Back in June I set myself a few challenges to reach before I hit 30

1 - I will either own my own place or be living away from home.
2 - I will have that maths GCSE.
3 - And a horse.
4 - I'll have a good job to pay for said horse.
5 - I'm gonna go back to the old driving and very determinedly pass the damn test.

So I have been going about it, I've been making tenative arrangements to take an online Maths course to get my GCSE, quite honestly trying to fit 10 years of maths into one year is gonna be hard. Probably impossible, but if I can improve on that F it'll be a damn sight better than now.
I have also kinda arranged to move out again. And in with Welshy. I'd like nothing more than for it to be us together, but after looking at a few places I slowly realised that its impossible.
So we're going in with his current housemate (BDF) and his Mentalist Girlfriend (ASK), I dislike her intensely and the feeling is fairly mutual.
We have nothing in common and are good at winding each other up, so seeing as I've already threatened to smack her once, i'm not sure how good a move it is. But being with Welshy is.
I'm also reluctantly surrendering my Wednesday Riding Lessons (God Fagia is getting better and better and I'm improving so much!) to go volunteer at my Mams nursery.
Yuck.
I LOATHE children, honestly.
I question my own sanity about considering going into a career where I'd be stuck with the shits all day, every day. But the benefits'd be better than being at the Museum day in and day out.

I hate that place, I hate the inanity of a job where I spend all day alone. Wehre I get sent on a course telling me to greet every visitor. I hate how management implement crazy ideas, and ignore staff explaining over and over how it wont work, until someone threatens to sue and then they suddenly change tack. (a shipping reference I learnt the other day)
I hate how they ignore health and safety and disability discrimation acts, and have a grand plan to rid the museum of artifacts and make it a giant shop/cafe/playground.
I hate the fact that the overtime is given to the managers favourites and when I manage to get some scraps, I find I'm taxed for the food I am given and the taxi's home as its impossible for me to walk home at 7pm through the park in Winter.
Most of all I hate the fact that although they deny redunancies and unfairness in pay, that we all know its happening, but are unable to say anything.

So perhaps teaching, and the weekends and long holidays and proper money will be better.

2 of my 5 targets are underway. I shall be using this next year to try and get myself accepted back into uni so I can get hold of target 4, and from there, complete the 5.

Why are parents so good at making you feel guilty?

Since May, Mother has been on and on about going away during the summer hols, I've been putting her off, but since E has bottled on travelling again, I've sorta become resigned to it.
Anyway, she wanted to go to Lanzarote, a place I've been before and she's been many, many times and believe me, it gets its nickname Lanza-grotty for a good reason!
I hate it, its boring, full of nasty ex-pats determined to set up London-by-the-sea and its hot. Christ is it hot. I can't bear to be out in anything higher than 15 degrees for long and its 30+ over there.
And me and Welshy are half-heartedly looking for somewhere to live together, so its 500 quid, money I dont really have and a waste of my leave to go to somewhere I dont really like. Anyway, last Tuesday she guilted me into going.
"I'm all on my own, all my friends have their own families and I'm alone in the world! Alone, neglected, unloved, unappreciated." etc.
So I said I'd look into getting some leave which I did so on Monday.
Only problem is, I've gotten all the week off apart from the Thurs, she wanted to fly out for, there aint flights on Fridays or Weekends.
So I've asked a few people, tried to get a swap, but we're short-staffed so its no good.
So now she's running about sobbing and stropping about:
"You did this on purpose! You could have asked last week" Yeah, like i'm REALLY gonna be able to chase our leave guy to his Tent where he was camping in order to get time off.
"I've ruined her summer holidays, she's now unable to go anywhere. And its all YOUR fault. Everyone else gets to go places and she can't. She was so looking forward to it, now she has nothing to do all summer."
And shit on toast how i'm hearing about it.
Over and Over and Over
Everything she can find to shout at me she does, opening a window, not being able to eat the tea she's cooked as its far to hot for a full roast, for falling asleep.

Sometimes I really just want to scream at her and make her see all that I do for her, the years I've wasted, how I've put aside my own happiness for her, how I bend over backwards for her, how I have to put her first when both her and Welshy make claims on my time. When the Brat couldnt even be bothered to drive down to sainsburys to get shopping, when she was ill in hospital, how I worked, spent all my free time visiting her, or looking after the house and him, struggling down to the shops on the bus with bags and bags of shopping while he stormed about moodily, and she lay sick in bed.

But there's no point in that. And now i've 5 wasted leave days, unless she gets outta her strop and decides to drag me off to some other shithole.

To Stop this being a completly self-pitying post.
Hurrah for Welshy who despite his own obvious boredom took me to see a Horseball tournament on Saturday and then let me watch Hickstead all afternoon!

Horseball - Rugby on Horseback (I SO wanna go!)

Honestly it seems like its just a never ending list here of drama and things never going right.
We'll start with what seems like the littlest of the two.
Meant to be a delivery today of worktops for mothers kitchen extension, now two years into the project and going strong.
Anyway, was told on the phone that the delivery would be by half 9, which would leave me late for work, but I could still do my relief shift as that starts at 10.30. Anyway 10am, still not arrived so I'm panicking trying to get hold of work, ringing constantly and not getting anywere.
Finally get hold of someone at 10.25 which is the EXACT time the lorry pulls up. Turns out that the worktops weigh about 100kgs and the chances of me and the driver unloading them alone are Zero.
So its a wasted journey for him, I get to work at 11 after racing for a bus and I come home to find Mother sobbing cos "everyone she asks for help with the house lets her down and how can she get the builder round when the worktops aint here"
Anyway when I calm her down we move onto Drama 2.

Drama 2 consists of someone who has posed as Mother (Mother has put all of My nan's accounts into a joint account to prevent her taking it out and losing it)
And this pretend Mother Person has taken TWENTY THOUSAND POUNDS out of my Nan's account and into an internet account. My Nan is so addled she cant even remember her phone number and they don't own a computer.
So who's done it? And how can the bank let them do it with out any authorisation from Mother?
Anyway Mother only found out about this by Nan waving a statement at her and demanding to know where her money was.
I dont know how we're going to get the money back, or even how its got there, although we have our suspicions. Other money (smaller amounts, perhaps only 50 or a 100 quid) have gone missing previously and my Granddads Work tools.

Apparently using the words "spastic scrotumheads" to describe a moron gang of 14 year olds is frowned apon by my boss. Even if she then has to resort to calling the Park Police (who helpfully failed to arrive) in order to deal with the little shits.
Well I guess you learn new things every day.

E and I have been thinking since April about travelling, either to Peru or Botswana for at least three weeks, we both agreed to save all our leave and try and book something for their winter (our summer - less heat!)
She's proved very evasive ever since at pinning down a date, and now has hit me with the news that she's booked other leave and only wants to go away for a week or two at the most. Its really annoyed me, as I've been putting off going away with Mum and Welshy so I can have all my leave for this and she told me to save my leave up and now its probably too late to book for this summer as we'd need 6 weeks of injections and shit like that.
Grrr. I'm especially annoyed as the company we were going to go away with, have a 25% sale on at the moment. Sigh.
She also told me about how we should go away to The Lake District to this place where we can ride proper Shire Heavy Horse types, and now she's buggered off with another friend without me.
I dunno maybe I've upset her in some unknown way and thats why she's messing me about a bit and not wanting to hang out.

today it was so hot i fried a piece of bacon on one of the metal structures at work.

I've been doing a lot of thinking lately. Thats one of the few good things about my job. I have time to sit and think. And I've come to a conclusion.
One way or another the majority of my 20's have been a bit of a disaster, from one thing or another. When I was 10 I remember making a list of things that would have happened to me by the time I'm 25 (as I considered that grown up and old)

1 - I would have my own place.
2 - I would have lots of animals. At least one pony
3 - My house would have a swimming pool.
4 - And a Helicopter.
5 - I would either be a top class showjumper/vet/author.

Well here I am rapidly approaching 26 and its very much time I dug myself out of the rut I'm in at the museum and did something with my life.
So. Before I'm 30 I plan to have achieved the following.

1 - I will either own my own place or be living away from home.
2 - I will have that maths GCSE.
3 - And a horse.
4 - I'll have a good job to pay for said horse.
5 - I'm gonna go back to the old driving and very determinedly pass the damn test.

So. I plan to enrol back in college in September and do that GCSE, as an evening class. I may fail it completely again. In face its very likely that I will fail it. But I think just attempting it again will be an accomplishment, due to my fear and sheer panic when faced with any number higher that 20.
After I have completed the course, I am considering doing teacher training. Despite loathing children. I want a job with weekends off again. I want to do something where I can go home and think I've done something worthwhile with my day. And of course the decent pay and all the holidays encourages me more. I may change my mind. I'm certainly not giving up on the dream of working with animals. I figure that the 6 months of GCSE may give me time to get that job, but its time to be realistic. I'm 4 years since graduating and nothing has worked out. Maybe I'll go into vet nurse training. I can if I have that GCSE. I will have more options, even if I have to deny the degree.
Welshy's flat contract runs out in September. We may, no will look for a place together. I dont know how we'll afford it on my pittance and his casual work, and the fact that we cant agree where to live. But they're irrelevant. I want to live with him. I want to be independent again.
So we'll aim for those targets by September and maybe from there I can reach those goals I've set myself before I hit 30. Which most definitely has to be grown up.

