The End of March…

I cant believe March is over all ready, where on earth have the past 3 months gone?

I’ve had another quite quiet week with Wednesdays trip to the cinema & Fridays jolly to the Exeter Food & Drink Festival the only things of note this week.

The film this week was one we have been waiting to see for what seems like AGES – The Illusionist. We were a little worried when we went in that we had been building it up so much that we might be in for a major disappointment but that was far from what we got. It was a brilliant film with a great twist at the end and I thoroughly enjoyed it although I do wonder if the leading lady was picked due to how much she looked like Scarlett Johanson thus linking it more to The Prestige!

Yesterday saw me with a day off to go the Food Festival in Exeter for the day. It was really good! Lots of freebies, lots of stuff to buy, met Hugh Fernley-Whittingstall (very nice chap & he signed my book!) Met up with some peoples I used to work with so that was good, nice to catch up. I spent too much money and ate too much food but had a really nice day.

Today has been a quiet one for me. Not so good for John – he has crashed his car. He has been to Bournemouth to pick Adam & Troe up since they have now vacated their flat ready to travel around Europe for a bit before going home. Whilst driving home on the A35 he had a crash with another car and John’s car was written off. Thankfully no one was hurt but they were all pretty shock up especially John.

Quite a quiet week really

Well this was a change from last week. I’ve not really don’t much this week. Went to the Picture House with John on Weds to see Letters From Iwo Jima – the Clint Eastwood, Japanese war film. It was really good, gave me a very different perspective on the fight in Japan. It was quite emotionally draining to watch though as it just kept making you think about how pointless it all is and how extreme people become all the time and all too easily. Still, a well made, thought provoking film.

Other than that the weeks been pretty quiet, I did have a mini-breakdown on Thursday night but that’s nothing to write about so I wont.

Today Dad & I went to Welsh-Wales to buy a new car to rally. We took the recovery truck and set off about midday eventually getting home again at about 5pm now the proud owners of a little while Peugeot 205 1.4 GT! Yay!

Tiring weekend

Well that was a packed couple of days.

Friday was Comic Relief and I was in work 15 mins early to decorate our teams pods to make us look like we were at least taking part! We had helium balloons - a big red star on the centre of each pod with 1 white comic relief branded balloon & 1 red shiny balloon on each corner of each pod - it looked grand! Admittedly downstairs looked even better (it was described as looking like “comic relief through up down here!”) since they had balloons on sticks in the centre of each pod and bunting & everyone either dressed up or at least wearing their Comic Relief T-Shirts. Oh and they also had a cake sale which is ALWAYS good! After work a few of us headed over to the Barn Owl pub for a quick drink before we came back to the office to help man the phones (as willing volunteers) for the phone in pledges throughout the evening. It was a really good atmosphere with food and drinks provided throughout the evening and TVs dotted around showing the footage from the studio. John came in at about 8ish to help out and we worked through til midnight when our call centre closed for the night. It was a cool night and I’ll definitely volunteer again if the chance comes up.

Yesterday it was up early to go help Dad set up for the Rally of the Moors. We had 50+ boards to put out and 110 miles to drive which was fun fun fun! I drove Dads truck and Dad map read, without throwing up (albeit only just!) I hate driving Dads truck – its so big and really rocks around but I managed so I spose its all fine! We had a bit of a snooze in the evening and then it was off up to the Exeter Court Hotel ready to spend the night marshalling. Mum, Courts & Rach were signed up to start them off from the hotel while me, Dad and James (the chav who is STILL living with us) set off into the night to marshal a couple posts. The weather was totally sucky with torrential rain & blowing a gale but never mind, its always a good night. We had to go and rescue Simon & Rich out of a ford since they were working off the old route (which is good of Bob to have told course closing that he had changed the routing!) and they started to go into the ford before Simon decided it was too steep, too deep & too fast but then couldn’t reverse out! Luckily we weren’t far away and raced off to tow them out. We had to come home via Sourton Cross too to pick up stakes & then home for a couple hours sleep before going back up to the hotel for the complimentary breakfast (which, I will say, was NOTHING compared to the breakie we got on the Enduro weekend at Novatel!)

