Acting - why do I do it – for fun I think.

Believe it or not, after that spell of hot weather when it was impossible to cool down I have spent a couple of evenings struggling to keep warm. The costumes have a Grecian flavour – but NO sleeves! By ten o’clock it’s wee bit parky to be dressed as a Greek, I’d rather be dressed as a geek, at least the anorak would be windproof. We are performing outside you see.

On stage at the dress rehearsal last night a fellow actor, a lady of mature years, said in a quiet aside, ‘You can see his nipples in that’.

It’s enough to make you choke on your chipsticks.

But it’s all a laugh. A friction burn on one knee from tripping up the stage this evening. A wee hole in one hand from helping construction of lighting shed the day before. Indigestion from bolting down quick dinner before rushing out each night. A sore tendon from keep swapping high and low heels. First aid kit very much on standby.

I met an acquaintance today who told me I always look worried and tired whenever she sees me lately. I don’t know whether that has any thing to do with the fact that I feel stressed and frazzled lately. I had been having a brief moment of feeling fine until she said that.

But it’s all in the name of entertainment. A form of sado-masochism perhaps.

I really must go and wipe the gunk off my face and crawl into warm and welcoming bed.

WHAT’S YOUR CURRENT...?
Mood: mellow
Outfit: black vest and work skirt
Shoes: none
Hair style: the après-swim look

LAST THING YOU...
Ate: chocolate wafers
Drank: water
Sang: 21st Century Man - ELO
Heard: 21st Century Man - ELO

RANDOM QUESTIONS...
Do you collect anything? Blinking everything, I’m a hoarder
Is your room forever messy? Until I blitz it, yes
What's one of your talents? I have a talent for making a mess
Are you violent? Not remotely
How many pushups can you do? I can do 5 a day but then I haven’t tried to do more
Do you read for fun? Voraciously at times but always for pleasure
Do you act your age? You are kidding – why would I want to act like a 42 year old
Can you dance? I can Morris dance

Ok so I know it’s hot but it must be affecting my brain. I just had this mental picture of someone, looking like a cross between Orlando Bloom and the Deppster, washing my feet with cold, crisp lager.

I am up to my ears in printing at the moment and it is times like this when I regret having taken the job on because people are so demanding and so impatient. I do have a job to go to as well, a family to organise, a life of my own!

We had a wee problem at work today. I kept finding fairies everywhere which had to be scooped up and released back out of the windows they blew in. I nearly trod on one and I really don’t think I could live with myself if I had squashed a fairy. I still have quite a few fairies in my purple shed in the garden which I do try to encourage to leave but I do kind of like a few left in there.

Am still getting away with going barefoot at work at the moment but I don’t know how much longer this freedom will last. We are having a fire drill on Friday so I guess I might have to put my shoes on then.

My thumb is slowing me down this evening and I might have to put it in a splint. It needs wrapping in cotton wool or something…………..

I have a hurty thumb.

My first injury at Morris Dancing. Crack, whack, thwack. Poor G, she did feel bad about it but it happens! It is an inevitable occurrence if wielding sticks a lot and I’m regarding it as a trophy.

I think perhaps I have turned into a flower – I am covered in greenfly. I don’t know what flower I am but that has given me an idea for……another list!

1 If you were a flower which would you be and why?
A thistle perhaps, not outstanding but walk on me and you’ll regret it!

2 What is immediately above your head right now?
Cobwebs, bound to be, I’m crap at housework.

3 Where would you least like to go on holiday?
Antarctica – a little tooooooooooo cold

4 What did you buy in the Next Sale?
T-shirts, and why does the girlie look so much better in hers?

5 What age did you learn to ride bike?
12 – very slow learner.

So there you go, something to get on with.

I am shattered and I really don’t think I can hold onto wakefulness much longer so I’d better be quick. I have been on a jolly today as it was my day off. A visit to the Houses of Parliament. It was arranged a long time ago and way back in the spring when hot days were a figment of imagination still. And it was hot in London today.

We started with an official tour with a guide who made up for any deficiency on historical accuracy with a great deal of humorous quipping – now that is my kind of guide. Plus of course he was young and rather cute. Then we had an audience with our local MP and a look round the offices and then a trip to the commons to hear some debate. It was a great day out and very interesting but there was one teeny down side to it all. BO. No, not mine! My elderly companion, a single gentlemen of mildly eccentric ways, does not have any truck with deodorising products and under normal circumstances I am never usually subjected to more than a couple of hours max – at rehearsals mostly – but this was a full day and close contact. Strong odours are a problem for me and it was making me feel distinctly queasy at various times. I came home with a very muzzy head I can tell you. But all the same I am glad I went as it was a compete change of scene.

