Sometimes, photos speak for themselves....

Impulsive Decisions

I've needed to get my hair cut for quite a while now - the last time I had it done was before Christmas, and it was looking pretty shabby. So, I booked myself an appointment at my hairdresser of choice for Saturday, and was all set.

"So, what are you going to get done?", I was asked on Friday.

Like a flash of inspiration, the answer came to me.

"I think I'll go a bit blonder. You know, for summer. And ..... I think I'll get a fringe!"

For the sake of clarification, at this point I should explain that what we in the UK call "a fringe", in Canada we would call "bangs". Just so you don't get confused.

And so, I tell her what I want. But I just say "a fringe". I do not say "a fringe, but longer and kind of side-swepty and not too short, and did I mention not too short?"

Clearly, I should have said that, if that's what I wanted. Because that is not what I have.

I have a fringe. And it's not a sweepy, long, non-fringe, fringe. It's a proper fringe. It's bangs, baby.

Bangs. It's madness, I tell you.

I'm getting used to it though. I think. Oh, impulsive decisions. You're so much fun.

Funnier in my head...

See, I live in the UK, and we do not get the US version of Dancing With The Stars. We have the old school Strictly Come Dancing. And since I don't even watch that, it seems unlikely that I will watch Dancing With The Stars, should it make it's way to our shores.

So, as with all American shows I haven't seen, when I read things about them, I'm forced to create a mental version of the show that often bears no resemblance to the real thing.

Yesterday, I was reading this, and this line made me laugh out loud:

Do you think Tom Bergeron hates himself? I think he hates himself. He took this shitty hosting job, probably thinking that he'd make a quick buck and no one would ever actually watch the show. I mean, really. Dancing? With the stars? How long could that last? And yet, four seasons and some huge ratings later, here we are.

Because, see, I read it wrong, and had in my head this man as the host of the show:



I was so sad to learn the truth. Beacuse, really, is my version not infinitely better than some former news reporter and Hollywood Squares host?

The star of one of my favourite movies of all time - and don't you pretend that you don't think Major League is an under-appreciated classic, because you know you do - commenting on the dance moves of Heather Mills-(ex)McCartney?

That, my friends, is comedy gold.

It's like Ticketmaster can see into my soul....

An email I recieved only moments ago:



Because if there are two things I love, then those two things are McFly and Tom Jones.

The last tickets I bought from Ticketmaster were for Bon Jovi. Clearly, this means I am either a thirteen year old girl, or Carlton Banks.

Further tales of stupidity...

Chances are that, in a lifetime, most people will never have a coat stolen. This is because people, for the most part, are sensible. They take care of their belongings. They are vigilant and careful.

And, let's say that they do have a coat stolen once, from a bar or restaurant coat check. Do you think they'll let it happen a second time? Unlikely.

Unless, of course, they are me.

Then they will have had coats stolen on three occasions. That's right. Three.

Small Town Bar, December 2000 - Goderich, Ontario

Imagine, if you will. A formerly small town girl, now living in the big city, returns home for Christmas.

She's out with her friends at the local bar, which used to have a sensible name and is now called Paddy O'Irish or something silly like that, and she hangs her coat, a long dark grey number, on the clothes rack just outside the bar entrance, by the toilets. There are other coats on this coat rack, so it's not like she's being all that careless. She proceeds to get very drunk, as you do when you go home for Christmas. At the end of the night, before making the twenty minute walk home in the blistering cold, she goes to get her coat.

Only, it's not there. She looks everywhere. She asks at the bar. She checks the now virtually empty coat rack again, just to make sure that it's really not there. It's really not there.

She walks home with her friends, in the blistering cold, wearing borrowed gloves and a hat to prevent freezing to death. She keeps saying "I can't believe someone stole my coat!" all the way home, to the annoyance of her friends.

She buys a replacement coat when she gets back to Toronto, but has to wear an old blue ski jacket of her mom's the whole rest of the Christmas holidays.

Work Christmas Party, December 2004 - London, England

Right, so this same girl? She lives in England now. And she has a winter coat of such beauty. She bought it in Toronto with her friend Teresa, and it's real pretty. It's got a faux-fur collar. She loves her coat.

At her work Christmas party, there is much drinking and merriment at the meal, and she and her co-workers decide to wander into Soho for a few more drinks and a bit of dancing. They end up in a basement bar on Old Compton Street, and snag a group of tables. The boys stand and chat, all manly like, while the girls take to the dance floor. The girls return to the tables, where everyone is milling around, chatting, drinking and flirting. Good times are had by all.

