I'm really sorry...

...but there's not going to be a Grouse and Partridge story this Christmas!

I tried.  I really did.  I had quite a good idea and I was desperate to write it.  But time has been my enemy: I'm weighted down with work from uni and work from work and there aren't enough hours in the day to do what I ought to be doing, let alone what I want to.  There've been several casulties in the run up to Christmas but this is the one that hurts me the most.  My Christmas holiday looms but brings with it little prospect of respite: two 4,000 word essays required by January and not a clue how to approach either of them yet.  For the first time this term, I've begun to wonder if the course is worth the effort - and yet the part of the course I most want to do is next term's unit and to give up now would be costly and pointless.

So my characters are languishing in the mirk and cold of my rapidly disintergrating brain, looking mournful and unloved as Christmas approaches because I cannot bring them back to life.  Tonight, I wonder if this is the end of the line for my writing altogether: I think I've been deluding myself since Scotch Pine that I was just between books.  In fact, I think I'm stuck.  I realise I've stopped thinking of myself as someone who writes.  I'm just someone, once again, who used to...

Autumn Days



1907 glass in Sunderland Empire Theatre

It's now eight weeks on and I'm sorry to have kept you in suspense...  I think it is safe to say that the last eight weeks have been some of the hardest of my career so far not because I'm in a difficult school - far from it - but because starting a new job really does feel like starting from scratch again and because I hadn't realised how much damage had been done to my self esteem and self confidence over the past few years.  I've never worked as hard as I've done this term and although I've really enjoyed it, I am seriously ready for a break next week.  I know I have definitely chosen the best place to teach: my new school does serious cake related activities - in eight weeks there've been three cake related incidents of note and a further one concerning chocolate!!

 

It hasn't all been work: I've embarked on the second year of my MA (and am already seriously behind with the work!), there's been a wonderful trip to London to meet up with a very special friend briefly over from the States, a birthday (number now censored because it's starting to be scary!), a joyous three days of ballet last week when the 'team' came back to town ( and where the sun on Saturday was so glorious I was able to take this photo!) and last night a most surreal visit to Durham Cathedral, of all places, to hear Ian Rankin and PD James in discussion: I say hear because we couldn't really see either of them from where we were!!  Thick, mysterious fog engulfed us as we came out and walked down into town - Durham at night is so evocative!

 

Grouse and Partridge have taken on a life of their own on the internet, selling a very respectable number of copies across September and October, and the fabulous review of Scotch Mist FelePain posted in August has now been joined by an equally glowing review of Scotch Broth.  Kindle has been a revelation and I finally received my first payment from them at the beginning of September for £19!  More than I've had from Lulu over the years!!

 

And the new book?  Lies in piles of scribbled paper I'm afraid - it's not that I don't want to write it, it's just finding the brain-space to do so. I feel a responsibility to the characters and their readers.  But at the moment, I just don't know when I'm going to be able to take up the challenge again and allow myself the chance to write anything else.  Last night just brought it home: if you call yourself a writer, you should at least be trying to write, shouldn't you?

 

September already...

As we've reached the end of the month, I thought I'd do a bit of statistic crunching.  According to Amazon, 28 copies have been sold across all titles in August, which is an amazing 60% increase on July's sales!  The power of a positive review knows no bounds!

Today is the last day of my holidays.  Tomorrow I start a brand new job and hopefully a brand new lifestyle will accompany it!  I'm certainly going to have a lot more time to myself which has to be an enormous bonus.

It's been a lovely holiday: it has flown past but it's brought lots of good things with it and I'm starting tomorrow in a more positive frame of mind than I've started an autumn term for a very long time.  Fingers crossed...

My hundredth post!

Amazing!  I've been blogging for 100 posts!  How time flies!  I can't imagine I've ever had 100 things worth saying, so I must apologise for the rot I've been writing here!  However, since it is my 100th post, I thought I'd better have something worth reporting...

As of this morning, all the Grouse and Partridge Christmas books have been uploaded to Kindle and they should be available at the princely sum of 75p each from tomorrow.  Not that I imagine anyone in their right mind wants to read a Christmas story in August, but I couldn't guarantee I'd have enough time to format them when December comes!  Once they're on the website, I'll add links here.

