I am swathed in a cashmere shawl (my Snowdrop), woolly mitts, woolly socks, and still I am frozen.

I have also lost my favourite hat.  I cannot find it at home, I suspect I lost it on the bus or in the street.  I'll have to knit another *sniffle*.  Am wearing my second favourite hat.  I almost lost that on the bus today.

On the plus side, I have found my lost diary.  Things are looking up.

xxx

And my Rugby Team are raising money for Prostate Cancer Awareness by growing Moustaches.  So far, Mr Still Attached is doing his best to channel Samuel L Jackson, but with fewer grey hairs

 Number 8 is going for the Village People look, but in ginger,

 

 and the rest of them are sporting various degrees of facial fungus and fluff.  Bless.

If you'd like to help me support them: well, there's a linky in protected posting (and then it emails me and I send you shedloads of thank yous).  The thing is, it's got my name and where I work, so, um, yes, I want to be careful! 

Of course, if you can't donate, that's fine too.  Just be prostate aware: although how you're going to bring the prostate up in conversation I don't know.  I'll leave that to you.  You're all intelligent.

xxx

 

 

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

I've been making thank you cards, and spreading the glitter love....

I really do understand why I don't let the Brownies at the real glitter anymore.  I have glitter in my hair, on my face, on my jumper, on my jeans, in my socks, on the carpet, the table, the newspaper, the cards, the hoover, my handbag, my taping bible, my phone, my diary, my note book.  Everywhere.  Including, now, the laptop keyboard.  I'll hoover again once I've got them in the envelopes...

It's quite festive, I suppose...  I'm sure all the veterans are going to be thrilled by a glitter explosion in their letterboxes.  I'm planning to write 'In Flanders fields' in the space on the bottom left, and shove a picture of us all on Church Parade into the cards.

Which reminds me, I must label my copy of the photo, because I'll forget the names of the kids in about three years time if I don't, and it's a bit of a shame when that happens.

xxx

...will remain awake.  Will not try to rely on chocolate.  It is not helping my waistline any.

So.  Tired.

xxx

I guess I ought to do some laundry....

I cannot say how relieved I am that the weekend is nearly over.  The briefing meeting yesterday?  One small room, and 20 women with Opinions (myself included).  Came away with a tension headache which was going until a Brownie's Mum texted to enquire why her daughter had been in tears and pain holding on for the loo on the way home.  The short answer involves crap bus drivers who got lost, appalling weather, and lack of knowledge of where to stop.  The long answer involves formal complaints at County level and to the coach company.  Must write email to follow up long involved phone message left.  Lack energy to do this now.  Want to sleep.

Today we had 3 Brownies and 3 Guides for Remembrance Church Parade.  The Captain (ex-SAS) nearly broke down during the call to remembrance, which nearly set me off.  I did the reading, and sent Em into mild hysterics with my intonation (James, Ch4 v 1-6 if you are interested.  There are exclamation marks.  I read with expression).

Went home, failed to have proper lunch, discovered that I was terribly hormonal yesterday, took painkillers, went to rugby.  For about the third game running, R managed to injure himself about half way through - ankle.  I think he just wants my attention.  (joke - according to Facebook he is looking for 'Random Play' - I have no idea what that means).  One of the opposition concussed himself to the point of vomiting (fortunately, he had a girlfriend in tow, who towed him off to the hospital) on R's solar plexus.  One of the opposition nearly had his ear off (I would like to state, now, that I did a pretty good job with bandaging that ear, and the bleeding had stopped by the end of the game.  For once, I had the right tools).  V ended up with a banged middle, and looked green round the gills.  The Marine shot off the pitch, forcibly pulled my first aid bag off me, demanded gauze, stuffed it up his nose, and shot back on again.  He admitted, later, that he was a tad on the concussed side, which was quite obvious to the interested onlooker, but nothing like as bad as when he was out cold for fully five minutes last April.  He was a bit confused after the game, but I couldn't pull him off the pitch as he was un-pull-able (sometimes, you knw, they are).

Meanwhile, I recommend a gin and tonic and codydramol: the doctor on the team who is not The Marine said that at worst I'll feel sleepy if I do that, and not to go overboard with either gin or codydramol.  He is absolutely right, and I feel quite relaxed and disinclined to take any more of anything.

xxx

I do wish people wouldn't fight outside my bedroom window at 3.15 am. It seems that a bicycle rickshaw driver was having difficulty extracting payment from his customers, but I'm not entirely sure.  I have a vague, confused memory of people yelling "If you don't let go of me I'm going to slam you into that door!" which doesn't make much sense at all.  Eventually I hauled myself out of bed to work out if I needed to phone the police, only to see the rickshaw driver cycling off, and calling the police...

I would have a list, but I don't have enough caffeine, and I'm off to Pax Lodge (Guiding World Centre in London - please, do, google as I cannot face linking either) to meet the people I'm going to Japan with today, and won't be back home until after Church Parade tomorrow morning.  At which point I have a short turnaround before going to rugby.

But first, I have to wave my Brownies off to tree planting....  I am not sure why I feel the need to do this when I'm not going on the trip, but, anyhow.

I hope they've all gone to the loo before they get to the meeting place.

xxx

 

And, after that, I should be a calmer individual.

I suspect he needs a holiday.  "I think I probably need a 'flu vaccination," I announce.  He leaps up, shoots into the next room, pulls it from the fridge, shoots back in again, and promptly drops the flipping syringe on the floor. 

