I keep hitting my head on the lintel of the door to my Mum's sewing room.  Yes.  The door is that low (I am 5' 4").  And, dang, it hurts.  I haven't yet hit it hard enough to see stars, but I am sure it's only a matter of time.  That the floors are entirely uneven does not help matters.

My Father reckons that the cat is trying to talk to him.  Apart from woofing (she has done that since she was a kitten), he is convinced that she is saying, in the best approximation that one can with a cat shaped mouth 'Thank You'.  The cat currently hates my guts, owing to the fact that I have removed about six different sections of matted hair from her coat (without the aid of scissors) in the last 24 hours.  There's still at least three more in there.  She is very much the scruffbucket.  I think that she needs a different grooming regime, but I'm not sure what.  I am sneezing from all the cat hair, despite anti-histamines.  It is everywhere, despite the fact that the cat is not everywhere.  I think the everywhere-ness is partially due to the fact that she's been shedding on me, and I've been wearing the same long, grey, cardigan for the past week almost.

I need to find a green dress by New Year's Eve.  I'm going into town to meet Liz and go to the theatre, and we're going to see 'Family Reunion' at the Donmar.  Since Harold Pinter died over Christmas (insert joke about long pauses here), and of the two pieces of Pinter I can quote, one is the line 'Jane was wearing a green dress', I need a green dress.  There are not many green dresses.  There was one on the local high street, but either I am no longer a size 8 but a size 6, or the darn thing was mis-sized.  I leave it to you to work it out (according to the scales I was 8st 4lb this morning.  There are 14lbs in an st, for those who don't work in Stones.  In kilos I was about 52).  Shame, because it was a very pretty shade of green.  Anyhow, my current plan is to breeze into London early, pick up something pretty at Jigsaw (the advantage of being too small for the size 8 dress in the local shop is, I believe, that I will fit into Jigsaw kids) or John Lewis, see if the yarn Mum wanted for a sweater is on sale in John Lewis, find some food, and go to the theatre.  In a new dress.  Must remember to take scissors for the removal of labels...

You can just tell that this is going to go terribly wrong, can't you?

xxx

I found my most favourite tape in the world, thought lost and forgotten.  I am now listening to it on Dad's stereo, which seems to be the one functional tape player in this house.  The speakers are excellent.

And just as I wrote that, the speed went doolally, and Teenager in Love started to sound as though the Chipmunks were singing it.

Still, if I am spared my Daddy capering about the place, 'dancing', while brandishing a tack hammer, this is probably a good thing...

(The tape got wound round an extra sprocket, and is now completely and utterly unplayable.  Or, rather, I dare not risk it further).

xxx

Have been removing tangles from the cat.  She's tried to bite me, and she has spat at my Mum.  I am also, despite antihistamine, decidedly cat-allergy...

xxx

©English People Daily

This is the Christmas tree in Trafalgar Square, which is is sent, every year, as a present from the people of Norway, to say 'Thank You' for the help we gave them during the Second World War.  Sixty-odd years later, and they still do this for us.  It's lovely.

(The wretched stocking is too small for the satsuma.  I need to go shopping.  This time with a tape measure!)

