Tuesday 31 July 2012

I love the feel of autumn

I love the feel of autumn. 

That slight nip in the air. 

The sense of anticipation of something new.  I remember feeling that very acutely when I went to university but also on starting a new secondary school (which I did twice).

The regret that the long hot days of summer are over, but a freshness in the air.

The realisation that it's not that long till Christmas.

I love the feel of autumn.

BUT NOT AT THE END OF JULY




Saturday 28 July 2012

Not quite a curate's egg, but distinctly patchy

So what did you think of the Olympic opening ceremony then?

Opening film good, pacy.  Historical stuff good, although the much publicised animals seem to have been reduced to a few horses who looked well used to the spotlight, and the chronology seemed a bit hit and miss. 

Musical stuff all over the shop.  Not at all helped by Trevor Nelson's inane comments.  Still, at least the rest of the world didn't hear him.

Queen's arrival excellent.  Glastonbury Tor interesting (it's a lot harder to climb than that in real life - last time I did it the Red Arrows just happened to be practising and flew over, that was quite spectacular).

Arrival of athletes - well I went and loaded the dishwasher and when I came back it was still going on.  Quite intrigued by the ice-cream girls leading each nation and obv setting the pace.

Cauldron - excellent, very impressive.  And clever, the way pre-event publicity had odds laid on several likely torch candidates, and they were all there, but not the one.

Cringeworthy - Paul McCartney.  Please.  I used to love you when I was younger.  Now you've become an embarrassing cop-out at the end of every event.  No wonder they pulled the plug on you the other day.

 Overall, 9/10.  And you?

Tuesday 24 July 2012

SAD or just tired?

I have a clock in my kitchen.  Looks like this.  Has an AA battery.  It's been there for years.  It always used to run very slightly fast, which was quite useful as it meant that in reality I still had a couple of minutes in hand, if you see what I mean.





About three weeks ago it stopped, so I changed the battery.  A day later it stopped again, so I changed the battery again.  When it stopped a day after that I thought there must be something wrong with the clock itself, but no, the terminals looked clean and nothing was out of place.  I left it lying face down on the table.


When I came back later it had started ticking again, so I hung it up.  Over the next few weeks it would run for maybe 10, maybe 20 hours at a time and then stop.  Every time I laid it face down on the table and within about 5 minutes it had started again.  I came to the conclusion that my clock was tired and just needed a rest.

But since we've gone back to summer again, it hasn't stopped once.  Does my clock suffer from SAD, do you think?

Saturday 21 July 2012

A girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do

My brain hurts.

All morning and half the afternoon I have been writing a report (currently four pages long) detailing the current state of the project we are managing.  Trying to put politely the fact that the person we have to work with as Chair is an idiot, who goes off at a tangent on her own, upsetting volunteers, trying to discredit other people's judgements and who uses as an excuse the fact that she didn't know what was going on.  The fact that she is completely incapable of listening to anyone goes totally over her head.  She has no creative side to her at all.  She thinks everything should be done in formal meetings, in committee.  She talks a load of council type rubbish.  And then she wonders why this project has taken four years to get off the ground. 

It's taken six months for them to figure out a way of reclaiming VAT on purchases for the project.  Why?  Who would seriously want to give a sixth of the HLF grant straight back to HMRC? 

We have to find some niche that she can be put in charge of, just to keep her out of the way of everyone else.  I have had to write this report just to make sure that she doesn't write it and now I shall have to email it to everyone involved that I can think of just so that she doesn't either pretend it's not like that, or else steal all the words and try to pretend they are hers.  Not that anyone would be fooled by that as she tends to write total gibberish with very little punctuation and terrible spelling (eg "graffic" artists - to rhyme with traffic, I suppose).

There.  I've said it now.

And then after that I've been doing our year end accounts.  Not because it's the actual year end - those were done months ago - but because I need to do our tax returns.  Not because they actually need submitting now, but because the tax credits annual review has to be done by the end of July, and so I might as well have actually done the tax returns as well.  At least I won't get a penalty for filing a late return.  And with a bit of luck the tax credits people might decide I'm so poor they might give me something.  Alternatively with daughter having just finished secondary education they will probably take some away.

So the rather nice sunshine I can see out the window is just that - outside the window.

Wednesday 11 July 2012

W-w-w-w-w-w-wet again

Jeeeeze!!!  We've just gone from pretty dry and sunny to the biggest raindrops in the world.  Daughter said, "have you still got washing out?" - and at that point it was probably almost dry - and by the time I'd brought it in I was totally soaked.  Had to change my clothes, that soaked. 

I know I should be grateful that I live in a hilly city, and that for us to be flooded probably 40% of the country would be underwater, but still....

Why do I now think that rain is the default option?

Does anyone know a means of nudging the Gulf Stream back on course (ie north of the UK), otherwise we're all buggered from now till kingdom come?

Have you ever seen so many slugs?  And where have all these black slugs come from?

Yours, wetly....