By request....

...The 'techno' cat....


...and the 'iCat'

The 'house' cat!

Thanks Fletch :o)

A 'non' blog post

Oh fer pity's sake....proof positive, if ever there was proof needed that I am getting old and that my mind is turning rapidly to something that should be residing quietly at the bottom of a stagnant pond!

I was woken somewhat violently by the horrendously loud howl 'bleep' of a new alarm this morning but was surprisingly together...all things being relative.

I was up in a moment for fear of waking the whole house, fumbling for the 'off button and amazingly my mind
seemed sharp(ish). As I meandered my way downstairs, bleary eyed I had a bloc post ready and mentally written, all I had to do was make myself an utterly indispensable cup of strong coffee and beat my father to the computer. I was cooking with gas!


Coffee was made, Tilly was fed, my father was yet to be seen and so feeling pleased with myself I sat down at the computer and hit the 'go' button. The machine sprang hobbled into life and I placed my digits over the keys......and the post was gone, completely and utterly gone, absolutely no vestige of recollection as to what it's subject was, nothing, zip, zilch, nada, my mind was a complete void flailing around in a desperate attempt at proving to itself there maybe at least two remaining cells functioning.....hmmmm, not a chance, it was gone, likely never to be seen again!

Two hours later and still not a hint of what my post was to be about, hence this 'non' post....good God! This is age really settling in, I don't even have the excuse that I spent a heavy night on the tiles or that I didn't sleep, for I slept well unusually. Nope, this is the horror that is 'old', the proof positive that the years are catching up with me and poking me hard in the eye to make sure I at least remember that!

Hey ho....it's Friday, Friday's are good (to the best of my memory) so I'm getting outta here for a weekend of drunkenness and debauchery (hey, I can dream) in an effort to rest and re-invigorate my weary mind....have a good one guys.

Open wide!

So yesterday was the day of the dreaded dental visit, for whilst I have been unable to secure for myself a place with a dentist for the last seven years....I didn't actually have a great wish to visit one, just a need to. The fact that I couldn't did have a positive side in that I wasn't forced to look the demon drill in the eye and handle the gut wrenching fear it instills in me!

But yesterday was the end of the line and with a broken tooth to attend to and my father as moral support off I went looking considerably more cheerful than I felt about the whole process.

Dentistry requires way more trust in an individual I have never met than I would usually consider it wise to show but my ignorance of the subject requires, like most of us, that I offer myself up like a lamb to the slaughter, close my eyes and hope for the best whilst trying not to notice my sweating palms, banging head and impending panic attack.

And thus it was, almost upside down and braced for the worst the guy could hit me with that amazingly I survived....yup, I am still alive and more amazing even than that is the fact that this torturous appointment was in fact not torturous at all! More specifically it was a walk in the park, it didn't hurt one iota, he didn't pull my mouth in that way that feels like one is competing in an international gurning contest and there was none of the prodding with heinous tools of torture in the darkest recesses of my mouth!

The guy was a star, completely understood my fear and worked with me on it, the whole incident was over in a few minutes and my confidence that I can cope with the next stage is boosted.....for there is a next stage to be faced. One crown and one filling, not bad after seven years of no treatment but whilst I can't say I am exactly looking forward to it I will perhaps sleep the night before the next time.

All that remains is to raise the £300 for the bill. Of course whilst I am in receipt of benefits I could claim reimbursement for treatment but not for the most appropriate treatment of my problem. That of course is not covered, so as ever seems to be the way if I want the job doing properly I'm gonna have to pay up and look happy.....hey, it will be worth it, the treatment offered on the NHS is liable not to last too long and £300 to only have to do this the once seems a bargain.

However less of a trauma it was than I imagined, a visit to the dentist will remain in my top ten list of things I wouldn't choose to do for fun but it was considerably more bearable than my little mind envisaged! :o)

A rock and a hard place

Once before in my life I had to learn to create a mental image of myself in my own psyche, an image that enabled me to visualize that somewhere, at some point there was or would be a light at the end of the tunnel I then found myself in. Recently I have found myself relying on that same image once again.

To say I currently feel between a rock and a damn hard place is an understatement, no matter what course of action I decide upon, no matter how much research I do into the options open to me it seems that there is always a new hurdle. Each day, just as I begin to think I can glimpse the chink of light I am looking for some new difficulty presents itself and obscures my view.

As with all of us very little of what we do impacts only on ourselves, each decision I try to take, each time I think I have found a way out of this bloody mess it becomes apparent that my course of action will affect others negatively and I have to consider a whole new set of circumstances. How do I choose who's life to disrupt, who to hurt. I wish I could only affect me but that seems impossible.

I feel as if I am walking a tightrope trying to keep everything together, trying not to affect others more than I absolutely have to, trying to keep everyone happy, trying my damnedest to 'do the right thing' for everyone and somewhere among it all what I need or want is lost.

