1) Working
2) Sleeping
3) Blogging
4) Worrying
5) Happying

Well, that about sums it up.

I think you’re all lovely - thank you, for commenting, and emailing, and supporting, and donating and for saying nice things and sometimes wishlisting and oh, just for being around all year and stuff. Etc. Ahem. Now bugger off, before this third glass of wine kicks in.

And, you know,
Happy Fucking New Year!
an’ stuff.

Oh! I just realised - I did eating and drinking as well. Otherwise I would have died. Bother. Oh well. Well tomorrow I will do New Year’s Revolutions. I will include eating and drinking in those. Yes.

Happy New Year etc!

Hooray!

Woo!

I think that glass is kicking in.

Happy New Year, all of you lovely lovelies.

xxx

… Not a creature was stirring, apart from…

“Anna, don’t move. You won’t like this. You really won’t like this.”

A mouse was behind the sofa.

A mouse, in my apparently mouse-proof house, after six months of mouselessness and four days before my Mouse-Catcher Beloved disappears for two weeks.

There was a mouse.

*********************

Anyone who has read this site for any length of time probably saw that coming from the first word of the title. They will, you see, be aware that I have a slight problem with mice. A small issue. A diddy phobia.

Anyone who hasn’t read this site for any length of time is about to get the same idea. At length. Sorry. It’s just the way things are around here when the mice come to stay.

****************

Roused from my warm going-to-bed-early telly-snuzzle, I was immediately as alert as a really really terrified fox. In a single bound (or so) I was on the arm of the other sofa, scanning the room and calculating how much danger I was in where I stood. It could run up the side of and across the sofa, taking a direct route up my trouser leg - that was the most obvious thing. It could run up the curtains and be in my hair in seconds. It could - and did, at that very moment - run around the back of the sofa and into my line of vision, before disappearing under the bookshelves.

A highpitched scream (mine). A leap to the floor by the door, down the hall, into the bathroom, a quick scan under everything, behind everything, then the door closed, a towel against the bottom of it, and me, standing tall, one foot on either side of the bath, and pushing myself against the wall to cool down the skin which, as my heart rate had increased and my temperature risen, was beginning to cover itself with tiny blotches, spots and welts.

Everything went quiet. In the living room, my Beloved Of The Shoebox was trying to catch something scuttling and succeeding only in chasing it from the under of one sofa to the under of some shelves. In the bathroom, I soon got bored, and inbetween the violent waves of vomit, I cleaned everything thoroughly - sink, bath, toilet, floor. Reorganised the shelves. Shaved my legs.

My beloved brought me my jeans, coat and shoes. He would keep the thing in one room - I would veture out to secure its cause of death.

***********************

Three days earlier, Christmas eve, on the phone
“… And I managed to get a baking sheet thing from Woolworths, but they didn’t have any more lights for the tree, sorry”
“No matter - will you walk up to meet us, then?”
“Ye - Oooh, while I remember, theCostcutters down the high road has … Oh, no, no, sorry, maybe I shouldn’t say this”
“What?”
“They sell mousetraps.”
“What?! What do you mean? Why would we need… Do you mean that we have … Why are you telling me this? Why, WHY?”
“No, Anna. No. No mice. We have no mice. I just thought it would be a useful thing to know for the future - just in case”

Turns out it was.

Forty minutes and a journey into the depths of Dalston later, I returned with two packs of traps. Two packs of four traps. Eight traps.

While the living room was over-boobied with traps, I retired to the bathroom, read a little, did some more sicking and polished my nails.

The living room was sealed. The space under the door that mouse had used for entry was stuffed with television guides, apart from two gaps which were covered by traps. Six more traps snuggled up by the walls inside. Once the bedroom had been checked - under, behind and in everything - I left the bathroom, double checked the bedroom while the kitchen was quickly scanned and cleaned, and then laid down, buried my head under the duvet, and commenced the business of shivering.

*****

For a while, my beloved sat beside me reading while I dropped off, us both knowing that this was the only way I wouldn’t convince myself I had to lie staring at the ceiling all night.

