Another reason to get married to the internet

So I've got another blog, I've got my diary-style blog here, my fembrogweblog, and now a sewing blog. No-one seems to have a sewing blog apart from DressaDay which is brillo pads. Hopefully it will attract people who can sew and we can swap tips and pictures of things wehave made and have a little web community like all those knit freaks.
Also, you heard it here first, I've got an idea for a website in the pipeline...ssshhh! Its a secret!

Its probably a good thing that I have to be back at work on Monday...

I am eating nutella out of the jar using the wrong end of a dirty fork.

Fingers crossed

Ok, I have just sent off 8 cvs with covering letters on beautiful laid paper, and stamped each envelope with the little cloud stamp from my charity shop kit, all to publishers in London.
I am bored of living in Brighton, I am bored of having mates but no friends, I am bored of hating my job, I am bored of living in my house. Its going to be rub if I do go and me and the Lovely Boyfriend have a long distance relationship, but its better than living out the eerily timely conversation LB overheard today:

I saw some sour faced 30 sommat woman in Burger Hill ,

pushing her pushchair, and the voice was saying:

" yeh well I wanted to become a writer when I was at uni,

but that wouldve meant moving to London,

so I stayed here with my boyfriend......

and weve got little jimmy now so............im happy........"

aaaaiieeeeeee! As the LB said.

What have I done today?

I went to the library to get some books on pigeons (for the article I want to write), and to feel that I did something productive today. I got some almond fingers on the way home. I'm feeling all maudlin' (probably something to do with Saara not updating her blog I think) so I'm listening to Laura Cantrell.

That is IT!!

I have looked on the internet for sewing blogs and I invariably find one, scroll down a few posts, see what they are sewing and close the page before my eyes are assaulted with things like a purple waterproof silk (wtf?) shapeless jacket, or a pair of haigh-waisted (in the bad sense) mint green trousers...
There are so (sew hihi!) many knitting blogs with gorgeous things, but hardly any sewing blogs...

Bread Tongue

I think my tongue has gone premanently numb from the operation, it feels like when you put some Bonjela on it, or when the anaesthetic from the dentists has all but worn off.

Economic household tips

Having an Irish Father and French Mother meant my childhood home was slightly different to a lot (not most) of other UK children's homes. Of course not that different, not different enough to write an amusing yet slightly pointless column for a liberal weekend paper. Different enough for me to fantasise about the exotic delights of squash and tuna sanwiches (how can I make the tuna grey when it is pink in the tin? Teach me!).
One difference which astounded me was the J cloth. Who would want a dirty rag that had acquired a patina of slime rendering all cleaning tasks impossible? Most of England it seems.
The Lovely Boyfriend was one step ahead, he hangs a J cloth up to dry and uses it like a non-disposable eco-friendly piece of kitchen roll! Genius! I have not used kitchen roll in years for ecological reasons and it is a real luxury to me.
Another domestic concern of mine was I was always unhappy about the number of poundshop sponges we were getting through in my student houses, we were using about one a week! I then thought of using these useless eco-face washers I bought for a princely sum and never used as they were really harsh on the eyes. They are basically two circles of towelling with some absorbent fabric inside, and they make fabulous washable sponges. If you want, get in touch with me and I will make you some and send them to you, they're shamefully easy to make.

I'm like the man in Game On (mid 90's brit-com), I'll never go out again.

On the quiet ear playlist at the mo' is Antony and The Johnsons' My Lady Story. Very nice and quiety. Even the kettle is too loud, as is crunching my morning mixture of bran flakes and rice puffs, how will I cope with going outside again? I desperately want to buy some fashion magazines, some foundation and black eyeliner (ok so desperately is a massive overstatement) but I reckon a trip to Boots and to Borders would be a trip too loud. I might take my flatmate up on her offer of borrowing her ear defenders, I'm scared of setting myself up for some industrial strength tinitus.

