i may be some time

There's not much posting been going on over here, as after Mr McMuffin's epic, I have been trying to get one of my own written. It's almost done, but I keep being distracted by work, sleep and gardening. Tonight we're going out with Gypsy Tart, Rock Cake and Single Cookie to see, wait for it...The Buzzcocks and tomorrow, we're off to visit Mr McMuffin Junior and the Beau, so I can confidently expect to have alcohol poisoning on the Bank Holiday unless I can cover my glass with one hand and eat dinner with the other. Being British I like to use a knife and fork at the same time, but can now see the advantages of the US style.

Anyway, just thought I'd mention (for Keith's information and the pleasure of David-he loves this phrase) blogging will be light.

separated at birth...

We were inadvertently listening to Queen of New Orleans by Jon Bon Jovi the other day when Mrs McMuffin recognised the guitar riff as being from one of our favourite songs, Hey, Johnny Park! by The Foo Fighters. It doesn't just sound similar, it's a total ripoff. The Jon Bon Jovi song was released on an album called Destination Anywhere in June 1997 and the Foos' song was released on the album The Color and The Shape in May 1997. It's bad enough that Jon Bon Jovi has stolen a great riff, although he always was a bit derivative, so it doesn't come as that much of a surprise. The sad thing is that Dave Stewart apparently co-wrote the song.

Just interesting. That's all.

the proust questionnaire

My very own meme, sort of. I got this from the Sunday Times today. Apparently these 24 questions have been all the rage amongst socialites for the last century. Marcel Proust did not come up with the questions, however, it was his answers, when he was just 15 years old, that made them famous. While, not as famous as Proust, here are my attempt to answer the questions.

Your favourite virtue

Generosity.

Your favourite qualities in a man

Integrity, honesty, loyalty, intelligence, kindness and good humour.

Your favourite qualities in a woman

Integrity, honesty, loyalty, intelligence, kindness and good humour. The questionnaire is probably showing it's age a bit. I like to think that I look for the same qualities in women as I do in men.

Your biggest flaw

Sometimes the words fly from my mouth like bats from a cave. Once they start, there is just no stopping them.

Your favourite occupation

I hate working and while some jobs are less obnoxious than others I just hate working. I suppose if I have to work, which I do unfortunately, I would want to choose a job where I did not have to keep a record of anything that I did. That would be nice.

Your chief characteristic

Integrity. It gets me in a lot of trouble.

Your idea of happiness

Coffee with my wife in the Yellow Square in Funchal

Your idea of misery

My idea of misery is being trapped on one of those reality TV shows, like Big Brother, for example. In my version of the show, I would be locked in an isolated house on an island in the middle of nowhere with my entire family. Oh God, I forgot, I’ve already done that. I used to walk past these stones, which are a lot closer to the road than you think, on my way home. These stone, the Stennes stones, are on one side of the road and The Ring of Brodgar is on the other side. I often used to walk past them at night. It was bloody creepy, a Wicker Man moment, if you like. I could easily imagine the damn Orcadians sacrificing poor unsuspecting tourists on the altar of these stones.

Your favourite colour and flower

This really has changed over the years. Nowadays, I would probably say that green was my favourite colour and that roses were my favourite flower.

If not yourself, who would you be

I always wondered what life is like for the rich and beautiful. I wouldn’t mind spending a few days as Matthew McConaughey, although I promise that I will definitely not smoke any pot, and there will absolutely definitely not be any naked bongo playing.

Where would you like to live

There can only be one place for me, and that is Madeira.

Your favourite prose authors

That is a hard question to answer, but here are just a few of my favourites:
John Steinbeck Tortilla Flat
Michael Moorcock The War Hound and The World’s Pain
Walter Tevis The Man Who Fell to Earth
Mervyn Peake Titus Alone

Your favourite poets

I was never really into poetry, but I have always been a bit of a depressive and have always been partial to Edgar Allen Poe and Emily Dickinson. Here is one of my favourite Dickinson poems:

The Forgotten Grave

After a hundred years
Nobody knows the place,--
Agony that enacted there,
Motionless as peace.

Weeds triumphant ranged,
Strangers strolled and spelled
At the lone orthography
Of the elder dead.

Winds of summer fields
Recollect the way,--
Instinct picking up the key
Dropped by memory.

Your favourite painters and composers

The painter is easy: Vincent Van Gogh. I think I was always a little in love with the romance of his unappreciated talent. I saw some of his sunflowers a few years ago and they looked as if they had been painted with fluorescent paint. Absolutely amazing. My favourite composer is a little bit more difficult. I don’t really listen to classical music enough to talk in those terms, but I do like JS Bach, especially the pieces for harpsichord, and I do like Philip Glass a lot. There is something about the intricacy of their work that appeals to me. I remember going to see a Glass opera some years ago, and being struck by how melodic his music was. You could practically hum along to the tunes, which at the time surprised me.

