Wedding Bells .......

I have never understood until now, why people cry at weddings, after all when your young and have only ever been to celebrations for 18ths and 21sts then the odd engagement party thrown in for good measure, whats the big deal with a wedding, well here is the deal, I am now in my forties (I wish someone would say really? and mean it) yes forties, hubs is now in his 50's and we have had a decade at least of illnesses various, some more serious than others and let me tell you it makes you cherish each and every happy event in a way you never did before...

So after our day at poppit beach and goood old catchup with my former work colleagues from Manchester Uni and a few scoops of ale and damn good ......nights sleep (steady on) well it was more of a coma as we had drank a fair bit......

we got all suited, booted, fascinated, spanxed (is that even a word) and headed to St Thomas church in the beautiful village of St Dogmeals and watched a beautiful, smiley and 10 minutes early bride arrive at the church to marry the groom, we sang, we smiled and I admit that my eyes felt that prickle of pending tears that I have never ever experienced at a wedding before, so if I reach a ripe old age it will be proper crying, complete with snotty bubbles at future weddings, I cant wait.......

Cardigan here we come ......

Last weekend me and hubs were lucky enough to be travelling down to Cardigan in Wales,much further than familiar cricieth and just as beautiful. We set off very early and by around 10ish we saw a sign for RHUG, we stopped looked as some real live bison (straight out of a western) I admit I wanted to round um up swirling rope and in my head this would work, then I thought logically and I am not a cowboy, I have trboulbe with corodiation and i could come a cropper, so, we just had a bison burger and a cup of tea in the cafe, the sun was coming out and it showed all the promise of a nice day. The sat nav lady was just beginning to get on our nerves as we pulled into a municipal carpark in cardigan town and got out to stretch our legs, we had a stroll around and then I saw the groom, completely by chance so hubs put on a deep voice and shouted hey McGlinchey (why do boys think this is so funny?) anyway after hugs all round, yes the bride was with him and her lovely matron of honour too, they were going to have their manicures ahead of the big day, not sure what the groom was up to. We got our chicken and chips and headed to a fab beach called poppit.

I do like to take a pebble from each beach visited, it feels like i am taking a little of the seaside home with me. Poppit beach is very flat and very sandy but not much int he way of pebbles, in fact there were just 4 and now there are just 3.

I had the picnic rucksack with me and we ate our chips with proper cuttelry (non of your plastic or wooden forks for us kennys) we also shared a cold can of lager in proper glasses.

We saw a sign that read "Cardigan Museum" and decided how random it would be to have a museum of all the different cardigans in the world, you could start with the matinee jackets in lemon knitted by grannies, right to the arran chunky cardigans perfect for cold days and fisherman........

Broken promises and flipcharts

My dad had a saying that certainly rings true despite it being over 30 years since I still heard it as a teenager and thought “what is he on about”?

He said someone will walk a mile to borrow something from you, but cant cross the road to give it back..... never did this saying ring more true than yesterday this is the story.....

Texts: LJK to MK - do you have a flip chart in your office
MK – LJK – Yes
LJK - MK Can I borrow it for a few hours, I am in meeting rooms above a bar and they dont have one.
MK - LJK - I will ring you....

So I did ring and got the version of events of first born that made me say YES. How I got the flip chart to him went like this.....

After some subtle distractions to a couple of work colleagues in the form of a round of drinks (tea of course this is a work situation) I wedged the door open and carefully carried the flipchart stand down in the lift 10 floors. 5 mins later first born came round for it, I said the following and even as the words left my mouth I wouldn’t have gone to betfred and put money on it for one second, but it didnt stop me going through the motions...

This needs to be back here tomorrow, if it gets lost of stolen or broken you have to replace it.

He assured me in front of the receptionist (so i do have a witness) that he would collect it from Bachanalia at 9.00am and deliver it to my building so I could place it back and no one would be the wiser....... this is what happened next

He didnt come home that night, he didnt come home the following morning and I rang left messages on email and mobile, then finally he rang at 9.55am, to say he was now at home and could I go to Bachanalia and just say I was a work colleague of his and had come to collect the stand. This wasnt what we agreed at all.

