The randomness that is us!

OK so sorry for the delay in writing.  Last week I had a problem with my ears, which affected my hearing and balance and gave me a rotten almost week long headache.  I’m not sure whether it felt worse because the weather has been rubbish and it’s meant to be summer.  Perhaps I just felt a bit low.  No matter – back to normal (whatever that is) and raring to go this murky Monday.  This Morning is on in the background and HuffingtonBear is snoring on the sofa – life is good!

Rather than indulge in ‘weather chat’ I’ll just quickly point out that just as Summer appeared to be popping it’s head around the corner, Wimbledon has started, which of course means that it will rain on and off for the next two weeks (sad face).

So here’s a bit of an update.  Guess what?  We’re not moving.  If you remember, we had sold our house and we were trawling around the local area in search of the perfect house.  Now I must just say at this point that OH and I are a tad impatient.  We do things NOW.  We don’t spend forever thinking about something and then not do it.  Once we make up our minds we pretty much go for it.  So imagine how extremely disappointing it was to visit 20 properties and find that they were all lacking one way or another.  Apart from the fact that we couldn’t find anything we liked enough, it was craziness to even think about moving to a place not five miles down the road and into a house pretty much the same size as the one we live in for somewhere around £150K more.  If we are spending that much then it’s going to have to be a pretty little country cottage.

The estate agents, who were initially so helpful, were turning into phone pests, ringing every couple of days to ask cheerfully ‘Have you found?’  And as if that wasn’t enough someone else from their office would ring to ask every few days for details of our solicitors.  Of course we hadn’t instructed a solicitor as we hadn’t found anywhere to live.  So in the end with the pressure from the agent and the fact that we just couldn’t find the house for us, we pulled the house off the market.   This was on the Saturday morning.

Three hours later we had ordered a new oven and hob, new floor for the kitchen, new floor for the bathroom, new fabulous reclining sofas and a quote for an extension!  Like I say, when we make our minds up then we get cracking.  So, we are staying and the pressure is off.  For now.  I’m sure we will move eventually but perhaps when the boys have left home or are at least not dependent on travel to new jobs or college.  Oh and I almost forgot to mention, we decorated the dining room yesterday – I say we, I mean OH.  I sat and apparently ‘looked pretty’ (and a bit vacant if I’m honest) while he painted as if his life depended on it and than lay on the sofa at the end of the day demanding coffee, sweets and chocolate cookies.

So here I sit, waiting in for the men to fit the bathroom floor and now watching Loose Women.  Next week we have a busy week, Son#1 will be 21 and we are going on a mini jaunt to the New Forest.  We will be taking HB of course but leaving Son#1, Son#2 and Kitty McVitie at home to fend for themselves for a day or two.  Oh and again, I nearly forgot, next week is BUBLE.  I am beside myself with excitement – I do love a bit of Buble and we have the most fabulous tickets yeeeehar!

Finally, just before I go, I am now officially published.  On page 15 of Time and Leisure’s Surrey edition my winning short story Waiting For George is featured.  I am also mentioned as a ‘contributor’, which is pretty cool.  Oh and finally finally, the editor has asked me to contribute an article for one of the autumn editions – how exciting.

Blog you later,  Julesy x

You really do learn something new every day

Ever judged a book by its cover?  Of course you have.  In fairness we are probably encouraged to.  Don’t authors, literary agents and publishers all spend a great deal of time with creative types mulling over the perfect cover for each ‘to be’ published masterpiece?  Possibly.  So when you see the cover of a book that appeals, are you not just compelled to pick it up and have a sneaky peek?  Absolutely.

Tonight I judged a book by its cover – well not a book exactly but a person.  This evening I attended my very first ‘writers group meeting’.  Having recently won a competition with my first ever attempt at a short story I was kindly invited to become a member of our local group.  Minutes after having walked into the room at the aptly named ‘Friends Meeting House’ I felt most welcome.  I sat myself beside the unsuspecting Jane, whom I managed to monopolise for at least part of the evening.

A hush descended as a young woman entered the room.  Now I must confess that having only been given her name shortly before the meeting I had only managed to do a quick Google search of her.  Writer Sam Mills was to join us.  A successful author of young adult fiction, Sam had most recently written a book called ‘The Quiddity of Will Self’.  Firstly, I had no idea who Will Self was.  Secondly I had no idea what ‘quiddity’ meant.  Double whammy for me then – I was already confused and it doesn’t take much at the best of times.  I quickly read a review of the Will Self book and expected to be somewhat out of my depth.  I prepared myself to be baffled but to look as though I wasn’t.  I needn’t have worried.