Your favourite heroes in real life

I have always admired Primo Levi’s humanity, and his wonderful skills as a writer. His first, great book, If This Is A Man started a life long obsession for me with the holocaust. I always hoped that I would have the strength to endure the terrible experiences that he suffered in Auschwitz and still retain a sense of hope. Levi killed himself in 1987 by throwing himself off a third floor banister in the block of flats where he lived with his mother in Turin. I was shocked by this, as was the rest of the world, but I don’t think that his suicide detracts from his great gift.

Your favourite heroines in real life

I have really struggled to think of a real life heroine. There is one woman that I admire and that is Barbara Dockar-Drysdale, a psychotherapist who set up one of this country’s first therapeutic communities, The Mulberry Bush. She tried to demonstrate that Donald Winnicott’s ideas on how children develop could be used to help children overcome some of the damage that had been done to them by the way in which they had been cared for. I have read her book The Provision of The Primary Experience many times, and yet each time I read it, I gleam something new from it.

Your favorite heroes in fiction

My fictional heroes are real heroes. I grew up reading comics. I used to have thousands of old Marvel and DC comics piled high in my wardrobe. Every now and then I would spend an afternoon rereading them and fantasing about the superpowers that I was sure to develop. After all that was the thing about superheroes. They never knew they had superpowers until the day they suddenly started manifesting them. I guess if I had to pick an absolute favourite it would be Batman. He doesn’t really have any superpowers as such, just a lot of technology and a really bad mood. I don’t have the technology, unless you count my ability to store 10,000 tracks on my iPod, but I could do the attitude with no problem whatsoever.

Your favourite heroines in fiction

When I was a kid I used to fantasise about Modesty Blaise, she was a kind of super cool spy chick from the 60s who's adventures were printed in a comic strip in The Evening Citizen in Scotland. Although her 38 years career started in the London Evening Standard. I remember her dressed in black, all slinky and dangerous. I seem to remember that she could change her hair colour at will, but that might be something from the really bad film that was made about her. I suppose in lots of ways she was a female James Bond. I haven't read anything about her for years, but I still think about her occasionally.

Your favourite food and drink

Chicken. Nothing fancy, just roasted or even better barbecued until the skin is crispy black. There also has to be chocolate involved somewhere. Any kind of chocolate, but I suppose if I had a choice I would choose a decent bitter chocolate with at least 70% cocoa solids. My favourite drink has to be red wine. I don’t really have a favourite, although I do like a nice ChateauNeuf du Pape.

Your favourite names

Despite my lack of any religious beliefs, I just love the names Mordecai and Esther.

Your pet aversion

Anyone who talks about being flexible. It invariably means that they are attempting to manipulate me into doing something I don’t want to.

What characters in history do you most dislike

I really dislike all those despots who have managed to kill millions of people to maintain their little bit of power: Hitler, Pol Pot, Mao, Stalin and so on. I don’t know what else to say about them that hasn’t already been said.

What is your present state of mind

It is nearly midnight and I am feeling tired, but also satisfied that I have been able to complete these questions. It has turned out to be a much bigger job than I expected.

For what fault have you most toleration

I have an older woman friend who talks all the time. I find her very relaxing, in some strange way. She is almost a live version of those relaxation tapes that you get. Gentle sounds of waves on the seashore, that sort of thing. I seem to be able to listen to her and yet zone out at the same time. Odd really, but I like her lot. Although, maybe I wouldn’t if she also wasn’t kind, thoughtful and generous too.

Your favourite motto

Do unto others as you would have others do unto you.

How would you like to die

Quickly, in my sleep. I don’t really mind where, so long as it’s not somewhere embarrassing like in the bath or on the toilet or driving at 80 mph down the M25. When I am dead, I'm not that bothered about the funeral arrangements either. I’ve told Mrs McMuffin that she should just put me in a bin liner and leave me out for the refuse men to collect.

inevitable weekly Slinky post

Little Slinky sometimes need to go in the middle of the night and tries very hard to wake us up to let him out. Now that he has been banished to the dining room to sleep, we find little piles of poo in the downstairs bathroom, right next to the toilet. I have to confess to some satisfaction that he is clever enough to realise that this is the place to go and that the tiled floor is so easy to clean. However, it's a horrible way to start the day and drives Mr McMuffin insane.

Mr McMuffin has demonstarted his innate manliness this weekend by fitting a catflap to the back door. Slink is highly suspicious of this technological wonder and appears not to have grasped how to operate it. We do not believe him as we know he is capable of using the one in his real home and we have seen him in hot pursuit of Ra and Fluff through the catflap chez Gypsy Tart and Rock Cake. I think he's just pissed off that he has one less reason to scream loudly at us. Haha, Slink, you are not the boss of us...'til next time.

Despite moaning about the poor weather yesterday, it has been ok today and I spent about an hour in the garden before being felled with tiredness (suspiciously like the grotty feelings associated with the Bug Of Which We Do Not Speak) I am definitely going to see my GP this time. After being restored to normality for so long, I am not going to go back to the feebleness of sickness and all those wasted weekends.

need...?

