With great trepidation!

My son has already told me there is nothing to be uptight about, just get off the seat, walk a few yards, shake hands and walk back to the seat. But he doesn't get lost does he?

This is my graduation that is causing the wobblies at the moment. I am sure all will go well, I won't have to walk anywhere on my own - there will be lots of us; I have several safety pins to hold the hood in place and the gowns are booked. Son, daughter and daughter-out-law are willing to have their photo taken with me, so all should be easy. You think I am being neurotic? I can get lost anywhere - airport, roads, house, and this will be a cathedral, a place with lots of little chapels. I can just imagine it,
"Calling Mrs P, come to the main altar for your degree."

Joking apart, I am so pleased to have finished the course. I never imagined when I started how much work would be involved, nor that I would in the end become quite addicted to the research. It was worth it, every minute of it. The only thing I would change would be doing the course face to face, as an online course is good, but you don't get to know the other students and that would have been better.

The next challenge? Well, a trip down under on my own, with no GPS system just a very good map. Then next year I am going to work hard at learning Spanish and take the Teaching English as a Foreign Language course so that I can travel and teach. A degree was necessary for that, so the MA is going to be useful as well as a purely personal achievement.

Better make sure that I walk to the Chancellor and don't get lost in the Cathedral then!!

Seven Random Things about Myself

Either you think carefully about this or do a quick list of whatever comes to mind. Let's see what surfaces:
I can get lost for England - gold medal standard!
I lose things very easily. (Is there a theme emerging here?!!)
I get emotionally attached to all sorts of things - furniture, plants, recipes etc.
I love my children very much.
Gardening is a great past-time.
I hate cleaning. (ooh, and decorating)
I laugh at a lot of things.

That was a quick list - have a look at Tami's site for her list too. And now in the spirit of yesterday's resolution, I am going to clean a floor before I allow myself a coffee, then sort out some clothes for Friday.

Another wonderful moment in the saga of 'Loosin Liz'

On a scale of 1 - 5, five being really good, how would you rate your favourite vegetable peeler? Mine gets 6, and it has been missing for the last two or three weeks. Sense might have told me that it coincided with the manic decorating and therefore I should look at the place where I was keeping the tools that I was using. Sense? Not switched on at the mo.

However, I have found my wonderful peeler in amongst all the srewdrivers, chisels etc that were on a tray in my usual working manner. (Find something that will hold the things so that I can see them and will know where they are. It usually expands to at least two containers and then of course, there are the horizontal planes where I put things down in an absent minded moment.)

Strangely enough, my sister and I were talking about her working with mum in the garden . Mum was a disciplined woman, she would always tidy up after she had done a job. I don't know if this was her medical training, but I know we used to send her round the bend with our untidy ways. But, (and I hope she is listening to this!) I can see that tidy saves a lot of time spent looking for things, it prevents those self inflicted bruises when you kick yourself for being so stupid, and those bad tempered hours during the searches.

The problem is, I seem unable to manage it. Neither child of mine has come up with an injection for tidiness, however many times I put it on my Christmas present list. So. now I am going to have to work out a strategy similar to the one where I taught myself to remember a shopping bag everytime I go out. Refusing plastic bags is now a way of life because I used to reward myself by buying a bottle of wine everytime I remembered 'the bag'. People still laugh when I claim I am no longer a member of the plastic bag brigade. So now, I am starting a new training regime. (Thank you Harriet for the idea.) No coffee until I have till tidied something in the house. And if I fail in this, then no glass of wine in the evening. This is the way my character works, so let's give it a go. I might let you know what happens!!

Found it!

It was very carefully covered up with a dust sheet, must remember not to do things properly, or if I do to leave myself a note!!

Such a sad person. (But not sad in the unhappy meaning!)

I'll just put everything back.

Those two words "I'll just.." should never be put together in one sentence! Every time I think a job can be done in one day and it will be straight forward, King S**'s law rules.

Just putting everything back into the sitting room is proving to be quite amusing. The drawers in the large chest have been sorted and many little treasures have seen the light of day for the first time in years. Yes, DLG, I have an Oxfam bag and it is full!