I told my work colleagues I was going to get milk for the office as we had run out and trotted off to bachanalia, I was enormously lucky that a member of staff was outside and about to have a cig break, she showed me up 6 flights of stairs to the flipchart which had been unused ! I carried it down the 6 flights again and over uneven terrain in the rain back to my building, back up in the lift and in the hall, where it was now 10.10am and a meeting was due to start at 10.15am in our meeting room and possibly requiring the flipchart........ as you can imagine I am now exhausted, perspiring and just as I think I have got a way with it a voice says, “Maria, what is the flip chart doing out there”......

First borns biggest worry in all this was in his words “dont tell the girl at bach your my mum or anything, I was trying to hit on her and I dont want all that “Oh he’s my boy” type of conversation going on ......

My biggest worry, was getting the flipchart back in the meeting room before it was missed.

I have learnt a valuable lesson

I managed it and exactly 5 minutes after I replaced the flipchart in the meeting room, two visitors arrived and the meeting went ahead.

It certainly was a close one.........

If first born were anyone else I dont know that I could have forgiven him, as it stands I almost do, but there were lessons learnt...

My Fab Week

Tuesday after work I went to a loccitane evening at the shop on king street, the ticket was a tenner. They locked the doors and we had fiz, canapés, cakes and I had an arm, hand and cuticle massage with shear butter. I bought a nice shower gel and a mini sheer butter that just about does everything, it will come in handy on that long hall flight to Chicago next month, for lips and eyes and cutticles etc.

I spent nearly an hour there then called into Waitrose which is attached to boots on market street, at the end of the day they do mega markdowns I got a huge bag full of high quality scran for £3.30, only they let me use my boots clubcard points so it was well and truly nought pence!

Wednesday night after work me and Sean went to see Styx, Foreigner and Journey, we had a couple of pints in the hard rock cafe and first born collected us. It is lovely to have a willing chaufer after all these years, I suppose I should keep on the good side of him and stop nagging when he leaves me three pans, two mugs and various glasses all in the sink for my return from 7 hours at work.....

Thursday, I have started a new trend of always booking the day off following a gig, I feel cheated if i have to rush around to get home or out to work the next day. It feels like a reminder that the good times are just fleeting and I need to get back on the treatmill. As I comp fanatically I end up signed to many websites and from time to time the random and abstract invitations do indeed come my way, this week it was to a book launch at Selfridges 1-2 so took my working from home mate there (after all it was a lunchhour) we had fizz, canapés and cakes again (I do like a good canapé) we met the author Tasmina Perry and she gave us her new book and signed it, then as nails inc were the promoters we got a free nail colour each, and managed to quaff some more cava and canapes before heading to WHSmiths as my friend had been ordered to buy a scientific calculator.

Friday, back to work today and there was a Malibu promotion on in St Annes Square, so I got a free cocktail, nailvarnish and my nails painted by nails inc a lovely orange its got a base coat, colour and top coat so it should last a few days.

Saturday the decks were cleared today, no visitors, I didnt have to go anywhere so I spent 4 hours cleaning with kate bush on my ipod (the directors cut) strictly for the fans as the songs are the same just the arrangements differ, but me and Kate have been together since 1977 and I saw the very groundbreaking "Wuthering Heights" on top of the pops (thank god they didnt allow pans people to taint the image by dancing to it), hubs had Emerson Lake and Palmer on which on the whole I dont mind, though the lyrics start getting trippy and I have to leave and find refuge in my all time favourite charity shop, MANACARE, I spent £10.50 but I cant remember on what, its prob still in the back of my car.

Sunday came and went and it rained, rained and rained some more, I didnt mind as my garden was looking more beautiful and green by the hour......

No ones getting out alive...........

I am aging, there is no getting away from it and as I said to my mum, this is life NO ONE GETS OUT ALIVE and hopefully very few with a full head of nut brown curls.


So going grey isnt something I worry about too much, I have started to have my hair highlighted and was informed by my hairdresser last week "OMG you are so grey", of course the reply i wanted to give was NO SHIT SHIRLOCK (as in Holmes) but I just asked her what percentage, she said thoughtfully 30% and I thought that was an accurate assumption.