• Two three hour sessions bag packing at the local supermarket, to raise money for Guides I managed one.  I feel really wobbly today.  So have bowed out gracefully.
• Collect SQL2005 book from work
• Tidy and hoover sitting room Am trying to tidy as I go along.  I have managed to put a pile of stuff into a folder.  Hurrah!
• Clean bath, loo, basin
• Clean kitchen sink, run dishwasher one last time, clean surfaces
• Make up bed with clean sheets
• Make up spare bed with clean sheets  Can't find the stripey duvet cover.  Gah!
• Hand over keys to downstairs neighbours, extract cash.
• Wrap two parcels ready for PO
• Post three parcels to UK, one overseas card (sorry, sorry)
• Burn CD  Stupid idea to download new version of iTunes....
• Make CD cover
• Pack up CD Just need address.  Already had it.  In Address Book.  Am losing marbles.
• Post CD
• Email Em the cleaner's address (assuming I can locate it) Found it!
• Make emergency Christmas stocking, fill,  seal in cardboard box so recipient doesn't open it before the day.
• Try not to panic too much about things that are mostly beyond my control.  Control those feelings of panic where I know I am being irrational.  Mostly, ignore it all.  No, I don't want to talk about it thank you, I am being an idiot.  Hug please?  Am actually doing OK at this.  Which is nice.  Not having had to see anyone on Sunday has helped (bleary flatmate does not count - he's just sort of around, you know).
• Party tonight  I ought to leave.  But I'm listening... And then I'll depart. http://www.denvergaels.com/video/fk_christmascountdown.rm needs Real Player.
• Carols Sunday Well, it all depends on how I feel.  I'll make my mind up at 5pm.  Suspect, though, it is a good idea to stay home.  See below.  Must phone Welshman and apologise.  Staying at home, phoned, apologised, felt awful, missing the Last Carols Ever he'll do with that choir and he'll see me tomorrow after work.
• Attempt to throw off what I believe is an incipient chest infection and the reason why I feel so exhausted.  There is pheglm, folks, and some of it is greeny slime, but nothing like as much as last time.  Yet.  Mum has decided that I am going to the GP tomorrow, and she and Dad will come down and help prepare for the incoming people renting my flat over Christmas and drive me home.  So I'll be taking my Christmas presents home with me and opening on Christmas Day!
• Finish Sara's mittens, and put in parcel, and mail that.  The mittens are blocking!  They are still damp.
• Buy orange juice, satsuma, chocolate coins, candy cane, stamps  Where, oh where do I get chocolate coins?  Don't want to buy a big Starbucks one.  Is an anathema.  And, and, and, the satsuma is too big, so I'll have to go shopping again. With a tape measure.  Gah.  Will do that one way home from GP (whom I want to tell me 'no Jane, you have not got a chest infection').
• Pack to go home for a week
• Tidy bedroom  Work in progress.
• File paperwork
• Try to assemble folder for Guide Sleepover Qualification  Have folder, have contents, need to put it in order!
• Email complaint re state of Scout Centre.
• Brownie Admin from last weekend..
• Open New Bank Account Brownies  Finally sat down, and phoned, and gave this, that, and the other bit of information, and the forms will arrive in the New Year, I reckon.

OK.  Onward.  Or rather.  Workward (to collect the book)

xxx

I managed to climb the ladder up to the loft at the Guide Hall.  I rock (last time I tried, I got three steps up and then had to stop dizzy.  Note.  The ladder has since been changed so it's no longer flush to the wall, but, anyhow).

xxx

I know, totally behind here.

• Buy bog roll and squash that unaccountably got missed off the previous trip to the supermarket (where I mostly bought ingredients for curry.  Madras curry paste.  Much yum).
• Tidy the sitting room again
• Laundry
• Brownie Accounts  Started
• Meet Mum for lunch tomorrow, remember to take her bank statements for Dad, also watch that needs repairing.  Bother, forgot to hand over watch.
• Locate ball shoes, which may or may not be here.  They are here. Huzzah!
• Email old French Exchange
• Brownies Admin  Just really need to sort out the forms that are no longer relevant, also, contact parents who owe money.  I HATE doing that part.  Sunday.
• Sort out Brownies sixes if feeling particularly energetic.  No-one is in a six with anyone they don't want to be with.  As far as I can tell, they are in sixes with at least one other Brownie they do want to be with.  Have made new 'six' for the three eldest, who, despite having a really nice set of Brownies in their six, were being troublesome.  Easier to have them work together on, say, Go For It Guides, then all go up to Guides together in the reasonable near future.
• Sort out recordings, record own reading, burn CD, decorate cover, send off.  Waiting for a few more recordings, thus stuck.
• Send off details of bag packing to co-ordinator, so she knows which kids will be there then. 
• Send cheque to Woodland trust for money raised by a Brownie.  Stuff it, gave on line.  Much easier.
• Knit Sara's Mitts (she's still in the hospital but sounded perky last time we IM'd)  Significant progress has been made!  I knit 1/3 of the second mitten yesterday!
• Exercise immense self control and do not open pretty packages from SorrowAndSong, as they're all in pretty Christmas wrapping, and therefore should not be opened until just before Christmas.
• Well, perhaps the chocolate bag can be an exception?  Because it's less Christmassy....I peeked properly into it, and am looking forward to eating the chocolates.  I like anticipation.
• Make yet more Christmas Cards... 