Am I the only person in the world who really needs one of these. It would come in very handy for that hazardous trip to Waitrose. It only costs £72,995. I see that Landrover have tried to boost their sales by staying clear of the damage that could be done if they crossed that £73,000 bar. How clever of them. Taking that £5 of the price makes it look almost cheap.

weekend weather

As dull as the post title suggests. Why has it been gorgeous most of the week and come Saturday my gardening plans are thwarted by coldness and drizzle? I was also going to leave on time yesterday and get a couple of digging hours in, only to be troubled by a student who has now learned a valuable lesson: Never pick up the telephone after 5pm, particularly on a Friday. By the time we had sorted out another (long gone home) worker's difficult case and the poor student had started to lose the mortified look on his face, I had no more energy left.

So here I am, drinking coffee, listening to Slinky moan and staring at the screen, when I could be outside doing something. That parental injunction is still strong in me. Fortunately my bedroom is not too messy and I pay my own pocket money these days.

everything is connected

After a fraught week at work, I was pleased to see that Mr McMuffin had hired a couple of DVD's for us to watch. I wasn't terribly impressed with Birth, which made even the lovely Nicole Kidman look like a peaky faced witch. However, I am enjoying the Huckabees film and the sight of Mark Wahlberg on a bicycle wearing his fireman boots.

This strange apparel reminded me of the sight that greeted me yesterday evening. Mr McMuffin still wearing a shirt he had worn with a suit earlier in the day, had now removed the suit and tie and teamed the shirt with a pair of baggy shorts. His slippers complemented the whole ensemble beautifully, as did the rug he had placed over his knees. I like to pay attention to his appearance and tell him how gorgeous he is and he was most flattered by my regard.

It's my spider shorts he said. I had to ask him to repeat himself as I thought I had simply failed to understand what he had been trying to say. It's my spider shorts he said, when I put my hands in my pockets, it makes me feel like a spider. With that he proceeded to demonstrate how putting his hands in his shorts pockets made him lift each leg high in the air, placing each foot carefully on the floor in a reasonable facsimile of a spider with two legs (wearing spider shorts, of course).

I still haven't quite processed the whole experience. Surreal, yes. Traumatic, a hint of. Just as I began to have concerns that our marriage could not survive this madness, Mr McMuffin reassured me of his normality by trying to teach me how to carry him around the house without bending his knees. See, he's not so strange after all.

the bottom line...

HIV prevention work has certainly moved on from the deadly earnest stuff of the early 80s when the message was more or less straightforward: do and die. PACE have just released a fantastic FREE workbook called Getting Ready: improving your self-esteem and getting ready for relationships. It is filled with really interesting exercises that you can do alone and which allow you the opportunity to think about what you expect from a relationship. It's aimed at gay men and lesbians but it's about relationships and self esteem and so can apply to anyone. Although, the images used in the book may put off some straight folk. I can't believe that I am endorsing a self-help book, given that I hope to make my living from other people's pain one day, but the writers also recommend a short course of therapy too. So everyone comes out a winner! For what it's worth I recommend this little book to everyone. Unfortunately, you don't seem to be able to get the book through the PACE website, but you can get a copy by phoning this number: 020 7700 1323. By the way, I love the picture. It makes me chuckle every time I think about it. Mrs McMuffin says that it is all too depressingly familiar. I'm not sure what she means.

recently updated again

Just cruising the recently updated feature and have discovered some interesting things. Bill Gates is frightened of being pro gay rights and has caved to the fundamentalist Christians-see this via this blog. The Simpsons are a source of study and contemporary relevance in any set of circumstances (via him) and there really is a blog about lawn care. I tell you people, there's gold in them there links.

election fever

Is not very catching this year. Fifteen days to go and I still haven't got it. I find an innoculation of anti war sentiment, cynicism and boredom with the whole democratic process due to over exposure to the US elections prevents any actual infection.

new music...

I've discovered some great new music from a wonderfully cheery band called The Gunshy. Here's a little ditty for you to listen to. It's called Mistaken. Be warned though that this is not music to listen to if you are in a delicate emotional state. It just may provide you with the final push over that edge.

looking for the answer

Did you know that Google can give you the answer to life, the universe, and everything? Just put an = sign after the question.

gardening talent

Some people have it, others, like me don't, but try to develop it every now and then. My recent idea of shaping the lawn into an ellipse has now come to fruition and although I've got a fair bit of messing around to de weed and de grass the newly extended flowerbeds, it looks really good. Gypsy Tart deserves credit for helping with the digging (that girl really loves digging and smashing things).

It was also incredibly easy to mark the shape out using this guide. I didn't even have to measure anything, I just unhooked the string, found the halfway point and marked with another bit of string. Mr McMuffin helped a bit and within ten minutes I had marked out a perfect ellipse in flour. There is something very satifying about seeing geometry in action and all our maths teachers are right, we should shut up and pay attention because we shall use some of the things they taught us, in the real world.

tunisian orange cake

I can't remember where I got this recipe from. I just remember that I had made a much more complicated version of the cake before I found this straightforward recipe. I have an idea that it was written by Sophie Grigson and I found it in one of those free supermarket magazines.