Anways, that brings us to now, I slept from about 10 til 3 but I’m up again now.
Oh and – Happy Mothers Day! I will be taking Mum out at a time convenient to all for a meal at a restaurant of her choice in the near future!

Happy Birthday Vicki

Today was Vicki’s birthday at work – she is the big 2-0 (or according to her Twen-teen!) Now the reason I mention this is birthdays at work = cake (or in Vics case crisps, flapjack, mini crispy cakes and other yummies)


After work I went to TKMaxx on the way home and purchased my Comic Relief t-shirt ready for my supporting bit on Friday. Also, given that’s it’s a Wednesday John & I then obviously went to the cinema. Tonight we went to see ‘Becoming Jane’ about the early years of Jane Austen with one of my favourite actresses at the minute, Anne Hathaway, playing the lead role and James McAvoy playing her leading man. It was a really good film, John spent the entire time routing for the ‘safe & sensible’ love interest against the grain of everyone else who wanted Jane to end up with her true soul mate played by McAvoy!

After the cinema it was home for an early night, I’m getting old I can’t stick these late nights!!

And all that Jazz!

I was back in work today after my day off for the Big De-Sticking (which, btw, is hurting like you wouldn’t believe – the muscle is bruised & I have reacted to the steristrip stitches and got two big blisters – nice) Anyways work was a WONDERFUL experience as always (!) but the evening was set to make it all better…

Straight from work I went & picked John up from his abode in the Mouth of Teign to tootle to the Mouth of Plym to go to the theatre (yup – get us!) to see Chicago. We had a bit of a parking fiasco as the machine wouldn’t take and £2 coins but John ran off and bought a Big Issue and paid for the parking with the change so all was fine.

We found our seats in the theatre – back row of the stalls – and settled in for the show. Now, Chicago is one of my favourite musicals, I’ve seen it twice before tonight, and the music really makes me wish I could sing and dance (I can do both I just cant do either WELL!) The people in the show are so fit, they dance constantly and the flexibility is amazing. It was a bit of a shame that the woman playing Velma Kelly had THE most annoying voice when she put on her sketchy American accent but thankfully when she sang it was ok & Roxy’s voice was bearable so it could have been worse.

The show was 2 hours long with a 20 minute interval breaking that up. All in all it was a very enjoyable 2 hours although I have to say I don’t think it was really worth the money at £30 a ticket but good none the less.

The Big De-Sticking!

I have been De-Sticked! Woo!

13th March - update - my arm is freaking killing me and I have reacted to the steristrip stitches & now have two massive blisters as well as a big painful bruise....nice.

Enduro Weekend

Ooo what a weekend we had! Me, Dad & Steve helped out on the SW Audi Enduro over the weekend and now we’re totally shattered. Our weekend started on Thursday night when I had to drop Dad down to Ivybridge to pick up the van that was basically to be our home for the next couple of days.

Friday morning Steve arrived and we loaded the van up with everything we needed and set off to Newton Abbot Racecourse which was the start venue for the event. Well, I say we took everything we needed – everything EXCEPT the folder that had all the information in it as to which stages we were looking after & what we needed to pick up each time……oops! So Dad kicked me & Steve out and he went back to Exeter to pick up said folder – a great start to the weekend! Since we were picking up at the first stage at Seale Hayne we headed over there once we had signed on and got to watch all the cars through the first section of the selectif. Then our weekend started in earnest; we spent the rest of the day chasing ass (except at Marley Head where we got there before the competitors & managed to take some photos) We got a break at Badgers Holt for food (paid for by the motor club and very nice) and a rearrange of the back of the van. We eventually made it into the Novatel at about midnight only to be told that there had been a mix up in the booking and we only had a single room…between three of us…yup coz that’s going to work. Eventually Roger (who organised the rally) managed to sort it out and we got a room that would fit us all.

