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Backstreet’s Back, Alright?

1 May

There are some times in a girl’s life when she regresses back to her pre teen days, and she frickin loves it. And this weekend was one of those times for me (plus two friends and my sister) when we got the chance to go to see the New Kids on the Block and Backstreet Boys hybrid tour.

It. Was. Awesome.

I’m a little young (it’s rare I get to say that!) to really remember New Kids on the Block, but I could hum along to enough of their tunes to be OK with going to see them, but the Backstreet Boys are a band I knew as a child, mainly because my sister had a massive obsession. She loved them and listened to their music all the time, and by osmosis the songs perforated my hearing and nestled in my head.

So I was surprised when I emailed her to say I had tickets, and she seemed quite disinterested. Fine! I thought. Plenty more people who will come with me!

But she came, and it made me laugh when, about half way through, she looked across at me and mouthed “I LOVE Brian!” gone was the emo kid with a cool taste in music, replaced by a ten-year old who wanted nothing more to grow up and marry a Backstreet Boy.

It was so cool. Have I mentioned that? It did get a little inappropriate when New Kids on the Block, who don’t fall into the ‘kids’ category any more, were thrusting in their PVC pants. We all looked away, a little embarrassed that they were pulling out all their best Chippendales moves and we were ever so slightly repelled, and half of the party decided it was a good time to take a trip to the bar and/or the bathroom. After all, they are older than they used to be. There was also a chant that they were all trying to start, which went N-K-O-T-B-S-B, which was all too much for us (in fact, the whole crowd) and we got lost at the K and mumbled the rest. Plus, I was perturbed by the fact that they had missed a ‘b’ out in the middle.

But the Backstreet Boys were nothing short of legendary. Well, except the weird faces that Nick Carter was pulling. I try to keep my thoughts about his quiet as my friend Charlotte loves him, but when he pulls the face, it makes me feel like a teenager that just got inappropriately groped by a youth in a nightclub. Sort of dirty and like you want to curl up in the foetal position and rock. I think it’s the sweaty curtains that were only borderline fashionable in his heyday, let alone fifteen years later.

I recorded a lot of it on my camera, but unfortunately the over excitement got to much for me, resulting in some real Blair Witch Project style filming, not to mention the drowning out of the actual singing by the four of us screaming out lyrics and whooping at regular intervals. Embarrassingly, at one point you actually hear me say “Im so excited!” and my friend replies “i think I might cry!” hahahaha.

So my two close friends, my sister and I had the best night we have had since the days when we used to make up dance routines and sing into our hairbrushes, swooning over the appeal of those hot American boys. And I have had The Right Stuff stuck in my head for the past 48 hours.

Some things never change.

Thanks to the people at Superbreaks who provided us with the tickets. They offer hotels in London, and sponsored this post. But all opinions are, as always, my own!

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Currency Confusion

30 Apr

I know I’m not the only one who has this problem, but I really can’t get the hang of other currencies. In the UK I’m pretty careful with money and have a really clear view of what is a reasonable cost and what isn’t, but if I have to get on a plane I lose all concept, like I suddenly have money vertigo. OK, I might think that something is expensive, but too pretty to not just go ahead and buy it anyway, but the little person in my head (normally with my dad’s cross face) makes it clear I’m behaving impulsively when I go ahead and buy it anyway. I’ve never been one to listen.

Other currencies baffle me. I just spent 25 euro on a taxi, and sitting here in the airport waiting for my flight I have consumed 6 Euros worth of chicken nuggets, totally oblivious to the cost per pound of my reconstituted chicken armpits. I normally go by the rule that if that’s too expensive in pounds, then it’s too expensive. This works in America as it’s roughly half the cost, so angry dad in my head is subconsciously keeping track of my spending, but anywhere else it’s anyone’s guess.

But this is where holiday mentality kicks in. On holiday, it’s OK to have a glass of wine in the airport at 6am, or eating ice-cream as a staple food every day, isn’t it? Just like it seems to be OK to spend money as if I have been shrunk down and popped onto a Monopoly board, trying to avoid being eatedby a giant dog or stomped on by a massive boot as I make my way around the city.

Holiday logic. You wouldn’t drink more than one jug of sangria in a twenty four hour period at home or you peers might rush you off to the nearest AA meeting, but as soon as the sun is to and the people are speaking a different language, it’s OK. Holiday logic.