When the bar closes, and the group is finally kicked out, the girl looks for her coat in the pile on one of the chairs at their group of tables. It's not there.

She checks the other chairs, checks the floor, asks at the bar, looks everywhere she can think of. It's gone.

Her second coat has been stolen.

She bursts into tears. Keep in mind that she is very drunk, and she loved that coat. The loss of it makes her very emotional.

She gets in a cab with two co-workers to make the trek home, and makes them promise not to tell her how stupid she was to leave it sitting unattended. One of her co-workers, who shall remain nameless, immediately says "Yes, but you really should have ...". He isn't able to finish his sentence, because the girl bites his head off and they argue for the entire cab ride. The other co-worker sits quietly in the back seat and giggles to herself the entire way.

For the rest of the winter, the girl wears a leather coat the isn't nearly as pretty as her faux-fur one. But she makes due.

A Friend's Birthday Party, last Saturday night, March 2007 - London, England

You'd think that by now this girl would have learned her lesson, and kept her eye on her belongings when out, wouldn't you?

Oh, you know that she's not that bright.

Anyway, she's out at London's only Bavarian Beerhouse on a Saturday afternoon for a friend's birthday, and has hung her coat up on the hooks provided. There is much chatting, much laughter, and much drinking of German beer.

At about seven o'clock, after a good five hours of drinking, the group is asked to move to a different section of the restaurant. The group, girl included, pick up their belongings, settle their tabs, and move over to the back bit of the restaurant.

There is much more drinking.

At around one A.M., the girl realizes she is drunker than she's ever been, possibly drunker than anyone has ever been. She decides to go home. She grabs her bag, and goes to get her coat.

It's not there.

It's not where she'd originally hung it up either. And it's not on the table with the random left-behind coats. It's gone.

That's right. She's had her coat stolen. Again.

She's lent a jacket from a very nice young man, and heads home.

She has yet to replace the coat.

Seriously. Three times. What do you think the odds of that are?

Oh, and also?

The Steve Guttenberg Project has a new look too, and a few new posts.

Fashion Avenger

Dear Woman I Saw On The Stairs Transferring Between The DLR And Northern Line at Bank Station On Sunday,

I'd like to share something with you, if I may. In 1990, I was in the seventh grade. As I'm sure you're aware the pre-teen years are often not kind to girls, fashion wise. Not only did we all love New Kids On The Block, perms and super hairsprayed bangs, but we all either pinned or rolled our trousers.

See, the fashion at the time was to either fold in and roll the cuff of your jeans or trousers tight against your ankle, or pin your trousers, either just at the ankle or from the ankle to mid-calf.

You've got to keep in mind that this was 1990. The fashion was not for tight jeans. It was for baggy jeans. Baggy, pleated, often highly patterned jeans. So, this rolling or pinning created an upsetting effect that flattered no one.

We also wore them with slouch socks, often more than one pair, that we'd colour coordinate to our outfits.

It wasn't a good look. But, in my defense, it was 1990, and I was twelve. I've learned a lot since then.

Do you see what I'm trying to tell you?

Because I'm trying to understand why you were rocking this look last Sunday. In 2007. When you were older than twelve.

I actually did a triple take when I saw your trousers. "Nice colour", I thought. "What the? No, I must have seen that wrong, " I thought. "Nope, didn't see that wrong. What the HELL?", I thought again.

Perfectly fine khaki trousers, ruined by being skin tight from the ankle to the knee, creating a very unfortunate jodhpur effect. I couldn't tell whether you'd modified them, or if they were designed that way. But, you know what? It doesn't matter.

Why, why, why? Why???

I already lived through this look once. I've dealt with a lot of unfortunate looks from my childhood becoming fashionable again, but I'm damned if I'm going to deal with this again.

Get it together lady. I'm not going to re-live the early nineties again. Buy some new trousers.

For all of us.

All the best,
Alice

New look!

I did a bit of updating, since Blogger has forced me to switch to their version 2 and lose all the fancy whatnots that were on the pretty version 1 blog.

What do y'all think?

Curse that Facebook!

Because I am easily coerced into doing almost anything, I signed up for Facebook today. And while I was procrastinating on that, I found this on a friend's page thingy.

And it's so true.

You Are 40% Evil

A bit of evil lurks in your heart, but you hide it well. In some ways, you are the most dangerous kind of evil.