I don't think there will be a Christmas story this year - although I do have a plot fermenting - largely because of the new job/on-going degree course/full length G&P in progress at the moment.  I know I'm gaining lots of extra time by not commuting, but I will need to eat and sleep as well!

I've spent a lot of time this week mentally furnishing Hamish's wee cottage (found some lovely tweed covered chairs I really adore and since I can't afford them for myself, he might as well have them!!!) and sorting out old files and computer discs.  In the process I came across several parts of chapters from Scotch Mist which didn't make it into the final cut - maybe one day I'll do an 'unabridged' version!

The new book has reached 12,000 words and is, so far, being interesting and reasonably easy to write: just wish I could stretch out the last of the summer to the 20 000 mark - I'd feel happier about it if I could!

Best cake : In Whitby last week so had to have some Yorkshire Brack (a kind of sticky tea loaf!) from Elizabeth Botham's bakery in Skinner Street.  Gorgeous with butter and a cup of their tearoom blend coffee.  She does mail order too... YUM!

Grouse and Partridge Country part 2 :The Naming of Parts

Where exactly are we??

When I first started writing the Grouse and Partridge stories, I didn't really put much thought into where they would be set and it never occurred to set them in a  real place, because the things I was describing were so far fetched.  I was hardly setting out to write a ground-breaking police proceedural - I just wanted to have some fun with genre cliches!

This has actually been really useful over the years because it has enabled me to change and shape Murkshire as I've gone along.   As I've needed places for the stories I've invented them - Murkhaven, Murkbury... a bit like 'Midsummer' in 'Midsummer Murders' - all you need to add is the ending!!  Slowly I've build up a sort of county map in my head although it probably makes no geographical sense at all. Murkton itself is a probably a bit like Hull, where I lived for three years, mixed with parts of Birmingham.



Nuff said!!

With the new book, however, I hit a dilemma.  It's got to be based in Scotland because that's where Hamish is living.  I'd always been coy about naming his 'wee glen' except to say its in The Trossachs (and to be honest, I picked the Trossachs because it sounded vaguely rude!  I didn't realise until I went there that it is so lovely!!!)   Not that I was expected hoards of G&P fans to descend on some little hamlet I'd accidentally named, you understand, but I just felt I didn't need to be that specific when it would only concern one or two scenes.

In 'Scotch Pine' I wanted to name Killin and the Falls of Dochart because of the MacNab connection and I really tried to make it as close to reality as I could get.  At the end of that book I mention Hamish working in Callendar for part of the week, simply because I'd found the police station there and it looked just right for him, but I didn't want him to have to live in a real place all the time.  (I don't, so why should he?)

So, this summer, I am creating my very own Scottish Glen.  Armed with Ordinance Survey maps, I've taken the best bits of all the glens and lochs round the area and hopefully created an arena for my characters to explore. It is somewhere on the fringes of the Trossachs, surrounded by romantic hills, it has a large loch with three settlements on its shores of varying sizes, the largest being a bit of a tourist centre for walkers, sailers and the like.  There's  neolithic standing stones nearby and the remains of a Roman fort, a bit of a deserted castle along the road, some forestry, waterfalls... you get the picture!!  It's all very lovely!

But - what to call it?  Well, Murkton was easy: I just wanted somewhere that sounded bland, boring and a bit dull. ( And I'd always liked 'Mirkwood' in The Hobbit).  However, Scottish places have fabulous sounding names with silent letters and lovely Gaelic suffixes and prefixes.  I thought about just making something up by shoving bits of names together - like Auchterauderpittenmuchty - but nothing really worked on paper.

Browsing the books in the Edinburgh Book Festival Tent last week, however, I came across a rather lovely book which demystifies Scottish Place Names and has a really useful list of said prefixes and suffixes.  On my return, I found and downloaded a 19th century book on the same subject which goes into it all in some detail and is really fascinating.  Armed with these and my trusty Scots dictionary I'm inching towards naming all the places on my rather sketchy map.  And funnily enough, it's much easier to write about them when I've named them!

Watch this space for further developments...!