Everything is more fun when you are on holiday and sounds far more magical, but I hate the fact that I only speak my native tongue, At school I was good at French but my horrible teacher told me not to apply for it to A level as I wouldn’t meet the C entry requirement at GCSE. When I walked out of the exam with an A* (in your face, horrible French teacher) the course was full. I don’t have a natural aptitude for languages though, unlike my beautiful friend Aimili who speaks Greek, French, Italian and lots of others fluently. I get muddled up. Ask me to count to twenty in Spanish and I get to twelve and revert to French. Industrious.

The Spanish language is beautiful though. The taxi driver told me this morning that I was a ‘Bella chica’. Although he was middle aged and could have benefitted from a wash I went a little weak at the knees, when he was essentially just  calling me a ‘fit bird’, something that would have induced a full body shudder in the UK. The guy at border control then called me ‘bambino’ and I smiled sweetly and carried on. Being called baby by anyone at home causes me to involuntarily retch, yet in a different language it sounds musical and seductive from whomever’s lips the words are spoken.

I probably should learn Spanish; it would help me with uncomfortable situations like the one I found myself in yesterday. After trekking round the city we stopped for tapas and a much needed loo stop. Off I went, being pretty confident that I spoke enough Spanish to find the right loo, identifying myself as a senorita. There were no pictures depicting a dress or trousers, and no ‘s’ option on the door. I hopped from foot to foot trying to work out if I was an ‘h’ or a ‘d’ until I figured that it could be a font issue and after reasoning that if I squinted, the ‘d’ looked like an ‘s’, I plumped for that one.

So by the time you read this I will be firmly back on British soil, excited about seeing New Kids on the Block. But for now I must wait for my plane and try to ignore the enormous diet coke that came with the nuggets, for fear that I might need to use the bathroom on the plane and get sucked from the plane, to my death.

Do you speak any languages?

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One is Apt to Overestimate Beauty When it is Rare – Mark Twain

15 Apr

Since the days when I worked in the cosmetics department, I haven’t been the type of girl who sees preening activities like getting your nails done a necessity. Sure its nice, it makes you feel pretty, but at the end of the day I would rather spend that weeks wages on food rather than toe nails that glisten. for example:

When I worked for Clarins I bought all the expensive mascaras (my addiction) that promised to make your lashes look model-esque but as soon as I realised that my wage would not allow for hundreds of pounds of lotions and potions, I soon went back to normal. Their dictator style “wear fake tan or die” mentality didnt wash well with a girl who’s excema made her regularly look like a giraffe, and the “wear the lipstick that’s in season” was annoying too, as every red clashes with either my skin or my hair. It was a minefield.

So while on my recent trip to California. I had a manicure, a pedicure and a body massage, which was lovely. They preened and primped my hooves and trotters and gave me a good rub down to ensure that I looked my best, to counteract the snoring and dribbling on the flight home (hahaha, its funny because it’s probably true).

When I say I loved it, I was a little concerned. The relaxing thought of having a massage always sounds like a really good idea, but in reality when you have your face pushed into the face hole in the bed, all you can think about is whether you will accidentally fall asleep and dribble all over the floor (Are you sensing a pattern? Total paranoia). Both my Auntie and Uncle are masseuses which takes away some of the embarrassment factor, but opens up a whole other can of worms. Sure, you remove the worry of snoring in front of a stranger, but it adds in the fear of doing something embarrassing and having it discussed around the dining table for years to come. it will become the “do yo remember when….” story. For example, one year my sister question whether you could only see Orion’s belt from the UK… whenever I have a massage I risk being the funniest thing that happened on that trip. It’s a lot of pressure to try to avoid.

When I went in I resembled a tree from Lord of the Rings; wizened and knotty, but when I came out it was like a grubby little caterpillar that emerged as a butterfly, all elongated and relaxed. With hair not dissimilar to a bird’s nest.

We went for a quick coffee which scared passers-by as we were both wearing jogging bottoms (never an item of clothing you should be seen out in unless on the way to or from the gym) and neither had make up on. Combined with the shrubby look that I was sporting on my head, people recoiled in horror.

So imagine the mutual disgust of the ladies in the nail salon. To really appreciate the nail salon, please watch the video below. It’s totally accurate.