Welshy was supposed to go back home today for his sisters birthday, only because of the tube strike, it was virtually impossible for him to get up there in time for the train, as all the buses were crammed! at like 6am!
anyway he reached there just to find the train pulling out of the station and because he had a saver ticket, he is only allowed to use them on the specified train. so i rang up and asked if they'd make allowances for this, as he left a lot earlier than needed.

After they refused and basically said he could either buy a new one at 60 quid or he should have slept at the station!

So I rang back and made up this huge lie about how he had a dying cousin and had to get up for her last birthday and that they had ruined this for him.

And yet they still didnt wanna change their minds! How can you be such heartless bastards?!
And how can i make up such a lie? Going straight to hell. yup.


oh and the weefit today told me i was 31 :(

Mother brought a wiifit thingy at the weekend. I prefer to have it known as a weewee.
Spookily it knows I have a tendancy to trip over lots. And it can measure your BMI (Ideal since you ask! Fuck knows how!) and weight (8 and a half stone).
My aim, is to get it done to an even 8 stone. Not that I consider myself overweight. Hopelessly unfit maybe, but there's something nice and right feeling about being a proper stone and not these piddling quarter and half efforts.
The other main thing it tells you is your "WeeFit Age" Which started off at 69.
Oh.
So my number one goal is to get that down to 25, which I feel is a happier sum as its my real age.

I did have it down to 27 yesterday, but then I went riding and now i'm stiff and sore.

I rode a new horse yesterday, a pure fully trained Arab ex-Racehorse. I dont think I've ever gotten on anything and felt so much power and muscle under me. She was amazingly responsive, eager to please and just a pure joy to ride.
Not to say that she's without her problems, due to her background. Everything needs to be done at a fast pace and I hate having to constantly remind or nag (hehehe geddit?!) her into going at my speed. A happy medium paced trot is all I ask for, but from her reaction you'd have thought the world had collapsed around her. Standing still doesnt exist in her world and she nearly bit my ear off when I ducked my head to tighten her girth. I felt the air get displaced and heard her teeth snap shut a few inches from my ear!
She's kinda spooky, but again thats due to this all being new to her. I'm a bit worried about that first real fright as I have no doubts that if it came down to it, she would take off and I would have no way in the world of stopping her.
I'd love to get her in a real dressage test. Well if I could convince her that standing still is good.

http://www.nmm.ac.uk/explore/podcasts/ontheline/ yeah check me out! I'm the link about Jack Cornwell VC, bastarding museum still managed to spell my name wrong though!

I had the best fun at work today. I so love public speaking, once you get over that initial fear its the greatest thing in the world!
I debuted a new talk on the HMS Challenger and some of the pickled specimens taken from it. It was awesome, I got 25 people on my 2nd go, which is a massive crowd for the museum, but a fair average one when I used to be at the Aquarium. admittedly 11 were a school group, but that made it more fun!
We carried out simple experiments on water pressure, we dissected the inaccuracies in Finding Nemo and talked about the gruesome way octopuses feed, the bizarre sex life of Anglerfish and how some species of crab can be half male and half female and fertilise their own eggs.
And of course a round of applause makes the talk!

i applied for a job at a zoology museum, only two days a week maternity cover. And the bastards, still havent got back to me, despite demanding my personal statement three times as it failed to send.
So either

A - my personal statement convinced them that i'm not good enough despite my other qualifications meant that they NEEDED to see it, (and if they were that bad, then why ask for it in the first place?)

or B - They decided that i'm not even capable of looking after and talking about dead animals.


wankers.

So last night I threatened to rip Welshy's housemates live-in girlfriends face off. But to be fair. She threatened to harm our baby tortoise. And She's a horrid, mentally ill, overly paranoid witch, so i dont think I was entirely unjustified in doing so. I mean I didnt really say anything beforehand that a normal working human being wouldnt have laughed off, so she shouldnt have gone mental at me first. Although I was ready to kick her head in, what kinda silly bitch threatens to "mark my face" anyway?!
I cant stand fakes. And she is so fake it drives me crazy.

Meanwhile in other news CL announced that she's 10 weeks pregnant. So Hurrah for her I guess! Another sign that we're all growing older and I shall determinedly ignore the little voices that tell me I should be going and doing all these grown up things, like having a real job, or moving out, or the boring engaged-married-kids route. (Yuck)

Oh and on Tuesday after my Uncle attempted to Poison my Granddad, by ignoring the doctors and Mother who TOLD him that he wasnt allowed to give him alcohol! He then proceeded to take him out, get him drunk, and then call mum and have her deal with taking him to the hospital as "he'd done his bit and now had to go to work."
So Considering it was my Mum's 25th wedding anniversary and she was already emotionally fraught. That was a good move on his part.

And in her rage she broke the porch door, we now have a six inch wide plank of wood, attached to the hinges which are still in the door frame.

On Friday Welshy took me to see The Woman in Black, which is my favourite ghost story, it was good, not as scary as the book, and yet I jumped even though I knew what was coming, and had my heart banging in my chest at the scary bits. It was set out really cutely too, with only two actors, and a wicker chest being a train, a horse and cart and a desk amongst others! Very School Production like!

A rather busy, manic old week!

Mega Shark Vs Giant Octopus!!!

Surely the best crap movie ever?! I cant WAIT to see it in all its shit graphics glory!


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fa7ck5mcd1o

Dear Charbs.

Thions to remember.

Trying tyo rape a pubs expensive and flimsily fastened statue of Nelson whilsht screaming "you've ruined mty life you wonky -eyed cunt" does not go down well in polite society.

Neither does jokes about date rape or necrophilia.

At least, make sure your audeience finds if funny too.

three. Hungry Charbs go "om nom nom whilse eating noodles"

I have a door! and Hot water! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!

I have had neither for a while, well a bathroom door for a year, just a curtain! and no hot water for a month, but now its all fixed!
And last night I went to see WElshy play cricket with his little team that he organised. He'll tell you it was a shite match, but it was ok, even if they did lose by about 50 runs and he got 48 N.O. which is good for a bowler!
I was annoyed by the fakeness of his housemates GF, who was bored throughout the match and then got out her knittting, but claimed she enjoyed the game and was starting to understand it. She made no attempt when I offered to explain the rules to her to look interested. Why would you pretend like that? Silly Girly. I'd have told him straight up and then saved myself from future hours of boredom!

And Welshys taking me to see Woman in Black. Which is THE shit-scariest book i've ever read in my life. I love being scared! I'm so looking forward to it! and at 11 quid a ticket, you cant complain!

ergh. I swear i have the most moronic person in Welshy. How can someone so good at maths be so shite with money?

He owes me close to a grand, well maybe 900 pounds, admittedly most of this is for the tortoise and his course and our holiday but still...

He's just got a loan off of his Dad, is paying off god knows how much council tax, possibly some phone bill that mounted up to a horrid level and is possibly still in debt to his two housemates.

So how can he think that borrowing a sum of money from a friend to "invest in the stock market" be a good idea?!

Honestly he has shit for brains and yet he still manages to go out every weekend, and alright he gets drunk as cheaply as possible but if he sat at home, he'd save 12 quid or so a week, which soon mounts up.
He shows no inclination to actually look day in day out as I do for a better job and is happy to doss about being lazy and sponging off of other people.

I honestly think I should be in charge of his finances and give him pocket money. and he certainly aint gonna get any more money from me, till he pays me back.

I had the best, sweetest little old man come to my talk today!

He'd come to my talk a while ago, around the winter time i think and returned with presents for me!
He'd found this old bok, from the 70's, pre-decimalisation anyway, which mentioned my boy and photocopied some pages for me, with a picture of his younger brother from the newspaper propaganda and a picture of all the medals that he'd been awarded posthumously and showed me his VC that either his Dad or Granddad had won in ww1 and seeing as they dont give them out that often, it was so cool to feel it!
Bless him to think of me and return to show me and give me his goodies!

I'll be recording a shortened version of my talk, later this week hopefully so you'll have more of an idea what i'm whittering on about!


Also I gotta give a special mention to the two girls who came in and looked a punchbowl and then asked "is that a real bowl?" I was SO tempted to say "No its a frog"

Its Cherry Blossom time again.
I love cherry blossom time, it makes me all nostalgic and i think back to when I was small, back in Primary school and the hardest thing ever to deal with was learning to colour in the lines.
We had a Cherry tree in the middle of our cul-de-sac. It never produced fruit but was so immense that even now I dont think I could put my arms around it.
We were banned from climbing it and plucking the blossom but each spring brought about the resumption of a game we invented and played. Me, OF, Brat and her sister and brother.
A complicated game using the fallen flowers, we'd pick a particularly good looking flower each day and have that as our "mayor" of "Blossomtown" We'd have solemn funerals for the wilting, brown petals and fill our bike baskets with them and ride around and around as fast we could trying to revive the blossom, convinced that the rush of air helped.
We protected our tree from invaders from other parts of the estate who'd come and climb and break branches and steal our flowers.
We'd dangle and shake the branches and pretend the petals that fell were snow or confetti in our hair.
Seems a silly game now but it makes me smile remembering it, looking at the pink and white blossom now. I wonder if the others remember it with as much fondness as I do at this time of year?