The funiest thing it the grandfather clock - I seem to have mislaid the top of the casing. Hmm, my house is little and has no cupboards, so where on earth have I managed to lose something as substantial as that?!!

It is a good think I spend a lot of time laughing at myself!

The Painting is finished!

Yess!

Another item that was on the list.

In those idle moments of this year I was going to learn how to set up this page with more individual touches. I have not managed this, but this map's site was found by one of our walking group. I don't want to go to every country, or 50 countries or whatever list that can be made, but it was interesting to find out where I had 'touched down' on earth. I have managed to add it to the site, when I learn how to make titles etc, I will tart it up!!

(Meanwhile back to the paint brushes, perhaps only two days to go. Then there might be some more interesting posts.)

Keeping me amused while painting!

I give Tami top marks for this, her emails with pictures and video attachments have kept me well and truly amused whilst up the ladder or down on my hands and knees scraping some kind of goo off the skirting boards. (Rumour has it that it is a coffee stain put there by the builders. Why??????????!!)

Tomorrow should see some paint going on the walls, but I am not holding my breath!

Daily lists.

Life is rules by the daily list of tasks at the moment, but this
morning I had time to think about the list of jobs that I made for this
year. Most of which were jobs that started with the phrase,
"Paint the ...." Well, I bought what I hope is the last tins of paint for this
year and now have started to paint the sitting room. The grandfather clock is moved and so I can wash down the whole wall, then when that is dry, the ceiling finished etc etc I can get on with the roller and do the speedy part of the job.

Unfortunately, I was chatting to a woman last night who also drained her radiators and painted behind them.
Now that is something new for me and I am slightly intrigued about how
to do the job, so next summer's list will include learning how to drain
my central heating system. All very girlie!!

My short term list has two quite important jobs on it - practise walking in high heels again and work out what to wear under the academic gown when I go to my graduation. I think it will have to be trousers, but I need a blouse so that the hood can be buttoned to the blouse, and a safety pin is also useful I am told. Both of these things are not suitable painting garb,so at the moment they have been postponed, but I shall need to start work on them at the week-end, otherwise there might be the ungainly sight of my going A over T on my way up to receive the certificate. There is even going to be aphotograph taken as this is one occasion I really want to have recorded. (Must also practise smiling in the mirror, so that the effect is not too inane!!)

Somebody - PLEASE invent a tidy gene?

This time I have mislaid my car tax disc. It went from being put in an obvious place on the stairs where I could not fail to see it and display it on the car's windscreen, to POUFF!! Somewhere.

I have spent the whole morning looking for it, the plasterer came and went, the sun is going down, but the the bright blue circle is not showing its face.

Drat.

It's true!!

A Rolling Stone gathers no moss... and they have been helping me to carry on with the prepartion for the painting. The window frames are now done - much lighter and so more light seems to be let into the room, and when I clean the window panes lots more will come in. But that must wait until the wood is dry.

My sister and her husband are coming to stay for the night so I have had to make a path in the kitchen and the spare bedroom, George Harrison has been really good for this. I love his song about the tax man - really helps to get rid of those antagonistic feelings!! (And I get lots of those when I see how much mess I can make in just a few minutes...)

The present problem in this decorating phase, is how do you decide which wall to paint a slightly lighter shade of the main colour? I am not very good at visualising these things, and have made horrendous mistakes in the past!, I will try ringing Livvy, she is usually very good at this kind of advice, but it is annoying not to be able to 'see' these things for yourself.

I am sorry to burden you with the decorating boredom, but that is what my life has been for the last few weeks, but not for much longer!! Divali lights in Leicester this week-end as an escape. I will try to take some photos and find the widget to load them on the blog.

Now back up the step ladder..

DLG, I can hear you from over 3,200 miles away...

I have had to stop the work and go online to make an apology that is 35 years overdue.

Oh, my goodness. Let me explain.