How Evil Are You?

I often feel my potential for evil is underestimated.

Marketing Travesty

There's a Woolworth's just near my house, and as well as having cheap kitchen-y stuff, they also have a smallish DVD section, which often has super-fantastic deals.

Every once in a while, I go to persue their selection and have come away with many a bargain. The other week, I was taking a peek, and what did I stumble across?

Let's just take a moment to laugh at the fact that it was only £1.

Anyway, huh, I thought to myself. Did Sarah Jessica Parker and Helen Hunt make a movie together recently? Because that's a recent photo on the cover, yes?

And then I noticed the title.

Oh, that's right. It's Girls Just Want To Have Fun.

The NINETEEN EIGHTY FIVE film Girls Just Want To Have Fun. The film that was made 22 years ago, when Sarah Jessica Parker was 20 and Helen Hunt was 22. The film in which they play teenagers.

And don't even get me started on the layout - if you're going to have the tagline "Life will be serious soon enough, but for now...", then it really should be ABOVE the title so it makes sense!

But back to the blatantly misleading photo.

Perhaps they've just used this on the front, and the back will clear everything up.

Well, in the sense that they've used actual photos from the movie, yes. In the sense that by far the largest photo is of Sarah Jessica Parker circa the Sex & The City years, no.

For the record, this is what the cover should look like:

That's right. They're YOUNG! And it also stars Shannen Doherty. The 2007 cheater cover shows no Shannen Doherty love. (Also, please gloss over the fact that I now own two copies of this movie.) (Please gloss over the fact that I'd actually already replaced the VHS copy in that photo with a DVD, and I actually now own three copies of this movie.)

I can only imagine the disgust that someone would feel if they bought this movie based solely on the (obviously photoshopped, once you really look at it) image on the cover.

They'd expect a rom-com about thirty-something gals in the city. And what would they get?

A teen dance movie that features an awkward teenaged Sarah Jessica Parker competing in a dance competition on a show called "Dance TV" with her dreamy partner Jeff. Her wacky friend Helen Hunt, Jeff's best friend Jonathan Silverman and his sister Shannen Doherty help the crazy kids win the dance competion - and each other's hearts. And it contains the line "Eat flame, Bozo!"

For shame, DVD marketing people. For shame, I say!

Being back from holiday is always a letdown

I highly recommend a skiing holiday in which you don't do any skiing. I'm telling you, that's some good fun. Try not to get a cold though - that can be a bit of a downer.

Meribel is just beautiful. It's about a 3 hour drive from the Geneva airport, in the French alps. A fair bit of that drive was going up the mountain. Turns out? Mountains are tall.

There were 11 of us in the chalet, which really does sound like a lot, but it wasn't too crowded. We did need to have a kids table at dinner though, since you couldn't fit all of us around the dining table. But the kids table isn't too bad when you have copious amounts of wine and get to be in charge of various iPods of awesome.

It snowed the day we arrived, so it was all snowy and gorgeous, and really looked just like a French ski resort should.

Seriously. How pretty is this?

You can try and tell me it's not gorgeous, and I will ignore you, because you will be lying.

It really was such a relaxing trip. Lots of beer, card games - well one card game, Asshole, which really is the best game ever - good food, more beer, wine, more wine, skiing and snowboarding (only not for me), still more wine and much hilarity.

We also formed the world's best pub quiz team, comprising me, Jo, Sam, Leanne, Ivan and Mel (also known as the Girl Team. Sorry guys.) We seriously kicked so much ass. 38 out of 50 questions right, and the next best team only got 25. We are geniuses!! And also good looking. This is a team of victory, I tell you.

We had our winning jug of beer stolen by a team that couldn't handle our superiority, but which shall remain nameless.

Nameless, but I will post a photo. That beer they're drinking? Stolen. Poor losers, I say. Intimidated by our awesomeness.

It was such a fun trip. And it's really so beautiful there.

Being back at work is a bit sad now. Especially since I still have a cold.

I'd rather be back here.

Feelin' crafty

Every once in a while, I feel a little bit crafty. Please see: the scarf I've been knitting since 2003, the pillowcase I've been embroidering for a year, and all the various books I own on paper mache, knitting, quilting, and a zillion other things.

I painted my kitchen a few weeks ago, from a nasty light blue to a delicious dark red, and it looks awesome. But it really highlighted the fact that the chairs that were left behind by the previous owners? Yeah, they were ugly.

