Bohemian Humbugs

Well, I seem to have disappeared again, at least from this blog. People keep sending me messages enquiring as to my whereabouts. I did think of replying in some sort of alien language, pretending I was a creature from another planet who had abducted me, but decided against it. Eccentric is one thing, totally insane is quite another.

What have I been doing since I was last here? Well, for one thing I became a Queen. No, I tell you straight, I am the Queen of Bohemia. It won't mean anything to you unless you are on SL and also on TE, but if you are, you'll now be going "OMG no, not HER". Yeah, it's ME!!! Don't you just love it. I am starting a new TE blog, for those who aren't sitting there going "Huh? What's she on about NOW?".

So, it's just over a month until Christmas and as usual I haven't bought a single thing, not even a card. I would rather not do, either. Total waste of money and I hate all that commercialism. It's almost reached the time when I will have to start saying "Bah, Humbug!" a lot. It's not that I don't like giving people things, I actually get a lot of pleasure out of it, it's just that I don't like been told when I have to do it. Shouldn't need a special day for it.

I'm a year older now in chronological terms than I was when I last penned an entry, so I am allowed to be that bit grumpier, so I may start saying "Bah, Humbug!" slightly earlier this year. I may even start today. BAH, HUMBUG!!!

Google Mood Ring (Black):Tensed, stressed, working too hard

I Should Have Been an Elephant

Well, it's been a while. Quite a few silly things have happened to me since my last entry, but I can't remember any of them now. Maybe they will come to me.

I do remember something relating to the last entry, although it wasn't anything silly. Just me forgetting about the no-smoking ban in cafes and having to traipse down the street carrying a plastic cup full of coffee so I could sit in the park at the end of the road. This particular cafe used to always be full, but on that occasion it was practically empty. I had to go by the law court on the way to the park and there were several police persons and a couple of lawyers outside smoking away, although that has always been the case as smoking has been banned in there for a while. Just struck me as rather amusing at the time.

I can't think of anything else to say, so I'm going.

Google Mood Ring (Dark Blue):Impassioned, delighted, whiff of romance

Light-Up and Cough-Up

Well, today's the day. Yes, from today a certain section of people in the UK are being mercilessly victimised and forced to live like smelly, parasitic entities from a lower spiritual plane. In other words, today is the day that smokers can no longer smoke in public places. I didn't even know about this until my 10-year-old son told me about it a week or so ago.

There's more to it than that and most of it makes no sense. I haven't even bothered to check-up on it, all I know is that it sounds totally stupid and is all based on whether or not the smoking is taking place in a home or a place of business. If it's a home, it's allowed, which means (and this is a good one) that if your home is also your place of business, you can't smoke in it. Yes, you heard right, you can't smoke in the privacy of your own home. Doesn't even matter if you live alone and have no other workers to contaminate with your revolting vapours, you still can't do it. Like hell you can't. I am seriousy considering starting a home business purely on principle.

Smoking is now banned in pubs, but not in hotels. This is because a pub is a public place, but a hotel is classed as a home. This means, of course, that the hotel bars will fill-up and the hotel owners will increase their profits to the detriment of the pub owners. I may be wrong, but I would say that there is a larger majority of smokers in pubs than there are in the country generally, so there's a fair bit of profit to be lost there. Smokers can go outside pubs to smoke, but they can only smoke in shelters with one side and a roof or something, 'cos if they have three sides (or something) they'll be public places. This presumably also means that if they just have a roof, they're homes. So, all we need to do is knock our walls down and we can work and amoke in our homes to our lungs' content.

And lorry drivers can't smoke in their cabs. Since when was a lorry driver's cab a public place? Bearing in mind that they spend a lot of time sleeping in them, I'd have thought they were more homes than business premises. But of course, they're working in them too, so that explains that. Not very logically, but the entire thing is totally illogical.

The punishment for lighting-up is that the naughty smoker has to pay a £50 fine if they're caught. The council will be employing officers to sneak around looking for errant smokers and I bet every single one of them is one of those evangelical ex-smoking types. You know the sort I mean. The most unfair aspect of it is that the person who owns the premises the smoker is smoking on (such as a pub owner) will be fined £2,500. A slight difference there. I would strongly suggest that no pub owners go to the toilet or anything, just in case the entire pub lights-up in their absence.

I don't want to talk about this anymore, it's boring me silly. Go to this link to read a much funnier and far more informative blog post about this topic. Before I go, though, read the title of this post again, because I think it's rather clever. Cough-up has two meanings, you see. Get it? Good. Have to keep you on your toes.

Google Mood Ring (Dark Blue): Impassioned, delighted, whiff of romance

Pointless Opportunities

So I finally get my blog accepted for this silly thing that is supposed to earn me money if I wax lyrical about products I've used (or products I pretend I've used) and things like that, but there's this problem. Out of 93 open 'opportunities', the only one I qualify for is talking about the site offering the opportunities and telling everyone how wonderful it is and how much money I've made from it.

HELLO, people offering these 'opportunities'??? See the problem???

Google Mood Ring (Black):tense, stressed, working too hard

Down With This Blog

OK, so I am somewhat miffed. Before my 2-year hiatus from this blog, it had a 5/10 Google rating. When I came back, it was down to 4/10. How it managed to stay that high for two totally unposted years is more than slightly puzzling. However, now that I am back, it has suddenly gone down to 3/10.