"It's fine, it's fine.  It hasn't touched the floor."

"Yeah, the lid's on."

I don't think the nurses at the 'flu vaccination clinic inject quite as fast as he does.  He really is swift.  He reassures me about various matters, actually agrees that I was really rather ill in September (he wasn't terribly sympathetic back then), takes my temperature and blood pressure for the forms I need to fill in for the Guidey trip to Japan, muttering all the while that temperature, blood pressure and pulse rate will be different tomorrow (and I was feeling high-speed and panicky while he took the pulse anyhow), but all are perfectly within the realms of normality.

Meanwhile, my flatmate is away until Sunday.  I have taken an entirely perverse pleasure in turning off the heating, with the result that I noticed it was a bit chilly when I got up this morning. 

I slept beautifully last night.  Watched Thunderball last night and started Sara's Mittens.  Got gauge, and didn't want to put them down.  I also had a brief trip to iKnit London (no, I will not link), in order to acquire orange sock yarn (I got Malabrigo in "Botticelli Red", as being orange enough for my tastes, but not so orange that the recipient will think his feet have mutated into satsumas), and got treated to political polemic about Proposition 8 and the evilness of every single person living in California.  I am going to be careful about commenting on people's stripey rainbow socks in future.  I dislike mixing politics and knitting, unless we're talking about the Fibertarian Party, and iKnit London do seem to like mixing the two.  I didn't hang around, and went home to make flapjacks.

xxx

No. More. Loud. Bangs. Please.

There is a reason why my Mum is so much calmer than I am.  It's called World War Two.  Anyone who hid under the kitchen table from the bombs, who clearly remembers Doodlebugs is, frankly, better equipped to deal with modern life than I.  I'm the one who jumps out of her skin at the sound of rockets on Bonfire Night (at one point I shriek'd aloud in the street) and cannot cope with thunder.  I enjoy Bonfire Night about as much as a cat enjoys being bathed, and I would be entirely useless in rural China, where my dear friend informs me there are many, many firecrackers that tend to leap out and surprise one.

I particularly dislike the rockets that scream.  So I went out dancing instead.  This was much safer, as it took place in a basement, sans windows.  We did quickstep.  I did not have a quick enough brain for quickstep.  Promenade, turn, step hops, scatter chasse, step hop, chasse, backlock, running finish, glide?   Something like that, anyhow.  The teachers had a brief disagreement as to what they were actually teaching us, and we looked on in horror as they threw themselves round the floor at high speed with an awful lot of 'quicks' and not many 'slows'.  Halfway through the lesson, while I am fretting about what my feet are doing and what my head is doing, and whether the former are crossing in the right place (debatable) and the latter is pointing in the correct direction (it keeps changing), and we're still only practising the first half of the sequence, chappy-teacher who is dancing with me suddenly announces "I'm losing contact halfway through".

You what?

An excruciating two minutes follows in which he grabs firm hold of my hips to point out exactly where my body should be in relation to his, which is, generally speaking, glued somewhere between sternum and knee.  "Right to left" he says, which is confusing to start with because it's his right and my left, and it goes on from there.  At this point, my head is ready to explode with information overload, and the rest of the class just looks on dumbfounded.  You see, not all of us are comfortable with the idea of pressing up against relative strangers.  In fact, one of the gents much prefers to be about a foot away from his partner...  "Don't panic" says chappy, establishing contact rather enthusastically.  I give up caring.  It is, for sure, easier to follow if you've got a decent connection, but why on earth is he picking on me?  I'm rusty.  This is my third lesson since I stopped dancing in 2003.  Can I just worry about my feet, head, line, rhythm and basic posture without adding in connections?  No?  My brain isn't big enough!

By the end of the lesson, two of us girls have just about gotten the knack of the sequence.  The rest are looking a tad confused,and the gents have partially lost the plot. I feel rather pleased with myself.  I did actually 'get' it.  Yay!  I am also sweaty, tired, and full of endorphins.  I decline the offer of a lift back to Camden, since everyone else is heading down to Leicester Square, and the One Way System in Camden does not allow for a sensible drop off point.  Much less walking involved if I get the bus.   Thisl I feel is, safer than running round Camden High Street. 

Well, I thought it was safer as I sat on the top and knitted at the sock, until some geezer, possibly of Arab, but equally possibly of Indian, Pakistani or North African descent (or maybe just very suntanned), pokes me in the arm as he's getting off and informs me he'll see me soon.  I have no idea who he is, I just got an impression of  tan skin and sky blue sweatshirt as he moved past.

I am suitably freaked, and go home, and sit up late.

In other news, I have reattached the collar of Le Pull Français the correct way round, and it looks much better and the instructions definitely agree with what I did.  Photos somewhen.  And one of my colleagues has just bought a sleeping-bag-suit.  It's yellow, and looks like a nylon puffa-jacket baby-gro.  He won't model it.  Spoilsport.

xxx

Yes, I put the collar onto Le Pull Français.  No, I did not put it on the correct side.  Thus the whole thing flops outwards and looks most peculiar.  And, golly gee, is that neckline low.  I tested by putting the sweater on inside out, at which point the collar behaved but the seams was all wrong.  At least I know what I *should* be doing now, and the instructions finally make sense.

A repeat attempt shall occur tonight.  I want to wear this thing soon.

xxx