For the cake

50g slightly stale white breadcrumbs
200g caster sugar
100g ground almonds
1½ tsp baking powder
200ml sunflower oil
4 eggs
Finely grated zest of 1 unwaxed lemon
Finely grated zest of 1 large unwaxed orange

For the citrus syrup

Juice of 2 unwaxed oranges
Juice of 1 unwaxed lemon
Juice of 1 unwaxed lime
75g caster sugar
3 cloves
2 star aniseed
1 cinnamon stick

Line the base of a 20cm round and 5cm deep tin with greaseproof paper, then grease and flour the tin. Mix the breadcrumbs with the sugar, almonds and baking powder. Whisk the oil with the eggs, then pour into the dry ingredients and mix well. Add the orange and lemon zest. Pour the mixture into the tine, place in a cold oven and turn on the heat to 180°C/350°F/Gas Mark 4. Bake for 45-50 minutes or until the cake is golden brown. A skewer inserted into the centre should come out clean. Allow to cool for a few minutes before turning out onto a plate. I usually turn out the cake upside down, so that I have a nice flat top to the cake.

For the citrus syrup, put all the ingredients into a saucepan and gently bring to the boil, stirring until the sugar has completely dissolved. Simmer for about 3 minutes. Remove the cinnamon stick and cloves. I usually strain the syrup so that I don't get any bits on the top of the cake.

While the cake is still warm, pierce it several times with a skewer, then spoon the hot syrup over the cake, allowing it to soak into the cake. Make sure that you use all the syrup and that you cover the cake right up to and slight over the edges.

You can use the star aniseed and cinnamon stick to decorate the cake if you like. Serve with Greek yoghurt.

Delicious.

dinner...

I love the morning of the day after people come over for dinner. The house is lovely and clean and there are no horrible jobs left to do. I'm sitting here in my dressing gown drinking a cup of coffee with no plans other than to go shopping for a dishwasher. The sun is shining and all is well with the world.

We had a lovely evening last night. Unfortunately, Mr and Mrs Carrot Cake couldn't come after all because their kids were sick. It was nice seeing Mr Rock Cake and Ms Gypsy Tart again, because we seem to see so little of them. Mr and Mrs We-Don't-Have-Cake-Names-Yet were on good form. We all ate too much and drank too much and a jolly time was had by all.

The food was rather good, even if I do say so myself. We started with a leek and onion tart, which sounds a bit dull but is lovely. Using a decent cast iron, or some other kind of oven proof pan, the leeks and onions are gently sautéed in butter and olive oil with a sprinkling of thyme. They are then covered with a cheese pastry and the whole thing is then baked for about 20 minutes. The delicious crumbly texture of the pastry is complimented by the sweet caramelised leeks and onions. We had it with some very lightly dressed rocket and some caramelised peppers (which were rather nice. Sweet peppers with a hint of heat. I can't claim credit for these. I bought them from Waitrose). The main course was something that I have made a few times before: cod and smoked salmon with pesto wrapped in Parma Ham. It sounds a bit over-the-top but it just works together really well. We had that with some pea mash. The mash was dead easy to make and can be reheated, although I did have some doubts about that. I made it earlier in the afternoon for convienence but I did wonder if the delicate flavour of the peas would be destroyed by reheating. It wasn't. All you have to do is soften some spring onions with a knob of butter, add a couple of heads of Little Gem lettuce, some chopped mint and the peas, together with some white wine, and gently cook the lot for about ten minutes. Then add some cream and puree the lot. I drizzled some mint vinegarette over the whole lot.

Pudding was a Tunisan Orange Cake, which is basically a relatively straightforward sponge cake made with bread crumbs and ground almonds, and an inordinate amount of sunflower oil. The cake is then soaked in a citrus syrup. I served it with dollops of Greek yoghurt. This is one of my favourite puddings and I've made it lots of times. For some reason, yesterday I decided to have a look at the recipe and noticed that I had been cooking it wrong all this time. I had misread the recipe. I could never work out why my cake took so long to cook. I sort of decided that the temperature of our oven was a bit off. I've told you before that I just cook everthing at full blast while keeping an eye on it. Turns out that the recipe suggests baking the cake from a cold oven. I gave that a try and it turns out that the recipe timing is perfect. I really should pay more attention in future.

We moved on to the cheese course: ripe Gorgonzola and a beautiful chunk of Parmesan. And we finished off the meal with some freshly brewed coffee and Tartufo Dolce di Alba (bitter chocolate truffles from Alba).

Finally, mostly we drank Spanish Verdejo, Australian Shiraz, a delicious liqueur Muscat also from Australia, Italian Limoncello and Disaronno and some vintage port from Portugal. We are just so cosmopolitan. Oh, and Mr We-Don't-Have-Cake-Names-Yet had some cheap French brandy, which I only bought because I wanted to use it in a recipe. He said that it was okay, but I think he was probably being polite. After agreeing to drink it, he couldn't very well say it was crap. The labelling of the 3 years old brandy is fantastic. The brandy is actually described as a rare old French brandy. There must be a law against that sort of thing?