Does this mean my blog does better without me posting anything on it? Perhaps I should just shut-up permanently ...

Google Mood Ring (Grey): Anxious, ill-at-ease, strained
(Is it any wonder after seeing my rating?!).

If It's Loose, Don't Lose It

Lots of things irritate me, on account of how I am easily irritated. Most of all, I am irritated by stupidity, especially stupidity caused by lack of attention to obvious detail.

No more is this demonstrated than in my total aversion to the misuse of words and one thing that really drives me insane is the inability to differentiate between "lose" and "loose". Why do so many people get these confused? It should be obvious from the pronunciation alone what they both mean, yet so many people insist that they are going to, for example, "loose their mind" ... what does that mean exactly, that they are going to send it on some sort of rampage?

Let's get this straight once and for all. When the word "loose" is pronounced, it has an "s" sound; when the word "lose" is pronounced, it has a "z" sound. If that simple difference is borne in mind, there should be no margin for error and no excuse for it. To make it even clearer, "loose" is the opposite of "tight" and "lose" is the opposite of "win". So, if you say "I know I am going to loose the game", what you are really saying is "I know I am not going to tight the game", which makes no sense whatsoever. It also makes you sound like a complete idiot.

Oh and while we're at it, the words "to" and "too" are pronounced differently, too (not to). So, you would "go to work, too" (light "u" sound followed by heavy "oo" sound), you would not "go too work, to", although you might "go to work to work".

Google Mood Ring (Blue): Comfortable, breezy, at rest, lovable

Unwashed Teenage Blondes

Well, for those who know what I mean, Second Life is down for updating and the Beta grid doesn't seem to be working either, so I may as well prattle in here a bit seeing as I haven't done for a while.

Perhaps I will moan about my teenage daughter for a paragraph or two. What is it about teenage daughters and clothes? Mine has like hundreds of things to wear, but yesterday she wanted to wear the one thing that hadn't been washed. Never mind that everything else was clean and dry, it just had to be the one top that she'd forgotten to give me for washing the day before.

We had far more fun during the Easter holidays, though. Her hair is naturally medium-dark brown with red highlights. Due to the fact that, like her mother, she can be a bit scatter-brained at times, the majority of her schoolfriends have told her that she should have been born blonde (she was actually dark blonde as a toddler, but it darkened). Anyway, to this end she decided to colour her hair blonde. Unfortunately, being 'blonde', she didn't make too good a job of it and ended-up with a large patch of very blonde hair on top, surrounded by reddish blonde, graduating to gingery-brown as it went further down. She did all this at her father's and he hadn't the common sense to tell her that with hair the length of hers she'd need two or three packets of colourant, not one. She did try using several others afterwards, but it didn't seem to work.

I had a similar problem when I was her age. My hair then was extremely dark brown (blue-black in some lighting), but it also had red in it. Blonde highlights were all the rage when I was about the same age my daughter is now and as my mother didn't want to pay for me to have them, I decided to try them myself. I bought myself a box of peroxide, grabbed an old toothbrush, and ... well, the end result was several huge frizzy pieces of ginger fuzz and the eventual loss of an entire head of hair that had taken me years to grow to well past the bottom of my bra strap. The hairdresser insisted the only way to solve the problem was to cut it all off to nape of the neck level (way above the bottom of my bra strap, on account of the fact that I have never worn a bra around my neck). Since then, it hasn't seemed to want to grow much past my shoulders, so goodness only knows what damage I did to it.

The upshot of this is that my daughter ended-up having to colour her hair medium-dark brown and the final count in financial terms was around £30 to get herself back to the colour she'd started with.

Google Mood Ring (Blue): Comfortable, breezy, at rest, lovable.

The Last McDonald's American Holiday

It's been the Easter holidays for the past two weeks and I took my son to the cinema a couple of times. Last week we saw The Last Mimzy and yesterday we went to see Mr Bean's Holiday. My son wanted to see Mr Bean last week, but I persuaded him against it as I didn't really fancy it much. However, I have to say that I did enjoy it when we watched it yesterday. The Last Mimzy was good, but nothing extraordinary. It started off reminding me of Gremlins, then became more and more like ET as it went on.

Anyway, the first time we went to McDonald's after the film and the second time we went before. This is the third or fourth time I have been to McDonald's since I NOTICED SOMETHING. The kids noticed it, too. Quite simply, the size of the various burgers has decreased, as has the size of the drink cups. The prices, however, haven't decreased. In fact, they appear to have increased. Even before this change our portions were much smaller than the American ones (as I recall, our small doesn't exist there and our large is their medium or small or something - I think they have two sizes bigger than our maximum).

Not that I want American sizes here, it's all I can do to manage our largest, but I do wonder why Americans eat so much more than we do. It's not as if they're built any differently. Do they feel they're missing out if something isn't BIG? I remember a friend of mine going to America once and coming back saying "Oh my god, one portion in a restaurant is equivalent to what I eat in a week". She was obviously exaggerating slightly, but she wasn't far wrong. I've heard similar from other people, too.

