paint it black

should I paint my bathroom black? Answer yes!

Yesterday I spent the afternoon 'staining' some untreated Ikea furniture - I wasn't terribly successful at it which is odd as have managed to accdientally stain many things quite well over the years. I am slightly concerned that my whole flat will be decorated with black items and thus reflecting some sort of 'Oh poop I'm 40 and everything is going down hill' way however I cheer myself with my idol's life journey when I am reminded that Susan Sarandon didn't meet Tim Robbins, 12 years younger than her, until she was in her 40s and had the first of their two children when she was 42.

She says Sexuality ... is something that develops and becomes stronger and stronger the older you get... If you can continue to say yes to life and to maintain a certain generosity of spirit, you become more and more of who you are.

I didn't realize that everything was supposed to fall apart at 40. So I just slid past 40 and 50. When you're an outsider and not paying attention to the rules the hurdles are a little lower.

Lovely

catching up

So many things have happened since my last post and yet at the same time, nothing has happened!!! I am a naughty blogger as have not been updating as regularly as I should ..... should I? That's why I have always been rubbish with a diary as I never remember or have time to update it so in a whistle stop journey through recent events.....

Fete poster is done and dusted
Lovely supper at Mikey's East End WI Picnic

Mother India at Rich Mix

August EEWI meeting (see eastendwi.blogspot.com) Making Morsbags and coffee tasting






plus drinks at Sorella's, beer at the Palm Tree with John and Tracy, Jake's AS level results (mainly great news), meeting the man who made a twenty foot robot out of recycling wheelie bins, organising The Welcome Wagon at Shoreditch Church, up to the eyballs with Fete admin and don't get me started on the Hackney Wick Festival .... must get back to work

it was only a matter of time

A couple of days ago my friend Sarah, who was having a particularly bad day, was walking her lovely little jack russell Jack through her home town of Penryn, Cornwall. In the street, she told me, she met a woman who informed her that she had once owned a pair of jack russells just like Jack and that she had loved them very much. She then went on to explain how one of them had died and the other had tried to kill itself. She suggested to Sarah that she love every moment of Jack's life as if it were his last. My response to this was 'What a lovely story..' and Sarah went on to explain how the woman had slightly mad and was carrying a radio in her hand.

Time passed and we reach today. I cycle a lot and when I do, I like listen to music on my iPhone, especially on longer journeys. I also like the fact that the iPhone headphones mean that you can answer a call hands free while cycling and go back to your music afterwards without having to get your actual phone out of your pocket. This saves loads of time and money calling people back when you have missed there calls. You can imagine my frustration when I realised I had misplaced them somewhere in the flat. So today when setting out on the bike to go to White City to work I thought I know I'll play the iPod part of my iPhone and turn the volume up and that way I will have a bit of music on my way to work. Once on the bike I thought I would try out a new 'app' on my iPhone and tuned into Gold FM. It was only really once I had got to Holland Park Road that I realised I was essentially a slightly mad lady with a radio.

It was only a matter of time

green tomato chutney and sand between the toes

Yesterday was such a fantastic day. What had been planned as a visit to the WI Federation of Essex Annual Show became an adventure to the coastline of the Blackwater Estuary.

The day started with an outing with Colleen and John to Towerlands Conference Centre for the annual Essex WI 'show' where branches from within the Essex Federation exhibited their submissions for this year's theme - The Orient. Although some of the entrants, especially the crafts, were amazing and very beautiful, the less said about that particular part of the day at this stage the better. We did accidentally go to Hatfield Peverel first before checking where we were supposed ot be going which was actually Braintree which didn't help but I did purchase some green tomato chutney and some marmalade. However we left the show fairly swiftly as, despite our purchases, we felt a little deflated by the event.

C and J whisked me off to the coast at West Mersea that they knew really well from numerous visits since childhood and it was amazing to be on a beach, paddling in the sea when only a few hours before (including the 'show') I was in grubby old Stepney. We saw jellyfish, ate ice cream and bought plants and cherry plums from someone's front garden, leaving the money in a cashbox in the porch...wouldn't work in E1! The day didn't end there, we then went off to East Mersea and walked along the estuary where we met a family of swans who had to negotiate a grassy bank then we sat in a bit of a daze in a bird hide watching the wildlife before making our way reluctantly back to the car and East London.

I had to go into town afterwards about three hours late for a birthday party which

I didn't get to until 10.45pm and I still had sand between my toes. Lush.

