May Mission - The Result!

I decided to give myself a mental workout instead!

The nasty chest infection I had for half the month was enough sweating thank you very much, so I've honed and toned, sculpted and flexed my brain :-)

I downloaded several free apps which I'm trying to use daily, some more successfully than others - but then some are more user friendly than others (I've scored them).

Brain Trainer - 4/5 (because I really struggle with the memory ones - the rest are great though)
Happify - 5/5 
Sudoku (by Kristanix) - 5/5
Motivational Quotes - 3/5 (some are good and some are just weird - plus the notification setting is a bit haphazard)
Mental Workout - 1/5 (only because the videos won't play and it's a laborious progress to get to anything)
Breathe to Relax - 3/5 (I think this could be good but have only used once so far - I need to practice the breathing technique!)

I also signed up to Happify Daily and Ted Talk emails most of which are really interesting and do help to broaden your horizons :-) 

I haven't actually put any of this to any good use yet though haha! I have to admit that I really am finding the Happify app to be the best thing I've tried so far - I think it may actually be slowly but surely having an impact!



I think I'm a long way off a bionic brain though!

Go Commando!

Go Commando Day - Go Commando Bootcamp, imagine my disappointment at finding it wasn't, in fact, a bootcamp to train how to go commando in the Wikipedia (and urban dictionary) sense of the word!

This was an educational day, I learnt that 'going commando' is also known as 'free-balling' for men or 'free-buffing' for women. You never know when this sort of knowledge may come in handy.

And apparently there's 11 reasons why women should go commando - I can't say I'm entirely convinced by all of them but some do make an interesting point!

There are actually rules of engagement for going commando - check out the video below...



And then there was this brilliant Male Cancer Awareness Campaign last year...



And I don't even know what this is, there are no words...



Did I go commando? 

I'm not telling you!

Eurovision! 

And this week saw the annual celebration at The Palace! As ever the food, drink and company were fantastic but I found the Eurovision itself very disappointing - each year it seems to get more ballad heavy with an increasing amount of songs just all blending into one. I'd really like to see a return to the outrageous, colourful, uplifting and fun kookiness of previous years so will live in hope for Sweden 2016!

I had a bit of a disaster with the pavlova, having baked the base on Friday evening I then set fire to it on Saturday morning - by accident I hasten to add! I'd forgotten it was in the oven and I put the grill on for breakfast...

Ooops! 

Fortunately my emergency base baking on Saturday afternoon paid off and my second attempt was one of the best bases I've ever made so I was able to complete my Austrian flag decorated pavlova just in time for the festivities!

Ken was pretty much guaranteed a win with his fortunate selection of countries from the hat...

While I managed to pick this lacklustre bunch...(although I did really like Cyprus)

Still, it could have been worse - we were a country short for the draw so Ray had to include a dud - obviously Ireland was the only choice. He also included a nice personal message for the unfortunate soul (John (Bernie's)) who drew it...

And thank you to Bernie for the surprise sparkly facewear!

I have to admit that I liked Australia, I thought Italy would do well, Sweden was pretty good, France was wrist-slittingly dire, the UK was fun and I particularly liked Cyprus and Austria (which just goes to show that either I or the rest of Europe have no taste)

Pleasure - I'll take mine simple!

Simple pleasures Day - in no particular order...

Fresh bedding 
A good nights sleep 
The smell of freshly cut grass
Feeling the sun on your face
Finding money you didn't know you had
Getting home just as the rain starts
Freebies (particular favourite today was L'Occitane)
Coffee (decaf tea) with friends
Magpie shop and giggling at cards etc
Morning kisses and compliments
Laughter
Holding hands
Beef space raiders (sorry)
Being a favourite place to snuggle for purring cats







Complicated pleasures Day - at the moment I don't have any and there are no songs about complicated pleasures! There is a poem by Billy Ramsell which you can read here, and a play (a modern sex comedy - what else?) by Robert Crighton from last year.

Late, Lost and Lying!