Perhaps having gotten myself into this situation I have no right to consider myself, I have to take the responsibility for the current state of disarray my life is in
and practice damage limitation for those around me but just once, it would be so good for one tiny aspect to be simple, for one situation to be resolved without the now seemingly habitual multi-faceted problems that arise. Without feeling guilty or scared of the reverberations around me.

I can't move forward without resolving some of this and I can't seem ever to get anything resolved for tripping up on a multitude of new difficulties almost daily.

I am beginning to feel well and truly hacked off with it all. I know and I always knew it was never going to be an easy situation I was putting myself into but I didn't ever imagine it would be quite so difficult....somewhere in all of this there is me squashed firmly between a rock and a hard place and the option to spend my last few quid on a 'flight to disappear' before I implode, is rapidly becoming more and more attractive by the day.....but then that would be running away and running away doesn't count as an option in the 'do the right thing' stakes. :o/

I wonder if screaming would help?!

Warm and wet!

Saturday, it was decided a day out in London was the order of the day. There were plans to see a Miro exhibition at the Hayward gallery but for various reasons it was decided against in favour of a walk along the South Bank and up on toward Leicester square, China town and Soho. The sun was shining there was a light breeze and all seemed well with the world, that was until yours truly decided upon a course of action, without first engaging even a modicum of common sense, and things went a little pear shaped.

The South Bank is currently home to a piece of art, a water installation the name and artist of which escapes me, the reasons for my lack of information here will become apparent, as the ensuing moments became somehwat distracted and information gathering became something not in the fore-front of my mind!

Said 'water art' comprises of a large number of narrow fountains arranged in a square and with a further four 'walls' inside of those. The idea is that randomly parts of the fountain stop and start, creating different rooms within and with some having a temporarily missing wall, intermittently enabling those stupid enough venture into this artwork to move about inside. The theory at least seemed simple, there was no shortage of people 'playing' inside these rooms and so without thought or much ado I decided, as soon as a wall came down to join them.

Big mistake!

What I had not envisaged was that barely had I got myself inside of this confounded thing than a strong wind blew up along the Thames resulting in the wall to the back of me blowing inwards and soaking my back half with freezing cold water! My attempts at escape were thwarted when trying to escape I walked through a new 'wall of water'infront of me into the next 'room'. These walls were made up of reasonably vast quantities of the wet stuff and instantly I was saturated to the skin. Add to that the shock on a sun warmed body of icy cold water and my gut reaction was to run out of the damn thing.......straight through another wall of water.

Idiot woman! I may as well have gone fully clothed into the Thames for a swim, ok, so the water was cleaner but I would have been no less wet had I done so!


Needless to say the amusement value of this debacle was not lost on the various tourists and onlookers and a friend 'kindly' saw fit to capture the moment in pixels for posterity!

So, there I was stood on the embankment, small rivers running off most parts of me, squelching shoes and soaked through to the skin. Various options were considered as to our next move but there were no real options other than to 'wring out' what I could on my body and wait to drip dry! Beach huts are not an option on the South bank!

This was not my most comfortable experience, my clothes were stuck fast to me, mostly they had become transparent in varying degrees and you wouldn't belive how cold even a hot summers day suddenly becomes when everything is soaked through and there is a significant breeze!

Suffice to say it had to be tolerated, along with a few strange and mystified looks from passers by. At the point of impact it was obvious what had happened....but a mile away no one had any idea why this half wit woman was walking through town soaking wet. Eventually I dried out, three hours of strong sun and breeze finally returned me to some semblance of normality but in the interim I looked and felt pretty stupid!

Ok....next time maybe I'll resist the temptation to play in water with kids!

Not another spider!

What is it with Fridays and spiders??

Last Friday saw the bath spider incident and today another presented itself, this time on the stair riser and of more than generous proportions.

It was suggested that I hoover it up but I've been there before only to find the monstrosity advance on me once again from the bottom of the machine.....so a new plan had to be formulated.

Plan #2 worked like a dream....squirt it with a generous helping of hairspray to slow down any escape attempts and then deal it a final heavy blow with a handy shoe!

Sorry if that's not very 'green' but my love of green and natural history does not extend to spiders, in any way shape or form!

Hey, I'm getting good at this, that's two 'dispatched' to the great web in the sky (do spiders go to heaven? they better deserve an arachnid hell) in a week....ok, so I'm shaking again but life ain't perfect and myself even less so! ;o)

It's Friday at last.....

....and thank heavens and little fishes for that!

Another week over, this one was a damn long unending one but various of life's pitfalls were negotiated with one degree of success or another, a little more of the current hoo ha that is my life was sorted and now two whole days where I am 'allowed' to forget all of it and just go play, try to chill out, even if only minutely and forget it all until Monday!

Yipeeeeee.