I didn't take any photographs of the food, but this is a picture of the table before our guests arrived. By the way the small silver thing hiding behind the candle in the foreground is an elephant bottle opener from Denmark. The lovely David TEFL Smiler gave it to us when he stayed with us a few months ago. Apparently it's modelled on the Carlsberg brewery's Elephant Gate in Copenhagen. It is very pretty, and useful, and now has pride of place on our table.

mmm...fresh bedding

I don't suppose that it will come as a surprise to our regular reader that Slinky is a funny little animal. He just can't stand the idea of fresh bedding anywhere in the house. I suppose it's the idea that there could be anything in his house that does not smell of him. Mrs McMuffin took this photo yesterday after discovering him slinkyfying the freshly made up bed in the spare room.

another survey...

I just couldn't help myself. Here's the results of another political survey. I got it from Kirsty again. I don't know what I would do without these online quizzes, they're the only way I have of being sure what my opinion is about anything.

morning dew

I took this in the early hours of this morning.

well hard rock cake

I thought you might like to see this photo of Mr Rock Cake kayaking. For some strange reason he seems to think risking his life is fun. Very impressive photo though. Apparently, he was "all good" at this point. He had hit the falls just right. Off to the right are some rocks, and you don't want to go there. Neither did you want to be taken by the flow of the river as it goes over the falls, which also goes off to the the right and will take you into more rocks. Whatever you do, don't drop with the flow of the falls. You want to be coming out of it. Sound advice, I think. Boy, doesn't this look like fun? What about this...its that enough fun?

big plans

I had such big plans for today. We've invited some friends over for dinner tomorrow, and my plan was to go to therapy this morning then do some shopping and then do some cleaning around the house, but as usual everything took longer than expected. Not my therapy, of course, my therapist has boundaries. Fifty minutes and no more. No, it was the shopping that seemed to take forever. By the time I'd whizzed around Sainsbury's and then whizzed over to Bluewater to get some lovely ripe Gorgonzola, and some other tasty titbits, from Carluccio's and had a double expresso and a fag, the morning had gone. I have now prepared a shopping list for the things I couldn't remember this morning and arranged two vases of flowers. That all takes time, Mrs McMuffin, before you ask what I've been doing with myself today. I'm now trying to get some cleaning done before I head off to offer succor to my own therapy clients.

I'm cooking for eight tomorrow: Mr Rock Cake and Ms Gypsy Tart; Mr and Mrs Carrot Cake and a couple who don't have cake names yet, but who, we found out last year, have been regular lurkers on our site for some time. It's about time they introduced themselves! You know who you are.

Now, I must get on...

just got to feel for him...

I received this great begging email today. In many ways it's much the same as all the rest, but there is something different about this one. The story just seems more intricate than usual, and I was surprised by his admission that he doesn't understand international investment. Someone could really take advantage of this poor soul. Here is a bit of the letter for your amusement, dear reader:

My name is Mr. Homond .Kabila from the Democratic Republic of Congo, the first son of the second wife to late President Laurent Kabila of Democratic Republic Of Congo. As you are aware, his bodyguard assassinated my father on the 16th of January 2001. My late father used his position to make some fortune for himself and his children. I was studying overseas when my father died and l was forced to return for his burial. After his burial, our family started having problems, which is phenomenal with polygamous families. He married three wives and had ten children. It was as a result of this problem that I beckoned on my father’s attorney for advice after I finished my study in 2003. He notified me about my father’s "WILL" with his chamber.

While I was going through the "WILL" I discovered that my late father foresaw what would happen in future, that led him to share his assets among his children. My attention was drawn where he states: "As a father who loves and care for his children, I took it upon myself to share my wealth to my three families". For you Homond; I have a box deposited with a security company in Johannesburg, South Africa for you to take care of yourself, your mother and your two sisters in case you see me no more. The box contains US$30,000. 000 (Thirty Million United States Dollars). I deposited the said box in Johannesburg South Africa, as valuables and my attorney will provide you with a letter containing the details of this deposit made in your name.

I now observed that my father’s family couldn’t accommodate me and Joseph, now the President of our country; Democratic Republic of Congo because of lingering family disputes. l then moved to Johannesburg where l now reside with my mother and two sisters on political asylum.
It is in this regard, l therefore decided to solicit for your help to transfer this fund into your company or private account in your country before it is dictated and seized by my half brother Joseph, who had threatened to do so. Secondly, you will also help me to look for a profitable investment, where l will invest this fund, because I do not have any knowledge of international investment.

who should i vote for...

