Bum, bum, bum, absolute bum.....

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.....me wordies are stuck in the pipe. Sorry Jack, I'm just not burning enough today!

Dear me

This letter is written to my thirteen-year-old self. Thank you Marie for the inspiration.

Dear Kate,
I suppose I should start by saying that the tragically, romantic death that you thought you were going to have at fourteen obviously didn't happen, although you only just made it. This era was perfect for you - punk and the new romantics fed your gothically challenged wardrobe and the effects can still be detected today.

The move to Cornwall next year is every bit as bad as you think it is going to be.You will stop crying (eventually) but just to let you know that your boyfriend didn't cry for very long and was having his wicked way with that tart up the road in under two weeks. Dad never forgave himself from dragging you away and it might be prudent to let him know before his last few weeks on earth that it really didn't matter and that Cornwall got into your blood quicker than he thought.

I suppose I could warn you off a lot of things (your sister will pay you back for stealing her platforms) but like your eldest Fecker, you always have to learn things by taking the long way round. You will have your first cigarette this year, an illicit Silk Cut with your best friend in the park. Unfortunately the cigarettes lasted longer than she did although you still keep in touch today even though you are continents apart.
I could maybe warn you off more illegal substances but your 'try before you die' theory seemed to lead to quite an interesting period in your late teens.

That foul maths teacher was wrong. You are quite good at figures but it will take you another thirty years to believe it, but please give up on the piano now as you really weren't very good. Strangely enough you will remain attached to that netball skirt you wore at school - you are more sporty than you look. Speaking of looks, you will grow into that weird face (at about 30), and yes, you're chest does get a bit bigger but your hair gets worse (stop crying).

Oh, and you know those funny scribblings that you have started to do, well....

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pee ess - I tag every single one of you

Smiling piggliness

I'll smile quietly if you stub yer toe and I'll smirk at a stupid picture. I will snort at a witty comment, and titter at a good joke but I laugh loud, long and messily at smart words and banter.

Can humour be boxed? Can we define what makes us fall off our chairs? What tickles my giggle spot might not tickle yours.
Humour does differ from culture to culture and the English humour, based mostly on 'taking the piss', sarcasm and irony, do not translate so well elsewhere. I have upset a few people!

For me there is nothing better than a dry sense of humour, real life observation delivered with a deadpan expression (Eddie Izzard and Dara O' Briain are my favs). Some would call it rudeness but it is often a throwaway comment from a friend that will leave me with tears of joy rolling down me leg.

The Gin Co-operative, my lifelong girls (see HERE or HERE) are experts. Our Saturday afternoon soirées leave me with ribs that feel as if they have been kicked by a donkey with lead hooves. They can turn a sensible conversation into half an hour of being unable to utter a word because your lungs don't work anymore.
What a great feeling and so good for the soul.

If the picture above does not tempt the corners of your mouth up then pass on to another blog. If you are smiling then please share and drop a smirk in me box!

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In pockets

There is always the sweet you didn’t like,

covered in tissuey down.

A back door key from another house,

the button that let you down.

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A Kirby pin that lost its grip.

The quietly perished elastic band,

a mobile number (God knows who)

and at least a thimble full of sand.

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The once favoured lighter, flintless fool.

A screw of ebullient fluff,

the receipt for shoes you could not wear,

and other long lost pocketry stuff.

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Rummage deep in a human pouch,

to seek that illicit, midnight smoke

finding the find that wouldn’t be found

and the things that lived in last year’s coat.

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Smokin'

You look tired.
I think you should treat yourself to a weekend away.
London would be good.
Around the end of February sounds about right for you.

I therefore prescribe a lovely, lazy Sunday afternoon of storytelling, poetry and good music. Not only will you get to meet some gorgeous bloggers but you will also get to hear them doing their thing at...

Pipe and Slippers

This event will be especially good for your health and what more could you want? A theatre pub in south London, tea, beer and top entertainment from your own lovely bloggers....