Outrageous excuse for being late day - I hate being late (although I'm often running 5-10 minutes late when meeting friends because I regularly underestimate how long it'll take me to walk somewhere - or I've had to stop for a choking fit, or two, on the way!). 

I hate being late and lost even more. These two combined turn me into an absolute wreck. Like the time I got myself lost in York and couldn't find the train station and spent almost 2 hours (missing my train in the process) wandering round before ending up, almost in tears, on a bench on the phone to Bernie to try and get directions. A bench within spitting distance (and sight) of the train station.

No, I'm not joking.

Anyway, thanks to another particularly disgusting chest infection and cold, I didn't go anywhere at all this week. The only appointment I had was with the sofa and it really didn't care what time I dragged my sorry behind downstairs.

Here are some excuse you may wish to consider for future reference though;

• I won't be in to work today on time. My brain is full.
• I super-glued my eye thinking it was contact solution.
• When I got up this morning, I took two Ex-Lax tablets in addition to my Prozac. I can't get off the toilet, but I feel really good about it.
• I won't be coming in to work today. My wife informed me that she is going to conceive today, and I really want to be there when it happens.
• I was abducted by aliens. After being transported to the mother ship, the aliens decided not to suck out my brains. They sent me back home.
• I just found out that I was switched at birth. Legally, I shouldn't come to work knowing my employee records may now contain false information.
• I saw a fire engine as I was coming to work and went home to make sure my house wasn’t on fire.
• The bartender wouldn't let me leave.
• I saw Elvis.
• I've used up all of my sick days so I'm calling in dead.
• Someone was following me, and I drove all around town trying to lose them.
• I was waiting for my deodorant to dry.
• I'm not late. I decided to change my hours to make them more convenient.
• I was trying to get my gun back from the police.
• I drove to the place I'd rather work at by mistake.
• I walked into a spider web on the way out the door and couldn't find the spider, so I had to go inside and shower again.
• I have transient amnesia and couldn't remember my job.

Lie in sunbeams day - slight technical hitch with this one. It rained. All day.

However, Rosie and Jim (Jemima) have been making the most of this one during the sunny days we had last week, under the velux window in the spare room became the favourite spot in the whole place!

Holsten Pils and spending pennies!

Wink suggestively at people - yeah, so I either looked like I had a twitch or something in my eye.

Speaking of facial expressions (in a roundabout way) gives me the perfect excuse to share my bizarre Jeff Goldblum crush and this old Holsten Pils commercial (I think this is where it all started!). There's something about the guilty and mischievous smile right at the end that just makes me weak at the knees - in a similar way to the grin and swagger in the scene at the end of Independence Day!



Hahaha! And in searching for the Holsten Pils clip I discovered I'm not the only one who thought this about his end-of-Independence-Day swagger...



Leave a penny for someone to find - thinking of pennies made me remember a story my mum used to tell us about being in a public toilet as a teenage girl, she was quietly minding her own business when a hand reached under the dividing wall and grabbed her ankle, this was accompanied by a deep voice saying "I bet you want to spend more than a penny now love". And thinking of public toilets (this is not normal behaviour for me I assure you) brought to mind an entry in a book about graffiti which I read many years ago - apparently found in a Harrogate public toilet...

We are the people our parents warned us about 

I did also leave a penny for someone to find, in the same spot I leave it every year :-)

Bunk off early - fortunately I work flexi-time so there's no such thing really, and even if there was...let's face it you'd have to be insane to write about it on social media!

Plant update - so, last week there were some signs of progress by the end of the week. By the end of this week it's gone crazy!

May Mission!

To find my own strength, lift it, pump it, hone it, tone it, sculpt it, and generally flex it!

To get moving and break a sweat!

Go forth and be BIONIC!

April Mission - the Results!

Spectacular fail!

I, in fact, did not move a mountain - I'm going to leave you with this though...

(I love this song)


Nor did I begin anything I've never done before so it was just a tad impossible to get very, very good at it. As a result there was no fruit of any labour to enjoy!

Ooops.