So lastn night we did the Charing Cross part of the Monopoly board. It was good, bit bad planning as we discovered several bars on our route had no disabled acess and we had Wheely H with with us so we had to lift her and her chariot up into some bars.
I think we did 6 or 7 stops, I was rather good and paced myself by only having the one drink in each bar as we were on a time limit to get round, so I didnt wanna end up getting to the bar and getting another drink in and then holding everyone else up by waiting for me to finish up.
I think I stayed rather sober too, well you'd have to check that with Welshy who I badgered into coming to meet me at Leicester Square and came with us to two bars, before his lack of ID meant we couldnt get into the final one and we went home early via Burger King.
I *think* i was on the happy giddy side of drunk before it descends into ramble, violent actions and abuse (on my part)
I did berate a man on the tube who was talking about TV detectives and had forgotten the greatest one of all - Mark Sloan on Diagnosis Murder!

And I had another nutter come after me! Oh yes, not satisfied with being harassed by TrainMan on Saturday I had a mental Big Issue Woman chase me into a bar at Covent Garden, claiming "I'm gonna start a riot with that whore!"

All I did was say to her "I don't want a Big Issue, Goodbye!"

Not quite sure it was deserving of being called a whore and threatened several times! And its good to know that the three guys I was with leapt to my defence with a "I'm not sure that's needed?" before fleeing into the bar with me!

On my way back from the England Game, I was sat on the train carriage home trying to eat a sandwich.
Half of it proceeded to fall into my lap.
"Oh for fucking cunting sake" I swore, possibly more louder than I shoulda done in polite society.
An Asian man sitting opposite me raised his eyebrow.
"I'm sorry" I said.
"That's not very ladylike." He remarked. I smiled and pulled out the programme to read.
He then told me that I shouldnt go to football as its "for men only to get some privacy from women and I was invading their space and it was immoral of me to go!"
I was really bemused and didn't know what to say so I went to get up and went to sit elsewhere and he then told me I would never get a husband as I was too unladylike
I wish I'd been faster thinking. I'd have loved to have seen his reaction when I told him I didnt believe in marriage.
Guess he dont get out much!

I'm going to the England game on Saturday! Wheeee! I'm really excited, i've never been to an international (even if this is just a friendly) STF, N and A are about and i've not seen those boys for yeeeeeeeeeeeeears! I can't wait to catch up with them and be beaten up by them!
I've never been to New Wembley either! In fact my one and only trip to Wembley was for this.


Although I'd been to games before, this is what made me fall in love with them, even if they have broken my heart lately! (Looking to be relegated into the 3rd tier of football now, what a fall from 6th in the top league!)
Attendances have dropped and performances have been well. Shit, but i'll be there again next season (hopefully) and we'll come back. Maybe not right away, but they will one day! I hope!

Also on Wednesday I'm doing part of a monopoly pub crawl with guys from work, I physically ache to attempt to do it all in one day, but i might die. but it'd be a good death!
Ha!

Bring on Slovakia!

Today I got to have my first conversation with a real Deafie! Well I say first conversation, its not really, our tutor is deaf but you know what I mean.
It was a bit of a struggle really, with lots of finger-spelling and guesswork and nervous giggles on my part, but we concluded that this girl, who was doing an MA at Wolverhampton Uni in steel work, or some kinda metal work. and wanted to have some pictures or use the telescope for getting ideas for designs and then we had to complicatedly explain that the telescope dont really get used now as the days are longer and disappoint her, we sent her to the NASA website to look for other pictures.
It was hard work and a little confusing but I guess the lessons are paying off and it serves me right for skipping yesterdays refresher session!
Anyhow things are moving on slowly at work, by next Tuesday I should have my meeting to confirm that me new talk "The Challenger Expedition and Creatures of the Deep" can go live as it were!
And there's talk of me putting my original Talk "Jack Cornwell VC" onto the interweb so visitors to the museum website can hear my dulcet tones and come along and listen.
This'd be good for me as I can then use it in covering letters to say to potential new employees, for a sample of my talks and talking style see so on....
I'll keep you all posted as I'm sure you'll want to hear part of it, although it may blow the mystery behind me as you'll all hear my awful cockney twang!

yuck.

Today I was busy adding to my talents at the museum, by offering my services as a "buddy" or a mentor to the summer newbies. Only the girl it turned out that me and one of the older guys that I was shadowing, used to go to school with me.

And whilst never one of the ringleaders of those that were mean to me, she always freely joined in. I hate this, I hate that, ten years on, I still don't feel comfortable in Eltham, I hate that I saw her today and got that awful sinking, "oh no" feeling.

Its awkward trying to explain the bullying that I got at school, if it was the traditional beating I think I could have coped with that more, but being ostracised, isolated the way I was, its more mental bulling I guess, the way they'd stop conversations to stare as I went by, the way they'd all move to another desk if I came and sat there, or moved as far away as I could and pretended I wasnt there, the refusal to work with me if it came to group coursework etc...

Seven years I endured that silent bullying, of course there was the more traditional name calling but that mostly always washed off of me, where as that stuck. How do you at 12, or even up to 17 when I left, deal with day after day of that treatment? with name calling or days of silence and evil looks if I was unlucky enough to be forced into a group that resulted in them getting split up from a mate?



So no, I wasnt best pleased to see her and less pleased to realise I'd be working with her, spending the day with her. She doesnt seem to have changed much, when we were at school, she was always quick to correct the teachers, if she felt something was wrong, or should be done another way, and it was the same today. She clearly feels the job is beneath her and was asking about how quickly she could apply for other roles in the museum, about how she could contact the curators/education staff. About the wages and seemed horrified that I'd been there almost two years and how little I was paid.

My manager, who is lovely came out of a meeting with her and instantly remarked "She will be trouble"

I'd like to think she's grown up from what we were as kids, but I also think I'll be avoiding her as much as I can in the mean time until one of us leaves!

This weekend I headed up to Scarborough to meet with The Lizard and prepare for our Marine Mammal Medic Course. It was great to catch up with her, she's always a little mental and up for fun, and is even more fun now she's chucked her boring cuntfluff of a boyfriend who most definately DIDNT approve of us throwing a space hopper around uni, making bin bag outfits and having a water fight once that covered the kitchen floor in an inch of water.
Anyway, once we checked into our B&b We had to get ourselves wetsuits, which proved not an easy task in a seaside town!
The shop that the course reccommended was closed, and the tourist info place told us about a place that didnt hire one, so we decided the best course of action was to go play in the arcades, eat ice cream and chips and then procede to get horribly drunk in the b&b.
and then having run out of drink, the most obvious thing in the world to do, was to walk down to SAinsburys, covered in stickers and comic relief red noses!
Its a wonder we got served really, staggering about, squeaking to each other, and clutching bottles of drink and a large chocolate cake!
We danced in our hotel room, comparing our shit music collection and texting everybody in both our phone books until 1am before deciding we needed to sleep.
So we possibly wasnt in the best state in the morning to listen to a three hour lecture on seal and whale biology!
We explained our wetsuit dilemma to the lady in charge who then organised for us to have two delivered.
And off we set to be at the beach by 2pm
Only. Me and The Lizard were at the wrong end of the beach at 1.56 and had to run a mile down it to the right place.
Well she says it wasnt a mile, but what does she know? it FELT like a mile and that was enough!
and we got there at 2.02 (i checked on my watch) only to find that the wetsuit hirer guy had taken them back. Fucking hell, nothing like being precise is there?
So we had to ring around and found that there was a surf shop near where we parked the car and we might be able to get a suit there! So we ran all the way down and BACK! and then joined in the rest of the course, being glowered at all the time, for not being organised and taking it seriously!
But I am now qualified to rugby tackle a seal to the ground, check it for injuries or illnesses and to help refloat a beached whale or dolphin!
Not sure how helpful this skill will be in London, but as TDR pointed out to me. "If there's one thing mankind needs its more whale first aiders." What a legend that guy is!

A quick mention has to go to Welshy who had his own interesting Saturday night, in which he ended up in a "minor scuffle" (or more accurately "Grabbing someone by the hair and bouncing their head off of a wall") and then racially abusing some poor chinese man who refused to serve him in his offie!
He's a bad, bad person!*

* I do not approve

I had an interview today over at Chessington World of Adventures. They have had a small zoo (and not a great one) for a long time, I remember going there as a kid anyway and seeing it.
In the last ten years or so they've been rebuilding and rethinking their zoo and now its pretty good, small still but a lot more forward thinking in their animal care and have successfully bred Sumatran tigers (one of the worlds most endangered tiger species) My intervew was for the sea life centre, again very small but on the process of being developed.
I think the interview went well, Its-a-small-world-syndrome struck when I found that the guy interviewing me used to work alongside me at the Aquarium! And now if I got the job he'd be my boss!
I dunno, I think it went well, but I didnt like the place itself. It was nothing to do with the people who were lovely and like I say, nowadays you cant critise their approach to the animals in their cares welfare. But I just left with a horrible atmosphere and I dont think I want to work there. Of course if I got the job I'd have to say yes, after trying for so long I'd be daft to reject them, but still....