John Ahearn and Barbara Smith

Barbara will be flying in from Ireland to read from 'Kairos' .
Dubbed the 'distinctive new voice of Irish poetry'. Barbara's style lets the 'ordinary and the fabulous sit side by side'.

John will be swimming over from America, reading and launching his fabulous new book - 'Pomes, Older and younger'.
John's first collection is an overwhelming delight from a craftsman of perfected simplicity.

So make a date to be in exactly this position on....

Sunday 24th February
3pm - 6pm

The Ivy House Pub
40 Stuart Road
London
SE15 3BE

(for more details click on Pipe and Slippers)

Oh, and me and The Alper will be there as well.


pee ess - and in the meantime you may want to check this out

The Pygmy Giant

where there is a small piece of my own thievery up (19th Jan)

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Bloggernomics

As I very often have the attention span of a fly on speed I probably should have stopped blogging by now. I have certainly surprised myself - there is nothing else that I do in my life with any regularity but after 21 months I still check my blog first thing every morning.
Statistics say that there are now over 70 million blogs worldwide so why am I bothering?
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Pigheadedness started me off. A writing tutor scoffed at starting a blog, saying that I would never get anywhere with my writing on the interweb (lady eat your socks!).
I gave myself 3 months, plunged myself into the anonymity of Minx and tentatively dipped my toe in.
At first there were very few visitors but after discovering the joys of a stat counter I realised that there were more than I thought. You come from all over the world, some of you have stayed and others have drifted off to pastures new. Some of you leave comments but there are others who slip in quietly every single day and just leave behind the trace of your ISP footprint.
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Some of you are googling some very weird stuff and come up with my blog - these are from the last two days...

maxi minx sex
once upon a mattress
minx point catkin
why do gnats fly in a circle
inches hair gone
string vest on beach

Most of you are my lovely fellow bloggers and you're all mad, but who is madder?
You're here, and apparently so am I - blogging every few days, rattling on about nothing at all and telling you a load of old codswallop. Am I performing a service or just screaming into the void? Is it the decor, the ambiance, or the smell of freshly ground coffee that brings you back or are you just trying to avoid cleaning out the garage or doing the dishes (I am)?
Oh shit, maybe I should stop trying to analyse it.

Anyway, while you are here, my lovely visitor, pull up a comfy cushion, tell me all about your blogging habits and together we will blog in style until we lose interest and go off to do something more interesting!
.pee ess - To the person googling 'paper thingy for you ladies so you could pee like a bloke' - I think there are men in little white coats who can help you.

Minxles

Someone commented yesterday that I don't look my age. Given that most people in polite society are hardly likely to say "My God, Kate, you look like a hag", I took very little notice, but being a shallow sort of person I grabbed a mirror a little later and peered at my 'now only five years years to fifty' face. I don't look much different than I did last Friday. Hmm.
But would it matter if I did? Would they like me/loathe me anymore than they do already? Do I judge a person by the life that shows on their face? I hope not.

On the whole the body is a very clever machine but I haven't figured out why my hair started to lose its colour at 16, or why it now feels the need to start sprouting body hair in some very astounding places (thank you Debi for reminding me). These are not the fine body hair of youth but some mean, wiry buggers who seem valiantly intent on trying to keep my aging body warm all by themselves. No amount of lotions or potions will keep them dead.

Recently a friend had a boob job. We all (because you can't help it) gathered around and admired their new found perky upstandiness. "I love them." she declared "They make me feel younger". There were a lot of quips about 'the woman you feel' but it got me thinking to what lengths would I go to hang onto a body that has decided to migrate south?

The answer was not very far. Filling my face with poison or stuffing myself with foreign objects does not appeal and having a tummy tuck always seems a bit like pulling a wrinkly pair of stockings up - eventually they fall down again.
Life and my children gave me this body and I am a strong believer that what is on the inside shows on the outside.
Anyway, I am still looking fab in me bikini....