So, in walked Ms Mills.  A slim girl with an open face, sensible glasses and her hair pulled back from her face.  She was wearing ordinary clothes, a cardi and optimistic summer sandals and although her most recent literary offering looked set to go completely over my head (she described it herself as ‘a bit bonkers’) she seemed relatively normal.  Until she spoke.  I was expecting ‘slightly strange’ at best based on the book review and what my mind had conjured up.  I was also expecting to be a little bored (my mind being a tiny bit closed to the possibility that ‘the unknown’ might actually be really interesting).  It was Friday night after all.  Same time last week I was watching ‘The Voice’!

Sam began telling us about her 9-year journey writing ‘Quiddity’ (I know what it means now by the way – look it up if you don’t!)  She was so engaging it was hard not to smile along with her.  I found myself listening intently and smiling at her encouragingly.  I even found myself doing that really irritating ‘head nodding’ thing that people do when they are super-engaged.  Sam was entirely fascinating, witty and likeable.  Not a bit odd.  Not even a tiny bit strange.  I decided I could sit and listen to her talk for ages.  I even began to understand where her book was coming from.  I even considered buying it for goodness sake.

As the talk came to an end I chatted for a while to some of the ladies and then found myself talking to Jane again.  I had no idea who Jane was initially, until someone mentioned her books during the evening and I then came to understand that this was Jane Davis, the winning author of the 2008 Daily Mail First Novel Award.  Jane is a successful novelist and writer and has recently published two new e-books.  Of course I didn’t get the chance to pre-judge Jane as I hadn’t expected to even meet her.  However, I found her to be completely typical of everyone I have so far encountered in the wonderful world of writing.  Really helpful, friendly and exceptionally free and open with her advice.  How lovely.

So there we have it,  I was expecting Sam Mills to be a tiny bit unusual and I guess she actually is - but in a good way.  I judged the book before I’d even seen the cover in her case and in all honesty I found her to be quite charming.

I almost didn’t go tonight but I’m so glad I did.  I have met some great new people.  I have some new books to read.  I have learned something new about people and perceptions and I have learned most definitely to not judge a book by its cover.

Julesy x

Is there a coffee shop here somewhere?

Last night, I lay back in a hot, luxurious bath with Barber's Adagio for Strings playing in the background on my ipad and knew for certain what today's blog posting would be about.

Yesterday I had a brilliant and inspired idea.  'Let's go to Richmond Park' I said, dragging OH from his book.  OH looked momentarily dubious but went along with it.  I had the feeling he would have preferred a duvet day and in hindsight he was probably right.

Into the C-Max leapt HuffingtonBear, ready and raring to go, swiftly followed by myself and OH, both sensibly bringing coats (just in case).  Now, because this was a spur of the moment decision we left home somewhat lacking in provisions, after all we felt that heading to a park where there would be plenty of refreshment available was a mighty fine plan.  OH will pretty much do anything if there's a coffee in it for him so off we went.

SatNav lady took us to Richmond the scenic way.  Ordinarily this would have been sweet and thoughtful of her.  However, we just wanted to get there.  Eventually, with SatNav lady telling us we still had six minutes to go, we drove into Richmond Park and parked up at Kingston Gate.  Feeling very virtuous and healthy I re-tied my walking shoes and popped on my coat.  

We set off, the three of us.  Randomly really.  Just pointed ourselves in the direction of 'the rest of the park' and away we went.  Past a group of Chinese people having a 'sports day' affair for their extremely competitive kids, past a calm and organised yummy mummy who had made the most incredible picnic tea for her little gaggle of children and onwards up the hill and into the woods.

We breathed in the fresh air.  HuffingtonBear zigzagged happily on his super-long lead, rummaging and sniffing at everything and anything.  Out through the trees and onto a vast grassy park where we followed one of many paths happily onward.  We talked about bringing a picnic next time.  I decided I would nip to John Lewis in the week and buy a trendy little flask.  OH suggested buying a proper walkers back pack.