Most restaurant portions here are way too large for me. Ideally, I would eat a child's portion, that's usually about right for me. If I went to an American restaurant I'd probably be sick at the very sight of what they would place in front of me. I suspect that even a toddler's portion would be too big.

I've never understood why restaurants don't offer smaller portions for smaller people - let's face it, there is no way a woman weighing 7 stone can eat the same size portion as a man weighing twice that size, yet there is no difference in the amounts they are given. This makes no sense to me, but I suppose it's all down to money, as they'd be expected to charge less for the smaller size. Nevertheless, if anyone ever has the common sense to start a restaurant chain like this, I think they'd make a fortune.

Just realised it's Friday the 13th today. Not that it bothers me, it's supposed to be lucky for us Scorpios. I shall live in hope of someone reaching 30 pages before midnight (don't try to work it out, you won't be able to, unless you're the person writing 'em).

Google Mood Ring (Grey): Anxious, ill at ease, strained.

I Can Only Marry You if the Weather is Right

It's been like summer here the last couple of days. I went out today in my jacket as usual and almost melted away. Sheepskin doesn't really go with blazing hot sun. Apparently, this year is going to be the hottest on record, beating the record set in 1998. I don't recall 1998 being particularly hot, the hottest year I remember is 1976, the year I got married.

I always said that I wouldn't repeat that particular event until we had another summer like that and as it didn't happen in 1998, maybe it'll happen this year instead. Actually, it's more likely to be 2008, because my last chance came in 1999, a year after the hottest summer, so it'll probably be two years after this time. Then again, it might go back a year, because there haven't been enough offers to work out the pattern yet, in which case it would be this year. Yes, I do strange things with numbers, it's probably some sort of disease. Wonder if it has a name?

Of course, it would all be totally mucked-up anyway if next year turns out to be even hotter than this year. Not to mention the fact that there may have been other 'hottest years' in between 1976 & 1998 that I don't know about, which would render the whole thing pointless and would probably mean I will never get married again at all. Then again, my chances of getting married again probably have nothing whatsoever to do with the weather, because in most cases I don't think there tends to be much of a connection.

Hot weather and me don't mix too well, as it happens. I don't like extremes of weather one way or the other, I prefer it to be warm with a nice breeze. Spring suits me just fine, especially mid-late Spring. I get all frisky and gambol about like a little lamb. Not that there is much use for my friskiness right now, but I live in hope. Spring has only just started, after all.

Apparently it's going to get colder tomorrow, so I won't go out jacketless just yet. Takes a lot to get me to strip off and weather doesn't necessarily have anything to do with it. Probably explains why I've never got married again.

Google Mood Ring (Green): Steady, stable, no emotional turmoil

Pushing the Elderly in McDonald's

My 14-year-old daughter is OK as far as 14-year-old daughters go, but she is awful when it comes to pushing herself forward. She's had since October to arrange a work placement for July and recently I received a letter from her school asking why she hadn't done so. It would have helped if she had told me about it coolly and calmly in October, rather than telling me in total panic a few days ago.

The letter I received included a website where details of available work placements could be found. My daughter said she'd tried this website at school and it was useless as it had hardly any placements on it. I went to look anyway and found so many it took about 15 minutes to read through them all. She'd already expressed an interest in social work and I found one for that, but the person dealing with it was unavailable until Monday so I tried another one in the care field. After trying that, I went back to the social work one and pushed myself forward a little on the phone, resulting in me being given another number to try.

The end result of this is that my daughter now has two work placements on offer, one working with disabled young adults in a social work setting and another working with the elderly at a nursing home. She has therefore decided to do one week at each. What she likes best about them is that both of the places she works from are situated round the corner from McDonald's.

What she likes least is the fact that when she is at the nursing home she will have to tie her hair back and remove her jewellery, including her belly piercing. She also isn't too keen on the fact that when she's on the social work placement she'll have to work from 9-5, not to mention that she will have to work on her birthday, which falls on the second day of the first work placement week.

My daughter is clearly going to go FAR once she finishes her education and has to work for a living.

Google Mood Ring (Dark Blue): Impassioned, delighted, whiff of romance

Cupboard Love

We're starting to get back to normal now. Didn't go to bed until 3.30 am last night (or rather, this morning) and got up at about 10.45, so that's far more like it.

It's Mother's Day here in the UK and my youngest son (aged 10) had hidden various things in the cupboard. When I got up he pretended that he couldn't open it and asked me to help - when I did so, there was a card and various wrapped parcels inside. My daughter's boyfiend had given him some money to get me some presents from him and his sister and I had to laugh because what he'd got me (apart from a box of Maltesers) were clearly leftovers from Valentine's Day, namely a single red rose (artificial) and a teddy-bear covered in roses, hearts, pearls and lace. It took about half-an-hour before he started begging me to open the box of Maltesers, incidentally. It is now rather less full than it was when it was opened.

I got a card from my eldest daughter, with a sarky comment on the back of the envelope, which read: "This is a card Mum, just in case you don't know what one is! You forgot last week!". The reason for this was because, despite quite a few phone calls from said daughter, I still forgot to send her a birthday card. I also forgot to send my mother a Mother's Day card, so I have absolutely no right to complain about the fact that my two eldest sons didn't remember to send me one. BUT I AM STILL GOING TO.