I'm off to Scarborough tomorrow to play with the Lizard on our Marine Mammal Medic Course, which promises to be very cold and wet but hopefully great fun!
Perhaps after that its time I hung out at home and had a quiet weekend or two to sort my finances back out.

Talking of finances, my wonderful Welshy scored us 100 off our next BA flight! When we flew back from Newark, the lady faffed about with everyone else around her and then claimed that she couldnt get us seats to sit together.
Although once we took off it was apparent that there was two seats spare and free, so unless some one just never turned up I dunno what she was on about.
Anyway he wrote a letter of complaint about it,
He put in some rubbish about how I was a nervous flier (which I am, although he exagerated it heavily) and got a grovelling letter in reply and they sent us both 100 quid off our next flight vouchers! Blatantly means we need to go away again soon!

So hi! I'm back from NYC! And sweet fucking Jesus is it cold! I blame the city builders, its all very well having straight lines everywhere, but did you not stop to think about the wind tunnel effect?!


I was homeless too! Well effectively homeless! I booked my hotel here, going on the nice pictures of a 4 poster bed and a nice shiney white bathroom, but the reality was awful. I swear it gets used as a crackden when its not being a hotel room, the "bed" consisted of a mattress on the floor, the room had weird stains and half finished plasterwork, and a noisy pipe and the bathroom was brown, full of broken tiles and a drippy tap and there was a BRIDGE across the window into another apartment, just strong enough to carry the weight of a serial killer.



They'd made a vague attempt at making it nicer by putting a portrait of a man/woman/girl from The Ring up. We lay on the bed, exhausted after our flight, trying to convince ourselves for half an hour that it wasnt so bad, we could cope and then I snapped. I can handle grotty, but not a crackden.
So we went to the hostel that we'd past on our way and enquired about a room, yes there was one available and they thought we'd be legally entitled to our money back.

But of course the Crackden leader was unwilling to give it back, trying to swap us to another room, which was unopenable! and then throwing a hissy fit when We demanded our money back. I can throw a hissy fit with the best of them too. And Threatened them with all sorts, threatened to sue and then threw myself into a chair and refused to move until I got my money back.


He reluctantly phoned his boss
"He's not a nice guy, he wont give it back."
Strangely the man on the phone gave it back right away and we were out of there less than an hour after moving in!

So we went up to the hostel only to find that they actually only had dorm beds and in a seperate room. So that was out.
And there we were, Me and Welshy, lost, homeless, tired, hungry and slowly freezing to death. It was kinda fun for the first half hour, convinced as we were that we'd get somewhere easily. I mean in London you cant WALK without falling over a hotel.

Three hours later and somehow we found ourselves in Times Square. It was something close to 4am our time, and I was near to breaking down in tears.
When we stumbled across the Hotel Mela, it was dead posh and that always equals dead expensive.
But like Welshy said. "We can manage tonight and then start again in the morning"
So I went up to them and explained that we were refugees from a crackden and probably a huge herd of cockroaches. and the lovely lady behind the reception went to speak to her manager, and then got us a huge $100 discount, it still made the room $50 dollars a night more expensive than what we'd originally paid for but still a beds a bed and homeless people cant be beggars.
(I think my trembling lower lip and quivering voice helped move her towards our plight.)

So we crashed into bed and prepared ourselves for a fresh attack on the city the next day. We planned to look for other cheap hotels, as this was SLIGHTLY out of my budget and as I was funding Welshy's holiday I didnt see how I could afford both of us to stay in such luxury, but in the end we caved and the nice people let us stay at the cheaper rate.

So we explored the city, Broadway, 5th Avenue, Time Square, and all the little offshoot streets. We went up the Rockefeller building towards sunset and played in the mad room at the top with coloured lights and music and watched the sun go down and all the pretty lights came on.
It was so MOTHERFUCKINGLY cold though! We were prepared for the cold, Christ knows we've been coping with -6's lately but this was awful, nothing could prepare us for that coldness, all day!
The next day we took a trip on subway again down to the Statue of Liberty and spent the day climbing the monument and exploring round there.


It was a fun, like London on acid as Welshy said, but as always when I visit the city I just wanna get out of it after a while, so I got my fix of the big city and then we flew home again!














Stairs to Nowhere - What the fuck is that about?!



















Named after you Hyde-y?

So yo! Did you miss me? I thought not!

I've just got back from Dublin and I've decided that now, whenever possible, I shall fly hand luggage only, fucking hell it makes such a difference, sailing past baggage and all those poor suckers waiting for it.

It was ok, more a holiday for mum more than owt else as she got to catch up with a few friends of hers that live out there. WE visited the Guinness factory and the Jamesons Whiskey Museum and the jail out at Kilmainham and the Post Office, home of the Easter Uprisings. I like that kind of history. I suppose its the whole romance part of it, struggling for independence and all that bollocks. (Despite nearly getting blown up myself in the whole IRA bombing bit, and my Uncle M twice narrowly missed out on being blown up, by little quirks of fate like leaving the office early or forgetting a paper and going back for it, only to return to a bombed office.) Interestingly theres still bulletholes and damage to the pillar structures of the GPO.

So yeah all that was interesting and then we went out drinking in the evenings in the Temple Bar area, although as Mother Dearest was there, I was very restrained and good!

We also met, "The trollop with the scollops"!

So despite making it up to Worksop on Evil Wednesday, the day of snow and ice, despite "Impressing them with my commitment, my knowledge and the way I conducted myself" They decided in the end to award the job to someone with more experience.
FUCKING HELL. Why is it always that catch-22? I cant get any work cos no one wants anyone without experience, but no one wants to give you that experience in the first place.
I have another application being processed with Dudley Zoo, (who have already turnt me down in the past) and at least thats a trainee role, so we'll see!!
Anyway I went out last night to see my good friend TDR and had a bit of a catch up and he brought me chips on the way home, hurrah! And I'm off to Dublin this afternoon! and then New York in 5 days! Wheeeeee!

WE had the most snow ever on monday! 4 inches! Its the deepest I've ever seen snow, and it pretty much destroyed London, no buses, no trains, hardly any tubes. Strangely the DLR was running normally.
We were warned not to travel unless we had too.
So. With schools, and buisnesses closed around us, the sensible thing to do would be to close the museum right?
Wrong.
I trudged through that snow, that came up half way to my knee to find that only 16 of us had made it in, half the galleries were closed but we stayed open until the Director finally admitted defeat and closed us for 3pm.
On Wednesday was my Worksop interview and I felt like a polar explorer trekking up there. I think the interview went really well, I got to cuddle all sorts of new animals, a barn owl, a skunk, some rather creepy but kinda cute giant milipedes...
I also got to inform them of a fact about one of their parrots that they didnt already know, which has - if nothing else - at least show that I do know what I'm talking about.
I should find out in a week or so how I did, so at least I'll be on holidays when the rejection comes which'll make it easier to bear!
I've been running about like a nutter trying to get this sorted, I needed a place to stay in NY and Dub, holiday moneys and insurance all of which I've now managed to get sorted in a week.
Welshy is rather excited too, he's never been on a long haul flight before, bless him!

its SNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWWWWIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNNNNGGGGGGGGGGGG

Wheeee! We beat the scum 1-0 and I've got my leave sorted for my adventures!

Since my intended trip to India was cancelled, I've been kicking me feet and trying to control my itchy feet, thats not been helped by E who has a mate who works on the airlines and gets her discounted flights and in the last year she's been to Vegas, Boston and LA and may be off to Shanghai or Hong Kong with him later this year/month.
Yesterday I could stand it no more and texted Welshy to "Find me a holiday"
By 8.30 that evening I have myself booked on a flight to Dublin with the mother and then I'm coming back from that and a day later jetting off with him to New York!
Hurrah!

I've been in a very bad mood over most of the weekend.
Resenting everyone and everything and most specially of all, poor Welshy who asked for help moving more of his crap down to London.
Which resulting in me hissing angrily (maybe not hissing as in screaming it at him) "I fucking hate you and wish you'd stayed in Wales" and then throwing his suitcase down the stairs at a rather crowded Oxford Circus Tube Station and kicking it angrily breaking the handle.
Oh and telling some poor lost tourist to "Fuck off" When she asked me what station she was at.
I'm a bad, bad person.
Poor guy, I dunno why he seems to be the brunt of all my anger and bless him for putting up with it and soothing and petting me back to a good humour.
I even took a sickie today rather than deal with the tourists and I'm in a fairly chilled kinda mood now.
Still I have lots to do, I'm only halfway through putting my Gallery Talk into BSL, I have another one to learn, oh and I have two to prepare for this interview. Well one that I know what my topic is and the other, they're just gonna ask me to pick from three animals and whitter about them, which worries me, I'm happy talking nonsense as long as I can prepare for it, but bullshitting is not my strong point.
And all this needs to be done in the next two weeks.
Busy, busy, busy!