Chair one, on the left, is a perfectly nice wooden chair with a nasty yellow seat. Chair two, on the right, was a puffy disgusting mushroom coloured monstrosity that was gross, gross, gross.

So, what's a crafty girl to do?

Well, re-cover them, obviously.

I bought some awesome fabric on eBay, along with a staple gun, some upholstery foam for the seats and some black paint. Sorted!

I started with the ugly yellow chair.

And what happens when you're trying to take a photograph of a chair?

That's right. A cat jumps on it.

Turns out that these chairs are really cleverly designed and it's super easy to remove the seat. Once you get the cat off, of course.

Let the painting commence!

I decided to move into the living room, where the floors are newer and more expensive and harder to clean. And there's a TV to watch while I paint. Really, what would you choose?

I did put newspaper down. I'm not an idiot. Thank god Julia reads four hundred papers a day, so we had lots to use.

The chair already looked much less ugly when I finished the painting, which was pleasing.

Sadly, the staple gun I spent all of £3 on eBay wasn't up to the task of actually, you know, stapling stuff, so I had to get a replacement for £4 at Woolworths. God, what am I? Made of money?

The staple gunning was the fun bit. The realizing that I almost didn't have enough fabric wasn't fun. Stupid bigger-than-they-look seats.

Fortunately, I did have just enough to get both seat covers finished. Yay! And they look so much better now. It's almost like I went and bought attractive chairs. Clearly, that would be crazy talk, but it's almost as if I actually did that.

Again, taking a photo of a chair? A guarantee that a cat will jump on it.

"This chair is so comfortable and pretty! I wish I could stand on it all day!", is clearly what Lucy is thinking.

Go on. Try and tell me these aren't some fabulous looking chairs that look great in my new red kitchen.

Because I won't believe you.

Holiday Reading

In a mere 10 days, I will be on a plane to France. I know! Isn't that exciting? I'm going to Meribel on a skiing trip with a big group of friends.

Well, actually, it's more of a "skiing" trip for me, as I will not be skiing. I may do one day of it, but it's not really my thing.

"But Alice," I hear you say, "what ever will you do with your time then?"

Oh, there's a plan.

Imagine if you will: a chalet in Meribel. Outside, the snow, she is blowing. Inside, the fire, she is roaring. The hot chocolate, she is delicious and chocolatey. Alice, she is lounging on a couch reading a book.

After a day of delicious reading, Alice's friends return from the slopes, they have dinner and then go out and have lots of drinking and dancing fun.

Seriously, it's like the best holiday ever.

I'm currently putting together my reading list for the holiday. I figure it's seven days, so ten books feels about right to me.

Any suggestions? What do you think I need to read?

Not so clever after all, am I?

So, you know how I was all "I'm the best baker in the entire world, I'm so fabulous, look at me, I'm so great!"?

Oh, I've learned my lesson. Come on, carrot cake. Why do you have to be so difficult?

I get organic vegetables delivered every week, and I do my best to use them up by making soups for my lunches and dinners of various kinds. I often fail, because there are too many vegetables. And sometimes they're weird and scary, and I get afraid.

For the last kazillion weeks, there's been a bag of carrots in the vegetable box. Now, of course, carrots keep forever, so they've just been piling up. The entire crisper drawer in my fridge? Filled with carrots.

Tons and tons of carrots.

I've been bringing carrots for lunch every day, but that only uses up like two of them a day! And each bag is a POUND of carrots! I'm putting carrots in EVERYTHING that can possibly have carrots. Soup? Carrots. Lasagna? Carrots. Pasta sauce? Carrots. Salad? Carrots.

But, last week, like a flash of inspiration, the answer came to me.

I will make carrot cake.

Because one recipe will use like a WHOLE BAG of carrots! Sweet!

I'd meant to bake on Sunday, but due to Sainsbury's online grocery delivery operators being deeply stupid, they screwed up my order so it had to wait till Monday.

But Monday evening was all about carrot cake. I grated four cups of carrots. I measured, mixed, chopped as directed in the recipe. I only made two teensy changes.

I used yogurt instead of oil, which I've done before in recipes and usually works fine. And instead of two round cake pans, I used two loaf pans. Harmless, right?

The recipe said it should take 32 minutes to bake, but I knew it would take longer because of my different pans, so I set the timer for 45 minutes.

I checked at 45 minutes, and no - not done.

At 55 minutes - still not done.

At 65 minutes - still not done.

Now, this is when I got a bit worried. Over an hour is a long time.