Google Mood Ring (Dark Blue): Impassioned, delighted, whiff of romance

Down Under in Western USA

My sleep pattern seems to be totally mucked-up now. Last night I went upstairs at 8.30, intending to have a nap. I set the alarm for 10.30 and woke about 10.40, but went back to sleep again. Next thing I knew, it was 6.45 am, so I'd almost slept the clock round. I got up at 7 o'clock and although that's normal for most people, to me it seemed as if I was getting up in the middle of the night. I mean, it was still dark! Chances are I'll be tired again by early evening, even though I've had more than enough sleep for one night.

I've noticed that my preferred sleep pattern seems best-suited to the Pacific time zone or the one before it, so maybe I should go live there. I find this somewhat perturbing insofar as people who live there are further back in time than anybody else in the world, but maybe it's because I've never wanted to grow-up. Having said that, chances are that if I did live there, I'd still stay-up way into the early hours and need to move to Australia or something. Eventually I'd probably end-up back in the UK where I started.

I mean, even my Google mood ring proves that I am just not suited to being awake at this ungodly hour! Yeah, I know it's totally random, but it does fit. Well, sort of. I'm not really feeling like that, I'm more bored than anything. Maybe I should go take a nap ...

Google Mood Ring (Amber): Nervous, on edge, uncertain

My True Love is Hairy With a Backward B (OMG)

Well, I was right. I didn't actually go to bed until 1 am. I set my alarm for 8 am, but was woken abruptly at 7.45 by my daughter, who was running up and down the stairs muttering "Oh My God, Oh My God", over and over. Turned out that her boyfriend, who was supposed to arrive here from London at 5.30 pm, had actually arrived somewhat earlier (his idea of a surprise) and she was panicking as she wasn't awake/washed/dressed/made-up. He didn't sleep on the coach down, so is now asleep upstairs on a mattress on her bedroom floor and apparently intends staying there until she gets home from school.

She should be so lucky. The love of my life is unavailable all weekend, so I have to play the gothic heroine and pine a lot. This is something I'm very good at as it happens and I can help it along nicely by playing soppy songs and pretending I'm Catherine Earnshaw. I've always been annoyed that some idiot decided to name a stupid cartoon cat after one of the most romantic heroes of all time (the most as far as I'm concerned), because it sort of takes something vital away when you cry out "Where's my Heathcliff?" to the cosmos, not to mention the risk of your true love turning out to be excessively hairy with whiskers. Wouldn't have sounded so good when Cathy screamed out "I AM Heathcliff" either, come to think of it.

It's not as if I don't have things I could be doing to occupy my time, because I most certainly do. Chances are I'll get a fair bit of time to myself, because my daughter's boyfriend is very accommodating in terms of taking my youngest off my hands, so I could take the opportunity of doing something constructive like cleaning-up (HA-HA, when I have the house to myself? As if!).

At the moment I am listening to ABBA. They are such an institution, I think keyboards should have a backward B on them somewhere so we can type the name properly. So who remembers them winning the Eurovision Song Contest? Unfortunately, I remember it all too clearly, even if it will be 33 years ago on the 6th of April. Apparently they came third the previous year with "Ring Ring", but I don't remember that.. As I recall, I watched them win at my first fiance's house and I remember him saying he thought Agnetha was "low-slung" and I had no idea what he meant.

My second fiance and ex-husband of almost two decades (I married that one) had a thing about Frida, which was a change because most men preferred Agnetha. He said Frida reminded him of me, although I never saw any resemblance. I did have a similar perm once, though. My eldest son, incidentally, is no exception to the Agnetha rule. Once when he was about 18 months old we were watching an Abba concert and he woke-up with no reason, which he normally never did. I brought him downstairs and plonked him on the fireside rug and he sat rivetted to the screen for the entire duration of the concert, then immediately made it clear he wanted taking back upstairs. He still fancies Agnetha to this day, even if she is more than old enough to be his mother - crikey, she's even older than I am. Then again, most of the women he fancies are. As for my middle son, he just fancies any woman who moves (especially if they're Greek).

Well, I started writing this ages ago, but I keep doing other things and not getting around to finishing it, which means I have long since stopped listening to Abba. So, if you want to know what Abba songs I listened to, you'll have to click on one of the songs on my list and go to my musical profile page, which listens every single song I've listened to since I started using the system. And I haven't even got around to classical yet.

Google Mood Ring (Green): Steady, stable, no emotional turmoil

To Sleep or Not to Sleep

It's 9.45 pm and I'm knackered. I've only been up about 13 1/2 hours, so I must be short on sleep if I'm this tired already. Trouble is, getting up before noon at the earliest is not good for my system and my body can't handle it. I'm not sure, but I think most hermits are night owls and it just isn't right that we're forced by society to get up at ungodly hours when the sun is shining and stuff. Not right at all.

Of course, for a hermit I've had a busy day in that I had to do something that really does give my system a shock ... yes, I had to GO OUT. Typically, for the first time in ages, it was raining at the time I had to go and, typically, I couldn't find my umbrella. On the homeward journey, it was raining so much that I had raindrops dripping from weird places like my nose (better than other things that could have been dripping from it, I guess) and by the time I got home I was absolutely soaked. I had intended taking the kids to McDonald's afterwards, but that had to go by the board. Pity, 'cos I fancied a Big Mac.