I just did this test to see who I should vote for. I got it from Kirsty over at Boblog. The results were a little bit surprising:

Labour -36
Conservative -51
	Liberal Democrat 84
UK Independence Party -10
	Green 25

For goodness sake what has happened to me? I used to be a member of the Socialist Workers Party, back in the days when I was also a very militant trade union shop steward too. Me and three other people planned for the downfall of capitalism and the establishment of a communist state, although one that worked, obviously. We used to meet every week in a small room above a local pub and over our pint of Guinness and a pack of cheese and onion crisps we would argue about when the revolution was going to happen. We were continually looking for evidence of the uprising in every minor sign of social unrest. We raised funds, and awareness, by selling the socialist worker, a really crap commie newspaper, on Saturdays in the town centre. It was always just a little bit embarrassing for me because I knew that normal people used to laugh at us behind our back, and sometimes small children used to laugh at us to our face. I fell away from all that madness when I realised one day that the SWP only had about 3000 members in the UK, and there was absolutely no way they were going to manage to instigate a revolution, especially given that most of them were probably a little bit strange. Ah, the good old days.

partly political broadcast

It's only three weeks until the General Election. At one level I'm pleased that the British blogs aren't displaying the vitriol of some US blogs I read (not your blog, lovely US reader) as it's nice that our politics aren't quite as vile (remember Swiftboat Vets for Truth, or something similar?), but I wonder if it's because most of us are just a bit apathetic (not you, lovely UK reader). Anyway, I know who I'm voting for and it is a bit of a compromise, but there you go. That's politics, partly.

i want one of these...

This company has taken the biggest picture in the world: 2.5 gigapixels. That is one big picture. Remember the scene in Bladerunner where Harrison Ford zooms into a photograph picking out all sorts of detail? Well, they must have had one of these cameras. I wonder if this camera can photograph around corners too? They've put the photo online so you can explore it. What a fantastic thing, but beware, you need to have a broadband connection to view it properly. You're probably wondering what it is that I want. I want one of those cameras! My pokey little 5 megapixel camera just doesn't cut the mustard anymore, even though I rarely taken 5 megapixel photos. What's the point? I just want to know that if the need ever arose I could take a 2.5 gigapixel photo if I wanted to. That doesn't seem unreasonable to me.

ssh...

...don't tell anyone, but I'm quite enjoying being back at work. It might be because I cleared the decks before I went on leave and it didn't fall apart in my absence. I've told them thay did so well without me I'm going off again and I'll check in November time.

good grief...

I have just been looking at the Typepad control panel and I've discovered that we have used up all of our storage space and that the projected bandwith usage over the coming month is currently running at 410.66%. I haven't heard anything from Typepad about this, so we're just going to carry on using it until we hear otherwise. I think we have a fairly ordinary blog, so it kind of suggests to me that Typepad have underestimated the amount of space and bandwidth people may need once they've had their site running for a while.

tuersday night club or how i was close to someone who knows someone who was nearly famous

We decided to convene an impromptu session of the Monday night club on Tuesday. I am feeling just a little drunk at the moment. Mrs McMuffin has gone to bed with Slinky, leaving me alone sitting her with the computer. I just had to write something. The only good thing that came out of tonight was that I found out that, in a Kevin Bacon kind of way, Mr Rock Cake, who comes from money by the way, is no more than two moves away from Neil Diamond. We found out this as we were all singing along to 'I am...I said' (a great song, by the way). It turns out that Mr Rock Cake's uncle's housekeeper once took a fancy to Mr Diamond and began to stalk him. Her love of ND was so great that she even changed her name to Diamond. I think she thought they were married or something. Apparently ND was not too happy about all this attention and slapped a restraining order on her. How nearly famous is that? Why can't I ever meet anyone interesting like that? While we're talking about Neil Diamond, you don't hear a lot about him these days. Why has such a great singer/songwriter gone out of fashion? Here's a little taste of the greatness that is Neil. It's I am...I said.

nope not pope

I've just had the news, I'm not being considered any further as a candidate for Pope. Apparently these are some of the things that went against me:

I said I didn't like the wardrobe and wanted a new one
I wanted a new Popemobile encrusted in rhinestones to make it look pretty
Mr McMuffin didn't want to be known as the Pope's consort
They wouldn't entitle Slinky 'Pet of the Pope'
I wanted to live in Paris (that's not as mad as it sounds)
I'm not keen on Saints and said I wasn't interested in beatificatian unless they put a 'u' in and we were talking lipstick
I support effective family planning
I'm pro choice
I'm not a Roman Catholic
I'm a woman

Oh well, I'm sure there'll be another job opportunity in my lifetime.

finished...

I thought I would celebrate finishing my last report for that place by posting a photograph of the lovely blue sky that I can see from our back door. I'm not sure it's going to last because I can also see some dark clouds in the distance.

i nearly forgot, we are the...

some great music...

Even Amazon are conspiring to stop me from finishing this damn report. I have had Millie Jackson running through my head for the last couple of weeks after Ms Ginger Cake mentioned her one night, and suddenly I remembered that I had forgotten that I used to love her. I couldn't find anything on the free sites, so I ordered a couple of albums from Amazon on Saturday and they were delivered this morning. What a service. Millie has been robbed of her rightful recognition as a true superstar soul diva. Before her potty mouthed rap music of the 80s, Millie released a couple of classic albums: Caught Up and Still Caught Up. They both deal with the relationships between a husband and wife and the husband's mistress. The first album was released in 1974 to some success and features the horns of the fabulous Muscle Shoals rhythm section. Here's a sample of this great album for you. It's a little ditty called It's All Over But The Shouting.

dinner...

