off - click click - then you realise that the bit that turns the mechanism around to select the program is a piece of plastic that has snapped? (See picture) Well then you phone your wonderful local repair guy who comes out on Christmas Eve afternoon and fixes the washing machine for the grand total of £42. How wonderful is that? For reference....his name is Steve Burton and he lives in Tingley.

Disaster no 2 was later on that evening, after work....

2) I was just laying the table and moving the glass place mats to get the candles in the right places, when I happened to touch a glass oil bottle with the stack of glass mats...then THIS happened - it must have been made out of safety glass because it actually broke into little 'cubes' of glass (no shards) but about a million of them. All over the table, floor, and generally EVERYWHERE!





Our third and final "nearly disaster" was a mega one

3) Michelle and Conrad were en-route down to Leeds, and were just about at Stirling (an hour into their journey) when the oil light came on in the car. They kept trying to convince themselves that all was OK with the vehicle, but it kept making stranger and stranger noises, and in the end, they stopped and called a recovery van to come and take them back to Errol. It could have been disaster - but they're not the kind of people to be put off by a leaking car and a chilly 2 hour wait by the side of the road, no, they got back to the house, had a cup of tea, got in the other car, and headed back south - and so at 10:45 on Christmas Eve, they arrived after 10 hours of travelling, tired, but still on good form! We had a fabby curry (which we made the night before) saw in Christmas Day at midnight and ended up going to bed at about 1:30am!

Forty and Fab Tour

Well ,

We are getting on a bit , and will nearly be hitting the big 4-0., So we are going to have to start looking at places we are wanting to visit.

Out initial thought is to take off a minimum of 3 months and travel around.

I have had a quick look on the web and thought this was a good site talking about planning it .

This also looks good.

Busy Weekend

Well starting with the 'moonlit shopping' it's been quite a busy weekend. Probably too many things to mention in detail, but we've...

• picked up my car from its MOT
• been to the farm to get some beef fillet
• posted parcels to Surrey and Brazil (guess which one was more expensive?)
  
• tidied up the house
• stripped beds in readiness for our guests
• done loads of washing
• wrapped a few more presents (I keep finding them)
• cooked a curry for tomorrow night
• sorted out some paperwork

Phew, I could do with some time off this 'at home' lark. Oh good, back to work tomorrow....for a rest!

ps the parcel to Surrey was £3 more than the one to Brazil!!!!

Secret Santa

We did a 'Secret Santa' thing at work. £5 max for the gift, and each picked a name out of the hat. We gave the gifts out on Thursday lunchtime and I got THE MOST FAB prezzie of a USB aquarium. Non techies: don't ask!...just know it's a really cool thing. However, there was something wrong with my fish. They wouldn't swim....and so I had to ask my Secret Santa politely for the receipt back...but of course, it being a secret, I didn't know who had given me the prezzie in the 1st place.
I started writing an email to all the team who had participated in the Secret Santa and begin it by typing...'Help me Secret Santa'...now clearly I AM a poet, and those of you who have known me for some time will remember some of my famous rhymed outpourings (not least of which my speech at Rose and Liam's wedding!) but as soon as my fingers typed the 'Help me Secret Santa'...I could hear the metre instantly...and nearly as fast as I could type it, the rhymes and rhythms came to my fingertips....

Help me Secret Santa
Thank you Secret Santa,
It really was just fab,
The present that you brought me, will
Look great in the test lab.

You "got me" Secret Santa
It's just the thing I like,
I'm... "gadgets gadgets gadgets!"
Not ... "give me a new bike".

So imagine how I'm hurting,
I hope it's not a joke,
I hate to tell you Santa,
But the gift you bought was BROKE

Please help me Secret Santa,
It would be really neat,
If, in secret, Santa
You could give me the receipt.

So please help me Santa,
And grant me this one wish,
All I want for Christmas is....
An aquarium with SWIMMING fish!

Needless to say, after my poetic overtures, the Secret Santa made himself known and I'm going to take my non-swimming fish back to where they came from. (Sainsbury's!)

Dodgy Christmas Tie

Chris, a lovely colleague from work, is well known for his sartorial eclecticism - that's a dodgy choice of shirt & tie combination to you and me! As yesterday was his last day in work before Christmas, he brought out one of his seasonal classics - a very scary looking Father Christmas. When you press his nose (Father Christmas, not Chris) his eyes flash and he plays a twinkly Christmassy tune.
Very very dodgy if you ask me.

Great night out

They're coming thick and fast now, it's the time of year! On Thursday night we went out on an IBM Leeds Location 'do' which involved a super quiz and a buffet spread! The do was in the Townhouse in Leeds. The quiz was really superb - not least of which because our team 'Recovering Arcadians' came 2nd!
These distinguished looking gents came second from bottom.

Christmas Madness

We did the weirdest thing this morning - we'd woken up in the night - about 3am, neither of us could get back to sleep. So, I was surfing a bit, and Dan was reading his book. At about 4am we were wide awake and Dan said, why don't we go shopping? It took me a minute to get my head round it, but at 4:25 we left the house and headed for Tesco's in Batley

View Larger Map
Interestingly, there were quite a few people there - although there were definitely more staff than customers, nevertheless, there were more people than you'd imagine at 4:30 on a Saturday morning!
There was a very jolly spirit - most of the shelf stackers were wearing sparkley deely boppers, and various festive paraphernalia . There were LOADS of wheeled cages with goods in ready to be put on the shelves - it made the place a bit difficult to navigate with an increasingly full trolley, but it did afford lots of opportunity for chatting with the staff who were all quite available for a bit of banter. I commented to one lady that I had no idea all this went on at night - she replied that most people thought that fairies got the stuff on the shelves - but that at Christmas, it was actually elves doing the work. Completely bonkers :-)

The Best Concert !