We walk into the place, totally make up free and looking like we had been roughed up by tramps, ready for the next stage of our beautifying process. The ladies looked absolutely horrified at the state of our hair and our outfit choices and started rushing around, prepping hot pools of water and sticking our hooves in to be totally certain they didn’t have to touch them as they were. They creamed and buffed and scrubbed and trimmed until we barely had any foot left and then they started on our hands.

I am fairly precious about my nails. For the majority of the time they are short, but I try to grow them so they look as pretty as they can, so when they are of a certain length I don’t want them trimmed by someone who thinks they should be. “I cut?” she said. “No thanks” I replied, “Just shape” and went back to reading a magazine about liposuction. Nice light reading.

She then informed me that she had to trim them to be the same length as the other ones, because she didn’t like them looking different. I stood my ground, insisting that I wanted them left alone. The lady began tutting, and then jabbering on to her friend in Vietnamese. I think she might have been cursing me to the God of nails, but whatever she wa saying, it made me uncomfortable.
This went on for twenty minutes, until she sensed I wasnt paying attention, and trimmed them anyway. I left the nail salon wondering if I had missed out on the Womanhood Bible, and where in scripture it was written that a girls nails all had to be the same length.

What do you do to make yourself feel good?

They say a change is as good as a holiday, so I have changed the look of the blog. Let me know what you think, or just have a chat with me on Twitter @lillyheart999

I also need to find out which of you live in and around the London area, so let me know if this is you! :)

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They Say The Truth Will Set You Free

4 Feb

Sometimes I try to talk and the words just don’t come out. They stick in my throat and hide there stubbornly like a small child not wishing to take the step into the great beyond. So I don’t say these important things, and its a hard lesson to learn when you lose something that was important to you because you were too proud to tell the truth, or too scared to admit that you aren’t actually OK all of the time. So in trying to maintain this pretence you snap and say things that you would never say. It’s like being the King of the castle and trying to maintain all the perimeters, protect the boundaries from rogues and bandits. But it’s not much fun being in a big old castle by yourself, is it?

“Honesty is the best policy” they say. “The truth will set you free”. But pride is a powerful thing, and I personally find it much easier to pretend that I am fine by myself, that I can cope perfectly without letting myself need to rely on anyone else.

But every now and then you meet people who you should be truthful with from the start. That you are a bit fragile, that you need a shoulder to lean against and that in your mind the perfect storm is brewing. You lay little barriers and they jump them with ease, and you start to think that maybe that person will hold your hand when you are troubled and rub the stress from your shoulders without you even having to ask.

Its funny, but in real life I am fiercely proud and hate to show anything to anyone other than “I’ll survive, you know me, I’m fine!!” but the words flow from my fingers like the barrier doesn’t even exist. Maybe it’s because you can’t see my face when I write, or that you can’t put a voice to the words, but I find a catharsis in writing my feelings down. My Mum says that when she reads this she sometimes is surprised that it is me; that I am so open and wear my heart on my sleeve. Maybe that’s true, and maybe one day the letters and the words will merge and I will stop being so prickly.

I learnt a hard lesson yesterday, and today the weather mimics my mood; a cold storm is coming. My head feels like it is full of a cold storm and I’m not doing well at people giving me their helpful advice. “You have a pretty face, you’ll find another one”. It doesn’t really seem like that matters at the moment.

I didn’t tell the truth and I didn’t let a person in who I needed, and for that reason, I lost him. He never did anything other than treat me really well; make me feel really special and made me look forward to seeing him, and all I did was doubt why I deserved it and kept things back that I really should have shared. I met someone who I wanted to talk to all the time, that I spent the whole week looking forward to seeing and that I just couldn’t be cross with. Someone that had so much going on independently yet I didn’t resent; football at 8.30 on a Sunday morning? No problem, I was just glad he fit in the time with me. It was all a massive surprise to me, something I didn’t get bored with or resent for taking up my precious time. I have never been so excited to see a person, or sit up talking with them until the sun came up and not be cross that I had to cancel plans for the following night because I was tired. But of course, I didn’t say that and when they say “You don’t know what you have until it’s gone” they really are right. By not appreciating someone and by thinking them the same as all the others, I didn’t see what was right in front of my face. Every time I told him something that was hard for me to say he never reacted with anything other than a big hug and an understanding smile, yet I still couldn’t say what I needed to. Don’t get me wrong, there were occasions when he took my hand and smiled at me and  the words were right there on the tip of my tongue, but I didn’t want to do anything to ruin it. Which, ultimately, ruined it.