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Because it's my birthday

Yes, it's that time of yearly pause and reflection where we calculate the numbers, have a gawp at the latest addition to our faces and move on swiftly before anyone actually asks us exactly which century we were born in.

I loves me birthday. Never one to shy away from a celebration I am happy to acknowledge 45 years earthside and eat all the cake before anyone else gets their hands on it. I wasn't always caught at my best....

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(I was a bit of a miserable witch when I was young
- not surprising with those lardy thighs!)

(Hanging on to those sturdy thighs in '66, and about to clump me

sister for wearing a lampshade on her head.)

(Looking older in 2008? No, just more gormless!)

Congratulations for surviving this long and presents of great worth will be gratefully received in me comments box.

pee ess - please stop 'poking' me on Facebook - I am too old to be poked now!
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Pantomime time

There is malice aforethought in Castle Blog. The scene opens in the kitchen where various bloggers are cooking a supper of baked beans and chocolate (nothing too complicated).

Prince Debi (running and stamping) - "Help! Help!"

Princess Taffiny - "What is the matter, Prince Debi, I am trying to write a book."

Prince Debi - "The Evil Minx has kidnapped Professor Vapours and taken him to the land of Tellyvision. What shall we do?"

Countess Roberta - "Oh good, can we all go, I've always wanted 40 inches?"

Everyone - No!

Nothingman - "We shall need some magick words, where is Baron Wordcarver?"

Jon the Vacuum - "He says he's got the flu but I think he found the gin and is under the sink."

Babs the Bard - "I sent in Verilion to get him out but she appears to have wandered off."

Prince Debi (slapping booted thigh) - "well get Atyllah the Hen on the case and Handmaid can lend a hand." - ( laughs at own joke).

Atyllah the Hen - "I can't see him, we need some moonlight in here."

Mutley appears with a radio active howler monkey - "The Moon has toppled and is on strike somewhere out there in the onion field. If you squeeze the monkey he will emit enough light to find Baron Wordcarver."

Atyllah the Hen - "I don't think he's in there. Call for the Royal Wizard and Seamus the Wise".

There is a flash and a rather weedy puff of smoke. The Wizard Pundyman appears with John G, a bottle of whiskey in both hands. Seamus the Wise has got waylaid by a bunch of literary lions.

Pundy - "We were in the Publog, what do you want?"

Princess Taff tells them what has happened.

John G - "You don't need a pissed wizard, call the Royal artists, they can draw you a magick blogbus to take you to the land of Tellyvision. Now, can we get back to the Publog, I was telling Pund this joke...."

Meloney Lemon - "Err, they went on a secret mission with Red Dirt Girl."

Soubriquet scrys in the frying pan - "They are buying pointy shoes in Milan. I will get them back."

Another more elaborate flash brings Lucy, Leslie and Loretta back to the castle.

Hoodie - "Nice heels, girls, but we need your artistic skills."

The coven of artists set about painting a huge bus on one of Loretta's massive canvas's. Leslie argues about the need for a fairy or two on the side but soon, with a little Pundy magick and a few illegible words from a gin soaked Baron Wordcarver, a very rickety bus comes to life.

Prince Debi (slapping thigh again) - "right, everyone aboard. Count them in Jan, we don't want to lose anyone."

The Vesper Girls - "I think we already did, someone left the Doors Open and that Japing Ape has made off with Wife in the North."

Prrincess Taffiny - "Never mind them, we are off to liberate Professor Vapours and save him from the evils of Tellyvision and that bloody Minx....."


The scene switches to a very comfortable front room. The Evil Minx and Professor Vapours are sprawled out on the sofa and have just finished watching series 4981 of Scrubs.

Professor Vapours - "Do you think they will try and find us soon? I'd like to watch some of your English soaps next."

The Evil Minx reaches for her crystal ball which has rolled under the sofa. She spits on it, rubs it on her sleeve and peers into it with her one good eye.

Evil Minx - " Wouldn't have thought so, they appear to be on some sort of bus, Prince Debi is navigating and Mutley is driving. They have already taken a wrong turn and are off to Bridport, I shouldn't think they'll be here until sometime next century."