As to where I went, it was nothing exciting, just to my son's school to listen to his teacher prattling on about how he's doing. Not worth repeating - he's excellent at maths and arts & crafts, very good at English, but crap at working as part of a group and hopeless at remembering his games kit . He's also very polite, very helpful and an all-round nice boy.

Anyway, as I'm knackered and haven't anything better to do, I am probably going to get a ridiculously early night. It may be a normal bedtime for most other people, but for me it's totally unacceptable and makes me think I'm at death's door or something. Chances are I won't go to bed for another 2 or 3 hours anyway, I never do when I say I'm going to. I'll get up and make another coffee and decide I'm good for another few hours yet, especially as in 10 minutes there will be something better I can do.

And I'm being told-off for singing again ... don't know why I bother existing at all, to be honest. Old, knackered and tuneless with a dripping nose. Not much hope for me really, is there.

Google Mood Ring (Dark Blue): Impassioned, delighted, whiff of romance.

Visitors Should Be Gassed

Being a hermit, I hate visitors. Sometimes I have to force myself to put up with them, but if there's one thing I can't stand it's when they arrive early. It's bad enough for me trying to be ready on time, but being ready early is basically impossible.

Today I arranged for my gas appliances to be serviced between 2-4 pm. This means that I expected the visit to take place somewhere between 2-4 pm. To me, this was logical and made perfect sense. Unfortunately, the men servicing my gas appliances were not as logical and therefore arrived at 1 pm, which meant I was not in the least bit ready and not in the least bit pleased. What if I'd been out and hadn't returned until 1.59 pm? What if I'd been 'indisposed'?

Being late is the way to go. Visitors who arrive late are courteous, polite and considerate. At least they are if they are visiting hermits. Having said that, the most courteous, polite and considerate people are those who never visit at all.

Moaning Musical Mothers

My teenage daughter told me off today. OK, so it's nothing new (I'm a lousy mother), but I do feel that she was out of order on this occasion. It's not as if I was doing anything wrong, I was only SINGING. I suppose the fact that I was wearing headphones (I'd been told to do that because I was disturbing her tv viewing) meant I was singing rather loudly (like you do when you're wearing headphones), but it's not as if I can't sing (well OK, I've had better singing days, but I'm still in tune). The thing is, since I've discovered Last.fm, I've been able to listen to all sorts of stuff I haven't heard in years, plus lots of new stuff, and I just have to sing to it if I'm in a singing mood. And today I just happened to be in a singing mood.

Anyway, I had a sort of indie morning, then I switched to the old sixties flower power stuff, which I just can't resist warbling to. It takes me back to when I was young and free and hopeful and totally unaware of the existence of "good old days". Anyway, there I was, warbling away at the top of my voice to Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds and I got told off. I am now about to start warbling at the top of my voice to Itchycoo Park (for the second time) and no doubt I will get told off again, because I also sing this one very loudly (well, you have to, haven't you. Poor Stevie's been dead for almost 16 years, he wouldn't hear me if I didn't ... my god, has it been that long?). Anyway, let's face it, lyrics these days just can't compare to blowing your mind by getting hung-up feeding ducks with a bun.

My eldest son was here this morning and he sort of told me off as well, although not for singing. He said it didn't seem at all right that his mother should enjoy the same sort of bands he did and as a result he was seriously considering changing his musical tastes totally. I reminded him that he was the one who was heavily into the Doors, which were actually from my era not his, but he excused that by pointing out that the Doors were timeless and therefore didn't count.

One thing I've noticed is that some people on Last.fm have no idea how to tag music. As an example, I am more than happy to listen to Ace of Base because I like them (I am warbling away to them now as it happens), but they are NOT from the flower-power era, not unless it lasted into the 90's, which it didn't. And has anyone else noticed that the intro to "Always Have, Always Will" is almost identical to the intro to "I Can't Help Myself" by the Four Tops? Well, it is. Listen to them both and you'll see what I mean. Talking of "I Can't Help Myself" (sugar-pies, honey-bunches), I still remember the dance to that ... and the dance to "Band of Gold" ... and the dance to "Get it On" ... hell, I'm old. I need another visit from Christine to make me feel better. Then again, having seen her latest photos, maybe I don't.

Up Your American Vagina!

Well, my Amazon stuff did arrive yesterday (today when I was writing, Friday that is) and I had quite a good time getting to know my Faerie Oracle. Not too enamoured with the Angel Numbers book though, it's a bit too god-biased to me, but I suppose I should have thought of that.

OK, going to pick on the Yanks again (I do that periodically, although not as often as I want to, believe me). Check this out: Girls Suspended Over V-Word. This totally baffles me, along the lines of "It's perfectly OK for you to carry a gun and shoot who the f**k you like, but OMG don't mention the correct anatomical name for the part of a woman's body that plays an important role in the procreation of the human race". (As an aside, I wasn't even allowed to use the word "cock" on an American writing forum today - just as well I'm not a farmer). WAKE UP, AMERICA!!!

