The Places in Between

Went to Rory's book talk last night. It was fab.

I have now read Rory's book and would thoroughly recommend it to anyone. It certainly vastly increased my knowledge of that area of the World and how it think and feels. It has also increased my admiration for this amazing friend of mine.

Rory was sharing the talk with James Ferguson who had been a journalist in Afghanistan in the late 90s and had befriended his guide. The guide's life was ruined because he had helped the western infidels and the book is about James' role in gaining political aslum for his guide.

James' book (Kandahar Cockney) sounds fascinating too so that is now on the 'to get' list.

Wendy came along too which gave us an, albeit brief, chance to catch up before she heads back to Canada. Amazing the call of the Edinburgh Festival: Wendy came all the way from Canada for three weeks of festivaling and is returning to Canada this weekend. Wendy if you do find your self back in Edinburgh again give us a shout we'll still find you a job! If not have a fab time on your continued travels.

Commiserations to Cara

Huge hugs go out to Cara who was made redundant last week. Without going into details if I was ever worried about my management techniques, I needn't be, I am wayyyyy better than her ex-bosses.

Anyone looking for a superb client liaison bod with stunning design flair would be daft to pass her up.

For those in Edinburgh I am trying to organise a few days when Cara can come up here to get away from things, go out and generally slag the ex-management. More when I have the dates.

Oh wow

Was completely bowled over by the power of blogging to reunite friends from across the ages this evening. Warren had said I should hop along over to Owen's blog as he had mentioned me. So over I hopped:

This evening, I have been reading Kitty's blog. Kitty (or, err, 'T', apparently) is someone I knew when I first went to uni (97/98 - Nottingham Uni, that is). She'll be suprised to read this, but she actually had quite a big influence on me as a person. Its a bit hard to describe, but she introduced to me the idea that you could be "grown-up and professional" and "sensible and understanding" at the same time. That is something I still look for in myself, and struggle to find.

I was indeed surprised to read it, but am incredibly touched. I know it is a little own-trumpet-blowing to highlight it here and that is not normally me at all, but it just blew me away.

Hi Owen, glad to have you along. If you are going to Week One I look forward to catching up with you there!

Meet the Parents

I want to thank Warren's parents and their partners for making me feel so welcome when I met them all for the first time this weekend.

It was great to meet you all and I look forward to many happy times together.

Bespoke number plates

We have all seen them. Walking home from the video shop this evening I saw what has to be the most exclusive front number plate I've ever seen:

S 0

I half expected the rear one to say:

W H A T

Sissinghurst

We went to Sissinghurst Castle Garden on Sunday with Warren's Mum (Carol) and her partner Bill. Family home to Vita Sackville West the remaining Tower of the old castle is where she did a lot of her writing. I really envy her her library/study it was a wonderfully snug little room lined with shelves of books, an inglenook fireplace and a turret leading off it with more books and comfy chairs. Real Hogwarts stuff.

It really is one of the most beautiful gardens I have ever seen. Well worth a visit.

A little geek humour

Typical!

Well, always knew I was a girl with expensive taste and I proved it again last week. Saw this in the window of Aitken and Niven:




Fell in love with it, headed back to A&N for late night shopping to discover it is one of Jean Paul Gaultier's new range of brollies and costs a mere £105.

Unsurprisingly it remains in A&N's window and not protecting me from our torrential rain storms!

Yet more weather

There was an item on Five News last night about the recent spate of rain in the UK. The stats laid out something like this:

• In August 2003 there were 19mm of rain and farmers got 25 full working days out of the month
• In August 2004 (so far) there have been 97mm of rain and the farmers have got 10 working days out of the month most of which have only been half days.

If the rain doesn't let up soon not only will the rest of this year's grain harvest be ruined but the planting of next year's crop will be in jeopardy.

Prayers to all the gods of weather to give us a break, please :)

Struck dumb.

Flying back from Stanstead to Edinburgh last night with easyJet added another travel concept to my list of experiences.

Waiting patiently in the lounge in a seat at the right gate, for the announcements that the Edinburgh flight was ready to board. Keeping one ear on the tannoy whilst deep in my book and hearing the boarding calls for Glasgow and Newcastle both of which left not long before Edinburgh, I became aware that there was a crowd forming expectantly at the gate. So I continued to sit thinking, 'Oh, well, they call it in a minute and I can't be bothered to fight for a seat so I'll just wait a bit'.

Eventually it was very obvious that the crowd was a queue and that the queue was moving and being boarded. I joined the queue with the intention of asking that staff if they knew there had been no announcements. The guy before me got there first and the, obviously very bored-been-asked-it-a-thousand-times-before response was: 'Yeah, we know. We don't have a tannoy."