This whole public transport thing is becoming a bit of a habit; we went to Manchester on the train last night to see HARD-FI - my favourite band of the moment. They were playing at Manchester Central (formally the G-MEX) which is a venue that I've never been to before. It's kind of like a huge aircraft hanger, and I was a bit upset that it wasn't completely heaving.....BUT......at least it meant that I could get nearer to them!
They came on and played brilliant track after brilliant track. It was (I think) nearly all of the new 2nd album, with a few classic favourites from the 1st. I'm absolutely hoarse today from SHOUTING my head off in the crowd.
We took some excellent photos (they all look the same, a dark area surrounding a bright light!!) but they're up on picasa anyway!

Here's a song frm the new album - 'I can't get along without you'

Barry Norman !

Well maybe not Barry Norman, But i have been watching a few movies this weekend and was going to give a quick review of each.

1) Eastern Promises (Trailer)

Russian gangsters. Dead woman. New baby. A Nurse. All bundled up. It was pretty good. Worth a watch.

2) Shoot Em Up (Trailer)

Classic movie if you are into the "Die Hard" genre. It doesn't take itself seriously at all. It's all out shooting and fast driving. Brilliant way to while away a couple of hours.

3) The Brave One (Trailer)

Jodi foster is pissed off and she wants to kick ASS. So if you like those kind of movies then this is for you. It's worth a watch but know what to expect!

I have seen these other movies over the last few weeks

4) The kingdom (Trailer)

Bombs > FBI > CIA > Find baddies > Try and kill baddies > Get chased by baddies > Big finish
It was ok.

5) Sicko (Trailer)

Michael Moore. Finding out about the US health system. Just make sure if you ever go over there, that you are insured. If not then sell your bloody house to pay for your care!
Scary. But done well

Manchester + Beer = AZ unix team night out

Well we hit Manchester on Wednesday night to celebrate up-coming Christmas and also because it had been a few mad weeks and we needed alcohol to let out hair down .

Miles and I and a two other guys had booked some digs (Posh flats) for £100 a night. The 2 bedroom flats are located above the Hilton hotel in Manchester in the tallest building in Manchester (it's located on deansgate).

The picture below is the view from the flat in the evening and see this further link for more piccys

The only slight ISSUE we had was when we got the keys from some dodgy geezer outside the hotel / apartments and then parked up and then got in the life to go to the 34th floor. The lift stopped on the ground floor and security were there and asked us to follow them !!!
So we followed them and they said "sorry, you can't stay here tonight, The rooms you have booked should not be rented out; its against the lease. You will have to find alternative accommodation."
So as you can imagine we were slightly concerned, as Take That were playing that evening, so we had no chance of getting any further digs.
After various phone calls to the owner and discussions with the security people, They said "We can't physically stop you going to the rooms, but would like you not to." So we went to the rooms and left our gear there and and hit the town, hoping that we would have our clothes left once we got back.

We then met in "All Bar One" a nice bar full of lots of solicitor types , but we found a table and then waited for the other people to turn up.
In the end approx 15 of us turned out. And then we left there and left some of the people there who didn't want to move and went to another bar (Lime), which was pretty good.
Only slight issue in this bar was that one of the guys met his ex-wifes best mate and she kicked off bigtime when he didn't say hello to her (Bloody manc women!), She lost it and started kicking off calling him all the names under the sun . Very weird. They guy gave us the history about it and she was OUT OF ORDER.

So more beers were had, and we went off to some other IRISH pub , not a clue where it was, but we stayed there for lots more beers and Miles and I then chipped off for some food (a kebab) which was great but then we found ourselves in a casino!

So we went to the pontoon table and played 20 quid each, both worse the wear. Lasted 15 mins and then left.

Got back to the flat @ around 4:30 and then woke for work, FEELING the love ! (Which is "Dan" for feeling krap!)

Excellent night had .

Anthony's Wine !

I went searching for some of the vino that Li enjoyed fully the last time we went to this excellent restaurant .

And i found it. The wine is Maury La Preceptorie De Centernach "Cuvee Aurelie".

So I have ordered some for xmas . And while I was on this site I ordered some Foie Gras so should be a great meal.

Turkey Lurkey

My task this weekend was to try and find / arrange our Christmas lunch (or @ least part of it).

So went to out local farm shop which has its own butcher and looked at the turkey crowns there, but they didn't look that great. We have had ones from there before, but they were packaged differently then. This time they seemed to have been split down the middle and packed that way.

It put me off so I went googling.

I found a couple of places that still would deliver and finally picked on kellys turkeys

They deliver this Friday, so have gone for 2X turkey crowns. (It said on the site that 1 crown would do 4, and there are 6 of us for Xmas dinner). Li I know we are having beef fillet as well. But I am also making sure we have some turkey left between Xmas and new year so sarnies and SOUP.

The girls' night in.....got out!