OK, the girls did disobey orders, but it's obvious that wasn't the real reason they were suspended. They were suspended because of an outmoded, old-fashioned, puritan attitude that, as the author of the play herself said, is "a throwback to the Dark Ages". It was far more acceptable to kill people then, too. I accept that I live in a country that doesn't see guns as a fashion accessory, but who in their right mind would want to? Children here are taught correct anatomical terms when their ages are still in single figures; they are not taught how to load a gun.

Sorry, and my apologies to those Americans who don't subscribe to the bang-bang philosophy (I know there are many of you, quite a few of whom I know personally ... I shall certainly be speaking to my friend in Brooklyn about this, I thought NY was a little more modern-minded than the majority of the US), but to those of you who do - VAGINA, VAGINA, VAGINA ... and for good measure: PENIS, PENIS, PENIS. Now, shoot me (already).

Tomorrow is Today and Today is Yesterday

Yesterday was my eldest daughter's birthday, although it's still today to me as I haven't been to bed yet. Will be going very soon though, as I'm knackered and falling asleep.

Hopefully my Amazon items will arrive tomorrow (today), although knowing my luck they'll arrive on Saturday (tomorrow). I actually did better out of the deal than I should have (see previous post) as when I checked my inbox earlier today (yesterday), I discovered that Amazon had actually sent me an email on Monday telling me that they couldn't process my card. If I'd noticed that and corrected the details, I would have probably had the order yesterday (the day before yesterday).

As to what I've ordered, well it's a set of Faerie Oracle cards and an Angel Numbers book. Look, I'm into that sort of thing, don't knock it. I've also ordered some new tarot cards from eBay because my current ones don't seem to be working too well these days. They probably needs a good spiritual cleansing, but I don't go in for that sort of thing, I'm too lazy. It's easier to just buy a new deck. While I was at it, I ordered a pentagram pendant from the same supplier (although I hesitated, because she described it as a "pendent"). I thought I might wear it when I go to the local shops so everyone thinks I'm a witch and keeps their distance. A hermit can never have too many "keep your distance" objects about their person.

Oh, and for anyone who is confused, my daughter's birthday was on Thursday, 8th of March.

Up Your Irish Amazon

Sometimes it helps to be a stroppy cow. Last Friday I ordered a couple of items from Amazon UK. I only really wanted one of them, but the second cost less than the first-class postage on the first, so I got the second item without paying any extra as the order then qualified for free delivery.

The items were supposed to arrive anytime between yesterday and tomorrow, but when I checked yesterday they hadn't been despatched, nor had they been despatched when I checked today. There was absolutely nothing on the page to explain the delay, so I rang Amazon. It turned out that they were using the wrong card details, even though I'd entered in the correct ones. It appeared that my old Switch card was on file and they'd used that, instead of the new Visa card I'd entered when I placed the order. The old Switch card wouldn't have worked because (a) it had been replaced some time ago by the Visa and (b) it had expired some time ago. Why they used these card details when I entered totally different ones is beyond me. Even more puzzling is why I was told that the card had been accepted and the payment verified.

I politely (at first) explained to the Irish lady on the other end of the phone that there should have been some sort of warning on the page, telling me that I needed to amend some details, but she told me that this wasn't their policy, they simply continued to try the card and after a while, cancelled the order. I told her that in my opinion this was rather silly (not to mention bad for sales, although I didn't mention that bit) and she agreed with me (humoured me).

After my card details were corrected, I was told that the order would be despatched tomorrow and would arrive next week, which caused me to have a mini-fit. "Next week?" I mini-fitted. "It was supposed to be here tomorrow at the latest!" I then suggested they sent the order first-class and it was amended, except I was going to be charged more than 20% more for the privilege. At this point I had another mini-fit and muttered something along the lines of "In the interest of good customer relations, you should send it first-class and let me off the cost". Receiving no response to this, I asked for the order to be changed back to free delivery, and the Irish lady said this had been done. Refreshing the order page on the website confirmed this.

After sighing a lot and loudly muttering (yes, it is possible to mutter loudly, I've perfected it) that I would be thinking twice before using Amazon again, I terminated the phone call. On checking the order status a few minutes later, I discovered that my items were being despatched tomorrow by first-class, were estimated to arrive one or two days later (i.e., Friday or Saturday) and I had been refunded for the cost of the first-class postage.

So ... if you want first-class delivery from Amazon but don't want to pay for it, you know what to do.

Is That Lipstick on Your Carrot?

A couple of days ago I bought this lipstick that's supposed to plump up the lips to 40% of their normal size. It's got collagen or something in it. Anyway, as mine are the "Excuse me, but I appear to be snogging your nose/chin" type of lips (i.e., almost non-existent), I thought I'd treat myself.

There's meant to be this sort of tingle after you put the lipstick on and I did feel something, but not that much. Anyway, after I'd applied it and seen nothing particularly amazing in the mirror, I decided to go clean-up the lounge. Whilst doing so, I discovered a bag of carrots on the fireside rug (don't ask, I have a very strange son). Feeling peckish, I took a carrot out of the bag and bit hard on it.

