Remember, children, it'll all lead to doom and gloom in the end

You know, I'm probably way way behind the times, but social networking is fun. In fact, this Facebook business could get addictive. I finally got round to setting up a profile, searching for friends, and having a good nose about. The whole world (under 25) seems to be on there, and at least they're not drivelling on quite so irritatingly as they are on Twitter, which I looked at once for a whole ooh, 15 seconds, before deciding that it really wasn't for me.

Others that have completely passed me by include myspace (the design just drives me crazy, although do check out the superbly fantastic 35yd beat experiment site) and flikr (I don't take enough photos of anything apart from my family, and I don't like the idea of those floating round in cyberspace, no matter how well-protected). Maybe I'm just getting old. Or it might be the fact that the little spare internet time I have is taken up with blogging (I seem to have been doing this since 2002 in one form or another, which is a little scary).

A

Alnmouth. Alnwick. Amble. Is there anywhere in Northumberland that doesn't begin with A? No, don't answer that. Of course there is, but I had to think of some way of beginning this blogpost, and I've run out of ironic sophistication for the week. Can you tell?

Actually, to be nerdy about it, have you noticed that although Alnmouth and Alnwick both start Aln, they're pronounced completely differently? (tip: Alnwick = Annick).

All of which serves to point out that we headed oop north to Northumberland today, and ended up in Alnmouth (Chelsea country cottage holiday territory, but with the most gorgeous beach, and a view out to sea to die for). Lots of rain, which swept across in enormous black clouds, so the sea looked black at times. And an odd smell of sewage.

Pia-pia-piano

Here's the new arrival, which sauntered up the garden path earlier today on a very large trolley accompanied by two rather burly blokes. It actually doesn't sound too bad, considering the huge amount of dust lurking inside the case.*

My audience has been very unappreciative so far - whatever I play is drowned out by requests for the Bear Cha-Cha-Cha. Bear in the Big Blue House has a lot to answer for.

*UPDATE: and two old notes of monopoly money. That'll be why some of the keys were sticking slightly, then.

Ah. Now how did that happen?

I appear to have bought a piano. Oops.

You see, this is what happens when you let me loose in auction rooms. I get distracted, see a piano lurking unloved in the corner, and put in a bid. And I can't even claim that it was in the heat of the auction itself - this was a proxy number. Hmm. Might have been a bit on the impulsive side, come to think of it.

Anyway, I will shortly be the proud owner of a Challen overstrung iron-framed piano. It looks rather 1930s, and if I'd not been so horribly overexcited, I'd actually have remembered to (a) take a picture and (b) write down the serial number so I could check the date.

I now have a very happy musician husband. Neighbours beware...

Back for good...

Well, until September at least. Sorry about the interruption: France stopped play.

And here are the scores on the doors:

Weather 7 (two really sunny days, rest of the time a bit cloudy)
Cheese 10 (naturellement)
Wine 10 (natch)
Pool maintenance 6 (cleaning the filters is an evil job)

And all of it beats sitting at home in the frozen (and dripping wet) north.

Books read (used to be far, far more in a two-week stretch, but these days I seem to get interrupted by demands to play with sandpits, trainsets and stickers far more than I used to..):

Stardust by Neil Gaiman (good, but Susannah Clarke does it better)
Zorro by Isabel Allende (wasn't expecting this to be such a page turner)
The Good German by Joseph Kanon (not seen the film, but not sure Gorgeous George would make a good Jake Geismar. Can imagine Cate Blanchett as Lena, the girl he goes back for, though.)

Right, now you're all thoroughly up to date I'm off to deal with the most ridiculous pile of junk emails.

Arts Corner: get a life

It's Saturday, and there's no weeping Josephs to watch. Quite frankly, what am I going to do with my time? Well, apart from getting a life...

• I could go and watch Opera North perform Dido and Aeneas at the Theatre Royal (but at £13 for the cheapest of seats in the gods, I'd have to really like opera - and as you may have guessed from my viewing habits I lean more towards musicals...)
• I could go and see a production of Peer Gynt at Northern Stage (only £7, and I'm sure quite a bargain for some experimental theatre, but my heart really isn't in it)
• I could go and see Das Leben der Anderen at the Tyneside Cinema (in fact I'll probably go and see this in the next couple of days, but it's not really light, frothy Saturday night entertainment, is it?)
• the Journal Tyne Theatre doesn't have anything playing, so that's a bit of a washout (although if you wait until September there's an evening with Ray Mears - Ray Mears! My hero!)
• the Sage Gateshead is similarly dark, but there do appear to be brass bands galore tomorrow night, for those wanting to entertain Brassed Off fantasies of Ewan McGregor...
• and that's all quite apart from places like the Star and Shadow cinema, City Hall, the Metro Radio Arena, World Headquarters...need I go on?

In short, Newcastle's a busy place. What's a girl to do? Well, cook chilli, stay in and watch telly with husband, obviously. I think it might be time for a nice (free) documentary on stadium rock.

Project update

Lemon drizzle cake = brilliant. Even if I say so myself. There's not much left now.

Wardrobe doors = still not finished. White with a hint of blue looking good, but mahogany still winning.

Big project ending = new book = Neil Gaiman's Stardust.

See you when I've finished it.

Fantastic, fantastic, fantastic!

Wah-hey! Big project pretty much finished, holiday just round the corner. Just time to pop back and tell you all about my exciting plans to finish painting the wardrobe doors (it's like the Forth Bridge all over again) and make a lemon drizzle cake. Hey, suburbia's where it's at, don't you know? What with the lawn mowing and washing cars, we really know how to party.

Actually, my car could really do with a clean at the moment, given that the last time it was done was when it went in for a service several months ago. Since then it's been liberally smeared in toddler goop on the inside, and Northumberland mud/sand on the outside, to the extent that even said toddler keeps remarking on how dirty it is. So far I've decided to buck the Sunday carwashing trend, but I might have to succumb.

Our carwashing avoidance tactic last Sunday was to spend the weekend camping in the wilderness of Northumberland, up past Rothbury. That's right - the bit that's practically Scotland, with no mobile phone coverage. It might have been a beautiful back-to-nature experience - the website of the place we were staying promised: "No busy roads or traffic nearby, just the gentle bleating of sheep in the surrounding fields, penetrates the tranquillity of this ideal retreat." Ah, but they hadn't bargained on the Coquet Creek Country and Western Weekend just up the valley or the Beerpigs Scooter Club taking over the nearby hotel with about 200 scooters had they?

Still, outbreaks of grumpiness aside, I've now discovered (a) it's pretty light at 4.30am (b) birds sing REALLY loudly at dawn when you're in a tent trying to sleep and (c) I can function reasonably well on three hours' sleep as long as I drink obscene amounts of strong coffee.

Sunshiney day

Newcastle was bathed in sunshine today, for the fourth day running. It's a bit weird, to be honest - we're not used to this in the frozen north. Usually you can't take your vest off until ooh, at least August, especially if you're a southerner like me. My grandad was a Geordie, but obviously the Bigg Market genes that allow you to go out in nothing but a boob tube dress and a pair of sandals in January got a bit diluted somewhere along the line.

We headed down to the Quayside, seeing as how it felt continental enough to sit outside and have lunch. Most of Newcastle seemed to be out there as well, parading around in their finery and watching the bizarre sight of an enormous stretch Hummer ploughing up and down the side of the river while about 20 six-year-olds dressed in pink party dresses hung out of the windows, frantically waving. It probably made some hungover stag parties do a double take, especially as the shrieking was a little on the loud side.

We ended up at Est, Est, Est which has a nice decked area outside and pretty good food considering it's a chain. The menu changes every couple of months, and they do a mean pizza fiorentina, which is more than enough in my book. And actually, the caesar salad was good today too - it was definitely lettuce at some point in the past, which is more than you can say at some places.

And, best of all, you get crayons and pictures to colour in if you're small. For once we let M play with them, rather than nicking them all and colouring in the (paper) tablecloth. Yes, I know we're mean. But there have to be some advantages to taking small child out to lunch, surely?

Drink: yes, please.

At last. Some sensible comment on the whole drinking while pregnant shenanigans. I didn't really drink much at all while pregnant with M - it wasn't so much that I thought it was wrong, more the fact that I really went off the taste, especially of wine. And as that's what I normally drink, it didn't really occur to me to have much else.

Mind, I did rather get to like champagne, although that was probably due to the fact that I had to attend five weddings while the size of a house. Watching as your friends and relatives got steadily plastered was mildly entertaining for the first couple of outings, but got steadily less amusing as time went on. There's also nothing quite like agreeing to be a bridesmaid for your best friend and watching in growing panic as your dress looks smaller and smaller the closer the wedding gets.