At this point I probably ought to confess that we had absolutely no idea where we were going or how we would get back to the car.  We assumed that there would be signposts.  There weren't.  But anyway, we carried on fearlessly until OH noticed some deer in the semi distance.  We continued onwards with HB on a much shortened lead.  Approaching the deer they stopped, looked up and stared.  All of them looked over at us.  There must have been a dozen of them.  Beautiful elegant creatures with beautiful brown eyes.  There were even fawns, little Bambi-like cuties with gangly legs and a slightly scared look about them.  

OK so I had left my camera at home but couldn' resist the temptation to photograph them.  We stopped for just a moment while I took a couple of photos on my phone until I noticed them coming towards us.  Not walking away but almost trotting at us.  'Come on then' I said calmly as we three began to walk apologetically through their party.  Once safely out the other side I looked tentatively over my shoulder to see three deer following us.  We stopped in our tracks,  they stopped.  We carried on walking and they followed - a bit like 'Grandmothers Footsteps' if you remember playing it as a child.  Eventually they gave up following.  They were beautiful - but a bit strange!

We continued our walk to 'nowhere in particular' hoping that sooner or later we would come across a coffee shop, cafe or ice cream van.  Nothing.  And then we came across Isabella Plantation and wandered inside.  Isabella Plantation is an oasis of colour with lush beautiful plants and trees.  We walked down little paths which eventually brought us out to a grassy bank.  The grass, having been cut with nail scissors was pristine and beautiful.  We were again hopeful for 'coffee' but alas no.  Small family groups were strategically positioned around the grassy bank.  No pop bottles, no barbeques, no screaming ankle biters and not a Monster Munch or cocktail sausage in sight just 'lovely' families.  Picture Ma and Pa sat quietly with Jocasta and Tarquin on a House of Fraser picnic blanket.  A banquet of home made treats laid out on the blanket, the children chatting nicely and 'looking at nature' - the only noise being made by Frankie and Poppy on the other side of the grassy knoll, crying out excitedly that Mama had brought a special treat with her... 'Apricots how yummy'.

We walked through the grassy bank.  I somehow felt the need to suck in my stomach and speak to HuffingtonBear as if he were a child 'Come on my darling, let's keep walking' I said.  We finished our walk through the secret garden and were expelled back outside the wire fencing to the mass of grass and trees.  We were completely lost at this stage and had been walking without a break for quite some time.  For a woman laid up with a bad back for a month earlier this year, walking for two hours was no mean feat let me tell you.

OH took control at this point and used my phone to 'find our way back'.  Trusting the Map App on my phone was like trusting a fat kid with an open packet of strawberry bonbons.  So the not very trustworthy app had us walking round in circles.  Every now and again we cheered one another up suggesting we were on the right track and that we recognised the path.  We didn't.  We were just being nice.  I did decide at one point that as long as we just kept walking in the same direction we would end up at one of the park entrances.  Surely that was more sensible than wandering around following the Map App.  The Map App incidentally had decided at one stage that we were in Ham and at another stage that we were in Twickenham.  Map app was not to be trusted. 

Three hours into our walk my head started thumping.  My mouth was dry and my legs were aching.  Still we soldiered on.  OH was sneezing wildly, eyes streaming and the only one having any fun was HB who was still zigzagging about sniffing the occasional deer poo. Still we walked, until we finally discovered the road and a 'lodge'.  Beside the lodge was a map.  Hoorah!  Ten minutes later - yes just ten minutes, we were back at the car.  I cheered quietly 'yayyyy'.  OH opened the boot and HB got in.  I got in - not in the boot, the car, and took off my shoes.  My head was pounding and I had developed a rasping tickly cough.  OH found an ice cream van and we stuffed down the biggest 99 cones he could buy.  

'When we come again' said OH 'we'll bring a map and a flask'. When we got home, we looked up the Richmond Park map on the internet.  Indeed there were several places to eat and drink in the park - we just hadn't been anywhere near any of them.  We traced our path and discovered we had only covered about a quarter of the park.  

So lesson for today is this.  If you fancy going to Richmond Park 'for a walk' then take a map.  Also take a bottle of water.  Maybe take a picnic too.  Oh and hayfever tablets, whatever you do, don't forget hayfever tablets.

Have a great week lovely people, I'm off to John Lewis to buy a flask, blog you later, Julesy xx