Now, apart from the inevitable questioning of people in the queue ' Is this the queue for boarding for Edinburgh?', the 'system' is manageable for those of us of sound faculties and bodies. I truly wonder what they would have done if there had been a deaf-mute-paraplegic in the lounge...

What saddened and struck me most I suppose was the gate staff's complete lack of desire for change and/or their knowledge that there was nothing they could do about it.

Ford Streetka

Test driving one of these tomorrow morning! Look out Edinburgh!

Review of Ford StreetKa

easyJet

Well, am sitting in Edinburgh domestic departures lounge heading, unusually for Stanstead. Also unusually on easyJet. I was due to take off at 17:50 and land at 19:10. We are now due to take off at...19:10 :(

But it does give me a change to do this post and check out the Internet facilities in the Lounge. Really pretty good I must say. You are behind enough, wooden partitions to dampen the noise of an over-crowded lounge, it is 10p/minute to be on the www and no-one who is travelling with small, noisy children is coming anywhere near the place! That is the real plus point it must be said.

Meant to post ages ago about my Monday morning Nottingham East Midlands Airpot - Edinburgh easyJet flight so now seems as appropriate as any.

It was a very different experience. We have all see self-check-in kiosks for those travelling light, i.e. with hand luggage only. But this was a row of self-check-in kiosks for ALL passengers, hand luggage and hold luggage.

You insert the card you have paid for your flights with and it says 'Hello Miss Fothringham' or words to that effect well no, it doesn;'t actually talk to you, but that appears on the touch screen. You then state how many pieces of hold luggage you have to check in and answer the standard security questions of '...packed yourself?', '...given anything to carry?', '...interferred with since you packed?' and '...sharp objects in your handluggage or on your person?' Then it prints your luggage tag and your boarding card (which is credid card sized). You then attach the luggage tag to your hold luggage. You then wander over and join a queue for what looks like a conventional check-in desk. You hand over your photo-id, you borading card and your hold luggage and they say 'Bon voyage, please head for Security and Departures'.

All-in-all a pretty satisfactory service that certainly took no longer than conventional hold-baggage check-in.

Sadly these kiosks are only being piloted at NEMA so when I arrive at EDI tonight I had to join the (very lengthy) conventional check-in queue even though I am only packing hand-luggage. Oh well, some you win and some you lose.

Yippee :)))

Have managed to take off just under half a stone this week! Admittedly since I last wrote about this I had crept back up to 12 st 6lbs, but am now spot on 12st. Hopefully the rest will be as easy!

Tintagle vs. Archers Bay

Tintagel Castle, North-West Coast of Cornwall.


Archers Bay, North Coast of Barbardos.

Again apologies for taking so long to post these pics that I wanted to compare. To add pics to my blog I need software and work won't let me download anything to my work PC so have to do it at home. Now that we have broadband it makes it easier so hopefully more pics to come :)

TTOC group shot on the banking at Brooklands.

As promised (ages ago I know) here is the photo of the 99 TTs on the banking at Brooklands for the TTOC annual meet. You can see what I mean about the brigh yellow polo shirts Warren & I were wearing! Bottom left, if you can spot us already :)

The brood has arrived!

They are fabulous! I ordered a series of ducks yesterday for Muma' Birthday later this month. They arrived today, beautifully packaged and really good quality.

Highly recommended :)

DCUK | The Duck Company

Warren found these on the web. I think they are great. I have always loved wooden things and these are great use of fast-growing natural resources. DCUK | The Duck Company

Might have to order myself up a brood!

Grrr.

I was accused of being a doormat today. By someone who doesn't know me. It is obvious they don't know me or they would know I am not one to be walked over. I couldn't do my job, live my life or feel happy if I was that drippy.

I learnt a long time ago that there is a time for everything. There is a time for fighting for what one thinks is right, there is a time for admitting one is wrong and there is a time for gracefully bowing out knowing that the battle is best fought elsewhere. I also learned a long time ago how to judge when to use which tactic.

I also learned a long time not to judge people I didn't know.

I am just feeling pissed off at being judged so continuously, so wrongly and so unjustifiably from the perspective of someone who doesn't know me.

Child of Nature

Have just been to a great talk by one of my (many) cousins: John Lister-Kaye. Great fun and it has left me with two more books added to my 'to read' shelf!

musical: The dictionary of Dubya

musical: The dictionary of Dubya

From my friend Cal's blog. Scary, just scary.

Perfect timing

Sometimes things just have perfect timing. Not just the big things either, the little things do it too. The supermarket shopping trip was one of those today.

I got into the car to go to Sainsbury's and The Goons' "Raspberry Song" was just beginning and lasted just long enough to get to the shop.

On the way home Chicago's "When you're good to Muma, Muma's good to you." played for the journey home.

Just perfect.

