Cakes, pies and festive fascinators

Radio silence again! It’s a bit daft to announce that I shall be quietly blogging away without any fuss only to disappear for another (nearly) week. 



It’s just that it’s that time of year again…. There are some gigs that I’ve done over and over, that I haven’t been asked to do (quiet sigh of relief) only to find they’ve been replaced with other new gigs. Some partners in crime and I were invited to decorate a Christmas tree for charity and Monday and Tuesday last week were the ‘decorate day’ and launch. More to come on that in a day or two when I come begging for YOU for votes! On Thursday night I went to the Foreign Correspondents Club to listen to Amitav Ghosh talk. While some of the politics was interesting, I was more interested in his writing, which was barely touched upon. Still, the gins were big and cheap and it was lovely to be out with friends. On Friday I was part of a group that was cutting up donated cakes and pies for Ye Olde Tarte Shop at the Ploenchit Fair, an annual event that raises lots of money for charity. 



This weekend my time has been taken up by the construction of some Christmas headwear. Obviously, for anyone that knows me, there’s nothing frivolous about making festive fascinators; this is a High Priority activity and the coming weeks would be less without them. Right from the beginning they were very fiddly little buggers; lots of cutting out in fraying type fabrics which turned me goggle eyed. And in the construction of them, I’m ashamed to report that I turned the language blue. On the first occasion, family members within earshot rushed in to see if I'd sewn my fingers together. After they saw I was simply cursing like a sailor in frustration, they ignored me. (Harumph.) Still, they’re done now and there’s only a similar headpiece to make for a teddy bear (yes, honestly) a costume to make for Husband and four Christmas Creatures. In the next ten days. Yikes.








(While I was checking out some visuals for the picture to illustrate this, I came across this post which made me laugh out loud. PLEASE DO NOT visit this link if swearing offends you. [It's not big and it's not clever; it simply demonstrates your lack of vocabulary... I do however like a bit of Anglo Saxon.])

Hello? Is there anyone there?

A pretty but irrelevant lotus from Khao Yai

What shockingly bad manners I have. It’s been a while, hasn’t it?

This time – not that it makes a blind bit of difference to you – it wasn’t because I hadn’t got anything to say but because I’ve been SOOO busy.

First it was migraines, then I fell over and gouged out a piece of ankle, followed by tonsillitis (really? I’m not ten anymore…) and then the exams! All the while I’ve been doing a course. So, no time to tell you about any of it.

The exams are going relatively smoothly. Not the actual exams, of course: we won’t know how smoothly they’ve gone until D-Day. Gulp (One child tells me in luxuriant detail how the paper was; what marks were dropped, and where. The other child responds to the ‘how was the exam?’ question with a declaration of: ‘good’ which invites no further response from the parent enquirer. If you know my children, it’ll be clear to you which is which!)

Having two teenagers doing exams at the same time could have been stressful and I won’t pretend there haven’t been tears (they were mine) but mostly there’s been an atmosphere of slight hysteria. It’s probably not terribly responsible or kind to laugh at anyone going stir crazy with revision but Daughter, in particular, has been first class entertainment.

Anyway, I plan to prioritise poor old Tea Stains because I miss her. I’ve a new theme planned for Wednesdays and to reinstate Friday Photo. If I’ve any readers left AT ALL, do please pop back again in the coming days.

Busy

I fly tonight and I haven’t packed yet.
I had book club today to discuss The Little Stranger. It was an excellent meeting.
I wasn’t going to stay for lunch because I hadn’t packed yet, but I changed my mind, saying ‘well, I’ve got to eat…’
I’ve come home to pack now.
And here I am blogging.
I have to go out in one hour because Paul Theroux is coming to talk at Neilson Hays Library. He is in Bangkok for the Sea Write Awards.
And now I must go and pack.

See you in the UK.

Sunday word count

How I’ve got any words written this week is a minor bloomin’ miracle. First there was the expedition of getting Son ready for the expedition; then Sampeng Lane in Chinatown (which I will post about tomorrow) and finally the purchasing of a dress for Daughter for a ‘do’ on Friday.

I told Daughter I would come to the shopping centre on condition that I would write while she shopped … Starbucks would do its magic, turning me into a writing dervish while she shopped and her feet got worn out and then I would approve the dress and pay.

We went to MBK: I settled myself at Starbucks.

After about thirty minutes she returned because the zip on her shorts was stuck (won’t go up; won’t go down.) She went off to find something cheap to buy to change into; she came because she’d found some shorts and needed the money, and then she returned with the change, she returned again to show me what the shorts look like on. Then she went off shopping again. Fifteen minutes later, she came back because she was hungry so we went off for lunch. And finally, after lunch she disappeared shopping again; fifteen minutes later she came back to say ‘MBK hasn’t got anything.’

So we went to another mall and I settled myself down at the second choice of Starbucks because my normal one was full. She found a frock but I wondered if the whole thing had been a tactic as I was a bit unsure about the dress’ suitability but I was so ground down I couldn’t argue.

I’d written 93 words in four hours.

So Sheepish, I won’t have beaten you this Sunday unless you’ve also been madly busy. It’s a bit pitiful but I have managed my minimum (500 words five times a week.) This week my word count is 2642.