WOMAD 2009

Ok so I've been back over a week but it isn't the easiest thing to find the time to keep the blog up to date. However on the eve of my next blogworthy event I figured it was time to report back on WOMAD 2009, plus I am avoiding doing actual work so...

After an extremely lovely evening in the not so lovely Cheltenham Spa with my gorgeous friend Archie, Sarah, Oscar and I met up in 'Nam and drove to Charlton park via the supermarket - very important for my frist festival by car as opposed to public transport. This would be our third WOMAD together (my 12th or 13th) but so much has changed for Sarah since we last went we guessed we would probably have a much better time than before.

Highlights of the weekend included camping with Judith and Nigel and their friends and friends of friends, strange smelling cigarettes and dancing to Shlomo. Solomon Burke was one of the headliners and apart from the fact that he had to be wheeled on as he was so obese (I may have been because he was old, but I doubt it) it was a pretty amazing performance from a man who has 90 grandchildren. Peter Gabriel was fab although his set was quite serious as he was campaigning for the charity Witness, so no Sledgehammer, and Biko made sarah and Judith cry.

Sarah and I danced like nutters to Shlomo and laughed so hard we cried - not necessarily at Shlomo more at ourselves due to the influence of aforementioned cigarettes. We also really enjoyed Charlie Winston and Deaf Shepherd on the Sunday although the fact that the latter were not allowed to do an encore on the BBC Radio 3 stage did cause me to shout a lot! Down with BBC Radio 3!!!

It was a fantastic weekend, the only thing wrong with it was it only lasted til Monday morning. Roll on 2010.

Both Sarah and I are yet to finish our poetic tributes to 2oo9 but when we do I will post them

Homeopathy, EEWI and Palm Tree

Last night was the EEWI's July meeting - homeopathy with my friend Tracy Karkut-Law. Mother came along and I think really enjoyed it. It was pretty well attended and as usual there were a few highlights.

A guy called Oliver King came along to talk to us about his climate change charity which I think is called Campaign Against Climate Change and the website is www.campaigncc.org. He seemed a little nervous and who could blame him really when faced with our group but he managed to get through it and I was rather taken to him. He seemed to like that fact that in my introduction I referred to him as an attraction...

Later in the evening one of our longstanding members was chatting to a newbie and suddenly there was a large gasp of astonishment from their corner of the room. Turns out they have been neighbours - literally next door neighbours - for years but had never actually met. One of them ended up giving the other a lift home - it is those sorts of things I love about the east end WI.

Tracy's talk was great and even though the room was stiflingly hot everyone seemed to enjoy it.



I drank way too much and ended up going to the pub with TKL and mother. I had a few sips of beer and suddenly felt extremely drunk but managed to muddle through - was very strange being in the Palm Tree on a Tuesday night with mother. Also saw a guy called Scott who I met in the PT after Sorella's concert earlier in the year - we were all very drunk but him particularly and last night he seemed to be on a date so was a little bit embarrassed and somewhat worried about seeing me and what I might say!! Ah the joys of inebriation.

meeting you, with a view to a kill

Yes I know it's not the best picture in the world but you can't zoom in with the iPhone and anyway it's the thought that counts. The man on the big screen to the right is Simon Le Bon, who I brushed past when I was backstage earlier on in the day. Backstage Niki? Why was that? Were you performing as Duran Duran's support act? Had you in fact organised the whole of the Lovebox Weekender? No. However the reason I was there and had an access all areas status was down to the real headliner of the weekend which was of course Dynamo's Rhythm Aces

For some reason Lovebox never quite get their name right and according to the programme they were playing on Sunday but who cares - I caught their set, drank their pear cider, used their meal vouchers, hugged them and took one of their CDs and in return they got a batch of raspberry topped cupcakes and a sort of saddo obsessive fan in the form of me. Anyway very much looking forward to seeing them again at some point over the summer.

As for Duran Duran, it was good to see them and hearing all the hits was fab but there was something lacking - there wasn't much energy on stage. The boys looked pretty good but they didn't grab me really- musically or literally. Their version of White Lies was excellent but I could have done without Mark 'Emporer's New Clothes' Ronson being on stage with them. Although, having said that, A View To A Kill was pretty exciting. Yasmin Le Bon was in the crowd a few people away from me and she looked phenomenal.