I'm not sure that Leeds is really ready for it - but the girls' night in escaped last night from in front of our TVs, DVDs (and in Michelle's case her Nan's video recorder) for our December gathering.

The first part of the evening was very exciting (on my part, anyway) because I had to get on a BUS to get into Leeds - first time in MANY years on public transport! (Yes I am the queen!)

Brasserie Blanc was the location for the dinner part of the evening. Very nice venue - great atmosphere and everyone's meal was fantastic mine wasn't that fab, but I think I might have made a wrong choice - they'll get a second chance anyway as I've promised to take Dan there.

It probably shouldn't happen too often - as previous experience would show that we can get a bit giddy if we're let out! Poor Anthony (of Anthony's Restaurant) may have a twitch for the rest of his life after having met us under similar circumstances after a fabulous night in his restaurant.

So it was all rather civilised during the meal. We took some piccies and the only trauma was that they'd run out of the Xmas menu, just as we decided on the Xmas menu!

After dinner we headed towards millennium square to the Epernay champagne bar to meet up with some of Michelle's suppliers who were in town and who she'd normally be going out with if it hadn't been the GNI(O). They were absolutely top geezers and bought a LOT of champagne for us - Thanks guys! There were loads of silly piccies taken, not least of which because Michelle's camera took a fatal turn for the worse after an earlier nose-dive so my one got passed around everyone (hence all the slightly sideways ones of champagne glasses!) Apologies now if you have an aversion to lots of drunken cheezy grins and a load of red-eye!

Link to the piccies here ---> GirlsNightInOut

Great Meal(s) Great Miles

We've had a good weekend! It has involved food and wine, and lots of both. Dan's buddy Miles was over for Dinner on Saturday night. (Intended) menu as follows...

• Oysters with lemon and vinegar
• Antipasti with dates wrapped in pancetta
• Seared scallops with chilli
• Crostini with garlic, tomato, olive oil, capers, anchovies, ham
• Tuna Carpaccio with pink grapefruit juice and sesame oil
• Watercress soup
• Beef Wellington with baby veg and sweet/normal mash
• Lemon syllabub served with pomegranate seeds soaked in pimms!
  

Unfortunately, between course 1 and course 5, we managed to put away a *few* bottles of wine and actually we never quite got to the soup! It's a good job we'd had quite alot of food before!!!

On the up side, the courses that were left...

• Watercress soup
• Beef Wellington with baby veg and sweet/normal mash
• Lemon syllabub served with pomegranate seeds soaked in pimms!

...made for a perfect Sunday lunch! It's a good job Miles didn't have anywhere to get to too urgently on Sunday, and he joined us for part 2 of the dinner!!!
It's now Monday night and Dan and I have had....avvos, dates in pancetta, crostini and the roast beef for tea! We could have fed about 12 people I think!

Mad Dog, Mad Dan

I've just uploaded my 1st movie to YOUTUBE! It's a silly one of Dan and Winnie playing in the garden....

*** Update - 32 views on YouTube (and no, they weren't all me!!!)

Perry Como - fab!

Oh I'm definitely feeling twinkly!

1st Christmas Cards received!

Ooooh it's very exciting! We've had 2 cards already....thank-you Bev & Daniel! I'm so glad I've written all mine! They'll get posted over the next few days you'll probably get yours soon, postal services permitting, of course!
I'm nearly done on all the prezzie buying because we started ordering things in November (more or less from when we came back from holiday) so it's actually given us a bit of time to enjoy the run up to the festive season! As you can see from the picture, Dan is totally delighted and feeling very Christmassy too!

Putting up the tree

Well it's Sunday afternoon and I'm sitting here with Gracie - we've spent a very nice day together. First of all we did the *quickest* dash round Tong Garden Centre to get a tree. In fact were in and out in under 20minutes. Gracie picked up the 1st tree we came to, it was perfect (she has an eye for the artistic!) and off we went. Good job too, Dan was having a claustrophobic trauma about there being too many people. He doesn't like too many people! It rather spoiled our attempts to purchase every sparkly gold thing in the building. But, never mind, we managed to get 150 lights, 5 baubles, and 2 pieces of gold tinsel! Dan, in the meantime, took out 2 Father Christmasses and an entire family whilst swinging round with an 8 foot tree in his shopping trolly!!! It was THE WORST weather in the world. Freezing, raining, and so windy that I ended up looking like I'd been dragged through a hedge backwards! So, tree safely in Dan's car, and Grace, Harry and I safely in mine, off we trotted to Frankie and Benny's at Junction 27 retail park. We started off with some nice garlic bread (and some with cheese, which we mostly all thought was nice) and then we had....

• Gracie - Margherita pizza
• Harry - A BIG lasagne
• Liza - chicken salad (and chips)
• Dan - calzone

As you can see from the picture, we finished ALLLLLLLL of it. We were so full at the end that we couldn't even think about a pud!
When we got back here, we started with the tree in its stocking, putting some cobble stones into the barrel base to keep it upright. Then we filled the gaps with little stones. This provides a very very solid base for the tree. One false start though - we were concentrating too hard on the stones and the tree started leaning at a funny angle! Not a problem, we took the stones out and started again, and this time the tree was more or less upright!!!!
We first put up the 3 new sets of lights. Fab, muticoloured ones. I bought them because the old set was really dying. Or so we thought......when Dan and Harry went into the loft to get down the ornaments, 2 new sets of lights were in there!!! I'd forgotten that we bought them last year. So all in all there were 326 (coloured) lights - one set a flashy flashy one! And one set of white ones (120) which will go into the lounge. Very nice. And slightly forgetful. Ooops!
After that it was a matter of minutes before all the baubles were up - with some query as to the tastefulness of each ornament as it went up on the tree. Some were discarded in bad taste! Others deemed to be so bad, they were good, in a kitsch way.
So now, we're sitting here admiring our hard work, and putting the photos up onto the web - link ---> here if you want to see more.