At 75 minutes, I thought the toothpick came out clean, and they were done. I took the loaves out of the oven, put them on the cooling racks, admired their lovely loafness and let them cool.

After they'd been cooling for about 20 minutes, I went to cut myself a slice. Mmmm, carrot cake, I thought. Delicious!

But wait - what's this uncooked goo in the middle?

That's right. One hour and fifteen minutes in the oven, and it still wasn't cooked.

I tried to salvage it by pitching it back in the oven for another 20 minutes, but the damage was done. Two loaves, and a solid two and a half hours of prep time, and neither was even close to edible.

Well, I may not have had any delicious carrot cake, but at least I used up the carrots, right? That's got to count for something.

iTunes Meme-Tastic!

I got this from Low Resolution.

QUESTION: If your life is a movie, what songs are on the soundtrack?

Here's how it works:
1. Open iTunes
2. Put it on shuffle and press play
3. For every question, type the song that's playing
4. Make up a Title and choose your Cast


Title: Oh, Jilly!

Cast:

Jillian - Kate Winslet
Henry - Michael Vartan
Betty - Shannen Doherty
Muriel - Raven-Symoné (I defy traditional casting rules)


Opening Credits: "Heaven Is a Halfpipe" by OPM
Clearly this is going to be a kicky high school movie. Does this mean my character is a skater girl? That seems unlikely. It seems more likely that the boy my character has a crush on is a skater boy, circa 1995. My character will be called Jillian, or Jilly for short.

Waking Up: "Manic Monday" by The Bangles
Well, duh. Of COURSE this is the waking up song. Oh, Jilly. Yes, Mondays will always be this depressing.

First Day At School: "I Think We're Alone Now" by Tiffany
I think that Jilly is having embarrassing fantasies about her skater boy to the sound of eighties classics, where she's totally zoning out and humming to herself. Oh, Jilly.

Falling In Love: "Lady In Red" by Chris deBurgh
Ha! Man, Jilly's a dork. Lady In Red. That's awesome. I feel that this scene is happening in a music class, and the band is playing an instrumental version of this song. Jilly plays clarinet, and she and skater boy make longing eye contact during his saxophone solo in Lady In Red and before you know it, they're in luuuuuuuv.

Fight Song: "The Perfect Drug" by Nine Inch Nails
Oh no. Perhaps does skater boy, who I feel will be called Henry, dabble in the drugs. Does Jilly not approve? This movie's getting all serious, and movie-of-the-week like. Jilly cries, Henry gets mad, they fight about the drugs. The perfect, perfect drugs.

Breaking Up: "LDN" by Lily Allen
Man, this is a cheerful song to break up to. Maybe it's shot all artistic like, with the two of them crying and hugging and fighting but with no sound as the happy happy song plays. It's all ironic, see? I don't think that things look good for Jilly and Henry.

Prom: "China In Your Hand" by T'Pau
Sure, I guess. They're broken up and at the prom with other people as T'Pau speaks to their pain. It's a very retro prom though.

Life: "Music Sounds Better With You" by Stardust
Life? That's kind of vague. Does this mean high school life? I thought this was going to be a high school movie! This is all peppy and great, but given the next category, I don't think things are looking good for Jilly, so let's decide that she's living in denial of Henry's drug problem and their break up and is going on as if nothing happened. She's just not doing well.

Mental Breakdown: "Venus" by Bananarama
HA! Awesome. I'm your Venus, I'm your fire, I'm having a mental breakdown. Awesome.

Driving: "Tell It To My Heart" by Taylor Dane
No, I'm not really sure why I have Taylor Dane on my iPod, but there you go. Anyway, this is a pretty good song for the sad driving and reflecting on her sad crazy life that Jilly is going to need to do. She'll go on a road trip with her best friend, Betty. Betty will help her stop being crazy.

Flashback: "Have A Nice Day" by Stereophonics
Oh, the good times that Jilly and Henry had. The nice days, the not so nice days. Clearly this flashback helps Jilly out - OR DOES IT? Because ...

Wedding: "Sugar High" by Coyote Shivers
Jilly crashes Henry's wedding! The breakdown must have taken a long time, because they've clearly graduated from high school here and grown up a bit. Henry got over his drug problem, got engaged, planned a wedding. Jilly went crazy, got better, crashed the wedding to declare her love (in an non-crazy way, of course). Jilly and Henry run away together to elope to Vegas. Henry leaves a touching but tender message on his ex-fiance's voicemail saying that he just can't resist the combination of Jilly and songs from the hit film Empire Records.

