that was the week that was

This week I did a spot of poll-clerking at a local polling station.  When I say 'a spot of', what I actually mean is that I was stuck in the same room with two complete strangers for 15 hours handing out ballot papers for the Police and Crime Commissioners election.  Yawn.  It is a very, very, very, very, very long day.  I ate lots of food, drank lots of caffeine and focused very hard on the dosh I would get paid for such tedium.  It isn't megabucks, but in terms of being paid to sit on my arse all day, it's pretty damn fine.

The book which I downloaded onto my kindle the night before hadn't synched.  I have to say that this didn't surprise me one iota, and so was forced to read the books I already have loaded on there.  These include the Works Of Dickens, Pride And Prejudice and the Holy Bible.  Because they were all free.  I got through a couple of chapters of P&P, but find it quite spoilt by the images and shrill tones of Alison Steadman as Mrs Bennet floating around stubbornly inside my head.  I can certainly see the merit in having read books before the power of TV/film restrict your own imagination.  To this end I am happy to have read all the Harry Potter stories before they came out as films, and sad that I didn't read the Twilight saga before devouring the DVDs. 

I also cracked on with the Navajo ripple.  There has been much debate about the inclusion of white in this colour scheme (well, between me and my SiL anyway) and Wednesday saw me taking a panicked 15 mile round trip to buy said ball of white before my sentence at the polling station on Thursday.  I am extremely unsure about this bloody white.  In fact, I have never been so inclined to frog back a blanket in my life - it really looks wrong to me, but my polling sidekicks (both blokes who clearly regarded me as some sort of woollen oddity) said the white was fine, and in fact, one said as I draped it across the polling booths for maximum effect, 'those colours are very North American Indian aren't they?' I could have kissed him. 

So, I am still unsure.  Oliver said it's fine, and past history has shown his colour choices to be more on the ball than my own, so it stays.  For now. 

What do you think?

Today I made my Christmas cake.  I have deviated from my normal recipe, and gone with Queen Mary Berry's cake, largely because I saw it on someone else's blog and I am easily internet-influenced.  What swung it for me though was the tin preparation.  I hate pissing around with tin prep, and this one seemed a tad easier because there was no fiddling and farting with reams of brown paper on the outside as well as lining the inside as I normally do.  I had a bit of a moment after it went in the oven when I came across two carefully cut out parchment squares lying on the kitchen worktop.  Cripes!  Did I line the base of the tin??!! 

 

After some bad swear words and deep breathing, I managed to convince myself that I did base-line the tin, and that all will be well.  Guess I'll find out in nearly FIVE hours.  It's been in four hours now and I can barely smell it cooking because it's on such a low temperature.  It would probably cook just as fast if I shone a bloody torch at it for the same length of time.

After this drama, I took a sulky stomp down the garden to clear it of leaves:

What a grim job this turned out to be.  I have blogged my garden antipathy before, but really, some of these annual shitty jobs don't even register on my radar.  I only went out to do it because Mark hinted that it needed to be done and I felt duty-bound.  It was cold outside and I had a headache when I started.  All that physical raking and wheelbarrowing manky leaves and apples around didn't help.  The two paracetamol and litre of water I drank halfway through seemed to though.  Ha ha.

Ta da indeed.

Oh, and yesterday I took Oliver to see Breaking Dawn part 2.  I have to say, it was, in my opinion, rather entertaining and most excellent.  It is the first one of the whole saga I have seen at the cinema.  In fact, I only got wind of the whole Twilight thing because my niece badgered my to watch the first one on DVD.  I put in on one day because I wanted some background while I was scrapbooking, and it was great - bit different, and interesting.   It reminds me of my Harry Potter introduction - I was not one bit interested in it at all, but my stepson had The Prisoner Of Azkaban for school reading and kept on at me to read it. I reluctantly started it one evening in the bath, and hey presto, I was off to Waterstones the very next day.  I am, I am realising, startlingly open to persuasion. 

 

 

This is one persistent moggy.