Dad demos the use of a fridge

Going....














going....














.....gone!

Getting more like home

The renovations have been going on behind the scenes and one week on from the last set of pictures you can see that there have been some big movements forwards with everything. The kitchen, the dining room, the lounge, have all started looking like rooms again rather than a builders' yard! Isn't it looking lovely? The floor is amazing and the rooms still look massive! There are stil a few bits needed. A sideboard and a table (the thing in the picture is actually 2 tressles!!!) and there's a bit of redecorating to be done still, but it's really looking like home - although, not home, if you know what I mean!!!
It's GORGEOUS!

Getting all Chrimbly at work

Donna and Nicole and I were talking about Christmas yesterday (Friday) at work. We were getting all very enthusiastic about it. OK, let's be honest, we were getting giddy and excited! After an expedition across the road to poundstretcher, we came back with some very very classy decorations (ho hum!) and then spent the rest of the afternoon getting the tree up! Well nearly! It looks very nice and will set us up nicely for when we get back after the weekend - after all it is December! We also got a load of tinsel to decorate the desks on Monday - it's going to be fantastic and Christmassy. Can't wait!

The nicest Advent calendar in the world!

Yes, it looks like St Mark's basilica in Venice. That's because it is! It's huge, gold, gorgeous and has (apparently) pictures of various Venetian works of art behind each window!
Thanks Jacq!

I want a car as fast as this

A quiet week

I don't know how to describe it but it's been a really bad week - flat, dull. It's not that I've felt ill or there's something wrong - nothing like that. I'm not sure that it's even anything in particular. Just a general feeling of lethargy. The weather isn't helping. That's been dull and flat this week too. The clock change is probably what it's all about really, the dark nights and increasingly dark mornings. How SAD is that?

Mum and Dad's renovations!

Although we've been banned from the house due to the cold, I forced my way in today (Sunday) - well to be fair the central heating had been reattached on Friday! So I was finally allowed in. Better still, it was Uncle Ste's birthday so the plan was for a nice Birthday lunch!
I was SO amazed at the difference, it's hard to know where to start - the floor is superb - all one flooring makes the downstairs look HUGE.


Then there was the new door into the lounge - very spooky. Uncle Ste and I were thinking it was a bit like 'Through the Looking Glass' - there was a space there which definitely shouldn't be there - according to our minds anyway.









Finally there's the kitchen - wow! It's all very bright and sleek and the cooker is AMAZING - totally not like the kitchen, and then totally just right!!!
Some more pictures are ---> here

Boo hoo! Back home.

Well it couldn't last for ever could it? It was such a nice week away that it did feel like we were gone for more than a week. Good job really as I don't have any more holiday left until Easter. That's bad!
Our final day in Ballater was just a bit of a 'get up and get out' really. We had to be gone by 10am but by 9:15 we were packed and ready to go. We were going to stop in the village for a coffee but I guess in off-season, nothing opens much before 10. So off we drove thinking we'll catch something down the road in Braemar, which looks like a nice touristy place. Well, there were plenty of tourists , but although we drove round the place twice, NOTHING was open and this was around 9:45. Loads of nice looking shops (closed) but we couldn't even see a tea shop. Damn them. The road is pretty bleak. So on we went. The next form of anything we came accross was 'Spittal of Glenshee local services' we'll give em a try, we thought. Wooooah. How wierd. You dive through a bit of a village and then to the Spittal of Glenshee hotel (which *is* the services). First impression is of a bad mock up of Crossroads Motel - 1970s dark wood cladding. Going into the hotel you are met with a disturbing mixture of all that is bad in Scottish decor (tartan tie-backs) with all that is bad about a ski lodge (pine cladding). The staff are wearing kilts (oh yeah so it must be Scottish!) with polo shirts and green knee socks, most of the ones we encountered were Polish - although that's not unusual in today's hotel business. There were (several) signs on the bar which said

Glass of Tap Water 50p
Water with meal - f.o.c.
Water for medicinal purposes (small glass) f.o.c.

The whole thing left you feeling rather that you'd dropped into 'The Shining' or some bad 1970s horror movie hotel from which you'd never leave! Strangely I can't find any comments about it on TripAdvisor or similar websites - so maybe noone does ever leave, or the American tourists who stay there think it's twee. Who knows!? Anyway when we got back to Conrad & Michelle's and we told them we'd stopped for a coffee there, the 1st thing they said was, 'oh that weird hotel' so clearly not just us who thought it peculiar!

After a fabulous venison lunch (and a bit of a gamble on e-bay) we left for part 2 of the journey. Much better, we did it in 3 hours 45 which got us home just on 7 and gave us the whole of Saturday evening, and Sunday to re-acclimatise to "southern parts". Obviously southern in this context meaning in relation to Scotland, we do still live in Leeds aka "northern parts" in relation to most of the rest of the country!