And it’s not as simple as my family’s opinion. “Ah love, you just have to explain and ask for a second chance. I’m sure he will understand”. That was the hardest thing I ever did. I didn’t expect him to change his mind, but I sat down and told the truth, and it felt liberating. I only wish I had done it sooner. It might have changed the outcome.

I’m not going to feel sorry for myself for long. it’s not me. I just wish that with all the medicines out there on the market, there was one that would fix a bruised heart, or let you sleep until the pain went away a bit. Maybe I can patent it. Last night I went out and realised another lesson, wine is not my friend. I came home, got in my bed and snuggled up, not sleeping a wink. This morning it still hurts, but so does my head. Thanks, Sauvignon Blanc!

So today I will paint on my bravest face and go about my weekend. If you look at me you won’t see the emotion that hides behind the mask, and if you see a brief flicker of something that seems like sadness, you will see it pass so quickly that you might think you imagined it or mistake it for something else. But it’s there, and when I’m by myself it will appear again.

“When people walk away from you, let them go. Your destiny is never tied to anyone who leaves you and it doesn’t mean they are bad people, it just means that their part in your story is over.” Thanks Sam, for those few words that made me feel a little better.

Normal service will resume soon, you know me, I’m fine…. But if you don’t hear from me for a few days, I’m just working on being OK.

Related posts: The Heart Is Just An Organ

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Lets Hit The Sales! I’d Rather Die

4 Jan

A lot of people love shopping in the sales. They eagerly wait for the January period to come, and then on Boxing Day they hit the shops like a tsunami on the shore; hunting down all the bargains and deals that they can find in an attempt to smugly inform their friends that they saved a bomb.

I, on the other hand, hate the January sales. In fairness, imp not a very good shopper at the best of times. I’m the kind of girl whose money burns a hole in her pocket, and for that reason I am always eager to get out and spend Christmas money on new bounty to feed the wardrobe monster and appease it for a few weeks.  But I can never find anything. Why is it when you have money that you want to spend you can find nothing that doesn’t make you look like you are wearing a potato sack or wearing something your Nan would dress you in, but when you can’t even find one more penny to keep the one in your wallet lonely, and the only thing there is an abundance of in your purse are moths, you see garments to fall in love with all over the place? Sometimes, life just isn’t fair.

Getting a bargain? It never works like that. My friend and I decided to brave the shops between Christmas and New Year, both of us with a view to get a new outfit for New Years Eve. He had rather more success than me as men’s clothes tend to stray from safe far less, but I walked in and backed out of shops at alarming speed, muttering under my breath about how I hated people en mass and sales in general.

I think the sales are out there to annoy me. It seems that through the year, eagle eyed sales assistants hook out the most offensive garments, and store them in a little hidey hole. It’s like payback for all those annoying shoppers who have time off when they have to work. Sure, you can come in and try to spend your money on new clothes, but they will try their very best to make the experience painful, finding all the alarming treasures that they have squirreled away all year and adorning the rails with them. Have you ever noticed how in the January sales there is a fright of orange, Lycra and tie dye that has been somewhat absent through the rest of the year? I think that some of the beauties that you come across on the racks at this time of year have been wheeled out year after year since the eighties, in a bid to not have to admit defeat and throw them out, but merely sell them to a poor unsuspecting victim who thinks they have found a bargain.

After all, there is nothing worse than going sales shopping and coming home empty handed, is there? It’s like admitting that there was nothing, however cheap that you liked or wanted, and for that reason we have ALL at some point or another purchased an item that will be fed to the God of the wardrobe, never to see the light of day again. Cast your mind back. This week I have gone through my wardrobe and donated a whole heap of stuff to the charity shop that has been hiding in my closet for years. Every time a friend asks to borrow something I hope they won’t come across said embarrassing item, and for this reason alone there was a high percentage of clothes that didn’t make the cut of moving to the new flat when I moved. Unfortunately I have now had to sort it all out on the way back in. What possessed me to but a T-shirt stating that “pale is the new tan” when I don’t wear t-shirts EVER? I don’t know. And we won’t even talk about the stripy jeans that made an appearance in the charity bag this year. I don’t even know where I got those from.