Well they promised they'd get back to me by Wednesday and I heard nothing. So I guess mum's right! There's always gonna be someone with more experience than me and they'll always pick them over me.
I have another interview in Feb for a seasonal job until October in a bird park. After 4 years of constantly raising my hopes and getting them destroyed and ripped apart, I can't say I'm hopeful.
Nor do I want to leave my job and uproot myself to Worksop for 6 months and then come back to the museum to beg for my job back.
Sigh.

Lol, cheers guys.
She is only doing it to try and keep me about, whether she realises that or not. IF I got offered the job, I'd take it and somehow try and cover up my lack of knowledge on S.O Pumps and underground filtration, but we'll see Tomorrow....
Anyhow, me and the Lizard last night in a fit of excitement signed up to do a Marine Mammal Medic Course whether we were more excited about the idea of being qualified to rescue stranded whales and dolphins or the chance to play with a life-size real weight (2 tonne!) inflatable Pilot whale is debatable! Wheeeee!

So yeah! I went and had this interview, disappointingly the park was closed so when we rocked up an HOUR AND A HALF early to check it out, we were forced to sit in the reception room, which does nothing for my nerves. I think it went ok, I had to blag my knowledge of feeding lionfish and S.O pump systems, but they seemed excited about me being at the aquarium and applying to do this shark thing.
I'd be given my own tanks to do whatever the hell I liked (within reason) which scares the hell out of me although I'd get full training in it and made Mother comment "You'll not get the job as its beyond you and even if they were stupid enough to offer it to you, you should turn it down"

Fucking hell we won a match last night! Our first one since the 4th of october! World domination clearly beckons!
I'm off on a whirlwind tour of the midlands later today, spending the night with Welshy's friend in Birmingham, before we go to Kidderminster where I have an interview for a job I have no chance in hell of getting, but the safari park has WHITE LIONS! Yeeah! Not albino Lions, but proper hardcore white lions, which, on its own, in my eyes makes the trip worthwhile considering there's what less than 30, 20 in the wild and they're pretty much genetically extinct.
So how exciting!
After the interview we're heading off to Derby to meet TP and TJ, they moved back to Derby late last year I think and I've not seen them for two years now! So although its a quick tea it'll be good to see them and Welshy's not met them.

Happy 50th Birthday Daddy!

So here we are again.
The third anniversary. We've not done anything this year, The Brat is working late and couldnt change his shifts. Its different this year. Perhaps I'm finally coming to terms with it.
I still think of him virtually every day, although its not every day like it used to be, and although it still eats me up inside and twists my stomach with pain I've not yet cried. Maybe I will, maybe I won't this year.
He'd have preferred that, that this year I acted normally, laughing and joking with work friends, that I havent sat around and moped.
I miss him terribly still and wish that he was here with us. Friday might be hard as it will be his 50th birthday, if things were normal we'd have had a massive party.
Instead there will be just us and a quiet dinner, we might go ski-ing at the Dome, I think his sense of humour would appreciate that. Being silly and doing silly things was high on his list of agendas, although He would have watched us make fools of ourselves and toasted us with alcohol.
I wonder how my Mother is coping, deep down. She makes brave statements about moving on with life, but I wonder deep down, if she really is.
I miss my Daddy, we all do.

I set myself Three New Years Resolutions last year.
1: To travel more
2: Learn another language
3: Finally get another job.

Hmm. I guess I did achieve the travelling thing, I toured most of Italy, well the only bits I'd ever wanted to see anyway. I only really got the one day in Rome, so I'd like to go back and see the bits I missed, actually get inside the Vatican and see the Sistine Chapel, as it was too busy when we were there and we were so limited for time. I think I'd like to go to Venice again as well, its shabby and rundown, but on a good day its one of the most beautiful cities. If things had gone according to plan I'd also be able to tell you that my Visa and plane tickets to India were sorted, but there we go. I still have 18 days of leave to use up before April, so I'm sure I'll get away again.
I did Also achieve my other language resolution, well I claim I did, I guess it depends on the person, I went on a BSL (British Sign Language) course in the Summer, I'd like more practise at it, but I feel I could, perhaps, have a very basic coversation with a Deaf person, I'm also trying to put my Gallery Favourite Talk into Sign, but that's gonna be a long process, perhaps next year I'll do another course in it as I really enjoyed it.
I failed in my mission to get another job, not without lack of trying, I had three interviews last year, perhaps that dont sound too good, but over 300 people went for my Seal Job over in norfolk and to get myself in the last 6 that get interviewed ain't too bad! And I think thats the same with all my other interviews, plus what with the climate at the moment, people are less inclined to leave the jobs they have, or create others, so it was August that I had my last interview, but I have one Thursday week, so we'll see.

Good points of the Year? - Welshy coming back and getting Geronimo, I cant imagine going back to just seeing him, one day every three weeks again, Italy was a good point as well. I've started riding again too, something I've missed a lot, although falling off of Selica last week, wasnt good!
Bad? - Still being in the Museum, still pandering to the whims of Mother - who is the reason I'm home tonight, even though she went to bed at 7.
Granddad's Cancer is another bad point, I couldnt bear it if he died as well, nor can I bear the fact that my other Aunts and Uncles seem to carelessly abandon him and Nanny to me and Mum to deal with.
And Charlton's seemingly relentless slide to League One is also a real bad point! Just think, when I started this blog, we were 4th in the prem and beating the likes of Arsenal, Liverpool and Chelsea. Now we're 24th in the Championship and 4 points behind everyone else, in a lower league and losing to the likes of Barnsley and Blackpool and if things dont pick up we'll be off to another lower division!

I wanna talk about MH too, but that's a post for another day, so all thats left is for me to thank you all for reading! Wish you a Great New Year and Hope you join me in telling 2008 to fuck off at midnight!

Happy Chrimbo to you all!!!
I've rather enjoyed having 5 lazy days off, although going back to work tomorrow is pleasing me slightly as I'm rather bored imprisoned in this house with no where to go!
Plus in the New Year I have another interview, for a safari park in the midlands. Wrong side of Derby though, but hey ho.
They phoned me up last Sunday, so i wonder if thats a good sign, or not! I've been to a few interviews over the year, for the RSPCA in Norfolk, for Colchester Zoo and London Zoo's but due to the economic climate at the moment, work kinda dried up around August and then didnt come back so I was reduced to looking for seasonal work, but this is a full time position!
I feel really awkward though, it was a job I applied for, merely to keep myself motiviated for applying for jobs, like I said it all dried up and from doing one application a week, to not doing any in three/four months and I was hopelessly underqualified for this job.
But now I have the interview and I cant even remember what the job was, something to do with fish/reptile keeping and public speaking according to the Covering Letter I sent it.
I hate being under prepared for these things!
But figners crossed!

I think i'm all caught up in the general gloom about at the moment. I'm disappointed about my trip to India being cancelled, well postponed indefinately and I'm finding it hard to summon up any enthusisium for finding another adventure.
Work at the moment is pretty shite. Well more shite than normal. There's fewer visitors, cos the weather, economic climate (despite us being free) and its always dead this time of year anyway. But being alone all day with nothing to do to keep you pre occupied does strange things to your mind. I made a film in my gallery on my phone today.

I find this time of year hard anyway.... too many memories I guess. I had to take my Granddad to the hospital last monday for his chemo as all the rest of my so called caring aunts and uncles claimed they were too busy to take the time off.

I hate that room. I hate the reclining green leather armchairs. I hate watching the clock and counting drips from the bag of blood or drugs slowly flow through the arm. I hate the relentless cheeryness of the nurses that work there. I hate being there. Thinking about all the times Dad sat there, how ill he was and how ill he'd be before he'd get the blood and how the blood'd perk him up for a bit and then he'd sink again. I never wanted to return to that room. I spent the day dealing with circular conversations and then trying to sort out his medication and feed him and my increasingly insane Nanny and I wonder why this is happening again and where in the world it is fair.

I came home and shouted at Welshy over nothing and I've been in a foul, tired gloomy mood ever since. I hate Christmas. I want to sleep it away.

So today is the second anniversary of THIS Its so funny now thinking of my dilemma back then of how best to deal with him.
We went out today to the pub we used to do most of our drinking in, only to find out its been upgraded and not for the better! So perhaps we'll fondly reminisce and not go back there again.
Sometimes I try and think exactly where I started to change my mind about how I felt about him, but I dont remember. It just happened somewhere between the long drinking sessions and day long chats either on msn or hanging out together, between the silly little bickering fights we have and the teasing jokes and giggles we had.
But I'm glad it did change.
Also amusingly the day after that incident I was working in the Blackheath shop and managed to drop a pint of probiotic strawberry yoghurt down me and into the freezer, where it froze almost instantly.
I dont know who was more worried about that incident, me or the shop manager. I text Welshy to tell him about me being clumsy just to reassure him more than anything that nothing had changed between us and he told me later that he laughed at me and then cried cos it made him realise that he loved me even though i'm a "clumsy spastic"

I've been so busy lately! Been working loads, managed to get my Bahamas application in, so now its a case of waiting and seeing, fingers crossed.


Selica is turning out to be hard work, I'm starting to fall in love with her and I kinda see myself as her Social Worker or something. Me and my Instructor both believe she's been badly abused in the past and is slowly coming out of her shell and wants someone to love her.