Holidays 7

Friday - oh no - second to last morning in The Stables - can it all be coming to an end? It feels like we've been here for weeks! Today we got ourselves up quite early (7:30) after a good night's sleep on both parts, but after coffee both collapsed back into bed - Dan for further sleep and me to update the blog and more piccies popped up onto picassa.
Dan then suggested we go and have a look at a waterfall - good thought! So we checked out the map and found a loch with a waterfall really near to Ballater - called Loch Muich (pronounced "Mick") off we drove - Dan was delighted because about 6 miles of the road were single track and we could see very clearly what was coming along the road so a small 'T.M.' ensued. (T.M.= turbo moment) So off we bimbled down this track....and parked in the car park. There were warning notcies on the pay & display information saying not to go down to the lake without being properly kitted out! There was a 'short-ish' walk round to the end of the lake and back - about 3k - so we decided to do that. Fortunately we both do 'gear' so we did have all the gear this time. Good job! It was WILD out there. The loch sits in a wide flat bottomed valley and the wind must have been whilsting down there at 100mph! Some bits we could hardly take a step! Mega! Talk about blowing the cobwebs away. It took us about an hour and a quarter to walk around and at the bottom of the valley it was like being on the surface of the moon! Really beautiful. On the way home we drove to Balmoral throught the back roads, really gorgeous countryside. I can see why queenie likes it up here. The seclusion must be a relief.
When we got home we went for a cuppa and a scone in another nice local tea shop. The couple who run it are from Devon (22 years in Ballater tho') and were dead chatty, talking about the difference between life up here to down there. Very friendly!

Holidays 6

Thursday - well I know it doesn't sound like we've been doing too much but with Dan's sore neck and then the cough and sore throat, I'm conscious that we don't do too much to tire him out so we decided that Thursday was going to be a day at home. We got up about 10 and I made sausage, bacon and egg for brekkie. Then I tidied up the fire 'doins' from last night and Dan reset it. We read books and magazines and then went to get some more fuel for the fire. We mooched around a bit more then popped to the Balmoral Bar for a game of cards and a couple of pints of Guinness extra cold. Then it started to snow! Just a little bit....but it was nice. There were a few old chaps in the bar dressed in suits and black ties - there had been a funeral in the church - and it was lovely to watch them getting excited at the snow - '...ach isn't it lovely?' one said as he turned to the window. To be fair it was about the only thing they said that I could actually understand! Their accents were very strong. I wish I could have brought Dad here for a listen to see what he'd have made of it.
To round our lazy day off, we popped to the local Chinese so we didn't have to cook any tea! Now, there's a nice day!
(PS Picture is the 'surprising castle' mentioned in prvious post!)

Holidays 5

Wednesday - today was our 'longer' journey away from Ballater - we decided to drive through the National Park on the one road through the middle, accross to Aviemore. So, after a bit of toast and jam, we got en route. It was only 50 miles but, partly because we were enjoying the scenery, and partly because it's a mad wiggly road, it actually took us about an hour and a half! We came through some little towns in the middle of nowhere and came through some amazing scenery and the beginnings of the ski area.
For lunch we went to JJ's in Grantown on Spey - a bizarre little place in a bizarre little town. It took them 45 minutes to churn out some soup and a sarnie. 'New chef' was the excuse. I'm thinking how come you need a 'chef' to make soup and a sarnie? Never mind, we then did a bit of a nice tour round the smaller roads behand Aviemore - Loch Garten is the place where the Ospreys were that we wanted to see - only problem is - they're migratory and had gone for the season (they leave at the end of August) but we stopped there anyway - and I'm so glad we did - it was stunningly beautiful (see the pics) not a big loch, but still clear water lapping up against pine and various other trees....amazing place. I knew Dan was starting to feel better when I heard him say '...and the next time I see you, you'll be in my fire...'! 'Who are you talking to?' I said. 'The logs' he replied.
There wasn't really a circular route option for coming back so it was the same way again - nice to see it from the other angle though - including a most surprising castle which seemed to pop up out of nowhere. Gorgeous. Most of the drive was through scenery you'd invent for a movie! Honestly this place is stunning! I was pleased we made it back in daylight though as some of the single track roads were a bit 'challenging'!
For tea we went to 'La Mangiatoia' - a nice little Italian place in Ballater - the pizzas were fantastic and definitely the best I've tasted for some time. Another fab day!
PS oooh forgot to mention that we saw 2 red squiggles at the lake - they were too quick to snap but they were gorgeous!

Holidays 4

Tuesday - the days are starting to all feel the same and as I'm writing this on Wednesday night it's actually quite difficult to remember what we actually did! I'm pretty sure we got up....and had brekkie, oh yes I remember now, Dan had had a rubbish night with the coughing and when I woke up he wasn't in the bed - I heard him coughing from the next room. Poor him. We had a brief chat about plans and looking at the weather we weren't sure whether it was fit for wandering about (or whether we were, for that matter) so we decided to have a bit of a drive over to Banchory - a town about 25 miles from Ballater. Conrad and Michelle had recommended a nice place for tea and scones and we spotted it as we were driving through the town. We drove down a long path and this nice hotel came in to view at the end of the drive. The River Dee ran by the side of the hotel, it was a very picturesque spot. We had a nice lunch (omlettes & chips) then went for a very brief walk along the river during which we spotted a pair of herons chilling out by the river bank! We wandered back through the town and we went to the pharmacist for something to sort Dan's cough out. I was thinking along the lines of a chainsaw, she offered a cough suppressant. Ho Hum. We went to the pub for a swift pint of Guinness. We then meandered on home and got the fire lit - 10 out of 10 for the fire this time! Roaring within about 5 minutes! We've been talking about getting a real fire at home - how nice would that be?