Whereas now, I'm happy to knock back whatever wine I can get my hands on. Small children drive you to it, your honour, what with the endless requests for "read a book Mummy" (after a week of reading particularly inane rubbish about cuttings, recalcitrant trucks and patronising Fat Controllers I could throttle Thomas the sodding Tank Engine) and "bounce, Mummy, bounce".

Head case

Having just spent most of the last 24 hours with one, I can confirm that migraines are hideous.

And the weekend started so well - a gathering of friends for a sausage BBQ on a Northumberland beach in the blazing sunshine (although in typical Bank Holiday Weekend fashion the weather soon degenerated into freak hail showers and rain) followed by lots of ice cream at the delectable Cresswell Ices.

But by that point the headache had set in. Just behind my right eye, where it always lives, with the accompanying feeling of nausea and general nastiness. There's only one cure - lots of paracetemol/codeine/migraleve, one of those ridiculous cooling gel packs that sticks on your forehead, and lying flat in bed.

Didn't work.

Woke up this morning and felt like death warmed up. Which continued for most of the day, despite regular ingestion of pills and cups of tea (lemon and ginger).

I hate it when the day's a washout. Call me a neurotic overachiever, but I like to feel that I've actually done something by the end of the day. In fact I'm completely rubbish at chilling out, whether enforced or otherwise. I'm one of those people who gets through 47 novels a week on holiday, visits all the sights and then still complains that they're bored. If you left me on a beach for 10 days with nothing to read I'd probably self-combust or produce a 500-page plan on How To Take Over The World.

Arts Corner: I wish

It's Tuesday, it's 10.50pm, and I think I've been staring at a computer screen for far too long. Work is a bit like buses - nothing for a while and then inevitably several things come along at once. Not that I'm complaining, but it does tend to ruin what little social life you can carve out with a small child in tow.

Here's what I'd love to go to the cinema to see:

• Sunshine
• Fast Food Nation
• Dans Paris
• John & Jane

Here's what I end up watching:

Any Dream Will Do.

Yes, I know, I know. I said I'd never watch reality tv, but I've been hooked by the weeping Josephs and by the fact my 20-month-old daughter loves the sparkly lights and songs, and starts clapping along (note to BBC schedulers, will you stop messing about with the timing of this? If it starts at 8pm it's way too late for bedtime, so can you please put it back at 7pm?).

That's my film critic credentials blown completely away, then. Hey ho.

Je suis à la maison

As you may have guessed, I'm back.

France was, well, French - warmer, sunnier, and with better coffee/croissants. Why is it that even the pokiest cafe on the grottiest street corner in France can produce a decent espresso, when over here you're lucky if it even tastes vaguely of coffee? Or is that just a Newcastle problem? Actually, I must get round to posting my top tips for coffee houses in the north (don't worry, it's a pretty short list).

Anyway, M and I had a great week. Proper cheese, actual sunshine, several tarte aux pommes, giraffes and 'stipy zebas' at Bordeaux zoo, walks in the countryside past endless vines, and, not, surprisingly, some rather nice wine.

Not in da house

Gone to France. Back soon.

Listmania

It's supposed to give you an insight into my psyche or something (and not a lot else happened today, apart from M and I making gingerbread men and bears), so here, for your edification, is some stuff.

• playing: A Hawk and a Hacksaw (various)
• reading: The People's Act of Love by James Meek
• cooking: Falling Cloudberries: A World of Family Recipes by Tessa Kiros
• watching: BBCFour's Edwardian season
• wearing: Daisy Collar dress by Once upon a Time for Top Shop (in my dreams, when I have £48 spare...)
• driving: a Micralite

Place your bets!

We all descended on Corbridge today, for some gambling.

It's not often you get to write that, is it? (Admittedly, if you don't live near Corbridge or aren't planning a holiday to Northumberland in the near future, you'll get to write it even less.)

But I digress. Today was an introduction to the wonderful world of point-to-pointing, complete with spivvy bookies, more tweed jackets than you could shake a stick at, and an awful lot of Land Rovers. Oh, and the odd horse as well.

It all took place in a freezing cold and windswept field just off Hadrian's Wall. Oh, how we laughed, as the old, rather rotund, gentleman in a tweed jacket and flat cap fleeced us of £8 per person at the entrance (sometimes I think they see us urban types coming. Maybe it's the lack of wellies?). Oh how we marvelled, at the assorted horseflesh (horses are LARGE, aren't they? And rather menacing when travelling towards you at high speed) as it ran past and jumped over fences. And oh, how we failed to pick any winners. Spectacularly failed. In fact all seven horses we picked (a) trailed in in last place or (b) failed to finish.

So I don't think gambling's going to make us rich and famous, or even pay for a takeaway curry. I'd say we should stick to the Lottery, if it weren't for the fact that I think we've won a measly £10 over the last two years, and most weeks fail to even get one number right. Maybe it's time for bingo...

Adventures in Cinema (part 2)

Not content with sitting on the sofa and watching Any Dream will Do, I decided to be intellectual again this week, and went back to the tiny Star and Shadow cinema, to see some films by a team called Desperate Optimists. Now there's a title for a song, if ever I heard one.

They screened three short films from a series called Civic Life, and another slightly longer film called Daydream, developed as part of a cultural initiative in Liverpool. I went along thinking it would be several documentary-type films, but it turned out to be a more experimental and poetic business - the premise of the Civic Life films are that they're shot in one day, and are mostly one long-take. There's often a story in there, but you have to work out for yourself what that is. Sometimes that worked (the third film, Leisure Centre, about a young man who goes back to work after the birth of his child, managed to take you on a physical journey through the leisure centre and engage you emotionally as well), sometimes it didn't (Twilight, set on the Tyne, was technically very good, but just dull). Sadly, I suspect I'm rather traditional in my film watching, and prefer something that has some semblance of a plot, so the one that I liked most was closest to a traditional "story".

The longest film, Daydream, was harder work with ten scenes (eg a man falling from a balcony in a concert hall, a school party getting lost in the woods...) of varying length but a single take. It was supposed to show "the connection between a city during a moment of great change and how this moment can be reflected in the emotional world of its citizens", but it didn't really come across. Yes, the stories were on occasion emotional. But to a non-Liverpudlian, who didn't necessarily know the locations, the connection with the city itself wasn't apparent.

Saturday night popcorn thrillers they weren't. Interesting, though.

Desk: work in progress

I'm utterly fascinated at the moment by the photos in the Guardian Review section each Saturday, that show writers' rooms. Aside from the fact that I bet they've all been tidied up before the Guardian photographer got his foot inside the door (although Claire Tomalin's desk this week was suitably messy) it's interesting to see what sort of equipment they use (a surprising number of old-fashioned typewriters), and what they cover the walls with (I can't remember who it was last week, but their walls were almost entirely covered by a regiment of Post-it notes).

So, in comparison, here's mine, squashed in next to the filing cabinet:

The pictures on the walls are all ones I've taken in Paris. There's one of the giant geodesic dome at Parc de la Villette, two of La Defense's skyscrapers and wacky modern sculptures at night, a couple of the Louvre, and a close up of the Institute du Monde Arabe's fantastic panelling. Oh, and the Eiffel Tower, natch.

As for the desk (suitably tidied):

• my laptop
• a mouse
• a replica bullet train, sent from Japan in the 1970s by my auntie, containing a stapler, a hole punch and a stack of business cards
• a picture I did, shortly before M arrived (there's the delights of maternity leave for you...)
• a money box in the shape of a cat, bearing the legend "rainy day fund". Needless to say, it's empty...
• a (stilton) pot of assorted pens, mainly those ones you get sent free in the post by charities
• a coaster
• small pile of notebooks and diary. If I lose those, I'm dead.

Not sure what all this says about me. No life? No taste? Answers on a (tidied) postcard.

Arts Corner: The Departed

Dear Martin Scorsese

I rather liked this. Not sure I would have given it the Oscar for Best Picture, as I have a soft spot for Little Miss Sunshine and thought The Queen was spiffing, but it was a good, intelligent Saturday night thriller. I actually had to watch the film and think about it, rather than doing my usual trick of multi-tasking and reading the newspaper as well.

In fact, you got me a bit confused to start off with, because Leonardo DiCaprio and Matt Damon looked so similar what with that haircut and the mumbling. But I muddled through all the same - I'd had some practice while watching Infernal Affairs.

It was a shame a lot of them died in the last half hour, though, especially that nice Martin Sheen. I was a bit surprised that his presidential bodyguards didn't manage to stop him falling off the roof, but I guess even the FBI have their off days.

Anyway, nice try - probably a 7 out of 10.

Yours etc.

Rach

House porn

Otherwise known as Grand Designs. Actually, the alternative is probably porn starring Hugh Laurie, which is just too weird to think about right now.