When we bought our marital home in the early 1970's it was actually two homes that the council were selling together. One of them had little electricity, no indoor loo or bathroom. It was a two up two down Duke of Sutherland cottage, built for his workers.
The sitting room had been decorated with wallpaper, and you could see exactly where the furniture had been because they did not move it to re-paper the room. There had been a grandfather clock, sideboard and a large chest of drawers that were obviously too big to move and they had been papered around several times. At the time I thought it was dreadful.

But now? Having to move my own grandfather clock to repaint, I can easily understand why they did that, and also appreciate how much more interesting it was for the people who lived there after the previous tenants. We knew far more about those people than any one will from my decorating. So, I am sorry I was so snotty about them!

However, why will DLG be shouting at me? OK. I will own up - I have never seen so many dead spiders and their webs in the top of a clock's casing, as there were in mine - oh, the shame of it! And the dead woodlice at the bottom? Well they are going to act as kindling for the fire when I next light it. Perhaps this is why in my heart of hearts I know I have to do this horrendous amount of painting - it is instead of the annual spring clean. Who was the English man in New York who never dusted? I think I am a genetic descendant of his!!

I will now put cotton wool in my ears and hang my head in shame. (Whilst I carry on with the dreaded decorating of course. Woe is me...)

Remember, remember the fifth of November

Do you love fireworks? I do - the noisier the better! Rev Roy Lancaster has just been showing us all about the different types of gunpowder and how they make those screeching fireworks. How lovely to have had such a hobby throughout life and make something that lots of other people enjoy!

Guy Fawkes had enough gunpowder to blow up everything within a 2 1/2 mile radius of the houses of parliament. Slightly over doing it I think! Listening to Jeremy Paxman saying he would love to interview the young Princess Elizabeth was interesting. (The view was that she would have been one of the few royal survivors of the blast.) That would have been an fascinating programme! I suspect she would have ordered someone to chop off his head rather early in the show.

How is the work going? Well, I could do with a firework to speed up my results somewhat. Just one window frame cleaned up today, perhaps the room will be slightly lighter when it is all finished.

I escaped!

Last night I escaped off to Market Harborough to watch some fireworks. A local school held a fundrarising bonfire and fireworks display, it was fantastic! Lots of whizzy lights, bangs and booms - just what Bonfire night should be. And the bonfire was huge! We had supper with some of Ian and Renske's friends after the display, then some more homely fireworks to be let off in the garden. All good fun.

Today we walked off the food in the Leicester countryside, we managed about 10 miles, around a delicious lunch at a pub in a village called Hallaton. The pub was the Bewick Arms and the food was excellent! http://www.hallaton.org/localfacilities.html Have a look! I ate the walnut and cheese flan, it was delicious, the pastry was excellent, the salad extremely good. Their Christmas dinner menu looks exceptional, pity I won't be able to get there!

But there could be more walks in that area and the menu changes frequently...!

Now back to that blooming painting - yuk.

Yuk!!

I have just spent a couple of hours up one of the several step ladders, washing down the ceiling in my sitting room. The fire has certainly made a difference, smuts? I have loads of them.

The plasterer is coming next week-end to sort out the fireplace, then I shall be able to paint the room. It will probably take me the week to prepare all the walls and the windows. So, I feel some loud music coming upon me - perhaps Queen and Fat bottomed ladies will suit the purpose? Any other ideas for music to be played whilst mindlessly painting and washing walls?

Just one more room...

You can sing that to the tune of "Ten green bottles.." and then if you are me - scream loudly at the thought of painting yet another room.

Tomorrow a plasterer is going to look at the fireplace and sort out if he will plaster over the bricks. Then I need to find a wooden surround for the grate. That's the bit that is easy I suppose ( or is that tempting providence?!!) - my work is going to be sanding down the skirting boards, smoothing down the walls, washing the ceiling and walls and then finally do the painting. My goodness, I am bored already!!

However, I shall have a lovely little house when it is all done and then the garden desperately needs some TLC. The weather has been lovely recently, just hope it lasts until the decorating is done.

Looks like the new front door will not be ready until March, so that work will need to be sorted after the winter. I just hope that it won't be too expensive, otherwise I shall feel guilty about scooting off in the cold weather. There, that's all the exciting news about the decorating - see? I told you it was boring!!!