One of my photos - Loch Lomond I think..

WOW!

A  whirlwind 14 hour trip to Edinburgh for the Book Festival today, the highlight of which was Ian Rankin reading, for the first time ever, from his BRAND NEW REBUS NOVEL which doesn't come out till November! AMAZING!!!!

Didn't even mind when the sunshine turned to 'biblical' rain and we got soaked on route to the pub afterwards!  Home now, tired but too wired to sleep! Suspect I may have over done the caffine and the book purchasing in equal measure!

Is it Gloria's Twelfth or her Thirteenth?

Like the Ides of March and Julius Caesar, Grouse has a rather superstitious dislike of the so-called 'Glorious Twelfth' - the day the grouse shooting season begins.  This year, however, it falls not on the 12th of  August but the 13th (unlucky for the grouse!) because the 12th is a Sunday. 

Personally, I prefer my grouse alive and clucking, my Grouse riding on a vintage Bonnie and my 'Famous Grouse'  in a glass with some ginger ale and just a splash of water. 'Gloria's Twelfth' is, of course, Hamish.  Her thirteenth (unlucky for both of them!) is Allan...

Have returned from holiday with several nasty insect bites, with sunburned ears, even more more new books and the desire to make a Suffolk inspired patchwork cushion.  I've been today and bought the fabric and am starting to draw out the pattern.  The new novel has grown a bit too! 

Best cake on holiday?  Well we bought rather a nice fruit one in the Budgens supermarket in Woodbridge and another rather nice Toffee and Fudge one at Snape Maltings.  But my favourite - for ambience, hugeness of portion and quality of accompanying tea, has to be the Victoria Sponge in the National Trust tea shop at Flatford.  Constable views and mischevious ducks just completed the experience!

Heading North again...

in my imagination, at least.  I've been on holiday for two weeks already: not sure where they've gone to be honest, but they have been surprisingly fruitful.  Thanks to Google I've been doing a little light research in the wee small hours to fill in a little more background about the post Hamish took at the end of Scotch Pine and the kinds of jobs he's finding himself doing.  I'm slowly building up an image of the places around the wee cottage on the loch and, if I'm honest,  I'm getting really rather excited. 

There are 4,000 words of a new novel - about a chapter's worth - on my lap top at the moment and although I'm not quite sure as yet where they are going, they are definitely going somewhere.

The three years since Scotch Pine have brought a few changes to the lives of the characters - some of which have taken me by surprise already - and it's taken a little bit of manipulation to get everyone back together again but all the usual suspects will be there. 

I'm heading away on holiday soon, which is always a good writing space for me, and I've got several scenes that I want to put down while I'm away.  I'm not going North, however, but South, so the google images I've saved into a folder will  inspire me, I'm sure!!  And in mid August I have my (almost!) annual audience with the great Ian Rankin in Edinburgh - only stopping in the city for ten hours so that'll have to be enough to get a Scottish fix this year!

What happened yesterday???

I've checked my Amazon stats a couple of times a week since I 'Kindled' G&P.  I glanced on Friday and saw that nothing had changed: the same 6 copies were listed as sold on Amazon.co.uk and none elsewhere.   Yesterday I didn't come on line at all, so this afternoon, just before I logged off, I thought I'd just have a quick look - good job I did! To my amazement,  I sold 9 books yesterday across the whole range of titles! 

And then, to add to the excitement, the wonderful  'felepain'  left a review which is quite simply sensational!!! 

I feel so proud at having disrupted at least one reader's housework!!!  Thank you so much!

Almost there...

Summer holidays start tomorrow and I say goodbye to the place where I've worked for 19 years and where Grouse and Partridge were actually born, in an English exam, sitting next to a fidgety Year 9 pupil who needed constant supervision.  I was bored, I decided to attempt the writing task... and all these years later, I'm still writing about them!  It'll be a day of very mixed emotion tomorrow, but I really am excited about September...

Moving on...