Portrush 1

I know we're in the Cairngorms, but that's *this* week! *Last* weekend we were in Portrush for a nice weekend up there with Scotty, Michele, Sarah & Steve.
On the Friday it was touch and go as to who was actually going to make it to Ireland at all - 3 couples, converging on Portrush, from diferent starting points....Sarah and Steve flying from Heathrow to Dublin, Liza & Dan flying from Leeds Bradford to Belfast City, and Scotty & Michele, flying from Southampton to Belfast International. The logistics were...initeresting.
Spanner in the works no 1
Sarah phoned on Thursday to tell me that Steve had sent his passport off to the Aussie Embassy to get his Visa - this *would* have been good news (Visa finally sent) apart from the fact that he didn't have a picture driving licence and therefore no other photo ID. Damn.
Spanner in the works no 2
On Friday at about 11:20 I got a call from S&M saying they were stuck on the M27 and could I check them in online...yup, no problem I said. What time is your flight leaving at....11.50! Onine check-in closes at 45 minutes before departure and even though the flight was aledgedly delayed a bit, there was nothing doing.
Oh My God, I thought....are Dan and I going to be kipping on the floor in the Harbour Bar tonight!????
It all came together though - I got a text from S&M saying that they were on the flight, and one from S&S saying that Steve had got through security OK (noone even checked his ID) and we got on our flight knowing that the guys were all en-route. S&S had hired a car down in Dublin and were driving up to Belfast (Sounds convoluted but the cheapest flights from Heathrow to Belfast were over £200 each!) to pick us up on the way to the north coast. Even with the airport restrictions (no stopping in front of the building) we managed to effect the smoothest pickup without (a) having to pay for car parking and (b) stopping...well nearly...and we were soon on our way to Portrush - after a relatively uneventful hour, were were pulling up the driveway and S&M were pouring the wine and serving up the pies (nice one Michele!) which were our tea. Fantastic welcome.

Cute Dan

We stayed over at Conrad & Michelle's in Errol on our way up to Ballter, and just as we were getting ready to leave I was looking at the piccies on the wall of their hallway. Some nice old photos of family members past and present, and, I noticed for the 1st time, a child's drawing of the family. The time it was drawn must have been before Marina was born because Irv is depicted as a baby in the pram, but the others are all there....Vanora, Wilma, Conrad, Michele and of course Dan. Or 'Daniel' as Wilma has identified him, for it is she who drew the pic. It's the cutest little picture of him, and, I think, still a good likeness....what do you think???? It's a must for facebook!

Holidays 3

Monday - this is the 1st day (I think) that your holiday starts to feel like a *proper* holiday. No work, no hassle! Yesterday we had spotted the cute little station tea rooms which is in the old Ballater station building alongside the tourist information (it's a little museum with statues of Queen Vic herself getting off the train which she used to do on her way to Balmoral). So at 10 am sharp we were up and about ready for the big Scottish brekkie promised on the menu. When we got to the door there was NO sign of life! How disappointing. We concluded it must have only been Sunday morning that they did brekkie. So, we wandered round the village again (5 minutes) bought some bread and cheese from the posh little deli, got dominoes, a map and some cards from the paper shop and wandered back home to make our own brekkie. I looked at my watch, 10:35. Hmmmm, I wonder? I said to D, 'I'm just popping out to see if they open at 10:30'....and right enough the door was open! 'Wahoooo', I said as I walked back in 'what's that mean?', 'It's open' I said. 'Lets go'. it's a good job we went as quickly as we did, as we got the 2nd to last table in the place. During the time we were there they must have turned away 8 tables! I'm not surprised, the smoked salmon scrambled egg was DELICIOUS and at £4.25 amazing value for money as they seemed to have dropped at least a tenner's worth of smoked salmon on it! Really delicious!
After brekkie we came back to the cottage and lit the fire. D is getting pretty good at this now. He sat and read whilst I wrote a couple of letters. What bliss, it's such a luxury to hand write notes to people - I just never get the time normally! We decided to go out and post the letters then, as the post office is less athan 100 yards from the house. Continuing the stroll round the village, we popped into the The Glenaden Arms for a swift pint of G. Dan was very impressed by the Dyson hand dryers in the loos! We continued round the village and I bought a camera USB cable from the internet shop, and then some jogging pants for lounging around the house in (I've forgotten to bring PJs). After that strenuous day, we had to come back to the house for some of Dan's mum's apple pie, freshly made for us on Saturday morning. YUMMEEEEEEEE! Needless to say, I needed a nap after all that, so retired to bed for half an hour.
When I got up, Dan was...reading the paper in front of the fire. It's all getting very relaxed round here. We planned some TV to watch (a couple of documentaries we wanted to see) and made a nice tea from the leftovers and lovely fresh bread and cheese!
It's such a hard life being on hols.

One lump or 2?