Mrs McMuffin went sailing again today. I had some idea that I would finish off my last report for the evil employers, but I wrote for about an hour (probably about 45 minutes, in truth) before I was sidetracked by the computer whispering to me. I decided to make them dinner for when they returned. We had roast lamb with roasted vegetables (potatoes, parsnips, beetroot, carrot, onion and garlic). It was lovely. For pudding, I thought I would make something ribstickingly stodgy. I found this 'recipe' the other day which calls for a packet (500gms) of frozen berries, whatever you fancy, which you then cover with ready made cookie dough and cook for 20 minutes. I stuck a couple of chopped up pears in mine, and I used Saxo chocolate chip cookie dough (350gms). We smothered it all with a good quality ready made custard. It was probably the best pudding that I've had in a long time. Sweet without being cloying, with just the right amount of stodge. The best bit was that by the time you got to the bottom of the bowl the custard and the juices from the fruit had combined with the melted chocolate from the cookie dough to make the most fantastic sauce. Who could ask for more? I'll make that again for sure.

amazing...

Just been looking at our stats again. We have now been visited by people from 109 different countries around the world. Only another 83 to go and we will have the full set. For some strange reason our stats seem to have gone made during this last week. We have been getting about twice our usual number of hits every day. How odd. Do you remember that I told you all about the great stat service provided by statcounter.com? The only problem was that they charged for it. Well I cancelled my trial account with them. They wrote to me asking me why I had done this. I told them that even though I thought the service was great, I couldn't justify the cost of it for our little blog. That was a few months ago, but they've allowed me to carry on using the service for free, or at least they haven't cut me off yet. That's rather nice of them.

you'll never guess where we're going...

We're off to sunny Madeira in June. The only difference this time is that we are taking Ms Gypsy Tart, Ms Ginger Cake and Ms Victoria Sponge with us. This will be our fifth trip to the sub-tropical island, and their first. I just love the idea of us all sitting in the sunshine drinking coffee in the Praça do Colombo or The Yellow Square as we like to call it. We've decided to rent a house together rather than stay in a hotel. I'm sure that this will be a bit of a challenge for us too. We've stayed together a few times but never for as long as a week. That should be just about enough time for the veneer of civilisation to slip clean away. I wonder if that is long enough for us all to have a big blazing row over tooth paste or something equally trivial? Probably not. Anyway, I'm just giving voice to some minor anxieties. I'm sure we will all have a lovely, relaxing time. At least I am not like Mrs McMuffin who I'm sure will probably set off a few days before the rest of us to make sure that the place is clean and tidy for our arrival. I can't wait to get there. I really need to have a holiday. We haven't been away since last June, when, by coincidence, we went to Madeira. I'm not exactly sure why we haven't gone on holiday. Money has been a little tighter this year, but not enough to stop us going on holiday. Strange really. I'm already thinking about organising the trip we plan to take later in the summer. I can't remember if I've mentioned this already, but we are going to Warsaw by train, stopping off for a couple of days in both Brussels and Berlin. Although I'm really looking forward to the trip, I have an idea that it will be more knackering than relaxing. Which brings me back full circle to where I started. Madeira is very relaxing. Have I ever mentioned that to you before?

a little something for our foreign cousins

In the UK we have a saying: curtains at the front and blankets at the back. I think this should help to illustrate what it means.

if i was...

Trapped in a speeding car with a homicidal maniac who had a .45 pointed at my head, right, I would make sure that I was wearing my seatbelt and then I'd accelerate into the nearest concrete pillar. As we were getting closer to the pillar, right, I would have the presence of mind to release the killer's seatbelt. I would walk away from the terrible crash completely unscathed, although I imagine I would need to comb my hair, while the mad killer would lie crumpled over the bonnet of my car pleading for help. I would merely sneer at them, right.

Mostly tonight we have been watching the box set of the third series of Millennium. It's great.

alright, it's not really all about me

I've never come across this before and it seems almost too good to be true. Credit to the nice blog I found on 'Recently Updated' and can't remember the name of.

just because i am the centre of my world

I see Mr McMuffin has begun to post again, his spirits buoyed by having left the hateful job (although he is still technically working for them, completing some reports). I am slightly depressed at the thought of returning to work on Monday as I am relaxed enough to be ready for a holiday now.

I have managed to do quite a lot of heavy gardening over my now leave and now plan to mark out a lawn area in the shape of an ellipse, with three sticks and a piece of string. I knew it could be done, but had forgotten how. Two minutes on the internet I have rediscovered the method. It's a truly wonderful thing, even if the cost involves daily emails from Constance Ibeowa and her friends.

I have also put on 2lb and this is quite an achievement as I seem to have lost a lot of weight thanks to the evil job, despite eating as much as ever. Now, please don't hate me for the ease with which I lose weight. I have a small margin between slim with a slight bust and niceish bum and scrawny like a prepubescent ten year old and I'm on the skinny, with no proper arse side now. This has made me very sad, as I do like my arse and I am optimistic that there are early signs of its return.