Have a good one guys :o)

.....and it rained and rained

Here in the South we have had some pretty impressive storms over the last 24 hours and though they seem to have done little to clear the air in any real way they did produce some pretty spectacular skies.

This afternoon saw rain and fork lightening the like of which I have never seen before, the centre of the town I live in flooded, as it had last night also, the result of which was that many of the traders either shut up shop and sand-bagged their doorways or never opened at all this morning in an attempt to make good the damage overnight.


For my part I love extreme weather, save for the roof of this house leaking in the late hours of yesterday evening causing me a degree of concern, given that my parents are away on holiday for almost three weeks.

The biggest storm hit as I was leaving Sainsbury's this afternoon laden with bags full of food chocolate. Not one to hover in the doorway hiding with the throng of those waiting in vain for it to stop I decided to make the most of it and go 'play out' in the rain....and some rain it was. It hurt, it actually hurt as it hit my skin and within seconds I looked as though someone had dumped me in a bath-full of water.... but hell it was fun and provided much amusement for my neighbour when I finally arrived home sodden and dripping and looking none too elegant!

(Images clickable)

Biting the bullet

So this morning I decided I needed to 'bite the bullet' a little harder and actually make inroads into the becoming bankrupt thing.

Thus far I have dithered, I have researched it, I have considered it, I have tried to think of all the pro's and con's but I hadn't actually done anything about it....the actually doing it is kinda scary, the point of no return.

As time has elapsed the problems surrounding this delightful state of 'financial cock-up' seemed to become greater and greater (is nothing simple?), for those who consider it so, this is by no means an easy way out, the repercussions have the possibility of becoming quite daunting. Obviously I have to learn to live without the god that is credit cards (not a bad thing in reality), the threat of losing most of my possessions (like I have may!!!) including my car, without which I'm stuffed, a frozen and then non existent bank account (how in God's name do I pay direct debits I wonder?), a completely defunct credit reference for at least six years, prospective landlords taking an instant dislike to my becoming a tenant, absolutely no possibility of a mortgage without massive massive interest penalties or dodgy offshore dealings, this address, which isn't mine becoming credit blacklisted (my parents are gonna love me to bits for that one) and hell....... I don't even know how I will get a salary paid to me once I have a job, without having to divulge this damn bankruptcy thing to the world at large!

Oh...and just for good measure I have to try and raise £500 somehow to pay for the priviledge. Um.......do those seeking personal bankruptcy usually have £500 cash (unsurprisingly county courts don't accept cheques or credit cards) sitting around doing nothing then?

But hey ho, onward and upward, this morning I registered with the insolvency bods, I got the final bits of information I needed and so all I have to do now is fill in the copious number of pages with horrendous amounts of information and then go to court and be grilled for an hour or so by a judge, who in theory at least, will declare me financially inept and pass me onto a liquidator. He or she will then paw through my possessions and assets (ha ha) for anything worth taking and consider making a charge against me for three years.

Sounds like fun don't you think?!.....remind me to forget this part of my life quite quickly if you would please. Bitter? moi?

...and for good measure, whilst I'm having a crap day I have an appointment at the dreaded hairdressers this afternoon, might as well do all the yukky nice stuff at once eh?.

Tomorrow is another day...I hope! ;o)

Big ears!

Especially for Bert,

who enquired if Tilly had yet grown into her ears....a resounding NO!....she still looks like Gizmo!

The heat is on!

I'm gonna melt! No question!

As if last weeks temperatures weren't bad enough the forecast here for the coming week is for hotter still and with the added horror delight of high humidity to boot. So then, that's any possibility of sleep felled in an instant, my chances of a productive few days annihilated and Tilly splayed out under my feet in a state of near collapse, tripping me up for a further spell.

We are an odd lot we Brits, we complain all year of the dismal conditions we endure, the rain, fog, drizzle and wind, we moan and winge that it's no wonder we suffer 'the miseries' given our usual inclement and depressing meteorological situations and that we would, in an instant, 'up sticks' to warmer climes given the opportunity....but then, as soon as we are availed of temperatures anything approaching those that we envy other continents we moan like hell, buy fans and air conditioning units by the lorry load and hide away in the coolest spot we can find wilting! My excuse...hey, I always said I prefer snow!

So for me it will be another week of trailing my hard sought (yup, everywhere had sold out by the beginning of last week) fan around behind me from room to room and hiding out at the local Nero's reading my book where the A/C is excellent and the coffee even more so for the majority of the week. Oh and better still I discovered yesterday that the said Nero's has also to offer a wireless connection for those who wish to pay a small annual fee!

Hard life eh? ;o)

Sunday smile

Bad hare day? :o)

****STOP PRESS****

gemmak just 'dealt with' the most massive bath spider all on her own!!!

Ok...so I'm still shaking but I did it!!

Fcuk!, apologies but this is one of those occasions when no other word will do!