I've got really bad hiccups, it sounds like a dog barking.

Supermarkets are too loud

After four hours (!) of surgery I pretty much slept all day Thursday and most of Friday. They took out a pea-sized lump from my ear, scraped all the infected bits out of my mastoid (the bony lump behind your ear), and built me a new eardrum from my temple, sorry if you're currently being sick on your keyboard! I don't think I really realised how long that would all take, and how knackered I'd be. I haven't washed my hair in four day and there's blood in it.
The Lovely Boyfriend visited me in hospital and bought me Heat, Closer, and Glamour...that's love. Now if only my BUST subscription would come through the post I would be made up. I had a bit of a flap coming out of the hospital and had to have a sit down and a little cry, I suppose I was overwhelmed after spending two days in a quiet empty ward. The LB made me veggie broth when I got in and since then I've had veggie pasta, thin omelette filled with veg, and chicken roast, all made and washed up! And I've had both papers, since watching TV for too long hurts. To be honest typing hurts my ears too, so that's definitely no to a bit of sewing...Boo. And music, Kings Of Convenience and Nick Drake are all I can listen to, for short periods of time.
I was going to get a bus to the bank and Boots tomorrow but even going to the supermarket this arvo was too much, so I guess I'll do what I usually do at work: go on the internet at bit.

Hope they give me morphine

As I was walking home today a big red sun assaulted me in the face, and the low yellow sunlight reminded me of the way you feel when you look at someone you love, all glowy and yellow. Spring has sprung.

My ear operation is tomorrow and I have packed (I say packed, I have to get up in five and a bit hours and my bag is empty) three books to prepare for all reading moods: WG Sebald's On the Natural History of Destruction, José Saramango's Blindness, and The Devil Wears Prada by that smug WASP who used to stare down at me when I commuted on the subway. I will probably spend all my money on Heat and read that instead.

I have two weeks off (hoo-fucking-ray-fucking-yay!) and hopefully by the time I get back to lamex shamex work it will truly be spring. Sailing By has just come on Radio4, I'd better get to bed!!

Hharrggll hharrggll and yak yak and pffbb pffbb and even kkhh khh!

Hooks in your face anyone?

This is part of an email the Lovely Boyfriend sent me

salut mignon tupps!
yeh me too, well not that good....just much much better than normal. ie. im not fishing into my drawers* just yet.

...*i keep food in them. not anything rude...honest......

Blog the pain away

I have got carpet beetles in my room. They are the size of two sesame seeds, or half a sunflower seed, brown and ochre and when you prod them they retract their legs and pretend to be pebbles. They are not pebbles though, they eat your prized woolen m+s cardigan that you finally put patches on, or the blue and white check cotton shirt handmade by your Irish grandmother for herself and then given to you 20 years later, or the beautiful Laura Ashley dress picked up from a charity shop that fits you so well but shows your boobies if you slouch and you have to pretend that you care and sew a press stud.
So the carpet beetles must die.
I need to hoover the shit out of my room and put some fragrant rosemary and lavender pomanders in my wardrobe. I might even sprinkle tea tree oil all over the carpet. Infestation, its a horrible thought. I have seen them before in my parents house. I thought they were curious little things, their leg-retraction making them like mini-hedgehogs, but three in as many days? That is an infestation.
What is really ppfbbb! ppfbbb! (or harlarlarlgh! depending on the noise you make when bin juice falls on your bare toes) is that although I haven't seen one yet apparently carpet beetle's larvae is bigger than the beetles themselves, probably as big as a whole sunflower seed, or a short piece of grated carrot, and they are hairy and wormy.
Yak! (which is my Irish grandmother's noise of disgust, but she rarely uses it because she is at one with nature, especially daddy long legses...ppfbbb! ppfbbb!!)

For the love of Christ (please fwd to my boss)

Its still not lunchtime. I've read the internet.


I can't be bothered!!! its friday I want to go home, I hate my job, I don't even do it properly...AGHHH!!

