Scenes from a weekend

 Sunny garden breakfast

 Shopping with mum

 A book I couldn't put down until I finished it

A lovely little cafe for lunch

7 things

That I have never done, but want to:

1. Ride a horse
2. Eat Lobster
3. Dive
4. Hold a baby chimpanzee
5. Rent an apartment in New York for my six week summer holiday
6. Get a short story published
7. Go to Alaska

Things I like to eat:

1. Cranberry sauce
2. chocolate pretzels
3. hummus and carrot sticks
4. Toast
5. Mexican food
6. Chips and dips
7. antipasti

My favourite things to do

1. Sit in Starbucks and read/write
2. Plan my holiday!
3. Get home early and put my pyjamas on
4. Go to London at Christmas
5. Read a whole magazine cover to cover in a hot bath
6. Walk through town in the early morning while the town wakes up
7. Walk in the rain and get really wet

Things that make me smile

1. The muppets
2. Psych
3. Thinking of my Vegas holidays
4. My work colleagues
5. My sister
6. A sunny day
7. Wardrobe planning

Working Girl

Oh Melanie,

 

I love you in this.

 

I love you on the Staten Island ferry.

I love your white socks and trainers.

I love how you live in New York and own my perfect bag (oversized leather tote)

Altogether now at the top of your voice..

IT'S ASKING FOR THE TAKING

TREMBLING, SHAKING

OH, MY HEART IS ACHING

WE'RE COMING TO THE EDGE

RUNNING THROUGH THE WATER,
COMING THROUGH THE FOG,
YOUR SONS AND DAUGHTERS.

Book club and breakfast

The aftermath of last night's monthly book club.

This month, our choice was 'Room' by Emma Donoghue and we all agreed it was an excellent read, and we scored it highly. It was the first book group in my new house (whoever chooses the book hosts the meeting) and it was really cosy with all my lamps and candles on while the rain poured down outside.

Then, this morning, I met my friends for our weekly Wednesday before work breakfast.

We meet in a local cafe, the market traders set up outside and come in for their teas and breakfasts while we chat and get ready for the day.

I look forward to it all week.

Birthday Weekend

This weekend I have two birthdays to celebrate:
The first is tonight, my friend is having birthday drinks, then tomorrow morning off to visit my sister for her birthday celebrations.
We will be: visiting a vintage warehouse, spending lots of time in Starbucks (my favourite place) planning our forthcoming holiday- and then on Sunday, browsing a large shopping mall to get clothes for our trip. We will also fit in a meal with my mum, a barbeque with my dad and a cinema trip. We are going to be busy- I can't wait.

Home time

I love my home. I love getting home, making home, being home.
For a long time, I felt like I would best suit a transient lifestyle, never knowing where the wind would blow me, moving on whenever I got bored, being carefree and hectic, changing in public toilets (I blame 'Desperately Seeking Susan'- I was absolutely DESPERATE to carry my few items of clothing in a vintage hatbox, and emerge from the public bathrooms looking all eighties perm and lace glove-y)

But nothing beats for me now, the feeling of being home, of pottering, reorganising cupboards, cleaning, tidying, weeding the garden and keeping the kettle boiled for visitors.
It's heaven.

Lessons learned from movie marathons

This weekend was practically perfect in every way.
It involved these:

and a lot of cups of tea and four terrible low budget scary films.

Now, I LOVE scary films and my recent scare-a-thon has taught me some valuable life lessons.

1. If I am in the bathroom and I opened the mirrored cabinet above the sink, I will turn and look behind myself first before I shut the door again.

2. If I ever move into a new neighbourhood where everyone is very nice, I will take it as read they are part of a sinister cult and simply move straight out again.

3. If my lights inexplicably go out, I will go to a hotel until the morning when I will return with a very big light to go and turn the fuse back on.

4. If I hear a noise and then discover my cat trapped somewhere I will not be relieved and think that the noise was just the cat. IT NEVER IS.

5. Before moving into a new place, I will always spend the afternoon at my local library wearing glasses and doing a 'looking through the microfiche' montage to establish history of fires murders/ site of ancient mental institution / indian burial ground- this will save me time later.