Yesterday (amended)

So many things yesterday made me happy.

I love walking round Edinburgh. I haven't been here for a weekend for a while and I had forgotten how much I love this city. I feel I belong here. I feel safe here. It is beautiful. Addmittedly it is currently full of Festivalers: those who are visiting but also those who like to pretend that that they belong here because it is August. If it was Mardi Gras they would probably pretend to belong in San Francisco. Anyway, if you stay off the beaten track it is very easy to avoid the crowds, walk down beautiful, quiet streets and find locals going about their normal weekend lives.

Edinburgh has the good points of a city: It has everything I need and I have yet tried to find something I want and failed, it lives and breathes, not as 24/7 as London, but not far off. But Edinburgh is also a village. There are two things which typify this for me: You bump into friends and colleagues, unplanned, frequently. Not always the same ones, but you are likely to see someone you know at least half of the times you go into town, but never feel that the net-curtains are twitching or people are gossiping about what shoes you wore to work this morning. You will also see the same strangers. On a walk round town you will see a face in the crowd, which for not particular reason, stands out. Continuing on your walk you are likely to see the same stranger again later. Stangely it is not unnerving, just pure coincidence and is one of the things that make me smile and wonder if anyone else experiences the same thing.

I know that I will someday have to leave this lovely city. I would be naive to think I will spend my whole life here. I will miss her when I do have to go, but I know that whatever happens she will always be my city. Whenever I come back to her, she will be as beautiful, as welcoming, as wonderful as she is now. I'm sure it will always feel like coming home.

I got woken far too early by the phone, but it meant I got to sit and finish my book - it only took three hours! Sheer indulgence.

I walked into town and listened to a mix tape I made years ago, on my walkman, that I hadn't heard for ages so each song was a surprise and boy do I make good mix tapes!

Went to see Galerie Mirage's Festival exhibition. Gorgeous jewellry as always.

Warren found an advert for the car I want, which looks to be a good deal.

I bought myself a 'Cinnamon Cream' from Chocolate Soup, very decadent hot chocolate cafe, with squirty cream and chocolate & cinnamon sprinkles, drank it walking down the street not caring if I got choclate round my mouth.

Saw Jimmy Carr on my way home from Chocolate Soup.

I was beholden to absolutely no-one.

The only belmish was not being able to share it all with Warren. But, angels permitting, we are working on that.

Political Situation

Got sent this today. Really quite apt leading on from Newsrevue last night. Those without a sense of humour can give it a miss!

Newsrevue 2004

Living in Edinburgh during the Festivals can be great or dreadful. Every conceivable space is turned into a venue. During the first festival after I moved here I found a show called the Newsrevue. It was held in quite a small venue, St Columba's by the Castle (Ctoo), and was a side-splittingly funny, political satire, sketch and parody song based show. It has now graduated to C as the audience demand has dictated.

Every since it has been the one show that I insist on seeing every year. This year was their 25th Anniversary show and so had current affairs, but also had some numbers from the past shows. As always laugh-out-loud funny, occasionally painfully so and well worth the 40 minute queue.

It has now achieved a Guiness World Record for the longest running live comedy show, which is pretty cool I think.

Anyway, really just to say if you can possibly get a chance to see it do. It was a total sell out last year and runs from the 4 - 30th August at 9:30pm, C (-1) (venue 34), Chambers Street.

David flies to Australia...

...via Germany, the Czech Republic and Austria.

He flew to Germany on Tuesday and flies to Australia from Austria in three weeks. I haven't blogged this yet as I' not entirely sure how I feel about it. He is to be gone for a year. I am sad to see him go, but hope that he manages to find his life and is happy.

More weather. And dud batteries.

Seems to be an awful lot if it about at the moment.

• Thursday morning: Still wet and foggy. A9 (Main road up centre of Scotland) is puportedly closed from Perth to Ptilochry in both directions. That's about 40 miles. So I am no longer heading to Perthshire for dinner tonight.

Of course the other factor that affected that decision is that my bl*ody car battery died on me this morning which meant calling out the AA to jump start me to get to work. drive straight to the garage at the bottom of the hill at work. Of course it being a Japanese car the battery is an odd one that has ot be ordered in. So I gave them my mobile number to call me when it is ready, left them the keys and walked up the hill to work, in the rain. Got to work and realised that my mobile had fallen out of my back pocket into (I hoped) the car. Thankfully the garage were sweet and checked the car for me and will call me at work.

However, all in all, not a good start to the day.

Weather...

...has been interesting of late!