 I have begun the great clear out and started finally to throw away some of the rubbish I've accumulated in the last 19 years.  This was one of the piles of boxes which went out for recycling from my classroom last week! With only 9 working days left at my old school I'm frantically trying to write goodbye notes, wrap retirement presents, clear my room and bring home everything that's mine rather than the school's!  I'm actually quite enjoying the process.  The first of my 'fond fareweels' was on Friday at the house of a friend and former collegue where much wine was drunk and many interesting conversations were persued.  I was really touched by the cards, presents and beautiful flowers I was given (- and delighted that my former head of department's very moving speech in my honour was interupted by a vociferous demand for 'More Grouse and Partridge!' from a friendly heckler!)  I'm not looking forward to the last day of term, however:  there's a bit of a tradition of digging up old stories from the past when people leave our place and I'm a little nervous about what will be unearthed!!!! I'm already looking forward to the new school year and my 'reinvention' for a new location.  What I've seen and heard so far has been enough to make me very excited about what's on the horizon...

The Reluctant Self Publicist strikes again..

I've been giving this self-promotion thing a bit more thought this week for two reasons.  I have a small but perfectly formed following for G&P which is centred around my current place of work and I face the dilemma of how to keep them interested in the 'product' when I'm not there to bombard them with it in person! 
I'm toying with the idea of a twice yearly newsletter - at midsummer and Christmas - to be circulated by email or post.  (Only, my inner critic keeps muttering about me brow-beating my readers into following me.  I can't win!)

The second reason is because I suspect I really need some Amazon reviews and a few 'likes' on the sales pages to persuade people to linger and maybe even purchase.  My readers would be the perfect people to do this.  But I'd have to ask them to do it and that, again, feels like brow-beating!

I think I need a publicity manager!!!!!!

The Reluctant Self-Publicist...

Found myself in the middle of one of those conversations at work today - the ones where really nice people who don't really know about Grouse and Partridge pick up on something somehow and start to ask questions like, 'Oh, do you write?' 'What have you written?' 'Have you been published?'

I know that I should, at that point, swing into rampant self-publishing overdrive and promote my 'product' to within an inch of its life and instead I want to creep into a corner and hide until the subject changes to something else!  I find myself going 'It's only...' 'It was just...' 'It isn't very...' and then I stop talking altogether and everyone thinks I'm really odd!  

All the magazine articles and blog-posts I read tell me this is not the way to build my profile or create a following and that I need to do both of these things if I'm to sell more than a single copy on Kindle this year (and I suspect that may have been bought by a lovely relative!!)  And yet, I cannot do it.

It's not that I'm ashamed of G & P - far from it.  It's not that I don't want people to read it - I do!  Yet I cannot get past the fact that it feels a bit like bad manners to go on and on about my own books in the way I would happily do about someone else's! So worried am I that I will be considered a self centred bore that I dismiss it  all as something trivial, even though I consider that asserting my 'right to write' is one of the more important things I've ever done!  I'm terrified that people will feel the need to buy it out of duty, because they know me.  Or worse still, feel they have to be nice about it once they've read it!

This afternoon, the awkward moment passed, the conversation moved on and I was left realising the bitter truth:  I may be cut out to write the stuff but I sure as hell ain't cut out for selling it!

Can I be a Scot by inclination? Please?

To be eligible to submit writing to New Writing Scotland you need to be a writer 'resident in Scotland or Scots by birth, upbringing or inclination'.
I love the idea of the last category!  What other nation would welcome you to their fold just because you felt you wanted to be one of them?  It reminded me of the National Trust for Scotland doorman in Glasgow who, when he heard where we were from, said 'Och, weel, we used to come down and raid your bit of the country all the time so you're honorary Scots really.' 

http://www.arts.gla.ac.uk/scotlit/asls/NewWriting.html

Digital Mist update

I've just tweaked the Kindle version of Scotch Mist a little to include the rewriting of the first two chapters which I did a couple of years ago.  Basically, I always felt the opening wasn't up to scratch - it didn't really set the tone for the rest of the story - and although most readers won't notice the very subtle changes I made, I still wanted it to be the best I could make it.  It should be available on the amazon site by Sunday.  Feel much happier about it now its been sorted!!

Busy week...!

SUNDAY:  Just checked: it's there and ready to be read!!!