There are days when I feel I have been dwelling on things so much my mind hurts and days out like this are good for providing a total distraction. But back to the grind tomorrow

The other day a group of us were having a very interesting discussion about learning to be selfish. I have been told that I have been behaving selfishly on a couple of occasions and it triggers that instinctive guilt reaction. It is our aim in life to be seen as good people above anything else and any suggestion that we have slipped from the ideal by acts of selfishness cause us unbelievably intense sensations of guilt. Especially so for those people who are natural ‘givers’. People who strive to please others without taking into account their own limitations. Those who say ‘yes, of course I’ll do…such and such’ because to say no will cause disappointment - and then allow themselves to become overburdened with commitments they cannot keep on top of because they are pulled in so many different directions by other people. It is funny how these people get condemned for selfishness by the very people they wish so much to please and why is that? Because those people have their own agenda and manipulate their soft little friends and why? Because they have already learnt to be selfish. It was an interesting discussion. But it doesn’t stop me feeling guilty.

I’m wrecked.

Ok so it’s hot. And ok I had a night out last night. But I also had a 2am cat call. In fact kitty call. A kitten the size of a large hamster rolled down our outhouse roof and dropped onto the patio. This kitty does not belong to us by the way it belongs to the mad lady next door and her feral colony. But 2 fricking a.m.

We scooped up the wee all-black - it is all black, not from NZ – and let it warm up on my front. It wasn’t injured at all but it did like snuggling into my hair. At the moment I don’t think it knows it’s feral. Anyway we had to try to pop it back to its home. At 2am. In the dark. Up a ladder to where mom was. Ok so have we got that picture fixed? Me, in my pj’s, with a handful of tiny mewing kitten, trying to climb a ladder one-handed, in the dark.

Why is it on the outhouse roof in the first place? Who knows! For a day or two the mom has been taking kittens up to ridge tiles and rolling them down presumably to see which side they go to. They talk about mad DOGS and Englishmen but I don’t remember Noel writing songs about crazy CATS and Englishwomen.

I hadn’t had that much to drink either. Although several of the other night-outers had definitely over-imbibed. There was an embarrassing amount of slurring, staggering, hugging and discussion of willy’s – both huge and not so huge. Sophisticated stuff of course. Including the surprising suggestion from a rather strait-laced lady (as a rule) to smear the rest of my tiramisu all over my breasts. Being incapable of and disinclined to drink too much I invariably end up still being sober enough to recall things that would I would rather have been too drunk TO recall. There is such a thing called dignity after all.

Absence makes the heart grow fonder – but it makes the ratings fall!

As if I care about ratings!!

Well I am actually deeply sorry that I am so lackadaisical about my blogging and I fully intend to make a bit more effort. But it is soooooo hot.

I mean to say, is this really necessary, all this heat. Every time I move any part of me a sheen of lady-dew appears and believe me it isn’t a good look. I am seriously tempted to stick tampons under my boobs. And I apologise for the coarseness of the convo but I am too fecking hot to care.

On the up side though I have done loads of washing which has dried in about 2 shakes of ……….well, something or other. Ooh, I don’t think we should go there.

I am so glad that I have had the day off today. I have done quite a lot of sitting, lying, and generally flaking out all over the house. Sitting in front of the fan with my t-shirt up is real good. But I have also been travelling around the internet in my various different aliases and there is a whole lot of blog out there.

For someone like me with very little to say I have way too much blogspace. But it is kind of fun leaving a trail of me all over the web. Narcissistic? Well a little maybe. Heck no – a lot. But hey if I don’t blow my own trumpet how will anyone else out there know I have trumpet at all.

Enough already, 270 words just to say it’s hot!

Why is it that at a time when my finances are low I find myself with two extra mouths to feed. At the top of the garden we have a young fox. I haven’t seen the rest of the family for a while and she is very thin so I am keeping an eye on her, making sure she has plenty of water at least and giving her some food every few days. In addition to this little scrap we have now acquired a baby seagull on the garage roof. It can’t get off as it isn’t flying yet and the parents can’t get down to it to take food. The parents sit on the roof and terrorise anything that moves nearby so at least the cats are being monitored and we can access the roof by a landing window to hand out a dish of food and a bowl of water. I really don’t have time to run an animal sanctuary as well as everything else so this had better by our lot.

Clearing out the shed today unsettled an unbelievable number of spiders, all different shapes and sizes, but fortunately they aren’t in need of feeding.

Another meme, pinched from another bloggette. I have listed the answers underneath......but not necessarily in the right order...

1. How do you like to be kissed?
2. If you could visit your 18 year old self what advice would you give them?
3. What was the best present that you ever received?
4. What are you most afraid of?
5. What do you most desire?
6. Would you spend the night alone in a haunted room?
7. Have you ever nearly died?
8. Would you be afraid to swim at night time?
9. Do you do the right thing even when you hurt yourself?
10. Are you in love?
11. Is sex overrated?
12. Can you keep secrets?
13. Did you choose the life you lead?