She's a very affectionate thing, who loves cuddles, but is still very nervous and skittish, She dislikes me moving my arms near her face which is where I think she's been beaten, but she loves getting her throat scratched. To ride she's a bit of a baby, she needs constant reassurance to be told she's doing the right thing and if you push her beyond what she's capable of, or give her confused signals, she's inclined to panic and either stop dead or just take off at a million miles an hour.


She's been schooled really badly too, and canters in a really poor "disunited way" so that's something else I need to work on with her, and teach her how to canter in the correct way. But I love it and I feel like I can learn a lot from her as well.


I've started a new volunteer job with the RSPB (Royal Society for the Protection of Birds) mainly involves me standing around on events and shows and harassing people to join up, maybe it'll help me get a job, maybe not. We'll see.

Job hunting is going so poorly lately, I guess its the whole climate of things and the time, no one wants to be looking for a new job near Christmas, I did apply for a job in the West Midlands but I'm hopelessly under-experienced for it.

Welshy is good, still jobless but its great having him here and hopefully he'll get employed soon!

On a slightly selfish note, I'm annoyed that those terrorists have gone crazy out in India, I was really hoping to book a trip out there, either this weekend or next week and now it may not be safe.

Ho hum.

So what have I been up too? I#'ve had a rotten, rotten cold, and been a busy old bunny.
I've been asked to ride a young horse at the stables, Selica who is a challenge to say the least at the moment!
work wise? meh, its been about the same, we actually had this really, really exciting event last Saturday, Shark Day! With lots of marine charities, Save Our Seas, Shark Trust, that kinda thing, and dive companies, like the people who take you out to cage dive with Great White Sharks (God I'd love to do that!) anyhow this man reccmended I email some people and now I'm filling in an application to go out to the bahamas for a month next year, so fingers crossed on that!
Which leads me to my problem, they ask about skills you have, boating, (never done owt like that) mechanical and handycrafts (I have no idea what I'm doing, but i'll give it ago as long as someone's willing to supervise/tell me what to do!)
and then it comes to other skills, which has me stumped, i have no idea what i can put, not sure what i've dont is actually relevant to this, there's not a lot in work that i do apart from public speaking!
I really, really, really wanna go do this so i really need to come up with something to make me stand out, and so far I dont think making the best campside marshmallows will help!

Ever wondered what a giggling Charbs and a Grumpy Welshy sound like? Well wonder no more! And admire the video of Baby G trying to fit under the playstation unit and his little legs go scrabbling about!

So on Halloween I spent the night in the haunted building at work, it was pretty good fun, a shame more people didnt go really.

So did anything spooky happen?

I'm not sure, being the sceptic I'd like to say no, however I'll tell you guys and you can make up your own minds.

I'll skip the whole crazy episode with the dowsing rods, mainly cos i think they were set off by all the electricity and stuff about.

At 2am we decided to do a protection ritual before we communicated with the ghosts with our rods and as we did the ritual, the giant mannaquin in the far corner (well away from us) suddenly set off on his own, like something had tripped its sensor and he "spoke "breathed" and "moved" on his own for a good 10 minutes althoughout this ritual thing.

anyway the night moved on and as those at the far end spoke to the "ghosts" we saw little lights flicker on and flicker off on the telly screen that was connected to the camcorder recording it all and then the lady conducting it all asked the "ghosts" to communcate with us at the far end as we couldnt see what was going on clearly.
Now either it was a well-timed practical joke by Security but at that EXACT moment the lights all popped on and then went instantly off again in the rooms where we were and the phone rang briefly twice.
So ghosties communicating? Or just a very well timed practical joke? You decide!

I Pinched a Meme from Spins, its more fun than dwelling on our rubbish performance tonight and worrying about if Geronimo will cope with the cold.

The home I grew up in... Was originally a "prefab" designed to be a temporary answer to the housing shortage after the war. It was the house my mother was born in and lived in till she was 12, I lived there from the age of 3 until I was 15/14. I remember the pebble-dashing was painted pink, and also went yellow and grey in the years that I lived there. It was two-up-two-down, with a large wide garden

When I was a child I wanted to be...An author, or an olympic standard show-jumper, or a paleotologist, or a vet.
The moment that changed me for ever... was realising death really was The End.
My greatest inspiration... is Dad
If I could change one thing about myself... I'm not sure, there's the shallow things, like I'd like to be taller, look nicer but on the whole I'm pretty happy with the person that I am and I wouldnt change me.
My style icon... me.
The person who really makes me laugh... The Lizard, we always have a fun time together
.A book that changed me... loads, erm.. To kill a mockingbird, probably.
My favourite work of art... The Parting Cheer
My favourite item of clothing... my new geeky Black Holes Hoody.
It's not fashionable but I like... watching the Horse and Country Channel
You wouldn't know it but I'm very good at.... Remembering impossibly pointless things, like I can recite word for word the script to one of our planetarium shows, despite only seeing it twice.
You may not know it but I'm no good at... remembering things. I have a really poor short term memory.
.If I have time to myself…I facebook
My house is... always in a state of disrepair
My most valuable possession is... Sentimentally, my photo of my graduation with Dad, moneywise my new digital camera or my camcorder
My favourite building.... The Valley!
Movie heaven... is a really good horror film.
The best invention ever...changes day to day.
The last album I bought/downloaded...I've never brought or downloaded one for myself.
In 10 years' time, I hope to be in a job I love.
My greatest regret... Hand on heart, speaking truthfully I dont have one.
My life in seven words... Has enormous highs, lows, adventures and disappointments

Yesterday me and Welshy went on an adventure down to the Tortoise Centre and we returned with this!

Introducing *fanfare* GERONIMO! The coolest baby tortoise ever!

He's so tiny and so very, very cute, I can even forgive him for costing me 190 quid in order to get him and all the crap that he needs to keep him happy and healthy!

So. You'd think after locking myself out of Welshy's room three times in one morning and THIS INCIDENT would have taught me how to master his lock? Right?
Wrong.
Apparently learning how to work a lock was a lesson I musta skipped at school, because last night I managed to lock him out, before going on my merry way home.
And after he and his flatmates attempts at making a contraption to get the keys failed to produce said keys, and attempting to kick the door down also didnt work. They eventually had to get a crowbar and smash the door to get him into it.
I'm now officially banned from touching whats left of his door.

Despite Welshy nearly making me stupidly late, I went for the stables for a ride again. I decided recently its something I wanna take up seriously again and get back to my former levels of goodness.
It was a really good lesson, one of those where I really achieved something by the end of it, Pebbles is a stroppy little pony at the best of times and the start of the lesson was a real fight between the two of us, to get her to do what I wanted, rather than taking it easy and chilling out as she wanted!
But by the end of it, she was bending and being really flexible and really working to please me and enjoy it herself rather than grumpily huffing her way about and then going back for a snooze.
We worked on basic bending and circles, its always good to go back to the basics, especially as I've forgotten the diameters of how large to make some circles, and learning how to bend properly and flow around corners, instead of just turning sharply was the real highlight, again it just re-enforces to me, how much harder riding gets the more you do it. I mean to learn to turn as a beginner, its all sharp angles, left rein, right leg, for example to turn left. To actually have the horse bend with the corner as it goes round, there's just so much more involved. The outside rein needs to be higher, the contact with the horses's mouth needs to be more precise, the inside rein needs to be more centralised to help support the neck, your weight needs to adjust and lean with the bend to allow the horse to move its own weight easier, you need to keep the pressure on with your inside leg to encourage the horse to move over!
So much going on just for a simple turn!



oh and did I forget that all this was carried out in canter without stirrups? Gonna be stiff tomorrow!

Ooops Part 1. Getting locked out of Welshy's room for the third time that morning and banging on the door for him to let me back in, meanwhile his flatmate wanders out to talk to me. Cue Welshy opening the door, in a huff and stark bollock naked. Not sure his flatmate'll recover from that sight first thing in the morning!
Ooops Part 2. Finding a lead attached to a display case at work and obeying my cursed curiosity to pull it and then realising that not only is it the lead for the display lights, that its also the lead for the alarm system.

As for Shorty's question yesterday on whether my mum accepts Welshy yet.

I dont think she does. She's already making funny comments about "having to get used to me not being about as much" and "I'll have to book in advance to see you now" and "I'll have to be used to being alone."

It really exhausts me, I feel kinda like I'm getting torn in two different directions, I really wanna spend time with Welshy. He begs me to move in with him, but I feel like I can't cos she makes me feel so horribly guilty for not being there with her, to give her a reason to cook, to eat, to leave the house, to live.

I really have no idea about the best way to go about this, I'm too much of a pushover to just walk out and leave her, especially with Granddad still really sick.
I know she's had it rough over the last coupla years, we all have and I've bent over backwards to look after her as much as possible, so I guess part of it is my fault for spoiling her and part of me is still that silly little girl looking for her approval, desperate for her to like me.
And I guess part of it is the other way around. I was a Daddy's girl. All she ever wanted was for me to be little and fluffy and not run about in torn jeans, falling out trees, forever dirty and screaming and sobbing whenever a dress was placed on me.
I know she struggles with the idea that I'm independent from her, I've always known that, even from before she tried to talk me out of moving to uni.
I know that she loves my brother a lot more than she loves me, because of the above and because of his problems. So why do I still feel the need to try and get her to approve of me, even though she ignores me and then makes me feel guilty whenever I do my own thing?
She pushes me away loads and yet makes demands on my time and attention and I just simply can't say no to her.