Birth of Child: "Blinded By The Light" by Manfred Mann
Jilly's clearly on some pretty strong drugs during childbirth, and dreams an awesome choreographed dance sequence to this song. Excellent.

Final Battle: "I Got You Babe" by Sonny & Cher
Huh. Not really the best "battle" song I can think of. But perhaps it's a relationship battle of some sort that ends with Jilly & Henry realizing how much the need each other. Aw.

Death Scene: "Everything I Own" by Bread
Oh, this would be sad. Jilly dies, clearly. A sad disease that just makes her more beautiful as she dies. And Henry cries and cries by her bedside as the song sings "and I would give everything I own, just to have you back again". So sad.

Funeral Song: "That'll Be The Day" by Buddy Holly
Inappropriate! Jilly's wacky sense of humour comes to light, as this is the song that she requests for her funeral. Henry and the kid from the childbirth scene, who we will call Muriel, and Betty all laugh through tears as the other mourners exchange disapproving looks. Oh, Jilly!

End Credit: "I've Seen All Good People" by Yes
Well, Jilly was good people. That's for sure. Good people indeed.

Well, I would totally watch this movie. I only wish I could have found a part for Steve Guttenberg.

I very strongly suggest that all of y'all with blogs should do this.

It's Meme-tastic!

via Hot Links & Gumbo:

1. Go to Wikipedia.
2. In the Search box, type your birth month and day (but not year).
3. List three events that happened on your birthday.
4. List two important birthdays and one interesting death.
5. List any holidays
6. Post it.

5 November - Three Events

• 1872 - Women's suffrage: In defiance of the law, suffragist Susan B. Anthony votes for the first time, and is later fined $100.
• 1935 - Parker Brothers releases the board game Monopoly.
• 1951 - I Love Lucy airs for the first time.

5 November - Two Birthdays & One Death

Births

• 1911 - Roy Rogers, American actor (d. 1998)
• 1941 - Art Garfunkel, American musician
• 1971 - Corin Nemec, American actor

Death

• 1977 - Guy Lombardo, Canadian conductor (b. 1902)

5 November - Any Holidays

• New Zealand, South Africa, United Kingdom and the province of Newfoundland & Labrador (Canada) - Guy Fawkes night (also called Bonfire night; or Fireworks night): Failure of the Gunpowder Plot to blow up Parliament in 1605 is celebrated with bonfires and fireworks.
• R.C. Saints - November 5 is the feast day of the following Roman Catholic Saints:
  St. Bertilia
  St. Domninus
  St. Elizabeth
  St. Felix and Eusebius
  St. Fibitius
  St. Galation
  St. Laetus
  St. Magnus
  St. Sylvia
  Pope Zachary
• Ancient Latvia - the festival Katrina

Mmmmm, pie.

So, do you ever find, that as you're sitting at your desk at work, you're overcome by the urge to make a pie?

It doesn't happen often, but when it does, who am I to argue?

A conversation with Aaron about pie the other day got me in a pie frame of mind. So, today, I did a Google search for "apple pie", because it's a very delicious type of pie. Unlike cherry pie, which is deeply gross.

Anyhoo, my search took me here, and I was compelled to make it.

Mmmmm. Pie.

Seriously, doesn't it look amazing? I am a baking wizard.

Mmmmmmm. Pie.

B'bye, Christmas.

Christmas Trees, originally uploaded by alice's dark place.

You really know Christmas is over when you see the pile of discarded trees waiting for the garbage men to take them away.

Or the tree removal men. Or whoever actually deals with Christmas trees. I don't actually know.

What I do know is that there were four of them waiting as I left for work today. Ours is the one on the far right.

B'bye Christmas tree.

We had some good times, didn't we? Sorry about Lucy repeatedly hurling herself at you from assorted couches, chairs and sideboards. And sorry that you had to be naked on your bottom third because of over excited kittens and their ornament removal. We still think you looked nice.

You were a good tree. Well done. Best of luck in all your future endeavours.

Merry New Year!

I've been shocking lax with the posting in December, but there is enough time in my holiday travelling madness (current location: Toronto) to wish all y'all a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

Hope your holidays were delightful!

Dude. I'm like wicked smart.

Your Vocabulary Score: A

Congratulations on your multifarious vocabulary!You must be quite an erudite person.

How's" Your Vocabulary?