I did purchase and use a kit to dye my eyebrows brown, as they had all but disappeared and drawing them back in wasnt a success, I ended up drawing them too high and looking permanently suprised.

So my hair was high lighted and the thng I liked best was that I have a section near my (almost grown out) fringe where it must have had a lot of grey and its gone white, snowy white like father christmas and I rather like it it reminds me of a Mallon Streak.

Another point on aging, I mood swings will be the norm for the next few years”, great.... does that mean I can go shop lifting in st annes square and legitimately get away with it?

I digress, but then why would I not, its a crazy mixed up bag of a world we live in.

As I thought last night comeing home from work on the 256 and shouty man with tourettes was shouting sausages, hmmmn I havent had them in ages so thats what we will have for our tea, sausages, mash and cabbage that way I wont feel so guilty when I marinate my inners with good quality vodka and smart price cranberry juice over the weekend, god bless us one and all.

Losing Streak...

its fair to say I am going through a prize winning drought, i am ok with it as I have experienced it before, but I have also got to a point out that there has been less good quality opportunities around.

I checked out a weekly link (I am not at liberty to reveal this source as its ually a lucrative one and I dont want to share) but i didnt want to win either of the prizes, and to be honest if you had put both the prizes together it wouldn’t make them more appetizing they were

Two tickets to see ringo star in manchester
Tickets for you and a friend to go up in a hot air balloon

I didnt even bother.......

I would like to win something I can enjoy with feckles and one of them is a makeover, overnight stay and tickets to the comfort high street fashion awards taking place in London in September, the tickets to buy are 95 quid each and although you do get a goody bag worth 70 quid and a four course meal, its still out of my new purse friendly austerity agenda (skint). I have been trying to win this price for the last five years maybe this year will be my lucky break.

The other comp is “embarrassing dad”, its a vote one but as i always say nothing ventured....... so armed with a funny snap and 50 words written by feckles about why her dad should win i pressed send on the email at 11.30 last night just as my peepers were involuntarily closing – home measures of gin and tonic can be so haphazard!

That prize if i read it correctly is a mixed bag of experiences worth a grand total of 2,500. So that would be nice (as long as there isn’t a balloon ride with ringo star in there) I saw him on the one show and I dont know if he was just having a bad day but he never cracked a smile and was a complete charisma bypass. In fact if he came out and said “Not only was I not the best drummer, i wastn even the best drummer in the beatles”, i might have respect for him, but the old lady on the harp would be a better drinking buddy.

Purse Friendly

this month is all about saving the pennies, last month turned our joint account into something akin to a black hole (you know, it doesn’t matter how much you put in it just vanished).

5 weeks of mayhem, what with city at wembly, rush at the Men, then roger waters, then back to wembly again.... my car insurance on the new cutie (Ford KA) fayes hair disaster being sorted out at Selfridges (yes Selfridges!) and I admit I bought a few too many plants in b and q (so sue me.... actually dont I cant pay).

Anyway thats were we are, got paid checked what has to come out this month and was has gone in and i think PROCEED WITH CAUTION (if i was thinking road signs that is).

So I swapped the cans of lager and cider this weekend for a carton of cranberry juice 65p from quality save, as I have vodka and Bacardi in. Of course I wont force sean to drink a girls drink and will get him some stella (two large bottles for £3 at sainsburys). Instead of sainsburys big shop tonight, it will be targeted shopping at aldi at lunchtime where I plan on purchasing a leg of lamb to defrost tomorrow and cook on Sunday. I have aunt bessies in the freezer/mash and roasts.

Makeup, well i ave run out of foundation but have lots of sachets I can us up, each sachet last five days, you just put a pin prick in one side and squeeze a bit out every day. As for other stuff, shower gels etc, well still using up the stuff i got for chirstmas and my birthday so thats cut down. There are a few things I wont/cant cut out, first born needs his protein food to complete his plan to look like Johnny bravo and feckles needs her packed lunch essentials. I have made three wedding cards and an engagement card from craft stuffs in my cupboard.

More on this story later.