Professor Vapours- "Oh goody, now put the kettle on, we've just got time to watch the whole series of American Idol again."

The Evil Minx crys into her tea - how did her cunning plan go so horribly wrong?




CAST TAKE A BOW

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You buggers....

...you absolute buggers! Dancin' about in my comments box when I was obviously incapacitated.
The fact that my phone line has actually been fixed has put me in a good mood so I will deal with you horrors (you know who you are) at a later date.

Thank you for all the emails asking if I was dead and your concern for my mental well being. I was able to pick up mails at work (shhh) but was filtered out of my blog so I have been cut off from the world since last Monday!

The battle to get anyone to actually come and find out what was wrong took me until Friday. Every time I phoned (20 mins to get through each time) they asked the same standard questions and then informed me that I had a fault on the line. By Thursday I was ready to kill, messily - the helpline is based in India for obvious reasons.
Anyway, a short while ago a little man shinned up the pole outside me house and in five minutes had sticky-taped the wire back to where it should be (Debi, they don't use spit any more). So, I am back and horrified that I have obviously become so dependent on my wires doing what they are supposed to do.

Following on from the last post - I have been a good girl and not watched the monstrous TV thing in the other room too much. Instead I finished two more chapters of Natural Magick (the sequel to Coven of One) and wrote numerous short pieces. Strangely, most of them seem to read like a hit list of internet providers!

Good to be back - let the games commence.....

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Gilt or guilt

I quite like eating so tomorrow morning I once again set my alarm clock to rouse myself to earn another tin of beans for the larder.
I have been employed since I left education, going back to work when the Feckers were both three months old and struggling through the odd times when the MD changed jobs and money was tighter. We are (I hate to say it) an average family. We have an average lifestyle, an average mortgage and two point four average children.
Yesterday a friend popped in.

"Oh my God, is that new?"
I cringed. I wanted to crawl under a stone but not before I had run off a list of excuses for having bought such a thing. I don't need justification for buying a new pair of shoes/earrings etc so why do I feel so bad?
"It's huge." she added.
"I know, I know, don't remind me." I said diverting her attention to some coffee.
"Why did you buy it then if you don't like it? My kids would kill for something like that."

When she had gone I went in and stared at the new thing. The rest of room is quite acceptable in my eyes. There's a trunk we nicked from a skip that holds all the DVD's and video's. The weird thirties cabinet that I bought from a junk shop and lovingly restored and a small table that the junk shop man gave me because it was in pieces (again restored).

I glared at the monster that is now squatting in my living space. Forty inches of high definition televisual entertainment earned with our hard earned average money - so why do I feel so guilty?

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Revolutions

I think that should have been resolutions for 2008, but not being a very resolute character I think I'll go for the revolution. Funny how one letter can change the whole essence of a post - anyway, things to revolt about, or be revolting about in 2008....

I shall revolt about the things that are good for me. This includes exercise. I stumbled onto the shopping channels yesterday. There were orange skinned people doing strange things with nasty looking equipment. I revolt against this. Legs were made for walking and running away from tigers. I live in a modern world - running is unladylike and makes you sweat - ugh!

I shall set up a revolution against the word 'yes'. The word I am looking for is 'no, sorry, can't do that I haven't got enough time'. This includes the ongoing revolt against housework. Dishes will have to done by other members of the tribe and the Feckers will have to fashion small legs for their revolting socks in order to get them to the revolting linen basket.

I shall revolt about the empty spaces in my head. With a head like a sponge but a memory like, umm, that strainy thing with holes in it, I shall endeavour to remember to go to the dentist on the appointed day and not leave friends stranded in coffee shops.

I should be spending more time adding to novelish things so I should also lead a revolt against blogging. It won't work because I am a weak character. Maybe I should revolt about that as well.

Up the revolution for 2008!

pee ess - I am also revolting about my need for chocolate - I am sure I can live without it - hah!

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Happy New Year

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....heh!