Have you got any horrific purchases too embarrassing to throw in the bin, for fear the dustmen might come and knock on the door and laugh? 

 

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Its Not The Destination, Its The Journey

26 Dec

I’ve heard it said that the best things in life are free, and I’m starting to think that they might be right. Who are ‘they’ though? My mother references ‘them’ all the time. At the dinner table yesterday she started saying about how orange vegetables prevented cancer (my sister refuses to eat anything orange. You would think she was 12… she’s actually 23). “Who says?” enquired my sister. “Oh… they say!” replied Mum. I have visions of ‘they’ being a board of crones sitting around with their knitting, commenting on the lives of the rest of us and how we should go about them. Eat more vegetables / cover up your kidneys in the cold / get 8 hours sleep / drink 8 glasses of water a day…. They are so interfering!

Anyway, the best things in life are free. When did you last have the most fun? Was it at a music concert that you paid well over fifty quid for, or laughing with your friends till your jaw ached? Was it at the cinema or at the birthday party of your favourite four year old, watching her dancing with all her friends? I know that the times that I feel the happiest are when me and Emma are camped on the sofa discussing our day over a glass of wine, or feeding my darling Poppy a yoghurt and getting covered in it. I love cuddling up on the sofa and watching the TV, or simply just being with my sister and my Mum, drinking tea and giggling over jokes that we have had for years, like the fact that if you can hear my mother talking in another room it sounds like the clangers. Gone are the times where I will pay through my nose to get into a club or bar on new year’s; give me a quiet pub or a friends flat and people who I love and I will choose that any day.

As I get older I start to realise that it’s not about what you have or what you are doing, more about the people you surround yourself with and what you do for them. My darling Lou told me that she had the best night of the year at my house at the weekend, eating the three course birthday meal that I had cooked her, complete with comments from me…

“I’m so sorry that the onion soup looks like glue… I promise its nice!” or “the cheesecakes are cake-less because I forgot the biscuits, but I hope you like it!”

I am also starting to realise that it’s not about the destination, but the path that takes you there. It’s about stopping and taking in the sights on your way and appreciating the people standing behind you to catch you if you trip on an unsteady path, or fall and cut your knees in front of a load of builders on the way to somewhere posh.

Merry Christmas everyone.

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My Guilty Pleasure

20 Dec

My dear friend Jules is an advocate of Guilty Pleasures, and so I thought I would share another of mine. You may have read about my slight love for Milli Vanilli (if you don’t know, please YouTube them. Their shoulder pads will simply change your life).

So in the spirit of slightly embarrassing guilty pleasures I decided to share one of mine. I have been harbouring this secret for a good decade, and although I was aware of my guilty pleasure, my nearest and dearest were yet to realise.

Macauley Culkin. I love the little dude. Sure., I know he is 31 so only six years older than me, and was dating Mila Kunis (God damn her, she gets all the good ones!) but I love him when he was six. Not in a paedophile in a playground way people, like a wanting to grab him by his chubby little cheeks and give him a hug. Whenever he is on the TV I can’t help but “aaaaaaw!” because he is simply adorable. Why did he have to grow up?!

I’ve always loved him. One of my favourite childhood films is Uncle Buck (I also love John Candy and always will) but the best one is My Girl. I sob with all my heart when Thomas J gets stung by wasps and dies after going back to rescue Veda’s mood ring, and I think it will always affect me in the same way. Tears roll down my cheeks and my sister looks at me and says “Why are you crying AGAIN? You knew it would happen!”

I know, I knew it would happen. I could have chosen not to watch the film, opting for Cars instead (less of a tear jerker). But I love to watch his cute little face hidden behind those Harry Potter glasses.

Macauley Culkin (aged 6 – 12) I will always love you. And I don’t care who knows!

On the ninth day of Christmas my true love gave to me:

Nine Ladies Dancing! This ‘award’ has to go to one of the most motivational ladies I know, the one and only Megan. She is a fantastic chica, and I love nothing more than to stalk her on Pinterest and read her spirited messages (yeah Megan, I’ve been doing that!).

My eight maids a milking blogger was: Miss Vix.

Seven Swans a Swimming: Sam at That Place in My Head.