WRONG. I didn't bite hard on the carrot - well I did, but only partly. I also bit hard on my lip. I totally misjudged the position of said lip because it was sort of stuck out more than usual. I also learnt something new, namely that carrot and blood do not go together well in terms of taste and the combination is therefore not recommended for those without vampiric leanings.

Conclusion: The lipstick works, but should carry a health warning.

Mysterious Massage, Anyone?

Get Your Sexy Name


Get Your Monster Name

Get Your Cyborg Name

Thanks to Gareth for the idea.

My Daughter is a Prick

There I am, innocently enjoying a cup of coffee and a bit of surfing (internet variety, I don't go in for the other sort, gimme a break), when my 14-year-old daughter screams at me from the kitchen.

Daughter: MUM! HELP! There's a needle stuck in my foot.
Mother: A what stuck in your foot? Just a minute ...

Mother goes into kitchen. Daughter is hopping on one leg and announcing that she is dying. Mother looks and sees needle stuck in daughter's foot, with black cotton threaded through it. Mother has no idea how needle got on kitchen floor. Mother attempts to pull needle out of daughter's foot.

Daughter: Don't pull it out! I'll die!
Mother: What else am I supposed to do with it?
Mother pulls out needle. Daughter remains alive.

Daughter: Is there blood on it?
Mother: No. Next time try shoes or slippers.

Daughter returns to cooking pasta, Mother returns to coffee and surfing, assuming crisis is over. A few minutes pass quietly and peacefully by.

Daughter: AAAGGGHHH!!!
Mother: What is it NOW?
Daughter: **BLEEP**BLEEP**BLEEP**

Mother goes into kitchen and discovers floor covered in fusilli, mushrooms, bits of tomato and pasta sauce. Daughter announces she tripped over something and her pasta went all over her arm on its way to the floor and she is now scarred for life (she isn't). Mother tells daughter to leave kitchen and she will cook her some more pasta. Daughter leaves kitchen to go watch TV. Mother screams (therapeutically) and starts cooking.

Moral of Story: I live in a madhouse with mad people.

My Neighbour is Not Called Oscar or Helen

As it's been a week and a day since I last posted, I suppose I should say something, otherwise you'll think I've disappeared again. Perhaps I will say "Eh up, COMMENTS?". I know quite a few people are reading because I can tell from my site stats, but you're not exactly saying much, are you. No need to follow my example and keep quiet for over two years, y'know.

I shouldn't really be here at all, I should be tidying-up. Got some woman from the Council coming round tomorrow to complain at me about something (I suspect it's the neighbours again) and if the house is like this when she gets here, she'll not even be able to get in the door. In fact, I probably wouldn't even be able to answer it.

Was woken up by my radio alarm this morning as usual and was rather pleased to hear that Helen Mirren (DAME Helen Mirren, that is) had won Best Actress Oscar for her role as the Queen in some film about the Princess Diana death aftermath I haven't seen but have heard about. Not that I am into that sort of thing, but it's good to know a Brit has won it for once and it was about time she got some sort of recognition for something.

I was very annoyed when Hollywood rejected her for the Prime Suspect role (think it was Hollywood) because she was TOO OLD. Too old? What the hell does that have to do with it? Have they not heard of make-up? I don't know who got the part (if anyone did), but I know they won't have made of it what Helen Mirren did. Too old, my Aunt Fanny. Never heard such a load of utter codswollop.

Blogging in a Puddle

Today is my mother's 80th birthday and I've created a new blog. There's not really any connection, I actually created it a couple of days ago and have only just got around to posting on it. The blog is called The Word Puddle and you can get there by clicking on the title.

What's it about? Well, it's a very simple concept. I just pick-up the nearest published item to hand, open it at random and whichever word my eyes alight on first I write about. I am choosing a music video and a picture to go with each word and the entries will be a combination of serious and humorous. I find it very difficult to write serious stuff on its own and I think it's usually rather boring anyway.

The first entry is the word FELL and I have an old Beatles video on there, plus a rather nice picture of Scarfell Pike, the highest mountain in England, which is in the Lake District for those who don't know. The second word will be WEEKEND. Go take a look, you know you want to ...

What's In a Word Word Word ...

Quite a lot actually, at least if you take the initital letters of "Word Word Word" and come up with WWW. Ever since regurgitating this blog I've been somewhat confused as to why sometimes it has a 4/10 Google rating and sometimes it doesn't have one at all and I've finally solved the mystery.

It's quite simple, really. If I miss out the WWW I get my 4/10 rating, but if I add it, it disappears. This is because everybody who links to it links to it without the WWW, which means nobody likes it with the WWW in. Why, What's Wrong with WWW? Doesn't seem anything wrong with it to me.

Anyway, that's enough of Witty Woman's Witterings for now. Things to do, people to not see (I'm a hermit, remember).

Embarrassing Pubic Policemen (With Lice)

Google ads ... now, forgive me if I'm wrong, but aren't they meant to relate to content on the page which they appear on? So, can someone please tell me why there is currently a Google ad on my blog offering treatment for EMBARRASSING PUBIC LICE??? (Actually, it's "embarrasing" pubic lice, but I refuse to repeat the missing 's').