For anyone from the US who has the misfortune to have read the tedium that passes for a post of mine, please do not be offended by my use of the word, arse. I only discovered recently from a colleague from Chicago that she thought this word to be the epitome of vileness and obscenity and suggested that I use fanny instead. Us Brits had a proper smirk at that.

I have been sailing, as you know and continue to discover bruises ripening all over me, with a particularly impressive one (about the size of an orange) on my left calf. The freakish early exposure to the sun seems to have hastened the development of a lip tattoo peculiar to my sisters and I. My bottom lip now appears to have been permanently marked with lipliner. Mr McMuffin says he can't see it, but I think it's just a mean ploy to suggest that I am reverting to my former hypochondriacal ways. I sort of hate to say it just in case it's a jinx, but I've not seen evil bug for over a month now and I think the sun has killed it. Hurrah, rejoice quietly, so it can't hear.

The biggest news I've left for last. My little sister, Gypsy Tart is getting married to Rock Cake in August. This has given them bugger all time for planning and I'm a bit concerned as to how they'll work it out in a few short months. I hope they're better than Mr McMuffin and I. We decided that we wanted to get married to each other within a year of going out and spent the next seven years debating how we should do it, until Mr McMuffin junior organised it for us. He did a great job, but I still blame him for the sodding Piper.

gods and monsters

We just watched the wonderful Gods and Monsters again. Ian McKellan and Brendan Fraser are brilliant together. There is a real sense that their relationship with each other is important. Well worth watching, if you haven't already seen it. It will make you cry. It will make you fancy Brendan Fraser, whether you are straight or gay. It's like a rule of the film. The only sad thing about the DVD was the mildly interesting documentary extra about James Whale. Some stupid man, one of the producers I think, just had to tell us that black humour and gallows humour comes from the first world war. I just wanted to poke him in the eye.

our marriage is over

She is watching the final of America's Next Top Model. I told her that if she really loved me then she wouldn't watch it. What am I supposed to do with myself for the next hour? She is just so selfish.

poppet pope

I may be the wrong gender and faith, have many views inconsistent with current Roman Catholic thinking and revile the pomposity of Vatican City. However, I promise to do the one thing that would make Jesus most proud of the church if I get to be Pope... ban Sunday shopping. Actually that's not true. What I would do is liquidise the most considerable assets of the Church and use them for good works. Mad idea, isn't it?

Ow

Sailing might be good fun, but every little bit of me aches today (except, suprisingly for my stomach). I can hardly bear to leave the house and haul my aching carcass around, but the prospect of Slinky without food and the screams that would ensue, strike terror into my heart and I must go to the shops.

He has been relentless in his attempts to break me, by banshee like wailing, until I collapse and he can lie on me. You have no idea how truly annoying this is unless you are the parent of a three month old with colic, or have an elderly Burmese cat in your life. No amount of cuddling or putting him in his nice little sling bed helps, he just wants a human to lie on and I am the only one in the house. Don't even think ah, how cute for a second. He is a truly horrible specimen of cathood. He is the scrawniest cat around but takes delight in tormenting Gypsy Tart's cat by staring at her through the cat flap and hissing at her. When she and Ra take to the garden, he appears on the garden wall to stare and intimidate them until they return to the house. He's probably frightened they'll take his cosy living from him and the ways things are going, that's a distinct possibility.

water sprite

I have been sailing with Rock Cake and Gypsy Tart today. It was fantastic, especially hanging horizontally off the boat, parallel to the water as we zipped along. Strangely it reminded me of being a pillion on an old boyfriend's motorbike (that terrifying and amazing experience was the inspiration for getting a bike of my own). I don't think I'll ever make a great sailor, but I'm a grateful passenger. I also have a very sore set of stomach muscles and hands like leather from pulling on ropes all afternoon. Despite all this, I can't wait to go again.

Mr McMuffin chose to stay at home and had a hot meal ready for me on my return, which was much appreciated as I was ravenous. He has neglected his posting duties for the last few days, but I hope he'll take his responsibilities seriously over the next week as I've run out of things to say.

rustic rot

I have spent the last couple of hours painting the fence panels to stop them rotting. This is a job I have been putting off for some time, as the grapevine grows over the fence and I am frightened that a big spider will leap out from behind a twig and get me. Given that spring has firmly sprung in the Southeast I knew I had only a week or so before the little buds start growing into huge leaves and cover part of the fence up, so that's why I girded my loins and tied my hair up (to stop the spiders, of course) and painted the damn thing.

I had chosen a nice rustic brown to blend harmoniously with the old, Victorian brick walls on the other sides. It looked a little orangey going on, but I naively thought it would dry darker. It fu*cking didn't and it looks bloody awful. I could go over it agin with darker treatment, but to be honest, I am now scarred and traumatised from my ordeal. Could anyone who knows anything about plants please help me out. What climber would you recommend for quick cover (it will have to be grown in a pot). I like flowering plants, but Mr McMuffin is frightened of passion flowers (he thinks they look like Audrey 2 out of Little Shop of Horrors) so they're out of the question.

you have to...

...visit Roxanne today and gohugyourself. Makes me feel positively lazy, but I can tell you a little story about spaghetti...