Aaaanywaaay, I've just sat on the (sadly, IKEA) sofa thinking how it all makes suburbia look a little, well, dull. I love Victorian/Edwardian terraces, but a girl can lust after some modernist clean lines and glass, after all (even though the window cleaning bill would be monstrous). Although I'm not sure I could cope with living in the gorgeous art deco house they covered this week without a complete furniture transplant. Sadly, the aforesaid IKEA couch (at least five years old, wearing its second set of badly-fitting covers) really wouldn't cut the mustard. Neither would the raft of plastic sticklebricks currently floating around the living room floor, or the day-glo plastic mini-kitchen currently being used to produce pancakes (small raisin packets are flipped on a regular basis in our household). But hey, it's home. And I like it.

Beached

Beaches are where it's at, man. Tynemouth Long Sands was fantastic this morning in the spring sunshine - one of those days when you're really glad you're looking after an 18-month-old because you get an excuse to get your wellies out and stomp across the sand, and run in and out of the waves. There were lots of kids digging sandcastles with some very swish spades. A few people flying kites. Several red-faced parents pushing buggies across the sand (will they never learn?). About 10 dogs in varying states of wetness pursuing balls of varying sizes. And a strange man wearing headphones and brandishing some kind of sci-fi scanner, who was presumably looking for dropped change.

Anyway, we got very sandy, rather wet, and topped it all off with a sausage sandwich at the weirdly named Crusoes (I do love Tynemouth but it bears absolutely no resemblance to a desert island...). It was the perfect morning.

Well, I was bored with blue...

Ooh, it's gone all green, hip and urban. (That's green as in colour not as in eco-friendly. I don't know how you'd have an eco-friendly blog. Sponsored by Ecover? Or those folk who catch tuna on pieces of string by moonlight while humming merrily to passing dolphins?)

Lambs, daffodils, you get the picture?

Oh, spring has sprung, tra la laaaaaaa. Yes, it's been officially sunny for three days up here in the frozen north, so I think we can safely say it's spring. Yay! Lots more time outdoors (what do we have a balcony for, if not for swigging gin and tonics on?), and fewer cardigans. No bad thing, in my book. (Check out the link, and you'll see the most embarrassed male model ever, who is having to wear some delightful zip-up versions.)

Anyway, as you can tell, not much happening here today. A brief excursion into the delights of Newcastle to have M's feet measured (thankfully, the cute green boots still fit) and to purchase silly pink spotty sunglasses (thank you Primark for making my day when my small child stuck sunglasses on her head and said "coooool"). And that was about it. Bar a bit of meandering about outside on the balcony, drinking tea, tidying up and watering the plants. Oh, and making some fish chowder (sounds better than it actually tasted, although given that I've got the umpteenth cold of the year, most things are like cardboard at the moment). So not exactly high-flying, but rather satisfying none the less.

But don't worry, pop-pickers. I'm sure the obscure cultural adventures and terrible film reviews will continue in due course. I'm off to find an Easter egg...

Arts Corner: Exploring film

I headed out to Byker last night, to the Star and Shadow Cinema, a fantastic volunteer-run project in the middle of an industrial bit of the city. They've built a cinema in an old warehouse, with a bar and performance space alongside, and now run a magnificent series of odd films - it must be the only place in the north east to be running a radical, political programme, including an Anarchist Film Festival.

It all sounds terribly right-on so far. But actually, it was lovely. Really warm, welcoming and friendly, although the smell of patchouli in the bar did take me back all the way to student land... I have no idea how they make any money though, given that there were about 20 people at the screening I went to - a film called 'Be Fruitful and Multiply', from the Jewish Film Festival.

It was all about a series of women in Brooklyn and Jerusalem who have large families (large in the Jewish context seems to be around 10-16 children), which must be a popular topic at the moment, given that Channel 5 screened '10 Kids and Counting' this week. Hey ho. We'll be back to Daily Mail-style screeching about the fertility crisis next.

Arts (and Science) Corner: new stuff

I came across the most fascinating thing yesterday, while at a workshop about running a business in the creative industries (see, my life isn't all nappies. Honest.). Totally unrelated (it just happened to be in the venue they were using), but such a good idea - finally something useful being done with computers and new technology, rather than simply making a mobile phone thinner. It was rather nice to see something inspiring for once.

The venue we were at was the Culture Lab at Newcastle University (nice architecture, stripped wooden flooring - you can tell no undergrad student is going to be let within 500 miles of this place). It's developing an "ambient kitchen", which is embedded with computers and digital devices, so that it can aid those who require assistance with things like following a sequence (for example, the order in which you do things to make beans on toast). I guess it'd be really handy for people with dementia, or maybe learning disabilities (or maybe even stressed parents who get halfway through doing something and then forget why on earth they went to the fridge in the first place). We saw the kitchen under construction (rather joyously, the units are nothing fancy and are arriving from IKEA), with all the digital sensors being placed in the floor. Lots of ideas about bar codes, sensors and wireless technology, none of which I fully understood, but which sounded cool. Let's hope the finished product gets seen elsewhere - I'd love to know how they get on.

Pixie-land

Watching Red Nose Day last Friday (hey, I'm always renowned for my topical posts, me) I was struck by the fact that there seemed to have been an invasion of small pixie men. Stand up (on a box) David Tennant, Richard Hammond, Mark Owen et al. All fairly interchangeable, when you look closely (although I'd be worried if I ever came across Mark Owen wielding a sonic screwdriver, given that he tends to waggle his microphone about an awful lot and looks like he's going to poke Gary Barlow in the eye or somewhere equally painful at some point in the future. Or is that just wishful thinking?).

Anyway, what is itabout them that makes them popular? At the risk of sounding like my Nanna, I just don't get it. Is it the artful bed-hair (and no, Russell Brand, I darkly suspect that (a) you've overdone matters slightly and (b) you're about 2ft too tall)? The sparkly blue eyes? The short pixie legs (note, you never see Richard Hammond's shoes - are you sure they're not pointy green boots?)? Answers on a postcard please, to Confused of Gateshead.

Smug

I like that word. And the way it feels. Especially when you think you can legitimately have a quiet bit of smugness for five or six minutes. I reckon that today I've cracked it, given that I've

• made cheese, leek and potato pies for tea
• done 8 months-worth of filing which had been hiding under the bed (why on earth do I have SO MANY PIECES OF PAPER???)
• finally got round to dyeing my hair blonde again (boy, those roots were bad)
• and read 'Hippos Go Berserk' and 'Dear Zoo' about 97 times (can you tell we're on an animal-fixation at the moment?)

Mind, I haven't managed to clean the kitchen floor, but you can't have everything. And anyway, that's just too frighteningly domestic, and making pie is Nigella-ish enough for one day.

pee-pee teepees

This has to be the weirdest thing I have ever seen. Now I know it's common to try and flog new parents all sorts of stuff they never ever thought they would need, but really, a "pee-pee teepee"?? Hello? Are Americans really that gullible? I can't speak from direct experience of dealing with little boys, (mind, M was quite good at weeing everywhere) but wouldn't a tissue serve the same purpose?

I bet it was dreamed up by one of those terribly enthusiastic amateur entrepreneurs you see on Dragons' Den, with the light of evangelism for their product in their eyes. Run away, people. Very fast indeed. Particularly from anyone who describes a pee-pee teepee as "an ideal baby shower gift".

Coffee, love?

So, you know how way way back in January, I said I was going to raise enough money on eBay to buy a proper coffee machine? Well, I'd love to report that I'd managed to sell £150 of stuff (in my dreams...) but rather more surprisingly, I've changed my mind. Doesn't happen often, I freely admit (I'm a determined sort of lady/woman/girl/hot mama). I got as far as £43.20 before caving in and buying a stove-top espresso maker to tide me over for a while.

But I'm hooked. It's the low-techness of it that I love - fill the bottom with water, add a scoop of coffee to the filter, screw in the top and then stick on the stove for five minutes, until the sound of bubbling coffee manifests. As far as I can tell, all that might go wrong is having to buy a new rubber seal at some point. Bargain.

Arts Corner: Venus

Now this I rather liked. It was funny, sad, and creepy in equal measure. Although the soundtrack by Corinne Bailey Rae made it seem far too chickflick for my liking, and will probably date horribly. But Peter O'Toole was quite fantastic - he really does do creepy old lech better than anyone else. It's rather disconcerting just how cadaverous he can be, even in a suit...

Sew sew

Am feeling rather pleased with myself today - as well as actually making pie for tea (bacon, leek, cheese and potato, since you ask), I have finally finished a cushion! Yes, I know it's a small achievement in the grand scheme of things, but trust me, when the other highlight of your week has been a trip to the rather dull and smelly Pets' Corner in Jesmond Dene, then a fully finished cushion is not to be sniffed at. Anyway, here it is in all its glory.