So whether she'll ever accept Welshy and welcome him as one of my friends is debatable, and certainly not going to happen any time soon!

Hurrah the money's been located! And Welshy only has one more day at work before coming home on saturday!
I am rather excited by this, its been what? 16 months since he went back up to Wales. And although he'll be living 40 minutes away in the shittiest part of london, it'll be ace having him about again! And ordering him about so we can go on little adventures!

Last Monday I paid in Welshy's rent and flat deposit for him, 930 quid.
The money came out of my account on the first, however his landlady hasnt recieved it in her account.
So where's the money?
I asked Natwest, my bank, if they could check it went into the right account, they did this and confirmed it. So I went to her bank HSBC and asked them to confirm that it had gone into her account. They said yes and that it could take a few days to clear. So I waited. And waited. And waited.
Finally I grew fed up of waiting and went to the bank yesterday, they claimed that they could not trace it their end, so I went to Natwest and asked them for the statement showing that it had left my account and gone into hers, which they confirmed and said it must be a fault at the other end.
So I went back to HSBC, gave them her details, showed them this statement and gave them the reciept from the transaction (which I fear they might still have!) and they agreed that it was the right account but they couldnt prove that I'd actually paid the cheque in and told me to get Natwest to trace it, and they traced right into.... Yeah you guessed it, the HSBC account. So they photocopied me a copy of the cheque and I went back to HSBC. Now HSBC are starting to get concerned. Not concerned enough to ring me like they promised too, today though! And certainly not concerned enough to phone up the landlady and explain to her whats going on.
They're still blaming me for somehow getting the numbers wrong, even though when I challenge them about it, they agree that the account details are right.
So where does that leave me? I'm not sure. It leaves Welshy 930 out of pocket and he's potentially going to be homeless come Friday as the Landlady wont give him keys without the deposit!
How can a bank cash a £930 cheque without putting the money into the right account?
I intend to find out the whereabouts of this money tomorrow, even if it takes up my entire day off. I shall take my paper, some supplies and amusements and I refuse to budge from my one-woman peaceful protest until that money is traced and placed in the right account and I get an apology!

I've had a busy day with N, according to his wishes as to be allowed on a horse I took him riding where he commented that "its not as easy as I've always thought" and "I kept bashing my balls against the saddle"
Cheers N, nothing like too much information is there?
I then took him home to get changed and then we headed into the big city to play at being tourists. We went up to my former Aquarium where we got in for free (hurrah for my security pass still being valid there!) had a quick look round and then walked up to Trafalgar Square where he posed for many pictures, sat on one of the lions, laughed at me when i fell to the floor after jumping off of the plinth there. Its gotta be about 4 -5 foot high, so perhaps me taking a leap off of it wasnt my smartest move ever!
Then we walked up to via Picadilly Circus for more Touristy type photos to go to Mayfair to visit the IceBar that Welshy took me too once, on our one and only "official date" which impressed him.
"You've scored here Charlton"
Then we walked down to Buck Palace so he could have some photos taken outside there and then with one of the guards in their fancy uniforms and then walked home to get his stuff and back to the train station!
An epic sight seeing trip!

Welshy's sign the contract on his flat and is moving down in a few weeks time! the 11th to be precise! hurrah!
we've decided to cement this new stage by getting ourselves a pet tortoise!

So I worked at this staff party last night, doing a bit of overtime, it seemed to make sense to me, whenever i've gone to these do's before they mostly only ever serve wine which i dont drink, so i stay sober and watch my friends make tits of themselves.
So I figured why not do the same this year and just get paid for it!
Only they brought out pimms, which i'm still debating as to whether i like it or not, anyway i got horribly drunk, luckily i was only on the cloakroom so had nothing too difficult to deal with apart from trying to hide my state from my boss.
ended up going to the pub afterwards where I made my friend AH bleed cos I twisted his ear, stood on a bar table and dramatically apologised, stole someones pinwheel that i stuck in my hair for the rest of the night, staggered off to catch the last bus, and awoke this morning to find myself covered in AH's blood and clutching a bag of stolen candyfloss!
Now i have to go to work with a mild hangover. booooooo.

stupid work fucked up and have decided that actually they dont have free places for staff. Ho Hum, I can still do a 5 week short course but we'll see...

N has text me demanding that I arrange it for him to gallop a horse on a beach.
Now you might be able to do that in other countries but here in the UK? I dont think so! I've done it in the past down in Cornwall and paddled a horse out in the sea there.
But because of the safety laws to you and the horse, no one will take you out to do something like that unless you have the experience to back it up, to be able to at least control the horse at a canter and not sit there clinging to the saddle like a bag of bricks.
This is something that is really one of my pet hates.
It really irritates me, how people think you can climb onto a horse and yank and kick it into doing whatever the hell you want!
Its a living creature for fucks sake, how would you like to have someone yank you in the mouth with a iron bit the same size as your thumb and a good six inches long hitting your teeth, roof of mouth and tongue and never mind the side pieces which'll pinch?
And kicking at the horses side will lead to either one of two things.
A - The horse (and indeed most horses that I ride!) will take it as a signal to go fast, to run from something scary. And you'll inevitably fall off, cos you wont have a decent centre of balance on the horse and if you're lucky just be winded, and at worse paralysed or dead.
B- The horse, and most ploddy old riding school nags'll fall into this catorgory, will become dead. Their sides get so numb to the constant banging on their ribs that they just end up stopping feeling it and they'll amble along at a snails pace, slowly losing the will to live.
I love horse riding, but I'm greatly aware of how every action you do, reflects on the horse, how moving your leg, your arse in the saddle, how moving just one finger on the reins affects the horse and how it then reacts to what it thinks you're asking it to do.
Its most definately one of those things that gets harder the more you do it, and the more aware you are of exactly how much you need to know and be able to do, just to be able to control the horse at a walk and get it to turn a corner for example.

Dr. John Stemple, Medical Editor of the American Medical Equestrian Association News, said between 150 and 200 deaths are caused each year by horse accidents. Of those, 55 percent were caused from head injuries. Fifteen percent of the deaths were from chest injuries and 10 percent from abdominal injuries. According to the National Injury Information Clearinghouse, head injuries make up less than 12 percent of horse-related injuries, but over half of the fatal injuries.
I think you'll even find that its in the top 10 most dangerous activities to participate in, so people thinking its all just jump on and kick 'n' yank really annoys me!
Phew rant over!

I'm going back to school!
Well kinda.
Frequently I've reached the conclusion lately that as I no longer use my brain, its slowly rotting through lack of use and one day it will simply just ooooze out of my nose or ears or something equally gross.
So work offer this GCSE in astronomy and I've managed to grab one of the last free places, so for the next 30 odd tuesdays I shall be peering at a telescope and looking rather bemused at mathmatical equations which apparently teach you about the speed of light or something.
Best part of it, is that for part of my coursework I get to make a sundial! Hurrah!

Fuck, once again i'm gutted about the fact i'm no longer in Derby!
Yes MH got to meet Sir Cliff Richard today!

I work in a supposedly haunted building.

Rev. Ralph Hardy, a retired clergyman took a photo of our "tulip stairs".

however, the photo revealed a shrouded figure climbing the stairs, seeming to hold the railing with both hands.

Experts, including some from Kodak, who examined the original negative concluded that it had not been tampered with.

It's been said that unexplained figures have been seen on occasion in the vicinity of the staircase, and unexplained footsteps have also been heard.
This photo isn't the only evidence of ghostly activity at the Queen's House. The 400-year-old building is credited with several other apparitions and phantom footsteps even today...

a GA who left before I started was discussing a tea break with two colleagues when he saw one of the doors to the Bridge Room close by itself. At first he thought it was one of the lecturers. "Then I saw a woman glide across the balcony, and pass through the wall on the west balcony," he said. "I couldn't believe what I saw. I went very cold and the hair on my arms and my neck stood on end. We all dashed through to the Queen's Presents Room and looked down towards the Queen's Bedroom. Something passed through the ante-room and out through the wall. Then my colleagues all froze too. The lady was dressed in a white-grey colour crinoline type dress."

Other people that I work with have reported seeing people following them even as recently as last Sunday
Other ghostly goings-on include the unexplained choral chanting of children, the figure of a pale woman frantically mopping blood at the bottom of the Tulip Staircase (it's said that 300 years ago a maid was thrown from the highest banister, plunging 50 feet to her death), and even tourists being pinched by unseen fingers.

Welshy Claims to have seen a figure one day whilst visiting me in the Orangery, a place with a horrid, heavy atmosphere, I also think I may have seen something in there, whilst gazing out of the window I saw a figure reflected in the glass behind me, but having turned no one was there.

That can possibly be explained by my imagination seeing my own reflection, but I've also had doors slam, jumping out of their hook and eye fastenings to slam shut repeatedly.