• Saturday day: 33.5 degrees C.
• Saturday night: not much cooler and a beautiful long summer evening.
• Sunday day: the rain followed us across the country as we headed home from the Southwest of England to Nottingham.
• Sunday night: Went to bed at midnight temperature of 29.5 degrees C.
• Monday morning, Nottm: Got up at 4:30am, temparature of 25 degrees C - for those not in Britain that is very unusual.
• Monday morning Edinburgh: Landed at 8:10am, drenching rain which continued ALL day.
• Monday night: Drove to Perthshire (reasons in upcoming post) in drenching rain, fog and thought at one point I might not make it in one piece. Listened to the traffic news avidly, luckily finding my path was not blocked. Others were not so lucky though as one item stated that there had been an accident at Bridge of Orchy and warning drivers that the diversion route took you 100 miles out of your way. The next bulletin added to their woes by saying that there had been an accident on the Connell Bridge. These combined to ensure that a considerable stretch of the West Coast of Scotland were unable to get out to the rest of the country.
• Tuesday morning: Drove back to Edinburgh in drenching rain, fog and was only a little less concerned that I wouldn't make it to the office.
• Tuesday afternoon and evening: Drenching rain and fog.
• Wednesday morning: Drenching rain.
• Wednesday afternoon: Hints that Chac, or Jupiter if you prefer, might have remembered that it is meant to be August with sunshine and no fog.
• Wednesday evening: So far, no drenching rain, but fog abounds.

Sun, champagne cocktails, good food, good wine, FABULOUS madiera, great friends, wonderful boyfriend...

...what more could one ask for? Nothing in my opionion. Thanks to Elizabeth for a great night.

The Onion | Horoscope for 11-17 Aug 2004

This is one of those posts which will mean something to about half the readership and nothing at all to the other half. To those who don't get why it is funny my apologies, but just trust that the other half are laughing hard!

Gemini: (May 21—June 21)
You'll be forced to expand the list of sh*t you have to put up with to include "goat".

Gone in 60 seconds

Pubs' timer locks to stop women lingering in loos

Toilet cubicle doors which spring open after 60 seconds are being brought in by a pub chain fed up with slowcoach women. The mechanism - dubbed Bog Off - is designed to stop gossiping girls hogging the loo while a queue builds up. Pub chain Brannigans found that the queue for the ladies was the top complaint for women enjoying a night out.

I am incredulous! Not that I am, it must be said, a Brannigans regular, nor indeed even an irregular, but 60 seconds is a bit short!

The second biggest moan was from women who lose their shoes after taking off uncomfortable high heels while dancing. The chain plan to introduce heel bars, which will hand out slippers for stillettos when the going gets uncomfortable.

Now that part I like - probably not enough to outweigh the loos issue though!
full article here

Happy Birthday Elizabeth, for tomorrow

(sensing a theme yet?!)
Happy Birthday Elizabeth, for tomorrow.
Lots of hugs and looking forward to your party tonight.

Happy Birthday Helen

and of course the one post that cannot not be posted today! Happy Birthday Helen.
Lots of love, hope you have a great day.

vowe dot net : Gone fishing

I want to go here.

Happy Birthday Ed!

and of course the one post that cannot not be posted today!
Happy Birthday Ed.
Have a good one.

Party!

Am off to a friend's Birthday party this weekend so don't expect any entries till Monday. I may get inspired over the weekend, but I doubt it.

For those into travel I am trying a different approach to my flights to Nottingham East Midlands Airport this weekend: Flying down bmibaby tonight, but flying back easyJet on Monday morning. Normally I got bmibaby both ways, but this time it was cheaper to come back by easyJet and normally the easyJet 07:00 flight gets boarded before the bmibaby 07:00 flight so I hope that holds true for Monday. If Sod is working his law this weekend the easyJet flight will get delayed, but hey you have to play the odds sometimes!

The Onion | CIA asks Bush to discontinue blog

The Onion does it again! A great article here. Funnily enough www.PrezGeorgeW.typepad.com doesn't resolve anything...much like it's author :-0

Visitors

Finally onto more fun-related posts!

My cousines John & Mary Mayo came to stay Monday & Tuesday nights. It was great to see them, to catch up and to have a chance to repay their incredibly kind hospitality of February this year when they put me up at their home in Barbados for two weeks having only met me once - when I was 15 months old!

Sadly, with my stomach bug, I couldn't join in as I would have wanted, but they had a great time taking in the Water of Leith, the National Gallery of Modern Art, Stockbridge and the Botanic Gardens.

John works for the University of the West Indies, where he is a professor of History - such fun to have a friend who I can talk to about HE!

They have become fast friends and I love them both dearly. I wish them a safe trip home.

..and one 'attraction' that we decided not to see in Cornwall'

Nearly forgot - meant to post this days ago, but here it is for your delectation: The Gnome Reserve Really frightening - the brochure is even more frightening worse than the website.

stomach bug

all better now thankfully, but not a fun couple of days. Will do some catch up blogging tonight now that I have broadband at home!