Saturday morning started with me grouchy as hell since I had NO sleep Friday night. Dad and Steve had spent god knows how many hours in the bar & rolled into the room at about 3am pissed as farts and then proceeded to execute a light show trying to get the right lights on then all off again! Following that Steve (who was on the sofa bed) fell into a coma-like sleep and was snoring like an angry warthog. Now I can sleep through most things (bagpipes being one of those things!) but I cannot get to sleep when people are snoring. So basically I lay there, knackered and dreading the morning, totally unable to get to sleep. Me and Dad were up by 7 and down to a king of breakfasts, leaving snoring-beauty, well, snoring! Eventually Steve surfaced and we headed back out in the general direction of Holsworthy. We weren’t hanging around but it was looking increasingly unlikely we would make it down to Portreath Airfield to meet Alan at the arranged time but when we tried calling him to tell him we were running behind we got no answer so basically we just floored it (out van proved itself worthy since it really shifted!) When we got to Portreath there was a slight problem – Alan hadn’t turned up & no-one had heard from him or been able to get hold of him. Oh f……dear! We (with the guidance of Andy armed with the competitors road book) started laying out the course as best we could & kept our fingers crossed that Alan would turn up soon. Thankfully he arrived just as we were nearly finished (the other ‘putting out’ van had died so Alan had had to tranship all his stuff & set up his selectifs before he got to us!) & since there had actually been a quite serious accident involving a competitors car, none of the competitors realised that we had been skimming by the seat of our pants to get the selectif set up! We went for dinner and then just sat around watching it get dark & waiting for it to be finished so we could pick up & fk off!! It was looking likely to be a VERY long night but thanks to some good thinking on the part of Alan & Mrs Alan (who, you may have guessed, I cannot remember the name of!) with regard the road sections and a God send in the form of Dobbin going through the final wood section and taking down all the tape & stacking the cones we managed to get back to the hotel by 12.30. However our night didn’t end there…

Early on on Saturday we were in a wood section picking everything up & I was trying to get a bit of tape from round a tree when I fell in a ditch. Now this sounds quite funny (and in many ways was!) but I totally fked my left knee as well as filling my hands with splinters of bramble & cutting my arms to bits. This kind of made me a dead weight in the van for the rest of the day since I couldn’t keep jumping in & out picking stuff up (well more to the point I couldn’t walk once I was out but same difference!) Thing is, when we got back to the hotel I was in so much pain I wanted to crawl into a corner & die. I wasn’t comfortable sitting, standing, walking, lying down. Generally not good! So basically having just got back to the hotel & got changed Dad then offered to drop me home. I felt really guilty but there was no way I could have stuck a night in the hotel, in major pain & with no sleep. I got very little sleep at home but at least I wasn’t disturbing anyone else.

Well apart from the agonising knee & cut up/splinter ridden hands I had a really good time. It was knackering & a big commitment but I really enjoyed it. So, well done to everyone who competed & a BIG well done to all the organisers who worked their backsides off making sure it would all run. Thanks for letting us be a part of it all!

PS - there are photos to add but I will have to do that from the other computer!

Race for Life 2007

I am doing the Race for Life in aid of Cancer Research UK again this year on Sunday 29th July at Westpoint in Exeter and this time I will be joined by Mum & Courtenay.

We are looking to raise a massive £375 between the 3 of us so DIG DEEP and help us!

We have set up a 'Sponsor Me' webpage where you can sponsor us online using your credit of debit card or alternatively you can contact us and do it the old fashioned way, by cash or cheque.