The point of these stories?

Guess where I'm planning on spending Halloween night? We're having a sleep over, scary films, apple bobbing and all sorts of other fun!

Hurrah! After an iffy few days Welshy is almost set to come and move back down. He's even got himself a place at uni studying accountancy (yawn) so he's set to be in London for at least three years.
I'm however not gonna wait for him to finish his course and am carrying on with applying for jobs out of the city, so sods law, i'll end up getting something miles away and we'll be back where we are now!
hehehe, but for now we're gonna take every day as it comes, and I'm gonna make the most of him being down and eagerly await the 22nd of September when he'll be down for good!
Oh and plans for adventures in India are progressing well... Me and E have pretty much decided we are going, its just a matter of when, and we look like we'll be hitting New Delhi, Agra, before going down into the deepest, darkest jungles to find tigers, ride elephants and see what other freakishly cool animals we can find out there!

SO I went out last night for my birthday with work people, it was all rather jolly and civilised, cream teas and crosswords and so forth.
So any reports that at 1.30AM I was riding a disability scooter "Chariot" whilst wearing a chain mail shirt several sizes too big and waving a sword and squealing madly after i determinedly drove into a rose bed are all unfounded lies with not a bit of truth in them.

Its my birthday! Today! I am offically a quarter of a century old, and while this brings on its own dramas of "I'm 25, still living at home and still in a shit job" I feel kinda more positive about it than I have done previous birthdays.
Previous birthdays have resulted in a month long sulk as The Day approaches, getting more and more tetchy about the idea of growing old and although i'm still not exactly happy about reaching this milestone I'm ok with the idea.
How very grown up!
I'm also attacked by the travelling bug again, ideas are running through my head, from Canada, to the Cape Verde Islands to India.
India looks like it might be a winner so far, I've even gone as far as to start working out how much I need to save in order to get around, and I'd like to go out there for November, although stupid money might interfer and say "No Charbs! Save a bit longer!"
but we'll see...

Welshy has gone home today, its been really good having him down, i think i've seen him every day now for a week and a half. Annoyingly he's starting to have doubts about if he should move down to his friends place in case he doesnt get on with them.
I guess this is another way in which we're very different people, where as I've developed into a real people person, he's very almost anti-social and abrupt with his dealings with people, with a very low tolerance level of their actions and stupidity.
Red Squirrel can testify to this and how he suddenly developed a "hatred" of him after only meeting him the once and a couple of msn convos.
So now i'm kinda in limbo, I've gotten used to the idea that he'll be near and we'll be together properly and now he's thinking about the move with dread and starting to talk himself out of the idea.
Silly cunt.
But heyho, The Olympics have started, I have matchsticks holding my eyes up after getting hooked on whatever inane sport they seem to show at 2am and was rather late for work this morning as I refused to even consider getting dressed until after the 10m syncronised high dive.
And We won! Huzzah! I've missed football!

Welshy has been down since Wednesday, its rather exciting him being around so much, I dont think i've spent so much time in his company since before we started going out (now how does THAT work out? Stupid distances, stupid everything)
He's decided to take a week off of work and devote it to job hunting in London, I hope its a successful search, spending 10 hours on a train, there and back every three weeks or so, just to spend 24 hours with him, sure soon loses its novelty value!
We did originally start looking for places that maybe we could move in together with if he got a job here, but on our wages its just not gonna happen.
I mean, for a one room flat, we'd be looking at a good 800-900 quid a month minimum, in a place where I could walk the streets without fear of being raped or have people break into the flat and kill us in our sleep.
and seeing as I get paid 820 a month and assuming he gets a mimimum wage job too, you're looking at us living on one wage, taking tax, bills, food, transport into account.
Realistically, its not gonna happen.
However, a room may be available (depending on him getting a job...) at his mates place, for 105 a week, its a rather squalid and run down part of East London, a place I still dont feel safe in and would point-blank refuse to walk down the street alone but he'd only be 40 minutes away instead of 5 hours so I'd get to see him a lot more.
Hell I could even have my own sock drawer and goldfish bowl there, I'd probably end up virtually living there, and there's loads of benefits to him, and me, moneywise, him living somewhere so dirt cheap.
So I suppose I should grow up and swallow my disappointment that it'll be a year contract and we'll not be living together after all.

my granddad has come out of hospital which is good! hurrah! hopefully he'll get all better now.

I was talking with a few friends today about Poe and I remember reading a lot of him when I was four or 5 years old, I'd been given a collection of "mini-classics" with the pictures on one page and an edited version of the story on the other, it was this way that I discovered Dickens and trembled at Sidney in Tale of Two Cities long before I read the full length version, (actually I only read the full length version late last year)
Anyway, I still maintain that Poe wasnt the best choice to put into kids books, I still cant bring myself to read The Fall of the House of Usher again and I still skip the picture of the old man in The Telltale Heart now.
Anyway, a question for you all is: what was the most scary childrens book you ever read?

For me it was this, rather random story I remember reading during nursery, it was a foreign folk tale possibly from Poland or Finland and it was about a man who went to bed every night and a wildcat would creep into his house and each time he'd send his dogs out to chase it away and then one night the wildcat led the dogs far into the woods and got them lost and returned to the man's house.The very last page i remember reading has the cat peering over the side of the mans bed and the mans crying for the dogs but they never came.
Do any of you guys remember or know of this story?

I'm off to my cousin M's wedding tomorrow, thankfully he gave up on his earlier idea about making me a bridesmaid!

He showed up at his house at half 11 its a 2 mile walk from the hospital to his place. and refused to go back in, so much so that the hospital started to consider putting a temporary section on him to force him to go back.
But once the painkillers wore off, he was in so much pain he was glad to go back.
And strangely rather pleased, not so much by the fact that they were putting him in a private side room but that they were gonna make him wear a tag that set off an alarm if he left the ward.
I left him watching "The Great Escape" I hope he dont get any ideas about tunnelling out!!!

(i hate going to that hospital, its the same ward me Dad went into when he had his first battle with The Big C)

After two more botched attempts to escape/get us to take him home, my Granddad has finally ran away from hospital.
You gotta admire his determination, I mean Dad only managed to get half way out before he was rounded up.
Only question is: Where the fuck has he ran away too?

So Granddad had his op and it went really well, so well they decided he didnt need a colostomy bag and could even go home monday if he carried on improving.
However since yesterday he's gone crackers! I guess reacting on the methadone or something like Dad used too. Apparently people in the ward he was in were planning to stab him so he needed to escape and pulled out all his wires and managed to get halfway down the ward before a nurse spotted him and tried to restrain him.
ANYWAY, it all ended up with us held hostage by him in a day room for several hours before we managed to calm him down.
They decided to move him to another ward after that, with more older people in it, but apparently he's gone crackers again tonight and has just rung mother up to demand she come take him home.
When you add that to the bastard uncle who keep phoning mum up and telling her that SHE's not looking after them all properly, despite spending 3 hours locked in a room with him, spending 8 hours there the day before and 6 the day before that and STILL going to me Nans to take her dinner and to the hospital.
And When was the last time he went to see Granddad or Nan? Easter.
Yeah you can fuck right off.

So my Granddad had his rescheduled op yesterday, which lasted 4 hours.
He came out of it well, a little dopey (buut really who can tell the difference!) and today they'll tell us about what happens next, so fingers crossed that they've managed to remove all of it!
I went to see LOTR on stage last night, they've made it into a musical, which mostly didnt work I thought, although I liked the little song that Frodo and Sam sang near the end.
Visually its amazing, from the terrifying Black Riders and Shelob, storywise its a little confused, a little mishmash from the film and books and the ROhan bit is skipped completely but I guess its impossible to put it all in!

this weekend I headed down to Bristol to have a bitta reunion with CL and MH.
It was a bit rubbish to be honest, and I kinda wish i'd saved my money and not bothered!
See whenever I speak to them now its all about them and how good their jobs are and they talk about their houses and whatever and I cant really compete with that being stuck in the museum and at home, but you know I'm not really bitter about it.
You cant help the way fate fucks you about, but what really gets me is how they love to rub it in, even when I tell them how miserable I am with everything and the constant, constant rejections and knowing that even if I wanted to move out I simply CANT afford to live in London.
So when they get together and talk about stuff I cant join in with, you cant help feeling a little left out and compare yourself to them, even though in that way madness lies.
Anyway, we headed out to Cheddar Caves. Which took them an hour to get ready for, and involved me spending an AGE to convince MH that wearing a mini-skirt in there was a bad idea and waiting for her to choose which bra was best, after she cswapped between the two three times.
Girls!
Anyway, that was all pretty interesting, although those two wanted to rush and not take anything in and then we headed back to CL's and they both claimed they were tired and we sat in adn watched movies all night.
Which kinda annoyed me some more, you know i've spent money i dont have cos i'm more poor than them, in coming to see them, been unable to join in with any of their convos, and now i'm spending the night watching crap girly movies.
I came home feeling really depressed about my life and weekend away and feeling, like I do more and more these days that I'm drifting apart from them and really wouldnt be too fussed if I never really spoke to either again.
Which is an awful, awful thing to admit to.

holy shit they let me play with the colours on here now!