Actually, now I've got it all written down, it looks do-able.  The thing is, it's mostly just boring.  I'd rather be playing Facebook Scrabble with the Welshman (he is creaming me, but I've just played 'defrag' which makes me ridiculously happy in a geeky sort of way).

xxx

 For Nevragn:

The necklace is recovered glass - you know, tumbled glass, sea glass, from the shores of Lake Eerie, and came from DanielleSuzanne in a swop that was all to do with geography, a year or so ago now.  She also sent some really kickass chocolate-honeycomb candy, now long gone but I remember it well.

xxx

Socks (like a fight in a highlighter pen factory).  I love them.  They are yummily edible, and long, and saved my sanity on several occasions while I was making them.  Weird things in the corners are the camera handle and the case handle.  So it goes.

Scarf blocking: see Ravelry for recipe.  I think I might keep it for myself, as I vaguely made it with one of the rugby team in mind, but have since tried it on, and it is warm, cosy, and not deserving of being thrown in a washing machine and felted.

London.  From the top deck of the bus (the bus juddered, the camera was on a long exposure)

Can anyone else smell bacon being cooked, or is it just me?

xxx

It's the last day of my week's leave, and my sitting room looks like a bombsite.  So....

• Iron the tablecloth so it can go back on the table (I laundered it.  It is not that clean, but it is cleaner, and I found the original receipt for it, it was £21, I am not buying another, I'd rather buy books).
• Finish the Christmas Cards
• Go to the Post Office  Postponed until Monday.
• Sleepover Accounts, so I can work out if there will be refunds  No refunds unless I charge the adults for not sleeping on a hard floor in a chilly room.  Thus, no refunds, as I don't want to charge my volunteer helpers.  They gave up quite enough.  Is this fair?  The refunds for the girls would be about £2 (or $3 US, or $4 CAN ish)
• Decide which ice rink we will take the Brownies & Guides to the last week of term.
• Finish Christmas Presents  One is blocking or, rather, drying, the other needs sewing up
• Make the cutest Amiguri cat toys... (the site requires a registration for some stage of the proceedings but they are too cute). One done, and I need to get the catnip for the other.
• Put the Christmas tree up
• Find out when Ikea have their sale (I may want new tree lights.  I hope not)  Looks like it starts 26th Dec, but nothing concrete.  I just don't want to go with my parents on what turns out to be Day 1 of their sale.  We'll kill each other.
• Bring the sleeping bag up from the hallway
• Brownies & Guides tonight.
• Sort out recordings I'm on call next weekend.  I'll sort them out then, since I will be mostly stuck at home.
• Brownies Accounts
• Go to a book signing  It was so lovely.  I met Shirley Hughes, and bought a copy of her treasury, which she signed.  Just for me.  It's got "Up and Up" in it, which I vividly remember borrowing from the Library when I was small, and I told her about this, and she said she thought she might write another story with just pictures in it, for very smalls.
• Work Saturday Night
• Continue to tidy the sitting room  Suspect this is like painting the Forth Bridge and will never be done.
• Write cheque to self re. sleepover expenses (no, you don't want to know how much I need to be reimbursed).  Ditto refund for Guide who gave one week's notice of non-attendance (the one who let me know 2 hours after the event started that she wasn't coming will probably not get a refund at the current rate of progress).  Need to find out to whom to make that cheque payable, will do on Friday.
• In order to so do, count up this horrible pile of coins that I'm left with (not my strongest point, counting).  £26.21 in assorted coins.  Including £10 in twenty pence pieces.  I loathe twenty pence pieces.
• Attempt to get to Evensong, may or may not do party afterwards (not that bothered about the party, to be honest - suspect that DRAMA!!! plus fiancée will be there, and, really, I don't want to see them).  Requested not to attend evensong as quote "There's only five of us here, and no musical director.  It's going to be ghastly".   Decide not to attend party owing to risk of seeing DRAMA!!! and his fiancée.  On plus side, discover that phone has enough signal to ring when one has just exited the lift at Mornington Crescent Tube, but in order to have conversation when several stories underground, one must actually get back into lift.  Find 1930s Mickey Mouse Ceramic Money Box en route home.
• Collect prescription, ask for repeat prescription of asthma inhaler or possibly expire over Christmas.  Chemist shut.  Bah.
• Pre-order Little Drummer Boy (link to video which I can't embed).

OK.  Let's get on with it.  And, enough with Radio 2.  I think I want some Christmassy music.

xxx