A. No, it chose me and I have to respect it
B. Like I’ve never been kissed before?
C. Nope
D. Sadly no
E. Enjoy life – even the cruddy bits
F. It is definitely made too much of – love, however, is a different story
G. Yes
H. Stagnation
I. No I don’t think so but I saved my baby sister from extinction on more than one occasion
J. Fulfilment
K. Doing the right thing teaches you less
L. I love swimming at night – it’s so glorious
M. There is no best – what is given with love and sincerity is always treasured

Moments of surreality in a life less ordinary.

We were invited recently to the house of some friends to break bread with them. That is we went and had us tea wi’ em. Sausages in fact. There wasn’t anything remotely odd about the sausages btw, they were very good, meatful sausage. Quality, not your value fare. The onions were less plentiful but that was probably a good thing as I can be a bit greedy there and this leads ultimately to anti-social side-effects. The surreal part of the evening really was the moment when having to retire the entire group indoors as the chill of the evening descended (or rose – whichever it does), the hostess whipped the hamster out of his cage and set him rolling round the guests feet in his little plastic ball. Maybe I had overdone the Strongbow.

The following evening = folk night. Being a third share of the organising personnel I was in there from the ginning. One lady arrived carrying a large bamboo pot stand – as you do. The evening wasn’t anything grand or aught, it was just a bit of a singy evening to entertain fellow thesps etc. Baby sis and I do a nice bit of a cappella. We had to come up with a couple of extra songs half way through so marched off in the interval to practise in the car park and entertained a family walking their dog. I can’t see my sister agreeing to busking but the impromptu busking was fun. Shame they didn’t appear to be carrying coin and we had no hats. We did manage to find hats later to accompany a raucous rendition of ‘My Old Man’ – not strictly covered by ‘Folk’ but the whole thing was very loose and free and the other third of the organising trio was more inclined towards skiffle anyway so it was very mixed bag. Bit like me.

Today was kind of dumpy, weather-wise, and never really got to a splendid sunshine spectacle, more of a damp squib, but never mind. I finished work at my normal time of 2pm – woowoo – wonders will never etc. This meant I could meet the girlie from college and amble with her to my mother’s where we supped tea and nibbled cakes and watched Casanova (with Heath Ledger – wouldn’t mind nibbling….). The mater had to keep leaving the room whenever there was a moment of tension, so that explains why I am like that. Deal or No Deal is torture for me. I have to leave the room every time they open a box which is a lot of toing and froing. I often stand in the kitchen and call out to the girlie ‘what was in the box?’, and she sighs, patiently.

I can’t watch soaps when characters are being really crappy to each other and I have to pretend to have important things to get on with. Especially if there is a hint of a lump-in-throat moment. My neck aches from rigidly holding my inner cry-baby back. That is not a tear, my eyes are sore. Last weeks moment to avoid was Craig leaving Corrie – I’m sure this tablecloth needs examining very closely………..

1. Has anyone ever thrown a surprise party for you?
My children wanted to do one for me, many years ago. I knew about it but I so enjoyed their enjoyment and their smiling faces when I was ‘surprised’.

2. Are you easily excited?
I can be

3. If you won a million pounds what would be your first thought?
Oxfam

4. If you could have anything right now, what would it be?
Uncomplicated sex and calorie free chocolate éclairs

5. Where were you born:
Eastbourne

6. Want to have sex before you're married?
I did, that’s why I got married

7. Gay marriage:
Live and let live

8. Lower the Drinking age:
I’ve been drinking since I was a baby, you can’t get much younger than that.

9. Capital Punishment?
Capital, capital.

10. Abortion?
Life isn’t black and white.

11. Recycling?
Absolutely

12. Straight, Gay, Bi?
Celibate

13. Do you Love Someone:
I love many people but I am not in love.

14. Do you have a crush:
I can’t remember a time when I didn’t but rose coloured specs are dangerous.

15. Who is the best hugger that you know:
Anyone I really care for.

16. Do you believe in love at first sight?
I believe in a world of infinite possibilities.

The week ended with another party.

Daughter’s 17th birthday. The day didn’t dawn sunny and bright but then I can’t remember a birthday of hers that did. Even the first one was dull – although not uneventful for me.

Her father was late getting back from church because he had to assist with burying some ashes.

A group of fifteen teenagers can sound like three times as many and when the herd charges about the garden, the ground shakes. My newly applied shingle developed some large foot shaped craters and stones spattered all over the place. If you think a group of 16 & 17 years are too grown up to charge round the garden collecting sweeties off trees, solving a treasure hunt and playing pass the parcel then think again.
Or parce the parcel as she abstractedly jotted down.

We gave her a guitar. She intends to learn how to play it in the summer holidays – it’s her project.

The sound of her laughter for the best part of the day was a treat. She is a contented little soul most of the time anyway so it was the icing on the cake. And talking of cakes, we have a surfeit of cake. There was a whole birthday cake left over from hubby’s 50th which was earlier in the week and then the girlie got a cake given to her as a present as well.

Anyone for a piece of cake.