Grouse and Partridge Country part 1

I love being on holiday.  And being on holiday when it is raining like the second flood means there's no requirement to go outside!  So as well as overhauling this blog  this week, I've been tinkering with Pinterest.  It has to be the biggest time-swallower known to creation, but it is strangely addictive and I've really enjoyed pulling together my 'Mist Broth and Pine' mood board!  I'll be adding some of the photos I've collected over the years of writing about G & P in the next few weeks.  Of course it's a work avoidance tactic: my 'office' front room looks like a disaster zone, strewn as it is with 20 years worth of teaching materials I've now started bringing home from work!  This was supposed to be the week I made a start on clearing it all away...  But I've been far too busy playing with the internet!

Looking through the photos I realised I'm really missing Scotland.  It's six years since I was last there on holiday, which is where most of the photos came from.  I was very aware that we were touring 'Grouse and Partridge' country and the innovation of a brand new digital camera meant that I photographed anything and everything I thought might be useful as a memory-jogger.  So I thought I'd share some of them here as well as on Pinterest - kind of a 'virtual tour'!

I thought we'd start with Hamish's 'home' village: the place where Nancy and Bessie ran the tea shop. When we arrived in Luss on the banks of Loch Lomond I knew it was the place I'd been describing. I could imagine the Bonnie bumping down these roads with Partridge waving from the side car!

The gate of the church in Luss  eventually appeared as the wee village church at the end of Scotch Pine.  I liked the shadows on the wall and the shade - it was actually a really sunny day when I took this, very warm and summery.  We'd just had tea (and cake!) in a coffee shop which was very much the way I'd imagined The Pear Tree Cottage tea rooms, complete with (very tasteful!) tartan crockery.   

This is the view looking back up into the village from  Loch Lomond and the church graveyard (where Bessie is buried) is below: you can see the Loch clearly at the back and the hills beyond it.  What a spot for a final resting place! 

It's a very small village and yet within ten minutes of arriving, I'd bumped into someone I work with -   It's that sort of place. 

Just a passing thought...

If a journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step, a book of 140 000 words may well start with a single sentence...

Why has something this OBVIOUS only just occured to me now??

(We've had a bit of a face lift to mark the relaunch too - hope it is to everyone's taste!)

Forget my feeble efforts - this is the real thing!!!

Big announcement from Orion books about ten minutes ago!http://www.ianrankin.net/pages/content/index.asp?PageID=180

I have just let out a whoop of joy and fallen off the sofa in excitement!!!  Can I wait till November????  This is just the BEST news of the year!

Welcome back, Rebus!  I've really missed you!

Broth and Pine go Digital too!

Never let it be said that I wasted the long Diamond Jubilee weekend! Scotch Broth has joined Scotch Mist as an Amazon Kindle book and Scotch Pine  should be available within the next few hours!  I am really excited by this.  I'm also terrified that I'll have done something incredibly stupid and they'll come out all mangled and horrible!  If you are a fan and you want to leave an Amazon review, it would be gratefully received, by the way!

I've now spent the best part of three days on my laptop - time to give it a bit of a rest, I think!!

Mist goes Digital!

STOP PRESS!!!!!

'Scotch Mist' has just gone digital! 
I've just finished uploading it to Amazon - it's Kindled and ready to set the publishing world on fire! 
Well, maybe not the last bit, but certainly the first bit! 
Please spread the news!  Tell everyone you know! 
Grouse and Partridge should be available to buy from Amazon in less than 12 hours...!  Woooo hoooo!!!!

Right.  Now I've calmed down, I'd better get started on 'Broth' and 'Pine'!

The good news is...

I've been sitting on this news for over six weeks now and it's become a really badly kept secret, but I think I'm ready to face the world with it at last.  After 19 years in the same job I'm moving on to pastures new, to a brand new post in a not so brand new place - the school where I was taught from the ages of 11 to 18. 

Lots of people I know have asked me why I'm going and my answer is a simple one.  At the moment I commute upwards of 3 hours a day - walk, bus, train, long walk, work, lift to station, train, bus, walk. I am spending 35 days per year on public transport just getting to and from work.  Instead, I'm swapping for a ten minute door-to-door stroll there and another one back again.