Poor Dan, he's had a lump on the back of his neck the size of an egg for the last couple of weeks. The doctor says it's a cyst which has got infected, and in fact he's had this afliction a couple of times before, once about 4 years ago that I can remember and once on another occasion a few years before that which was, as they say 'before my time'. When we were in Portrush *last* weekend (more blogging on that here) we could see he was getting uncomfortble by the way he was holding his head a little to one side, and in fact it looked like he had a back problem, you know, when people turn their body instead of their head so as to avoid the pain, so I knew it was getting bad. Fortunately he'd already been to the docs and got 2 doses of antibiotic (because it took 2 lots to get rid of it last time) so it was a matter of taking the tablets, and waiting for them to take effect.
The lump got bigger and bigger and he was in increasing pain as the pressure got higher (see the 1st three pictures on the link below) it totally took over the back of his neck and goes up into the hairline - in fact you can see he didn't really have a neck - it sticks out rather than in when you look at it in profile.
The beginning of the end happened on Thursday morning. 'Something's happened to my neck' he said, and showed me the pillow which had blood on it. Euwghhh.
There was scar there from when it popped last time (which you can see on the 'before' pics) and it would seem that he'd managed to catch this somehow and it started to bleed. I washed it with antiseptic and gave it a blast of dettol spray and re-dressed it with a nice melolin dressing.
The next night it was clear that there was going to be an eruption as the pressure was building still (no let-up in the pain) and it had stopped feeling rock hard and had started to feel a bit squidgy.
D-Day (or rather I should say t-time) came at 5:30am Friday morning - 'It's splurged' he said - and as I took of the dressing, a stream of lava-like green and yellow stuff erupted from it. 'Phew that feels a bit better' he said. I was too busy running for the camera to feel too grossed out - and after taking the pics, I cleaned it up with some nice antiseptic wipes and re-dressed it. The next couple of days it's got better and better, still some rock-hardness in there but deflating more and more every day as the goo comes out of it. He's not been taking painkillers since the 1st eruption as the pressure started to reduce from that point.
Pictures (not for the fainthearted) ---> here.

Holidays 2

Waking up bright and early on our 1st full day's holiday, Dan got the kettle on and we settled into bed to read the papers. We mooched about a bit at home - I cleared out the fire and re-laid it - Dan faffed about a bit with my thinkpad to see if we could get connected. We wandered out into the village again at about 1:30 and settled on lunch in 'The Rowan Tree' a nice place on the main street with a 'tea room' feel about it. I had cock-a-leekie and D had the roast lamb shank. Simple tasty food, served beatifully with veg, massive portions, and at the amazing price of £7 each! We were very impressed and we'll deffo go back. We then did a little tour of the village again (it only takes 5 minutes) and stocked up on missing items in the COOP. The lady serving us was a bit mental so we got in quite well and chatted for about 10 minutes! It seems that all the shop-keepers are willing to spend a minute chatting to each customer. I think people have a bit more time here!
We got home and I, being in holiday mode, went for a nap, Dan was reading the paper and just chilling out by the fire. I came down after about an hour and a half to find him watching TV and being very relaxed. Papers EVERYWHERE. Ahhh yes that's what Sundays are for. Earlier we'd been to get some logs, kindling, coal and peat (yes, peat) from the local garage so Dan was waiting for me to put the peat on the fire. What a smell! It's wonderful.
After having decided to settle in for the night, we had just started watching "Charlie's Angels:Full throttle" when we heard a few fireworks go off. Damn, we were going to go to the town display. Quickly we made ourselves decent, and legged it out of the house. We followed some well wrapped up people who looked the part, through some side roads. Then Dan spotted the flames though the trees! A MASSIVE bonfire in the park! Excellent. You could feel the heat from about 200 yards away! Just as we arrived, the firework diplay began. We had a good 20 minutes of 'ooooh'-ing and 'ahhhh'-ing. They were great. When they were done we were just about to head back to the cottage when we realised there was a stall selling hot pork sarnies from a hog roast. YUM! Crackling and apple sauce to boot! On the way home we happened to fall into a pub and 2 pints of Guinness extra cold just seemed to find their way to the bar in front of us. It'd have been rude not to! Just as we were finishing up, Top Gear came on the pub's tv screen, so we legged it home to watch the boys having a bit of fun with clapped out cars accross Namibia. We were going to watch the dance-off part of Strictly Come Dancing, but Dan was so clueless as to who anybody was; that's Sam Fox isn't it - no it's Leiticia Dean, isn't that John Curry - err no I think he's dead (he meant Brendan Cole anyway!) that we gave up before anyone set foot on the dancefloor! Another chilled out day in the holiday zone!