I had to get my great-great-great aunt's Singer sewing machine out of retirement for this project, which was entertaining in itself, as it weighs about as much as a small elephant. But it does have very comprehensive instructions (printed 1930), which with many "shewns" and "theretos" allowed me to actually thread the damn thing up and sew a straight(ish) line. Not sure I could manage anything a great deal more complicated (the last time I did a proper bit of sewing was probably age 12 at school, when I made a rather pink, floral-sprigged nightdress), and usually I head straight for the wonderweb stuff that you iron on if I have to hem anything. But I found this fabric in the charity shop (its previous existence was as a tablecloth, apparently), and couldn't resist. One down, another one to go...whereupon the cat will probably throw up all over them, and I'll have to start again.

There but for the grace of God...

Remind me to always always look out for tigers... Thankfully the potty training hasn't started yet, so I'm spared the endless mantra of "do you need a wee?", but I'm sure it's only a matter of time...

Lego of it

This made me laugh a lot. Although, I reckon it must be a boy thing, this lego stuff. M forced me to play with the duplo today, and I was really bored after about five minutes. Mind, once you've stacked the dinosaurs on the top of a lorry 600 times in a row, it rather loses its appeal. We have a rather bizarre collection of duplo (hence the dinosaur) - a mixture of European farm stuff (my cousins live in the Netherlands), a set of cavemen, some dinosaurs, and a search and rescue boat/helicopter/aeroplane set up. Makes for some interesting scenarios...

Lady Marmalade

Or 'six-jars' Rach, as they will shortly be calling me. Yes, it's that time of year again, where those of us of the marmalade persuasion go in search of Seville oranges, preserving sugar and huge oven gloves to avoid being splashed when pouring the liquid inferno (can infernos be liquid, or technically should they be gaseous? Some kind scientist please reply) into ridiculously small-necked jam jars.

Anyway, I did it, and emerged unscathed. Although the oven gloves took a severe beating. Thanks go to the lovely Nigella for a tip top recipe (check out the photo on her homepage, and tell me that success isn't going to her head...).

Taxing

And so I return from the outer reaches of hell, otherwise known as the Inland Revenue Self-Assessment website. Whose navigation is only known to a few hardy souls who braved the concentric circles of help and faq pages, and reached the prize of Bill Payment.

Call it intuition, but I think I know which side their developers would be on in the three-click debate.

Alpha Mummy

This just makes me want to spit. It's The Times' attempt at a blog for "mums who work, used to work, or want to go back to work one day". Aside from the fact that it's mostly a blatant promotional tool pointing you to old Times articles and that the blog posts could be comfortably filed under 'money for old rope', it's the general tone of the whole thing that really bugs me. It's the subtle insinuation that 'you're only worth something if you're involved with the world of work' which pisses me off.

You know, staying at home while your child is small should be classified as work too. I happen to think that it's a worthwhile thing to do. Yes, it wouldn't suit everyone. But it's a valid choice. And a difficult one too. So how about making those of us who do that feel loved and wanted for a change, instead of insinuating that we don't really count. Why not a blog that looks at things for all mothers? Or, to be honest, all parents?

Rant over. Heave chip off shoulder. I'm off to find a glass of wine.

When Houses Attack

Slightly distracted recently, due to the fact that the house is getting its own back. The central heating/hot water boiler packed up on Monday night (which just happened to be the coldest night of the year), and then the shower managed to trip all the electrics on Wednesday morning, and has since been declared kaput. Marvellous.

Anyway, all is now fixed, and R has spent several happy hours looking for new showers on the internet. It's amazing what you can find - I particularly like the weirdness of the wireless shower, which you can set off from any room in the house. Sadly, it's probably out of our price bracket, which runs more to the Wickes end of the spectrum.

Oh, and I've got my voice back. Boy how I missed it.

Little Voice

Still no bloody voice. I am so sick of whispering! I'd start using pen and paper, but it's so long since I've used anything other than a computer that my handwriting has gone to the dogs. And blown £500 on the first race, spent the rest of the evening complaining and then gone home in a huff.

Still, does give the rest of the family a chance to get their own back. I swear they've all gone selectively deaf...

New shoes!

Though sadly not mine. They're teeny size 4 1/2, (which might give you a clue as to their new owner), lime green and beautifully flowery. M is going to look suitably hippy dippy for the next couple of months.

She's particularly confused today (as were the checkout operator in Sainsburys, the shop assistant in Clarks, and some poor woman who managed to telephone but had got the wrong number) as I have completely lost my voice. It was a bit of a novelty to start off with - I can't ever remember it happening before - but now it's a real pain in the arse. I didn't realise just how much I talk during the day now that M's around, and all I can do is a rather painful whisper, bracketed by much evil coughing. Which makes reading Meg and Mog 47 times rather a problem. I am Strepsilled up to the nines, but I'm not sure it's making any difference.

Coffee cash

OK, so I've been a bit busy, and haven't got round to posting. But to make up for it, here's a photo of R's birthday cake which M and I made this afternoon...classic Vicky sponge, with a raspberry jam layer in the middle. There would have been cream, but there was none in the fridge, and as it was (a) blowing a gale and (b) freezing cold I couldn't be bothered to walk all the way to the shops. And check out the glass stand action - Nanna's cakestand is getting its first airing of 2007. Now what I really need is one of those glass domes that sits on top to stop the cake drying out...


So what have I been up to? Well, mostly eBaying...I've been bitten with the bug. My target at the moment is to earn enough from selling stuff (things we found when we moved that we no longer needed) to buy myself a proper Gaggia coffee machine. But it's addictive - I keep logging on to see how many people are watching or bidding on my items. So far they seem to be going down well...and I'm becoming well-known at the local post office (if only as "that irritating woman who insists on using her switch card for trivial amounts of money because she never has any cash on her"). I reckon £150 should do it - maybe by Christmas?

Twirly bits.

Spent a while this evening drinking coffee in a civilised manner in the rather lovely Tyneside Coffee Rooms. The cappuccino's not as good as at the much lamented Intermezzo, but it makes a good substitute (note to self: must get round to writing up my highly biased 'guide to cappuccinos and other frothy coffees in Newcastle'. Which will have about three entries.)

Anyway, the Coffee Rooms currently live in the superbly grandiose Old Town Hall in Gateshead, for reasons too complicated to go into (Tyneside Cinema, refurbishment, lots of Lottery cash...). I have to say I rather like Victorian grandiose, particularly if it includes lots of twirly bits. There's probably a technical architechty term for all that kind of stuff - you know, all the fancy decoration on ceilings and pillars and the like. But twirly bits will have to do. And the Old Town Hall has them in spades, which is rather nice to look at while you're drinking coffee and pondering on the meaning of life, the universe and what you need to get done by the end of the month.

Penguin-tastic!

Ooh, the excitement has reached fever pitch. Not only have I just ordered West Wing season 7 from play.com, but March of the Penguins has somehow made its way into the shopping basket. A certain small girl with a love of Pingu is going to be very very happy.

Actually, Pingu's one of the few things I can stomach on CBeebies. Most of the stuff is just tat - there's so many dire puppet shows (stand up The Shiny Show, Doodle Do, Fimbles and the like), irritating presenters or appallingly animated trains that I usually turn it off within five minutes. The poor lass is just going to have to make do with a couple of Pingu videos and Radio 4, I'm afraid...

Arts Corner: Telly-tastic

Is it just me, or has this been the most ridiculous week for telly ever? Normally I watch a bit here and there, mainly (oh, the horror!) while having tea, but this week there's actually been things I've wanted to watch, ranging from Ken Branagh's making of the Magic Flute (bit of a left-field choice, but I've been a fan since seeing him do Hamlet), to Torchwood, This Life+10 and all the Monty Python stuff. I'll have square eyes by the end of it all. And you'll be bored witless with the Arts Corner interludes.

Here's the scores on the doors so far:

Arena - The Archers: dull, dull, dull apart from the last 5 minutes (4/10)
Torchwood: unintentionally hilarious (6/10)
This Life +10: disappointing (5/10 - with 1/10 for hair)
Kenneth Branagh Films The Magic Flute: still on video, awaiting consumption
What the Pythons Did Next: ditto
Green Wing Special: need you ask? (11/10)

I promise to go away and do something other than watch telly now. Like read a good, improving book, learn how to macrame or make muesli. Or simply have a life.

Oh, in other news, the starving swans have stopped being quite so vicious. Turned up today with M and a load of bread to be met with polite indifference. I think they've had a bonanza two weeks over Christmas, and are now planning a little light swanning about in a bid to work off some calories.

It's Love, Actually

I have fallen in love.