Six Geese a Layin: Live, Nerd, Die, Repeat

My five gold rings was: Dazzle Rebel.

My four calling birds favourite was: Go Guilty Pleasures.

My three french hens fav was: The Byronic Man

My two turtle doves were: Brooke and McKenzie

My partridge in a pear tree was: The Redneck Princess

The nine ladies dancing post I think you should check out is: You’re The One That I Want and is, in essence, a massive rant on girls waiting for Prince Charming.

5 more sleeps till the fat man with the sack visits! Are you excited?

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We Fear Change

13 Dec

I fear change. First boyfriend used to mock me with this fact when anything out of the ordinary happened, uttering in a voice not dissimilar to Gollum “Ooooooh, we fears change!” and often adding a “My Pretty” on the end. Oh hah bloody hah! But it’s true. I have realised this more and more as I get older and accept some of my weaknesses, and I truly am guilty of having a massive strop and panic in my head when something out of the ordinary happens. It normally causes me to end up in hot, angry little tears as my emotions bubble to the surface. Don’t judge me. I am a girl, and sometimes I get REALLY girly. I know the guys at work still haven’t got used to me saying “please ignore the crying. I’m just a bit cross”.

So it comes as no surprise that dashing to the supermarket yesterday, I had a minor meltdown. What is it with supermarkets redesigning and changing their layout? Surely it’s more pleasing to a customer to go into the store and know where everything is, rather than going to where the bananas normally are and walking slap bang into a massive great Costa. (Yeah, like we don’t have enough coffee shops in town). Usability it is not. It’s more to get you so confused that you go in for the ingredients to lasagne and come out with some really expensive steak, a two for one offer on cereal that you don’t eat, three leeks and a shed load of loo roll. And you can’t make dinner out of that, can you?

To make it worse, they have these people in bright yellow “here to help the redesign” t-shirts. As you know from my recent HMV rant, these people are not to be trusted as they don’t actually help. But in sheer desperation to get out of hell on earth and back into my warm flat (complete with joggy bums) I asked. “Excuse me, where’s the pesto now?” the answer I got did not bode well. “What’s pesto?” I quickly told him not to worry and scurried off to scour the pasta aisle again, but he was desperate to help and trailed me, offering someone else’s services. It didn’t get better from there, as every one of the five items I had popped in for had been moved. I ended up leaving, ready to tear my hair out, with fur of the five items, and once firmly back in the car realised that item five was my earl grey tea bags. NNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

On the second day of Christmas my true love gave to me, two turtle doves and a partridge in a pear tree!

So to add to my first day of Christmas choice yesterday (The Redneck Princess), my two turtle-dove choice for the second day of Christmas are two turtle doves, Brooke & McKenzie! These two little Christmas treats keep me giggling on gloomy days with dating disasters and men from their past, and are also in my top five things from Canada (watch out for my third Canadian bloggy friend soon!) I also love maple syrup and Toronto, bringing me up to five :) .

My second blog post of mine I think you should revisit is I CAN Haz Inner Peace. It’s about my disastrous attempts at a slightly hippie yoga class in an attempt to get beach fit and flexible like a gymnast. As usual, epic fail.

Happy 13th of December!

Belle xx

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Culinary Master? Kitchen Disaster!

12 Dec

This weekend I intended to spend some time making the flat all festive-smelling by baking lots of delicious Christmas treats. I was thinking a new batch of truffles (take 2, success), some mince pies, mini cheesecakes and a roast rack of lamb for my family on Sunday, all to get them feeling merry.

It never turns out the way you planned it, does it? On Saturday I sat in front of Christmas films and tried to make some little boxes to give my truffles in. I had visions of cute little boxes tied with a bow that I could put amongst the Christmas tree pines and label individually, for a sneaky treat on Christmas Day. What it resulted in was me feeling frazzled with tiny bits of cut card everywhere, and sellotape in my hair. At which point the Little Princess turned up and with a direct hit that only my favourite four year old could muster she said “There’s paper ALL OVER THE FLOOR!” Ten out of ten for observation.

Having had zero sleep for the past two nights, I decided to get an early night on Saturday. I took some Night Nurse (it’s always because of the Night Nurse!) and woke at 11 the following morning, aware that I had invited my family round for dinner in an hour, but with the muzzy head of someone who had drank a whole bottle of gin the night before. God help me.