Cancer effects so many thousands of people each day, not just those diagnosed with this horrifying disease but the families and friends of those people. Our family has lost people to cancer - my great-nan (BigNan) and my Auntie Jen both fought hard against cancer but unfortuneately lost their fight in the end. My Dad's cousin, Malcolm, has recently been diagnosed with liver cancer. My friend Carla from school beat Hodgkins Disease when we were still at school. Just look around at your friends and family - how long does it take before you see someone who has been effected by cancer, either directly or indirectly?

So, please help us raise as much money as possible for Cancer Research UK. Visit our sponsorship page by clickling HERE or get in touch to donate offline.

Thank you!

March already

Well another week gone and already we are in March.

John went up to Gatwick this week for his assessment interview with EDF for their graduate scheme on Tuesday / Wednesday. I think it went OK from what he's said so fingers crossed. He made it home on Wednesday in time for the cinema in the evening so we went to see Bobby at the Picture House. It had SO many people in it - it was like a who's who of Hollywood; Emilio Estevez, Anthony Hopkins, Demi Moore, Sharon Stone, Christian Slater, Martin Sheen, Heather Graham, Helen Hunt, Ashton Kutcher, Harry Belafonte, Joshua Jackson, William H. Macy, Lindsay Lohan, Elijah Wood and so it goes on! The film follows the last day of Senator Robert F. Kennedy on June 6th 1968 and how it effected the people around him who were at the the Ambassador Hotel where he was killed. It used a lot of archive footage from the Kennedy campaign trail and at the end there were lots of family photo album pictures showing Bobby with JFK as kids then in the years when JFK was president. It's safe to say the Kennedy family was not a lucky one. Anyway John is due to review it on the joint blog so pootle over and have a look.

I had Thursday off and went to the Westbank Centre in Exminster to find out more about their Young Carers Volunteer Program. They arrange activity days and trips for young people aged from 3 to 18 who have some kind of a caring role at home. It seems like a great program and I'm really keen to get involved. Dad had to go into hospital on Thursday too - he's been getting chest pains and stuff so they put him in the treadmill (his heart was fine but he leg hurt!) and they tested his colesteral (which was high) and weighed him (he's overweight) so he i now supposed to be on a health kick cutting back on fats and exercising more...we're waiting to see if this happens but given that he is currently eating thick slices of white bread topped with Fussels condensed milk (having just had eggy bread, sausages & bacon for brunch) I'm not seeing him being successful.

Friday night was the work Major Business Convention at the Sandypark Rugby club. I wasn't too fussed about going after the last convention in October (which was crap) but I had my new, now de-tagged dress to wear so I went! When we arrived there was a red carpet with fire spinners, women on stilts & photographers before we even went in the building! Inside there was a drink reception with a champagne fountain (so cool!) then we had a three course meal which was lovely. I had Mozzerella & Tomato Salad followed by Chicken Breast with herby potato and veg, all topped off with a wedge of cheesecake, which although lovely was a little bit too sweet. There was free wine on the tables and we all had 4 drinks vouchers each for the bar. After the meal Jim Bowen of Bullseye fame did a bit of stand up and then helped with the award presentations. I tried to get some photos of him but I was too far back to take any that weren't just a blur! O well! After all the speeches and that were done there was a poker table and a roulette wheel in the next room along with.....wait for it....A CHOCOLATE FOUNTAIN!!! Woo! Had I know that was gonna be there I wouldn't have eaten my cheesecake! There was so much choice as to what to dip too...oh it was like heaven...there was marshmallows, turkish delight, strawberries, profiteroles, fudge, mini doughnuts...SO GOOD! Lisa, James & Amanda were collared by one of the photographers to pose for a picture with the fountain (a side version of which I do have its just on the other puter so I shall add it at some point) There was also music from Hermins Hermits then a disco. Grandma picked me up at about 11.30 since my knee was hurting but I had a really good night. Hopefully I'll get some more pics uploaded when I get them from Gemma & Jamie!

Today has been a regular Saturday namely I have done nothing! Marion & Steve came over in the evening and we all kept running outside to watch the Lunar Eclipse but otherwise a lazy lazy day!