Now, don't get your hopes up. I realise this could possibly be considered an overly dramatic way to open a blog post, but trust me, the more drama the better. Particularly when you realise that I'm talking about falling in love with a hand cream... Sad, I know, when that's the highlight of the year so far, but us suburbanites have to take what they can get.

So, in a bid to big up the dramatic tension, let's cue the romantic music, bring on some soft focus and shag pile carpets (that sounds a bit 1970s, but it's probably 'retro' or 'ironic' at the moment, and therefore very cool indeed), and introduce the product of the moment:



ta da! Banana hand cream. Who would have thought it? But it (a) smells gorgeous and (b) works a treat on knackered hands like what I have got. Even if wearing the lovely cotton gloves provided with it did remind R of his Nanna. Which is probably not de rigueur at bedtime.

Arts Corner - This Life +10 (otherwise known as the Bad Hair Saga)

Oh, god, the hair. More specifically, Jack Davenport's. It wasn't just me, it was bad, wasn't it?

As you can probably tell, I got a tad distracted while watching This Life +10. Which was probably a good thing - it meant I stopped concentrating on the plot (frankly, quite poor), the dialogue (pretty good), the acting (well, they'd definitely improved over the last 10 years) and the 'will they, won't they' Miles and Anna scenario (surprisingly, I found I didn't really care). It was all a bit disappointing to be honest. There was some nice stuff amidst the predictable 'issues' - I really liked some of the scenes with the little lad, Egg and Milly - but that was probably because I was prime target 30-something-with-small-child-audience.

Ah well. At least there's the Green Wing special tomorrow...and the box set of West Wing series 7 in the post from Amazon.

Update: And don't even get me started on the final episode of Torchwood...

Life, the universe and everything

Just watched This Life +10, like every other 30-something in the country.

Crikey. I feel old.

Hippy Knew Yar

Happy New Year. Woo. And very possibly Hoo as well.

There's not much to report really. It's pouring down and blowing a gale outside, the Pythons are on the telly pretending to be Brian, and all is well with the world.

Here, in no particular order, are my resolutions for 2007. They'll probably last oooh, all of a week.

1. After last night, I will not make pot au chocolat for at least another six months.
2. Actually, while we're on the subject of food, I will give pineapple another go. And I'm prepared to extend an amnesty to marzipan.
3. I will go to bed before 11.30pm (except at weekends, or when Green Wing's on). Hey, this resolution thing is easy.
4. Erm...

Oof.

Too much christmas cake, and too many mince pies does not a happy me make. I think I might need a quiet lie-down somewhere, while I contemplate the meaning of laundry, life and why exactly I thought it was a good idea to mix champagne, red wine and dessert wine last night...

Books, books and more books

Once I've started on the subject of books and kids, I can't stop, I'm afraid. Here's today's question: why are most baby books so awful?

Sadly, so many of them look like they've been thrown together at the last minute, with text that seems to have been typed by a dog in a small back room somewhere near Grimsby, and computerised illustrations that someone did with Paint after several bottles of wine. I guess it's one of those things that anyone thinks they can do - ooh, yes, let's write a book for a baby. What a doddle. Write a couple of words, put in a couple of sickly pastel pictures and away you go. Oh, and why not add a musical doo-dah while we're at it, to really annoy the parents.

In reality, because you're working with a more limited vocabulary (although Slinky Malinki manages to include the glorious phrase "rapscallion cat") you really have to make the language work twice as hard. The ones that do it best (and also seem to get the best reaction from my consumer sample of one small child) are those that string together rhymes and silly words, and match them to carefully drawn pictures. Oh, and anything with a cat in it is a winner in our house.

Here's my list of "books suitable for 15-month-olds that I enjoy reading too" (although after the tenth rendition in a row my enthusiasm might take a slight downturn).

Pants (anything that begins "small pants, big pants, giant frilly pig pants" has to be good)
Room on the Broom
Barnyard Dance and Hippos Go Berserk
Slinky Malinki
Miffy at the Gallery
Dear Zoo
The Baby's Catalogue (reminds me of my 1970s childhood)
Cheep! Cheep!

M seems to like all these too, judging by the number of times a day I am brought them from the book basket.

Books ahoy!

I took M to Seven Stories today. It's a rarity amongst museums/galleries - somewhere that's for children, and yet is not remotely kiddified. There's no dumbing down of the subject matter, and they've really thought about how to get kids (and their parents) involved, and into the idea of reading books. Hurrah! And the bookshop is to die for.

At the moment there's a fantastic exhibition about Robert Westall (of Machine Gunners fame) which M loved because there was a projection of WWII aeroplane flying around the room, and which I loved because it was talking about his links with Tynemouth and Northumberland (and the plane was pretty cool too). We both liked the Blitzcat illustrations (cue much miaowing from M). And we also popped in on story time, listened (ish) to a story about a blue kangaroo, and made a christmas tree decoration. Definitely beats sitting at work staring at a computer screen...

Can't see the wood for the trees

Next year, when I blithely say I'll make all my Christmas cards, somebody please remember and shoot me. 60-odd later, I've had enough of folksy-Scandi style and have progressed to Habitat-chic. I reckon that at my hourly rate, each card is costing me about a fiver...

Arts Corner - The Holiday

Or Holiday from Hell, as I like to call it. Now come on Jack Black, Cameron Diaz, Jude Law and Kate Winslet. Did any of you actually read the script? Did it not occur to you that (a) it was about two hours too long (b) full of cliches, and (c) corny as hell? What were you thinking? Or were the dollar signs rolling in front of your eyes?

Actually, it was quite fun to watch - in a 'oh my god it's so terrible it's really good' kind of way. Top tips include:

• outstanding Telegraph product placement
• the snowy lands of Surrey, where snow appears and disappears from shot to shot
• Cameron Diaz running for a mile along a 'snowy' lane in stiletto heels without pausing for thought
• Jude Law smirking in every scene
• the old bloke who can't walk miraculously discovering that he can run up stairs

And I'm proud to say that I laughed hysterically at the bit in the car at the end when Cameron Diaz finally learns that she can cry (sorry everyone else in the cinema who was blubbing into their hankies at that point).

Arts corner - tv cookery

At the time it made sense to watch some cooking while I was eating my tea. Yes, I know it's uncouth and leads to rack and ruin, but I was on my own and couldn't be bothered to sit in state in the dining room. Anyway, I'd completely forgotten how annoying Nigella Lawson can be. While I think she's a brilliant food writer, and I have several of her cookery books (How to be a Domestic Goddess is my baking bible), she doesn't half bug me when she's on the telly. I started to watch her Christmas Kitchen earlier on, but had to turn it off halfway through. It's all this pouting, swinging her hair about and delving into cream that gets me. She's just turned into a caricature. Mind, some of the others are no better (stand up Jamie Oliver, Gordon Ramsay et al). I suspect that once you've made it on the telly, the mannerisms/enthusiasms that made you famous become ever more exaggerated, in a desperate attempt to keep/increase the numbers of viewers. There's only really ever been Delia, whose presentation skills seemed to be non-existant, who stayed the same.

So I've had it with tv cookery for the moment. What I really need is a bit of Julia Child.

Pies (mince)

Here are the fabled pies that M and I made last week. They look quite fancy, don't they? There were a lot more of them originally. And no, I haven't eaten them all.

If you wanna be the best, wo-oah procrastination's what you need...

I know I'm supposed to be writing Christmas cards, but I've got a classic case of procrastination, so I've been fiddling about on eBay, reading blogs and doing 101 other things in a desperate attempt to make Christmas go away. Don't get me wrong, I love the whole Christmas thang (especially buying presents for M), but it's a pain in the arse to organise.

So I'm proposing a whole new schedule for Christmas 2007, in a bid to avoid all last-minute card-writing, present-buying and mince-pie-making.

January: buy Christmas cards/presents in sales
February-July: write 10 Christmas cards per month, gazing into crystal ball to predict (a) degree of pennilessness (b) progress of diy (c) behaviour of offspring/cat/husband
August: wrap presents
September: make mincemeat/mince pies
October: eat mince pies
November: eat mince pies
December: eat mince pies

By my reckoning that gives at least three months of pastry ingestion, which can't be bad at all.

Buns (2)

No not that kind. Unless they are gorgeous George's. No, more bun cases, this time from the lovely Rice. I saw these at the Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art, and was smitten. It was a bit odd finding bakeware in the gallery's shop in amongst all the modern art books, but maybe I should get some and be an urban trendsetter.

Tea and buns

Carrying on the subject of domestic-ness (as always seems to be the case round here), here's some rather fantastic bun cases. You can't go far wrong with a fairy cake, that's what I reckon. And all the better if they're dolled up in spots, stripes or even Black Watch Tartan (thanks to the lovely Vic for finding these, by the way). Although I suppose it should really be mince pies, given that it's December. I've not got round to making any yet, although my Delia mincemeat is sitting in the pantry ready and waiting. Pictures to follow when I do.