I'll be sad to leave somewhere where I've been so happy - the place which was responsible for Grouse and Partridge existing in any form at all and which encouraged me so much when I started to write 'for real'. But I'm more than ready for the next adventure - and the fact that I'm gaining some 'me' time will be a huge bonus.  And I really won't miss the cold, decrepit and dirty trains, the delays and cancellations, the cable thefts, the germ ridden atmosphere, the horrid railway 'station' (and I use the word advisedly!) and the hours wasted hanging round Costa coffee till it's time to go home.

I've got half a term left to work: it's going to be strange.  But I really couldn't be happier about it!

I feel more creative already!  Cheers!

The wait is over...

And no news was very very good news after all.  Shows how much I know!!! 

Just waiting

I've been waiting all day, on and off, since I got out of bed and now it'll late at night and I'm waiting again and it is driving me mad.  What makes it worse is the fact that there is not much chance of anything happening for days yet: thewaiting game has only just begun. And although I know I cannot change the outcome of anything by waiting, irrationally I feel as if the longer I wait the less likely I am to hear good news and the more likely I am to get bad news: as if it is my mindset which is determining the nature of the news! 

I left a situation this afternoon feeling really almost positive.  Now, five hours on, I am as negative as I can be ( and, goodness knows, that's negative!) And yet nothing has changed except my state of mind... 

They say no news is good news.  Shows how much they know...

Some enchanted evening

My half-term break was most welcome: lots of uni work sorted out, a lovely coffee-and-stroll-catch up day, my kitchen chairs finally painted and a brilliant trip to London to see Les Miserables (again!) and the Dickens exhibition at the Museum of London.  Then, finally, on Sunday, we went through to Newcastle for the birthday celebrations of the Theatre Royal, which is probably just about my favourite theatre in the world after Sunderland Empire!  It was at the Theatre Royal that I first saw ballet and fell in love with William Shakespeare and the RSC - which quite literally, changed my life. I've met Charlton Heston, Richard Todd, Christopher Gable, Charles Dance, Michael Gambon and Jack Lemon at its stage door and once, covered in embarrassement, presented a rather sad-looking bunch of carnations there to a dancer I adored. (I was 15, he was kind and gracious - and now he's no longer alive, it's a memory I cherish!).
It's a jewel of a theatre and the recent renovations are simply stunning.
Anyway, this month marks its 175th birthday and so the Grand Old Lady of Grey Street (as she is sometimes affectionately called!) decided to have a party - a party which stretched  down the classically beautiful length of Grey Street, involved some spectacular street theatre (especially the dance elements!) and the whole neoclassical facade being turned into a light and sound spectacular, complete with fireworks set off from the roof!  Given that the whole place went up in flames  in 1900, this was a particularly brave thing to do...

It was a freezing cold evening, but the atmosphere was electric: like Christmas and Bonfire Night rolled into one.  The crowds were enthusiastic and the birthday cake (yes- we all got birthday cake!) was delicious.  We left with smiles on our faces and a warm, happy glow in our hearts! 
Happy Birthday, your Royal Highness, and may you have many, many more!

Another one bites the dust...

http://www.journallive.co.uk/north-east-news/todays-news/2012/02/11/iconic-morpeth-bookstore-appleby-s-to-close-after-roadworks-cause-major-slump-in-trade-61634-30308368/

I love this bookshop.  It's independent.  It's quirky.  It's a little bit old fashioned. 
And it's closing forever...

That's another loss to add to that of Borders, Waterstones in the Metro Centre, The Book Inn in Billingham.

What's the difference between a dodo and a bookshop? Not an awful lot these days..

I went into Waterstones in Newcastle today - about half the floor space of the old shop - and tried with no success at all to buy a book which was published to some acclaim in September.  So I've resorted to Amazon. *

Amazon, reputedly, are considering opening high street shops.  If they do, I suspect it'll be the first nail in their coffin.  But we're desperate for GOOD bookshops so if they think they can make a go of it, then I wish them well.  In the meantime, the purchasing of books from places like Appleby's is becoming a rare treat, not the norm.  A sad day for Morpeth.  A very sad day for me!

