Carolyn's Journal

Don't laugh, a weekend away in Coventry is as close as I'll get to a holiday this summer. I felt that I might be a bit of a fraud and an interloper as I've never been a writer, artist, vidder, meta writer, and these days I do very little reading in fandom either - the main thing I wanted to do was meet up with friends I hadn't seen for some time, and to finally put faces and voices to people I've read online but never met in person. But the great thing about fandom is that it doesn't matter! kazzy_cee reposted a great definition of fandom at the writerconuk community as well as on her own LJ, and I felt I just fit right back in where I'd left off four years ago.

( What happens in Coventry .... )

Then it was goodbye time, and after a very good journey (45 minutes door to door, despite some torrential rain) home to convince the children that this time I hadn't been 'stalking my man', and no I hadn't brought them back a present (though they did manage to eat most of my goody bag sweeties), and surely Coventry wasn't too far to go on a Saturday night for a curry, and that I'd had a wonderful time. And yes, I'd be doing it again next year, dates permitting. You should too!

Another busy day today, Ellen had her Grade 1 violin exam this morning, so I drove from one side of town to the other for the exam then back over here for school, then back over the other side to work. Worked flexi hours to make up for getting in late, dropped in at the MILs to give her the various presents we'd purchased for her (and did all the thinking of what to buy while we were at it) yesterday, and then got home just in time to meet the school bus.

I wondered why I was so hungry at work today, and the reason stared my in the face as I made a sandwich for my really late lunch - my cereal was still sitting uneaten in the bowl. :D

Tonight is Ellen's last of three performances of their Christmas play (she's a guitar playing male mouse and the story is about the writing of the Christmas Carol 'Silent Night' which they have to sing in German). Bethan and I are going along to watch - hopefully she won't have to carry on with any of the songs on her own today; yesterday the girl who was singing a duet with her fell up some steps onto the stage and stopped singing halfway through, but Ellen manfully carried on regardless.

I ventured into the town centre today to see if I could find anything vaguely interesting to photograph for WILD (Where I Live Day) weekend, which is looming large on the horizon ie next Saturday and Sunday. If you've not signed up or never even heard of it, head on over to the comm wild_photos to find out all the relevant info.

I ended up in the middle of an almost modern-day Fire of London (or Fire of Northampton, anyway). Greggs the Bakers was ablaze and the fire brigade turned up in force to rescue the staff, put out the flames and hopefully save some of the baked goods at the same time.

( Cuthbert, Dibble, Grub )

Day 30 - A song that you haven’t listened to in awhile

*looks at CDs on book-case to my right* I haven't got any Julia Fordham on my PC, and the CD case is covered in a thin fairly thick film of dust, so it's a fair bet to say I haven't listened to her for quite some time. She's got a really deep, beautiful voice, and just reading through the title tracks on the albums is bringing the songs all back to me. She's not the most cheerful of singers though. Here she is on YouTube:

Julia Fordham - Happy Ever After
Julia Fordham - Porcelain
Julia Fordham - Invisible War

And that's that! Can't believe that I've stuck with this meme for the whole 30 days. I haven't done that many consecutive postings ever, in the five years I've had this LJ. It's been fun though and hopefully has got me back into the groove of reading and commenting a bit more and posting in my own journal so that I don't become a lurky person again.

This way to Part 1

Saturday's events didn't start until midday so we had a lazy morning sitting round drinking tea and coffee, eating toast with homemade raspberry (as it turned out) jam and browsing round the interweb. Following some frantic texting EM joined us and we made our way out into the sunshine and headed towards the Drill Hall.

( They really did go to the moon you know )

Phew, nearly there now, just need Sunday to finish things off.

Part 3

from Ikea for not being able to purchase an item.

"Sorry sir it's in our other warehouse which is closed today due to an illegal rave taking place in the car park".

\o/

Wishing a very happy birthday today to two lovely ladies, alwaysjbj and spikesdeb.

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At 26 he's the youngest person ever cast to play the part, despite the director initially thinking he wanted someone older. And I've never heard of him.

( And the winner is ???? )

I'm not one for looking back at things that have happened - mostly because I have trouble remembering what I did last week, let alone several months ago. I had a quick look back at the number of posts I made during the year, and it comes to a grand total of 65. I did manage to post something each month, but July only just made it with a single solitary post (and that was probably wishing someone a happy birthday *g*).

I did manage to read 50 books though (and I'm going to list them here, mainly for my own reference - though if it weren't for Shelfari I wouldn't have a record of these either).

( In fact there were lots more )

So the plan this year is to try and post a bit more about what is (or isn't) going on in my life, to carry on with the reading (books and fanfic) though I don't know that I'll make 50 books this year, and to enjoy and do more with the girls and as a family. And to roll with the punches, whatever the recession may throw at us.

Yay, go me! Posting four days in a row. :D

Today I have been mostly made happy by Christmas cards arriving from near and far from friends old and new. So thanks go to enigmaticblues, josephine_64, calturner, oldgreymare, kazzy-cee, and a big 'merci beaucoup' to jamalov29. The biggest smile came from receiving a card from schehrezade_1 - so dearly missed from LJ land, but so good to hear from you.

I also had my hair cut, and it has turned out very nicely, so even more happy.

Wishing a very happy birthday to deborahw37. Hope you're having a great day and that the coming year is a good one, full of love, laughter and fun.




And I'd like to wish all my American flisters a very HAPPY THANKSGIVING DAY. Enjoy!