I realise that my baking exploits probably aren't wildly exciting, but there's a limit to how much excitement you can squeeze out of suburban life. I keep trying to kid myself that we're still living in the city, but once the Avon lady and the Betterware catalogue man have been round I know there's no hope.

Seasons greetings

Not content with attempting to do the domestic goddess-thingy food-wise, I've taken it upon myself to make some Christmas cards. It's December 4, and I've just begun. No pressure, then.

Above, you'll see a sneak preview of this year's card. As the design afficionados among you will obviously guess, it's a Scandinavian theme (which may have something to do with the fact that the wrapping paper I'm using came from IKEA last year) using the traditional four-year-old's drawing of a Christmas tree that seems to be my default setting. I expect the orders to come rolling in at any moment...

Actually, it's rather satisfying cutting and sticking, and takes me back to being about six and making scrapbooks on that weird coloured paper. Did anyone else save sweet wrappers and cut pictures out of the Mothercare catalogue, or was that just me?

Gorgeous George

Ooh, this made me laugh. And it's seasonal...

Arts Corner

This is a serious blog, you know (!), and as such, should obviously have an Arts Corner. Much like that bit in The Guardian that you never read, cos it's full of reviews of opera, biographies of obscure authors and how the telly isn't as good as it used to be (discuss).

So here goes.

Item number one: The Tempest. Shortly to be appearing in London, but last week brought to the provincials in Newcastle courtesy of the RSC.

It should have been fantastic - it starred the thinking woman's favourite Star Trek Captain, Patrick Stewart, for a start. I have to say I was distinctly underwhelmed though. It had the usual RSC groovy-yet-ingenious-scenery and staging, some pretty weird music and some really good actors, but to be honest I fell asleep in a couple of places, and Mr Stewart wasn't anything to write home about. I was expecting someone with real stage presence - I've seen a couple of people (Kenneth Branagh and a very young Toby Stephens spring to mind) who were so mesmerising that you simply had to watch what they were doing no matter where they were on stage, but I just didn't get that with him. And he was a bit fond in places of the shouty hammy thing that actors do when they are attempting to get all emotional, so you can't tell what the hell they're on about. Speak the lines dear boy. Us punters in the gallery who can't necessarily see all the facial expressions and movements need to know what's happening. Or we fall asleep cos it's dark, warm and we were up at 5.30am with a teething toddler. You have to allow for these things.

Thinking of Toby Stephens reminds me of item number two: Random Quest on BBC Four. Which didn't contain Mr Stephens at all, but the lovely Samuel West instead. I know it's not much of a segueway, but I'm trying, I really am. Anyway, I saw it completely by accident - you know how it is, you end up eating your tea in front of the telly watching some mindless rubbish, stay tuned, and actually end up with something really really good. Plot wasn't amazing (it was an adaptation of a John Wyndham short story, and lacked a ballsy ending), but the whole look and feel of the piece was gorgeous - the alternative reality segments looked to have been shot in a house that could have been straight out of Wallpaper. Me wantee. Anyway, nice restrained music, great acting...it was one of those dramas that don't leave your head for a while afterwards. And it was sci-fi. Now that doesn't happen often.

Arty-farty stuff over. Toodle pip.

How to celebrate your birthday

• Get woken up at 6.30am by overenthusiastic toddler.
• Make exciting breakfast of Shreddies and milk.
• Take a walk to the park, to feed the ducks. Get menaced by starving swans, who turn out to be about 5ft 4in when stood up waving their necks about.
• Eat lunch, while attempting to avoid being smeared with Marmite and toast.
• Go to Sainsburys. Allow toddler to stand in trolley, in direct contravention of about 540 byelaws in order to go round store in less than 5 hours.
• Make tea. Sort out washing.
• Collapse on sofa in front of Home and Away.

I have to say that throwing bread at the assorted swans/ducks/geese was pretty good fun (although a bit scary due to the sheer numbers of huge birds with very pointy beaks who demanded dough with menaces). I quite liked annoying the staff in Sainsburys. And I especially enjoyed the Marmitey kiss.

And I did get to go out to a very fancy restaurant in the evening (Secco, on Pilgrim Street) where I ate my way through the Menu Gastronomico (orichette with squid! tiger prawns baked in sea salt! fig and walnut torte! prosecco!) before collapsing in a rotund heap.

Best birthday for ages, I reckon.

Aaargh

If I ever start making noises about going to IKEA on a Sunday, then will someone please shout NOOOOOO at me, preferably at very close range. I'd forgotten how completely hideous it is in the run up to Christmas, full of people (me included) who fancied a trip out to buy some some candles and a pack of napkins, and unaccountably returned with some coat pegs and endless lightbulbs. And who meander. Very very slowly. Around the whole store, four abreast, so that you can't get past (especially not when your toddler insists on pushing the trolley as well). That's it. I'm abandoning Christmas shopping, and going online. Ebay here we come.

Smug, me?

Rather worryingly, I seem to have produced a child that will devour tagliatelle with chicken livers for lunch. I can't claim any credit though - rather than anything Nigella-Lawson-domestic-goddess-ish, I suspect it was the lure of smiling Italian waiters. I'm sure it'll all go to hell in a handbasket, and that there will be refusal to eat anything except beans on toast at some point, to terrify the middle-class mother in me. But for now I'll sit back in a smug and self-satisfied manner, while looking at all the furore on advertising junk foods during children's tv. My downfall will come soon, no doubt. Probably right about the point that she discovers there's chocolate in her Christmas stocking.

In other news, I'm currently watching the back-slapping celeb-fest that is Children in Need. Much as the cause is worthy, it makes for some really terrible tv. Lots of miming bands, awful local tv segments (sorry Wendy Gibson) and Peter and Jordan. I think I need to go and lie down. Or at least top up the glass of red wine that is conveniently sat right next to the laptop.

"Give Satan an inch, and he'll be a ruler"

It's amazing what you can see in 6ft high red letters on church billboards. This one had the unfortunate effect of making me laugh out loud at the idea of Satan as a wooden ruler, circa 1982 - those ones that you had in class that always had nicks and scrapes out of them so you could never draw a straight line properly. Dead scary, that would be.

Actually, it's been a day of religion, in one form or another. Took M to Durham, to see the cathedral, which is probably one of my favourite buildings in the world. I just love the ridiculously fat pillars, the sense of height and space, and the fact that it's warm in there when it's hurling down outside and the trees on Palace Green are horizontal. I also have rather a sentimental attachment to it, having taken David Rollason's Northumbria course in my third year at Durham and spent several happy hours pottering about looking at cathedral architecture.

No indication of the cathedral's opinions on Satan, though, which was a bit of a disappointment. Where's the fire and brimstone when you need it?

Fashion nonsense

Having not bought anything remotely fashionable for a while, I've finally succumbed. And I'm rather proud of the fact that it happened in Top Shop, surrounded by bizarrely dressed 16-year olds. And on a Saturday as well! It's so long since I've been shopping in town that it was all quite exciting (sad, I know). And once I'd stopped myself from looking at toddler-related stuff I had a ball.

Anyway, all that is a long way round of saying that I've bought a new t-shirt and long jumper (grey, no less). I'm in touch with fashion, me. But not as in touch as the sales assistant I saw in H&M, who could have have been in Grange Hill, circa 1982. She had Trisha's flicked long hair, a grey and red stripy long-sleeved top, stripy tights, and some killer dungaree shorts. Made me feel very old...

Boy band ahoy!

This made me laugh like a drain. And a hyena combined. In fact it's just made me laugh so much that I'm in danger of waking up M and half the neighbourhood. If you loved Take That's cheesy videos (in an ironic manner, obviously, as just liking Take That would have been far too uncool) the first time round then this one's for you. I'm off to You Tube now, to try and have a look at the real thing.

UPDATE: Oh, come on boys, you're not trying. Where's the dance routine? Or at the very least a few outstretched hands? And shouldn't you be in implausibly white suits that remain spotless despite being in the most windswept and rugged location?

I will say this for them, though, they've definitely worked hard on the pouting over the last 10 years. And top marks for the artfully dishevelled hair. It must have taken days to courier over enough hair mousse for the shoot.

UPDATE II: And of course you can't beat the lovely JRT's take on Back for Good... Go JRT!

UPDATE III: I think I may have spent too much time looking at You Tube.

Mistaken identity (3)

How about Captain Jack Aubrey? Although I'm not sure our Captain Jack has Russell Crowe's frown quite right yet. He's been practising for the last couple of days, but he's still not mean and moody enough.