Tangents

I am meeting up with Leonard Hatred (a nickname) and his nice friend to talk magazines. We want to resurrect nice friend's poetry mag, but add stuff and make ultra super boss. I have decided to write about pigeons because I love them, I will try to post some pigeon related links soon. I hate people who say 'rats with wings', they're the kind of people who start campaigns against cypress leyllandii in the Daily Mail. Honestly when I was a child I thought we were in the grip of some kind of life-threatening epidemic because being a child I lapped up the daily nonsense written in my mum's paper. A lovely headline today apparently was "Reese Has An Oscar - But Can She Keep Her Husband?". Fuck off.

Can i just add, while were on a tangent, that I love Mark Heap, who plays Leonard Hatred, and Brian in Spaced (amongst other things) in fact, just yesterday I was imagining what i would do if I met him...
Gush, blush, get a pic taken with my camera phone.

Let me tell you a sorry tale of woe...

Me and Phil found a ball on New Years day, and called it Bally. We would take it for a walk around the park, i.e. kick it around and follow it whereever it went. It was like having a low maintenance dog.
We found Bally when we were in a quite insane state, the day after New Year's Eve and 12 hours of partying we got up at three and went to the pub for a few gin and tonics, thus increasing the madness. Bally was outside the pub and one of the Lovely Boyfriend's flatmates kicked absentmindedly, and as it rolled out to the street I kicked it back toward the pub. Lovely Boyfriend's flatmamtes walked off but me and LB stayed to watch this battered, sludgy ball roll back out to the street, down towards the park, career off towards Patcham and finally settle wedged under a car.
In our topped up drunk state this was sheer madness, we couldn't have been more entertained if Bruce Forsyth himself had turned up doing backflips in a tutu. We picked up Bally the next day and he was our surrogate pet, until one day he disappeared.

Bally will forever be immortalised in the form of my password for my CDN sessions at work. Poor Bally.

Poor me. I hope its lunchtime soon.

PissBum

As you might expect, I had my eyes on some stretch lace from eBay today. This wasn't any old naff poly-white piece of crap, but a beautiful white mesh with grey/black embroidery along the edge. Perfect for making pants. I came home from work with the bidding end time stored on my palm pilot -aka written on my hand; and at 7.50 I tried to go on the internet but it was being a big bastard.
I had devoted three days thinking to that lace. I have just spied some old pillowcases on my floor (well you can't tidy when there's a massive crisis like the internet being a bastard can you?) that might make brilliant pants. I have loads of great fabric back home at my arents that I am dying to get my hands on.
I think this blog might have to metamorphose into a sewing blog...

I have recently got back into sewing, after a long period of doing very little I have started dragging out 4-year old projects in an attempt to finish them. It was while I was away that I started to miss my sewing machine and the possibilities it contained.
This renewed enthusiasm for a lifelong passion has given me my very own secret room, my log cabin, my childhood cupboard under the stairs. I can while away the hours at work in an imaginary world of seams, lace, patterned cottons and fittings, puntuated by visits to ebay, dressaday and Kleins to further fuel my imagination. I can now spend part of my day hiding in an abstract world, my brain buzzing away with images of dresses, jackets (I wish! They're so difficult), bags, shorts... The one thing that has captured my imagination is lingerie, or pants. With all underwear falling into either 'look each of my breats is a rock solid padded froufrou cream pie' or 'check my mesh + faux leather thong' categories I am always on the hunt for nice underwear. I basically like stuff that isn't cheesy, and fits well, with interesting fabrics. Add to that the fact that lingerie is small, and stretchy, hence not too fiddly to tailor and presto! I have a million wacky underwear ideas. I will keep you posted. Meanwhile I have my eyes on some nice stretchy lace from ebay.

Bite me Hennes! I don't need your shoddy clothes anymore!

-but not Topshop, for you are as pricey as the devil but lovlier.