Holidays

Well, I know it's been a couple of weeks since we last wrote anything on the blog but it's been a busy time! This week however we're on our hols and so hopefully we'll be able to get a few more notes onto the blog as well as catch up on in-between events!
So where are we? Currently we're in a lovely village in Scotland called Ballater - it's north of Perth and east of Aberdeen. Apparently it's where the queenie comes to church when she's at Balmoral (which is only round the corner). We're staying in a lovely little cottage right in the centre of the village which we managed to find on 'Cottages4you'. The basic search criteria were (1) a real fire (2) a pub nearby and that's exactly what we have got. Another advantage was that we could use Dan's Mum and Dad's place in Errol as a jumping off point - we did look at places which were much further west, but this seemed to suit us fine. 2 hours drive from Errol - it's only 70 miles!!! Wiggly roads and lovely views. We are actually in the Cairngorms National Park so great views wherever you look!
After leaving work on Friday night we drove up to Errol arriving just before midnight - we spent the morning with Conrad & Michele, and then at about 2pm on Saturday we headed on up here. The lady who owns the cottage was just leaving after having made sure we had loads of logs for the fire, and so we settled in to 'The Stables'. A quick unloading of possessions was followed by a run around the town to get some provisions. With this place being so close to Balmoral, quite a few of the shops bear the royal crest saying that they are providers of their produce to HRH Prince of Wales or Queenie herself. The crest things they have over their shops are quite impressive - about 3 foot high and all decorated in bright colours! I'll attach a picture at some point. So the town has a rather swanky old fashioned butcher from whom we purchased some lovely sausages & eggs. Then we were going to go to the equally swanky deli, but stumbled upon the COOP which we raided with a vengeance for goodies.
So that was us for the night - we got the wine open, and the fire lit - I roasted the sausages & we chopped them up and ate them like party food dipped in tomato sauce, alongside some potato wedgies I made! A perfect evening.

Coq au Vin

After 2 hours (half way!)

Dan's been buying fireworks.

I'm scared!

Coq au Vin

"Before"

Making Pumpkins

Mrs Bedford's Toffee

Blog entries like twitter posts today - this is the precursor to the toffee (finished product posted later today)

Wainer's Advice

Over the summer when Anna & Wainer were here, Wainer was giving Janie some very good advice about nutrition and how to get the right sort of chemicals and nutrients into her body, especially when she's going through a phase of being not well. One of the pieces of advice was to have red wine, not white, and one finger of it...as you can see from the picture, he didn't actually specify WHICH finger! We chose the top one!

You'd have thought someone had taught us to cook!

The last 2 nights we've gone for the 'bitty' tea in grand style! Prawn cocktail - pictured, and fabulous bruschetta with artichokes, anchovies, olives, capers, ham - also in the pic. Really really nice. Last night we even filled vol-au-vents with pizza style toppings. Really superb. They're definitely going to come out for the next dinner party!

Scary Webcam

As a result of the new lapotop, on Thursday night, when Janie arrived for the weekend, we were able to get online on MSN to see Mum and Dad on their webcam! Very scary! In fact when we did "full screen" view it was just like sitting across the dining room table from them at home!
The pic is at a point where we were trying to get some online game thing going! It's all a bit scary close-ups tho! Mum's microphone is very very quiet, we have to have the volume turned up VERY loud, and she has to lean forward into the laptop so we can see what a good job Dad did on her roots!!! It's all been cause for great hilarity!

Mum's new laptop

Yaaaaaaawn, we're a bit tired today - we didn't get in last night 'till 3am! No, nothing like that! Mum's got a new laptop and broadband and we (well Dan) went over to help her set it up and get everything started. Only 2 problems

1. it's Vista
2. it keeps freezing

very distressing on both counts. Even super Dan couldn't work out what was going on. It's very puzzling and we've had to raise a support record with Dell. The only problem is that after 24 hours they've not contacted us (or even sent a confirmation email) and, worse, when Mum phones up for help, I have no idea how to find anything or how to direct her towards the right bits! It's like a foreign language! Hopefully armed with a copy of this though, she'll soon become the family Vista expert!!!

Current TV faves

Greys anatomy (Season 4 Just started)
K-Ville - Cope show based in new orleans (started off very well)
Californication - Great series with the guy from Xfiles
Damages - Lawyer type of show starring glenn close

Don Quixote

Just back from the West Yorkshire Playhouse where we've seen a production of Don Quixote.

2 and a half hours of sheer magic.

The production has had its critics, but all I can say is, you soulless eeejits. How could that performance not have entertained you? We laughed and cried.

See it if you get the chance!

More Imposting?

And this from today - Imposter or real? You decide.....!

13:57 Veronica: my dear daughter, how art thou

mummykins is here

10 minutes

14:08 Veronica: Dont be ignoring me please. Your daddy and i will not be pleased

Imposter on google chat?

So I'm on gmail the other day and Mum's name went to green status - meaning she's online. Now, remembering that I'd given her password to Dan so that he could check the status of her new laptop order...the conversation went like this

14:38 me: dan is that you

or is it mum?

37 minutes

15:16 Veronica: nortee

its ur mum

stinky daughter

33 minutes

15:50 me: hmmmm i think your spelling has deteriorated somewhat, mother dearest

53 minutes

16:43 Veronica: oy my little scratter li

i always wanted to say that but never could

But i can now on this chat thing :)

16:44 so how's u doing?

me: heheehe

So, unless Mum has started with the Altzheimers - I think I need to be careful who I'm chatting to!

Cedric - finally captured

Our new housemate, who we have spotted over the last few days, was finally captured by Dan - unfortunately, using the traditional "glass & postcard" method of spider capture wasn't quite adequate so we had to press the pyrex dish into service!
Where has Cedric been spotted in the last few days

• Liza saw him drop through the window last weekend
• Dan saw Cedric in the kitchen
• Liza saw him in the bathroom cabinet
• Dan saw him scuttling around the lounge

Cedric was finally captured after a fight in which he pulled Dan off the sofa and knocked the coffee table over. Seriously. Look at the size of him!