There is nothing anywhere on this page relating to pubic lice, so the only possible explanation is that they have somehow homed-in on one of the blogs I link to, namely The PoLICEman's Blog, and taken it from there. I'd best be careful not to link to a writing blog called "My Pen Is Poised", then.

Don't Rip Your EMO, Chuck

There's this ad keeps appearing in my Google AdSense thingy, asking me if I'm EMO and, if so, do I want to meet other people who are EMO so I can hang out with them, upload pics and blog about whatever. Well, apart from the fact that I have no desire to hang out with anybody (does the word "hermit" not mean anything?), I have absolutely no idea whether or not I am EMO because I don't know what EMO is. At least, I didn't earlier today. Now I think I might know, but I'm still not entirely sure.

As part of my investigation, I clicked on the link, but it was no help whatsoever, it simply took me to a sign-up page, although the site appears to be Australian so I thought maybe EMOS were a variation of emus. I then entered EMO in Google and it appears to be short for emotional ... well, I can certainly admit to that. However, on further investigation it appears to be emotional music, only not the sort of music I would class as emotional.

However, I quite like this description: "Genre of softcore punk music that integrates unenthusiastic melodramatic 17-year-olds who don't smile, high-pitched overwrought lyrics and inaudible guitar rifts with tight wool sweaters, tighter jeans, itchy scarfs (even in the summer), ripped chucks with favorite band's signature, black square-rimmed glasses and ebony greasy unwashed hair that is required to cover at least 3/5ths of the face at an angle."

Now, were I still 17, I would probably be quite enamoured with a male person fitting this description, on account of how I was somewhat strange at that time when it came to what I did and didn't find attractive (I still am, but I've advanced somewhat in my age preference). However, as I am most definitely not 17 (and unable to pass for 17 even with the most amazing light system ever invented), I would probably find it rather perturbing. I therefore feel that this advertisement has no place on my blog and I will be considering visiting AdSense to ban it. I don't even want to attract 17-year-olds to it because they might leave messages telling me I'm old.

Although I think I now know what EMO is, I have absolutely no idea what ripped chucks are. I thought maybe they were jeans, but the description already mentioned those, so they must be something else. If anyone knows what they are, please tell me. If you know what unripped chucks are, tell me that instead, because I can probably work it out from there.

Obsessed With Flashing Lights

Without further ado I will start catching-up on the last couple of years or so. We'll start with why I disappeared back in October 2004, although you might find it hard to believe, or parts of it anyway.

It happened like this. There I was, sat at my computer thinking about posting a blog entry, when without warning there was this incredible flash of light and a voice came out of the ether and said: "Woman! Get off your arse and do something useful for a change!". Well, to say I was flabbergasted would be an understatement. I swear my gast had never been so flabbered. What could I do but obey? Voices don't come out of the ether that often, especially not accompanied by incredible flashes of light. I simply couldn't ignore it.

So, what useful thing did I do? Well, I went into the hall, picked up the jiffy bag that had just plopped onto my doormat, opened it, took out my brand-new The Sims 2 cd, put it into my disc drive ... well, that was that. I was totally hooked and forgot all about my blogs. I get these obsessions, you see, and I tend to jump from one to the next without warning. It can be quite unnerving at times. I did briefly think about starting a Sims 2 blog, but I never got around to it because I was too obsessed with playing it.

I have to say that part of the above explanation isn't entirely true, but you'll have to decide for yourself which part. In case you're wondering, my obsession with TS2 lasted almost 2 years, when it was replaced by an obsession with something not entirely dissimilar, but different. This in turn led to an obsession with something even better which is part of the first obsession but also separate from it, but I may decide not to go into that, at least not for the moment.

That's all for now. I need more comments on this and the previous one before I give anymore away. I know people are still reading this blog, otherwise it wouldn't have a 4/10 Google rating almost 2 1/2 years after it was last updated. That tells me that it has continued to be very popular and that I am probably the most undiscovered talent on the planet. Then again, it could be because of all the idiots who've been coming here spamming me about boobies, car insurance and tarot cards. I knew there had to be a catch somewhere.

Huge Prodding Boobies ... I'm Back!!!

Yes, the Eccentric Bohemian Hermit is BACK!!! So, you see, I was not abducted by aliens (unfortunately, a woman of my delicate years never says no to a bit of free prodding) or anything else untoward ... wanna know what happened? Well, maybe I will tell you tomorrow, that way you have no choice but to come back ...

Anyway, I wasn't amused when I came back. All those spam comments offering me everything from car insurance to huge boobies ... first thing I did was delete as many as I could find before I started falling asleep from total boredom. I will do the rest when I get around to it. Quite why so many people offered me tarot readings and the like on this blog instead of my other one is anybody's guess. Not sure whether I'm going to update that one or delete it, probably the latter. I know people liked it, but it was just too much hassle. I may start a new blog, though. I already have a subject in mind, but I'm not going to mention it for a few days. Look, I have to keep people visiting, OK?

So, that's it for this first post in over two years. I know you're all desperate for more (well, this one was rather boring, wasn't it), but good things come to those who wait. I should point out that I think I am probably rather more eccentric now and I'm certainly more Bohemian, but it's possible that I am slightly less hermit-like. It could be an age thing. Christine might know, she was this age 2 years ago ...

Oh, and before I forget, HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!!!