Abandon hope...

I wrote the most marvellous post last night, all about this band and their mariachi-inspired spooky Halloween gig that we went to at the Sage on Tuesday. It got to 9.30pm, and my eyes were starting to ache...the next thing I knew, I'd woken up with a start and was gazing at a blank screen. No words, nothing. All very Torchwood.

Sadly, you'll be deprived of the literary genius that was my work as I've completely forgotten what it was that I was wittering on about. I could baldly state that Calexico were very good, but it won't inspire you to go and see them as much as my late-lamented post would have done.

Mistaken identity (2)

The thought occurs – maybe Captain Jack isn’t that Captain Jack after all, and should really be swashbuckling across the high seas with Keira Knightly et al? Although he might be a bit small to wield a cutlass with any efficiency. And he doesn't like wearing bandannas.

You got to pick a pocket or two

Oh dear. I appear to have inadvertently defrauded Tesco. Got home from pottering around the supermarket with M, only to discover that she had lifted a toothbrush (a nice ergonomic one as it happens) and had somehow managed to hide it in the folds of her coat. I obviously need to frisk her at the checkouts...

Mistaken identity

Well, how was I to know that Russell T Davies was going to make M's Captain Jack the star of Torchwood? Here he is practising for yet another stunt on top of a very high building - we're thinking maybe the Get Carter car park in central Gateshead for that gritty, crime-ridden feel.

Although if you want 21st century disruption in the space-time continuum (aka acres of glass/stainless steel etc) he says he'll climb the Sage as well.

Les francais adore...

ooh, all sorts of stuff. But mostly nice wine, good cheese and cepes, if the last week is anything to go by. Me, well, I like nice wine, good cheese and cepes with the best of them and I think French bread is rather spiffing too. They're also not fazed by a small grinning child waving and shouting "bye-bye" at every possible opportunity. Which at the moment wins lots of points in my book.

In fact, France was pretty good. It was sunny, there were opportunities for small people to play in the paddling pool and sandpit with no clothes on (oh, yes, embarrassing photos a go-go), there were lots of interesting places to wander round and new food to try, and there were grandparents to enchant. It was all rather good. Apart from the seven-hour delay at Bergerac airport on the way home. If you've ever been there, you'll know it's just an arrivals shed and a departures shed with a bar in between. Tricky place to amuse a one-year-old for seven hours...

Anyway, now for something completely different. I was going to segueway neatly into a new topic, but it's late, and much as I love writing all this stuff, quite frankly I'm looking forward to getting into a freshly laundered bed. I could go on about the niceness of new sheets, but instead I'll shout "baking", point you at this link to the Guardian (which incidently has a fabulous headline) and then run quickly in the opposite direction. Don't get me started on baking. I've got a banana and hazelnut loaf rapidly diminishing in size on the kitchen worktop, and I'm planning an apple and rye cake at the weekend. I will shortly be the size of a large French cheese. Maybe a camembert, maybe a Roquefort. I haven't decided yet.

Oompa Loompa

Well, not much to report really, aside from cavorting to a mad German oompa band at a 30th birthday down south. As you do. A middle-aged seven-piece oompa band, dressed in fake brown lederhosen and long white knee socks. With one man carrying a giant tuba (and to be fair, blowing into it and producing a fair old racket). It was a slightly surreal experience.

Most amusing was the fact that amidst 80-odd drunk folk standing and swaying along to the music with their beer steins held high, M had a whale of a time. There was much clapping, swaying and stomping about, punctuated only by breaks to climb up and down steps (although the obsession with gravel and twigs continues, stairs have made a comeback). I think gig number two was a success. Although at this rate she's going to have something of an obsession with brass bands, given that gig number one was a combination of New Orleans brass and rap. It's an eclectic mix..

If you go down to the woods today

and you're one you'll (a) fall asleep while trundling through all the scenic bits (b) develop a fascination for pine needles and (c) discover that cream cheese sandwiches taste a bit rubbish once they've been dipped in soil. Marvellous thing, an education.

Actually, Chopwell Woods were rather fine. Lots of huge pine trees, many badly signposted paths and trails, the odd grey squirrel or two (boo hiss) and ridiculous numbers of mushrooms and toadstools. We racketed along with the pushchair, had a picnic and plodged about in the grass looking at bark, dandelions and gravel (an essential thing for any of M's outings - she's now well into the gravel and twig phase). Bring on the leaf prints and collecting pine cones. I'm ready.

Bella italia

At the grand old age of one, M has learned one of life's essential skills - how to flirt with waiters. In fact, she's verging on the shameful. Friday saw us in Caffe Zonzo for lunch, and she spent most of the hour or so we were there pulling faces at one of the Italian waiters. Mind, she might have blotted her copybook by smearing cream cheese sandwiches all over the table and hurling a plum to the floor with such force that it smashed in two. We might have to work on the table manners.

Bally hoo

I now know what it feels like to be eight years old again. I was standing in the middle of a ballet class at Dance City this evening when the instructor started talking about port des bras, and I was whisked back to Mrs Meyer's dancing classes, complete with mad pianist and bird cages. I must have done ballet from the age of about five to maybe nine or ten (Girl Guides and then swimming took over), and somehow managed to get through to about Grade 3, despite being very rotund in a pale blue leotard and not at all ballerina-ish. It all took place in a giant shed in the bottom of Mrs Meyer's garden, which smelled of old shoes and sweaty feet, and had a floor that moved up and down as lots of little girls pranced about. I remember plies, jetes, port des bras and all sorts of foreign words that sounded impossibly exotic.

Dance City didn't smell. And the floor didn't move about at all. The words were no less exotic, but I discovered I am nowhere near as flexible as I was age eight (even if I'm a lot less rotund now).

Words that really bug me (part 1)

"Fashionista" and "on trend"

Yes, I've been suckered into reading Grazia again. It's one of my guilty pleasures - a good cappuccino and a trashy mag. But if I have to read about "fashionistas" one more time I'll scream. I can put up with the fact that the clothes are never ever going to be in my affordable bracket (until they start featuring the St Oswald's Hospice Shop and Tesco), but the language stinks.

Rant over.

Are we nearly there yet?

In a fit of independence, I took myself off to see Little Miss Sunshine last night. I'm not the world's biggest fan of road movies usually - maybe it's because I get so bored when I'm travelling in the car - but this one had pace, style and wit, and some gorgeous cinematography. Not the picture postcard stuff you usually see (Grand Canyon anyone?), but some atmospheric shots of roadside America, including some run-down gas stations, flyovers and 1960s motels. They just don't build them the same way over here, and anyway the light is totally different. You can't really make anything roadside and English look atmospheric unless you shoot it at night, which gives it a particularly wintry feel.

Returning to real life today involved a singing session in leafy Jesmond, full of proper YMs who arrived in their 4x4s with children named Sonny and Felix, and then proceeded to talk all the way through the songs. If you're going to subject your child to 'Down in the jungle' et al complete with silly actions I always think the least you can do is join in. It's only fair.

Sunshine and showers

Having spent the afternoon wafting about in the sunshine eating ice cream I can thoroughly recommend this not-working-and-looking-after-child malarky. M was angelic, the Newcastle Quayside looked all hip and cosmopolitan in the sun, and pistachio and mocha was a great combination. Of course it's pissing it down now (with scary thunder and lightening and everything), and I've just looked at my bank balance and realised I can never afford another ice cream ever again. Typical.

In other news, Connie, Siobhan and Helena through to the final. Two out of three ain't bad. Of course I'm only watching it because M loves it. Mind, she's got absolutely no taste - the first thing she ever took notice of on telly was Brucie doing Strictly Come Dancing...

Happy Birthday

M was one on Monday, so it's the end of an era. Now that she's attempting to walk around, I am the proud mother of a toddler. Eek. It doesn't seem like two minutes since she was lying there, yelling fit to burst because she'd not had any food for all of oooh, two minutes. We looked back at some early footage recently, and it was terrifying. She didn't do anything apart from sleep, feed and yell. And we were still so proud of her.

Anyway, at the risk of being completely pretentious, we took her to a sushi bar for her birthday party. The expensive rice, seaweed and raw fish zipped round on a conveyor belt, we attempted to feed it to her, and like the sensible lass she is, she insisted on eating a banana. Followed by birthday cake (she definitely takes after Grandpa in her cake-eating habits. He's been known to lurk in the kitchen snaffling chocolate bars and almond slices long after everyone has gone to bed).