*POSTSCRIPT:  Have since bought the Kindle version for £1.49 as opposed to £8.99 for the pb...!

Where did my weekend go?



Mary's philosophy on a WW2 propaganda poster courtesy of the keep calm o matic website!

It's late Sunday night.  I've spent eight hours today writing an essay for my course... and then I scrapped it.  It needs to be submitted on Wednesday and I'm not sure how I'm going to manage to do it, to be honest, but it just wasn't good enough to hand in.  I'm beginning to have serious doubts about whether doing this course was a good idea: I think I've probably bitten off more than I can chew.  I love the reading and the research but I haven't got the time to do it properly. My confidence has been badly knocked by the last assessment and I'm starting to think I'm just not cut out for this after all.  Perhaps it would be better to walk away and just let it be.  I'm commited to the end of the academic year, but come September, I may be better to just walk away from it, cut my losses and admit I wasn't up to it after all.  Maybe if work was different, maybe if I had more time and energy, maybe if I'd done it a few years ago things would have been different.  Or maybe not.  Who knows.  As it is, I suspect this will be another 'something else I've almost done right, but not quite'!  Story of my life!!  Still, the kitchen is almost finished and it is looking good.  I should be grateful for small bonuses!

On the ninth day of Christmas...

...someone decided, Scroogily, to spoil the fun and send me back to work!  The tree is still fabulously green, the mince pies are still fabulously mince pie-y and the last place I want to be tomorrow is on the train heading for work!  I'm not ready to give up on Christmas.  Just a reminder: you've got till midnight on Friday to access the Christmas stories and then the whole lot go back in their box for another year along with the Christmas decorations!  Best cake?  My sister in law's Christmas cake.  She'll even give you the recipe! Click here for  Jen's cake!

Ring out the old, ring in the new..

It's early New Year's Day and I'm drinking a final cup of tea before I head off to bed.  I probably should be washing up the stuff from tonight's supper but I can't face it without sleep so instead, I'm burning the midnight oil.  I'm usually quite emotional on New Year's Eve but I saw 2011 out dry-eyed. I'm not sad to see it go, although it's not been a bad year - far from it - but given my propensity to dwell on the things that haven't been glowing, I suppose I was only thinking of the less pleasant changes it has heralded.  This doesn't really do 2011 full justice, so I decided to give some awards for 'bests'.  This is what I came up with:

BEST BOOK READ:   The Seville Communion by Arturo Perez-Reverte - fabulous to the very last line.
BEST FILM:  The King's Speech - especially Helena Bonham Carter's performance.
BEST SONG: The night will always win by Elbow - just as moving live.
BEST THEATRE MOMENT: the final night of Love Never Dies in London - all the stops pulled out and then some!
BEST BALLET MOMENT: Camina Burana in Birmingham in June - electric!
BEST TV MOMENT: that punch in Downton Abbey on Christmas Day! - about time too!
BEST SILLY MOMENT: being part of the crowd outside the Adelphi Theatre stage door on the last night of LND who blocked the road in Maiden Lane and forced a taxi to turn back!! Surreal!
MOST EMOTIONAL MOMENT:standing across the river from the new Royal Shakespeare Theatre and feeling I'd come home again and had begun to reconnect with the person I used to be.
BEST PURCHASE: My Kindle! No competition...
BEST CAKE: from Totnes - yum!
BEST NIGHT'S SLEEP: Jury's Inn, Birmingham - every time!
BEST PLACE(S) VISITED: tie between Greenway and Coleton Fishacre in Devon - and Devon itself.
BEST CONCERT(S): tie between Adam Ant - only 30 years late and Cleo Laine - inspirational.
BEST DECISION: Applying for the MA course (might need reminding of that during this year!)
BEST DISCOVERY: Brindley Place and the Jewellery Quarter in Birmingham - unique!
BEST MOMENT: Interviewing Robert Parker of BRB for the Friends group at Durham - absolutely priceless!

Not a bad old year, really!  And Neil Gaiman has set me right for 2012 already.  I love his New Year message so much, it is going to be my mantra for the year. http://journal.neilgaiman.com/ He's a genius!

Happy New Year!