I raced around the kitchen, fully aware that I had under half an hour to prep the lamb and roast potatoes and make the cheesecakes, as well as tidying the flat and hoover up the biscuit crumbs the littlest of the rascals had deposited all over my carpet the night before. I also had last nights makeup on and wanted to create a serene air of “Oh I just threw this together!”

I started with the cheesecakes. Easy peasy. Tub of butter needed melting and rather than faff with doing it on the hob I stuck it in the microwave. Now most butters come in plastic containers, but oh no, this one had an aluminium label, cue actual sparks from the microwave and an acrid burning smell.

Then I whizzed the mangoes and cheese together to make the topping,  forgetting to put the little lid on and therefore covering myself with cheese mix, all the while looking like an extra from Dawn of the Dead (especially since I dyed my hair back to slightly purple!).

Covered in cheese, I hoovered round the lounge, make the mince pies, got dressed ans made myself look alive in time for the arrival of my family. Result!

When they had gone I decided to make the mince pies, as it was on the list. The first batch went fine but I got the second out and decided they needed five minutes longer. Two hours later I woke up to a lovely sugary smell all round the house as the second round of mince pies merrily burned away in the oven.

I had had enough! I didn’t even bother trying to get them out of the muffin tray, sticking the whole lot straight in the bin and vowing to buy them next year.

How is your Christmas planning going?

I have received the Versatile Blogger Award a few times recently, but I have done a few of these before and am running out of things to say! So I thought than rather than respond to this I would do a 12 Days of Christmas style thing, naming 12 of my favourite bloggers, and 12 of my favourite posts that I have written :) .

So, on the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me… a Partridge in a Pear Tree! And…

The Redneck Princess

The Redneck Princess is in my top things that Canada ever gave me, and she makes me happy when I am feeling grumpy. I love her ‘f**k it all’ attitude and I think you will too!!

Sleeping to Dream is the post of mine I think you should read. I wrote it over a year ago about the sleep walking and sleep talking experiences of me and my friends, and after rereading it the other night it really made me chuckle!

Happy December 12th :)

Belle x

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Damn You Groupon!

6 Dec

I know I’ve posted about it before, but me and my email inbox have a love hate relationship, and all the more recently when I am trying to make firm friends with it to ensure it doesn’t send any job offers / interesting emails / things I should know to my spam like a defiant teenager. You know the kind of friendship, don’t you? It’s the kind of friendship a four-year old has with another child. They sidle up sneakily and offer one of their party rings in what seems a selfless act of friendship, when really it’s to get an invite to the impending princesses and dragons party.

So every time I get an email I think something exciting is going on in my life. I may not have a penny to rub together and be faced with moving back in with my father, like Annie from Bridesmaids (to her mum: Remember when you though I hit bottom? That wasn’t bottom!) I have metaphorically hit bottom (enough with the innuendos) and my inbox should be doing its a-friend-in-need-is-a-friend-indeed routine and filing itself with free facial offers and people emailing me to tell me I am fantastic, but no, it simply seems to filter only groupon emails. Actually, I get my fair share of adoration emails (thanks Mum!) but I need my inbox to step it up a gear.

Groupon is the bane of my life. I once thought it really different how it emailed me offers in my area (Surrey, or at a push, London) but recently they have started to email me offers for my not so local, British Columbia. As in, the one in Canada. So I think ah wow, maybe I will abstain from buying anyone a pressie this Christmas and go for a moose spit facial, that sounds….and then I realise it’s a gazillion squillion miles away. Or as I informed my friend the other day when trying to perk her up and tell her I loved her “a gazillion squid” thanks autocorrect.

I could cope with it if it wasn’t just them, but I get emails from a whole heap of jumping on the band wagon sites who also tell me about cellulite reducing cycling shorts that will tighten my buns without having to cycle (kerching!) or teeth whitening tricks, making me feel I could look like Liv Tyler at the click of a PayPal button.

Today’s one looked fantastic. It was an offer for a two-hour cake decoration class in London, complete with tutorials on marzipan flowers and heaps of other exciting stuff. I got my credit card out thinking I would treat myself until it flashed on the screen DEAL SOLD OUT.

Maybe I owe my inbox a thank you and a party ring.

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