Being backstage, especially on my own was a strange experience. There were times in my youth that I did a lot of blagging (not blogging) to get backstage at various things and in recent years I have had more opportunities to be involved in these things but of course on Saturday, after the Dynamos had gone back to Bristol and once I had realised that I was never going to catch up with my mates due to the fact that none of our phones worked (that's what they said anyway) I had time to wander and take in the goings on of the VIP areas. Like many things, as a very good friend said to me only yesterday, anticipation is often the most exciting part. At the end of the day backstage is just the other side of a fence where the only real exciting thing is that the loos have no queue and they flush. Not there a golden paved trackway to musical heroes, sparkling champagne and continual partying, instead a catering tent full of wilted baguettes, a bar full of wannabes, crew and council staff. Nearby a buggy waits to rush anyone resembling a pop or rock star as far away from E9 as is possible.....

Other highlights were Florence and the Machine - always good to see a redhead on stage and she was amazing. It was chucking it down during their set and it was a trifle tricky to see the stage through the sea of umbrellas but all in all a lovely free day in the park

if you sew then shall you reap..

My very first harvest this year. A runner bean which in fact would have grown a fair bit more if I hadn't been so impatient. Very very exciting!!!

Other stuff doing very well too.....

My little sign of hope

My courgettes are coming on a treat as are my runner beans. I do have the tiniest tomatoes known to man but apparently size doesn't matter. No chillies yet and I have no idea when to start pulling the carrots up but it is all very exciting.

As an added extra today. Tahsin is in charge at work today and has declared we must all work like this.... great for a hangover - I may doze off!!

Picnic in the (Car) Park

Yesterday it rained. Mile End Park, as I passed by in Nic's car, looked lusher than ever and there was a feeling of expectation in the air - maybe the coming storm, I'm not sure but there was definitely something coming. After a couple of errands we returned to our little block and set about creating our contributions to the house picnic. It was clear at that stage that we were not going to be going to Victoria Park so instead we erected the gazebo in the car park and waited to see if anyone else would turn up. The gazebo is amazing - absolutely massive and even though the instructions said you have to have four people to put it up myself and Nic - as she says one and a half people - managed to do it in a matter of minutes. Although I was convinced that the others wouldn't fancy an afternoon in the rain they proved me wrong and a few hours later there were 10 of us huddled beneath the gazebo as it tipped down. Red wine, beer, home made quiche and pizza, tofu salad, pear loaf, lemon cupcakes, tangy rolls the list goes on. Much alcohol was consumed and we managed to stick it out til about 7pm when we staggered indoors, soggy with drizzle but warm with booze.

I've been reading my friend Colleen's blog http://www.rusinurbis.com/ and in it she talks about walking through Stepney and passing the Ocean estate. Quite rightly she talks about the fact that it has been left to rack and ruin
'Bits of it are run down and waiting improvement, even so, people have made little gardens and grown tomatoes on back balconies. And leave little signs of hope.'
I like to think that she has inadvertently referred to my balcony but need to check with her - either way the idea that those of us who garden on balconies leave signs of hope fills me with warmth.

The picnic in the car park was so important to me because we have, as residents, experienced so many awful things in the past four years that you can feel isolated and a little lost especially if, like me, the problems have stopped you from sleeping over long periods of time. I have always felt that life is all about balance. I'm not a religious person but I do believe that balance is key. We have faced some pretty unacceptable things but the pay off is that there are some pretty amazing people living in my block - had I not moved there I would maybe not have had as many bad times but I also would not have met my lovely neighbours. And yesterday re-affirmed how lucky I am to have them

new to this blogging lark

Welcome to my very first blog. As I have no idea what I am doing I am not going to write much more but will instead relay a joke in order to check what my blog looks like. This is courtesy of Maureen Lipman at the NFWI AGM at the Royal Albert Hall yesterday.

A woman died and went to heaven. At the pearly gates God said to her 'No, no, no. You are due to live for another 33 years and in a flash she was back in her hospital bed in the land of the living. When she left the hospital she had a spring in her step and excitement in her belly at the prospect of a confirmed 33 years of life ahead of her. She decided to have the whole works done; botox, tummy tuck, face lift, boob job, cellulite removal, stomach stapling, new wardrobe, hair do and make up. After her last procedure she left the private hospital only to be mowed down by an ambulance. At the pearly gates she said to God 'What are you playing at? You said I had another 33 years.' and God said ' I didn't bloody recognise you.'