I failed to make a-grand-birthday-cake-with-something-marvellous-on, and instead went for the fairy cake, icing and cherry option for everyone, which turned out to be much easier. Very satisfying to bake, and they did look rather good lined up, all 14 of them. M's had one tiny candle on, which looked good, but it was a good thing that she wasn't any older, as I'd had to dredge it up from the bottom of the baking drawer, and it was definitely the last one. And the restaurant staff even dimmed the lights, bless them, so we could light it and sing Happy Birthday. M just looked a bit bemused by it all, and then stuffed cake into her mouth with gay abandon. That's my girl.

Hunt the polo-shaped bread object

M and I went on a bagel-hunt this morning, but came back empty handed. About 10 minutes' walk away is Gateshead's Jewish area, with lots of Kosher shops, including a greengrocers, a disposable plate shop and a bakery/delicatessen. I was hoping there might be a proper bagel or two to be found, but sadly there were none - it occurred to me later that I might have better luck on another day, as the bakery was chock full of challah bread (try saying that quickly!). It was delicious, but not quite what we were after.

The rest of the day was taken up with the educational pursuits of (a) tidying up (b) hanging out the washing and (c) tidying up. Sometimes I worry that I'm not exactly doing the most earth-shattering stuff with M, but then I think it can't be all-singing, all-dancing all of the time, or I'll go insane. I'm insane enough as it is already, having spent several minutes today pulling animals out of Noah's ark and making the noises (though I'm a bit stumped by the giraffe, so if anyone's got any ideas then do let me know). M now shouts "duck" at anything remotely duck-shaped, "twoo-whit-twoo-whooo" at owls, and moos at cows. I'm working on "mint sauce" and sheep, but not getting very far.

Brassed off

We've just taken M to her first gig - the Youngblood Brass Band, who were bizarrely playing at the DLI museum in Durham. Well, not inside the museum as such, but in the grounds outside, with a lovely backdrop of the 1960s concrete delight that is County Hall. M was supposed to be asleep, mummified in several layers of blankets in her pushchair, but of course woke up and wanted to boogie.

To be fair, the rap bits were quite loud. And not quite what many in the audience had been expecting - from the deckchairs and silvery hair I suspect that a fair few of them had been expecting to hear a slightly more conventional brass band. They seemed to enjoy it though, especially the New Orleans-y bits, which were probably my favourite too, to be honest. The more punky rap stuff, while interesting, is a bit shouty and doesn't really hit it with my pop sensibilities. Mind, the band did a great job explaining to the oldies and me where their influences came from, and how it was all like performance poetry, man.

A recipe for disaster

1. Try to make kedgeree for tea for wife and parents, who have spent all afternoon slaving away in the garden chopping down evil spiky conifers.
2. Boil eggs, cook rice/fish etc, using materials prepared by outstanding sous chef/wife.
3. Place lightly steaming smoked haddock on a plate.
4. Put tight-fitting saucepan lid on the top, to keep the heat in.
5. Leave for a while, whilst you finish off cooking the rest of the rice.
6. Attempt to wrestle lid off plate, using a combination of tea towels, mallets, screwdrivers, hot water, brute force and rude words.
7. Try to ignore hysterical laughter.

Eventually, the plate saw sense and collapsed under the pressure. The kedgeree tasted fine, once we'd picked out a couple of bits of china...

Problematic

I can't quite believe it, but I think I've become addicted to 'How do you solve a problem like Maria'. As a book-loving time-starved YM, I don't normally have the time to watch reality tv shows, but this one's got me hooked. Maybe it's the sparkly dresses and the pretty lights (those are definitely the bits M likes), or maybe it's the sheer delight of watching Andrew Lloyd Webber trying not to show exactly what he's thinking the whole time (he'd be such a terrible poker player). Or maybe it's just that I was in the Sound of Music at school (Sister Margaretha, since you ask, and yes the costumes were horrible and yes we did wear fishnet stockings underneath) and have a soft spot for it. Whatever it is, I'm there on the sofa on a Saturday evening, glued to the telly. Who's going to win? Connie of course. Although Abi, Siobhan and Leanne will probably give her a run for her money. I'll get back to you with the results in a couple of weeks, once I've finished trying to get 'High on a hill stood a lonely goatherd' out of my head...

In other news, made bara brith yesterday for the first time, and it seems to have turned out ok, despite me forgetting to put any sugar in. Mind, I'm not remotely Welsh (a funny mixture of English, Polish and Irish in fact), or a tea bread connoisseur so it could have been way off for all I know.

Shopping

Having blithely claimed to my friend Kate today that "oh, I haven't bought any new clothes in two years", I've realised that it's a complete load of rubbish. I reckon I can cheerfully ignore the things I bought while pregnant, as they're not exactly things I'll wear again day-to-day, so that takes care of at least a year (trust me, even when you've had a baby you still have to wear 'maternity wear' for a while). But if you take 2006 onwards, I've bought (in no particular order)

• a pair of blue sandals by art (£65, and the most comfortable shoes I've ever bought)
• a black La Perla bra set (£20 instead of £80 in the sale at Fenwicks - bargain!)
• a yellow t-shirt (can't remember the brand, but it was a TKMaxx bargain for £12)
• a blue sleeveless t-shirt (TU at Sainsburys, £2.50)
• a brown t-shirt (Tesco, £4)
• a gorgeous brown cardigan (antoni and alison in the department store - one of Debenham's weird designer brands, and another bargain at £20)
• a pair of second-hand jeans (Top Shop, but £4 from the Scope shop in Gosforth)

Oh well. Not exactly fashion-leading is it? This whole trend for skinny jeans has passed me by, obviously, as has the whole 80s kick (I was there the first time round and it wasn't any better then, trust me). But I probably score reasonably well on the bargain hunting bit.

She sells seashells on the seashore

Having spent yesterday plodging about on Long Sands beach at Tynemouth with R and M, I can now see why people with children go on beach holidays. M is fascinated with (a) sand and (b) waves, so it was a top day out. She's also discovered the delights of paddling, chasing the waves in and out while grinning like a loon. The only downside is that it's me that has to keep her company in the freezing cold North Sea, as her dad is even more of a wuss than I am. I refuse to go any further than ankle-depth without a full wetsuit, so her experience of swimming in the sea might be a little on the limited side until we can find one that's a bit warmer...

I'd forgotten all about the delights of sandcastles too. We have a rather natty red bucket and spade set that R was given for his 30th birthday, so it finally put in an appearance. It's a proper castle bucket, with turrets, crenellations, a main door and steps. Quite posh really. You almost expect Archie to come popping out with some mad invention.

Ear Ear

I realised today that I might need to broaden M's listening experience during the daytime. I'm a Radio 4 addict (as an ex-journalist it goes with the territory), so she gets the Today programme at breakfast time (Farming Today on Saturday, maybe Broadcasting House on Sunday), You and Yours and the World at One at lunchtime, and PM with Eddie Mair at teatime. If she doesn't grow up to be a news junkie, it's not for lack of trying. And if she's very good, there might be a bit of Vernon Kay or Jonathan Ross at weekends. Poor lass. What with that and A-ha in the car, she's got no hope.

Speedy Gonzalez

Have discovered it's very hard to maintain your YM status whilst crawling round the living room on all fours at top speed, chased by a hysterically cackling child. It's also rather difficult to do in a skirt.

Sometimes I wonder what I've done with my day, apart from wash up, and feed and change M. It's hard when you've been used to achieving lots at work, and been good at demolishing large to-do lists. And then I remember the cackling, and the huge grin whilst splashing at the swimming pool, and the wide eyes when trying a raspberry and strawberry smoothie for the first time. To-do lists are so last year, sweetie.

Ah.

Goodness. You take your eye off the ball for a couple of minutes, only to discover that you've been in hiding for a whole two months, James kissed Patroclus, and grey is again the new black. The cat ate my laptop. Honest.

Actually, it's been more to do with the fact that R, M and I moved house. Boxes. Boxes. Boxes. That's all I can say. My life was taken over by evil boxes. Hundreds of 'em. Most filled with VERY HEAVY BOOKS. But thankfully, normality has resumed. There are no more dastardly boxes, sitting mocking me from the corner of the room (apart from a few in the garage which are nearly empty. Oh, and those ones in the wardrobes in the spare room, but as they mostly contain R's classic car magazines they'll be ok for a while yet). I now have a whole new house and garden to play with. Yay! Oh the potential for baking cakes, planting vegetables, decorating Christmas treees...oh god it's all starting to sound rather Martha Stewart, isn't it. I do have a life, honest.

And to prove it, I even had a morning to myself today. It included an educational experience (the bus trip into Newcastle, through some of Gateshead's finer architecture...), a little light shopping (Fenwick's sale), a lot of window shopping (much sighing over gorgeous jumpers by Sita Murt in Fenwick's French Salon, and the realisation that self-employment, a small baby and cashmere do not mix) and a very civilised cappuccino and Guardian-reading experience at Intermezzo. Roll on the delights of next Saturday.