By the rules of the mouse-phobia, someone had to be alert At All Times. Someone had to be listening. After a while, when he thought he heard the soft snuffling snory sounds of sleeping, he silently burrowed down into the duvet, and held me while I slept and while I shivered.

As soon as he dropped off, of course, I knew. I knew it was my turn. I was on guard. Someone had to be alert, someone had to listen, and if he was - very understandably - needing to be asleep, then the listener would have to be me.

*******************

Rationally - and I realise that it’s a little late in the day for that word to come into play now - I knew that listening was pointless. The only thing it did was make me feel in the slightest touch of control in a situation where I have none.

But I’m trying to get a sense of rational about this all, so I’d tell myself not to listen. Then, in the seconds before I dropped off, I would hear something, or imagine that I had heard something, and the nausea would come burning up my throat, and I would feel my temperature rise, my head start to pound, and my heart start to rattle hard in my chest.

Lying on my back, breathing in through my nose, and out through my mouth, it would slowly go away, and, for a few minutes I would start to go to sleep again, until I heard something, or thought I did, and … and the whole thing would begin again. In around ten minute cycles, I think. Drift - panic - drift - panic - drift - panic - cry - drift - panic.

At around four, I think, or maybe five, I heard the snap of a trap in the next-door room, and I finally fell into a kind of a sleep - all the time dreaming feverishly of waking up and finding the flat completely overrun.

****************

It was the coldest night in ages, I reassure myself, that’s why he came in. The natural habitat of a mouse cannot actually be the third floor of a new apartment building, I’m informing myself that I still think. And besides, I’m very aware of these things, and there hasn’t been any sign of the bastards until now. Not a nibble, not a poo. Sometimes one mouse is just one mouse, especially when you live in a block and they scurry from place to place occasionally. It doesn’t mean there are 15 more living under the oven. Does it?

I could run away, yes, I could - but how would that possibly help? And besides - it’s my flat. I can’t actually be thrown onto the street by mice, just because my big strong beloved is going away for a couple of weeks - can I?

I’m sure it will be fine. I’m not sure what I’ll do for food, and the computer will need to be moved into a hermetically sealed bedroom - but you know what? I’m sure it will all be just fine. I’m sure. It will all be fine. Just fine.

**************

As I lay awake, I knew that I would write about this here today, and knew that those who chuckled when I said, full of hope, that the magic new flat would never get mice were proved right, now.

And I knew - knew - that someone would appear in my comments box and say the familiar, hilarious oft-spoken-by-non-phobic-animal-lover words:
“They more afraid of you than you are of them, of course”

So let me pre-empt you, if you were about to say that - and ask you to read the above once more. Carefully.

Because they’re not, you know. They’re really, really not.

Hello.
Happy Tuesday. Thank you for popping over.
Are you well? Are you? Excellent.

Right - away with pleasantries, we’re too familiar to be at all pleasant with each other now, I like to think, now that you’ve come - you should go and do this. It’s time for meg’s annual Mayfly Project - decribe your 2005 in the amount of words that a mayfly has hours. Um. That a mayfly has hours for. No. Yes.

In 24 words or less, basically.
It is very good, go play.

A couple of months ago nice Stuart at feeling listless emailed and asked if I’d take part in his Review of 2005. Describe a moment when you suceeded in doing something you’ve always wanted to do this year” he said. “It doesn’t need to be a life changing event, but it really could be… what counts is how it made you feel,” he said.

Hm.

I looked back at my year.

Slowly, it dawned on me that pretty much bugger all had happened to me this year.

That, really, my 2005, overall, was pretty fucking unremarkable. In a nice kind of way. But still…

This fact, taken in tandem with my general SADs, made me, frankly, a bit glum. But I still wanted to do it, very much. So I thought, and thought and thought.

And then I wrote this.

It’s far too long, of course. Because it’s me, after all.
But I like it. I think.
Anyway, it looks like proof that although it *looks* like I’ve been doing bugger all wriitting-wise recently, I actually have. Just not here. Just here, here and clearly here, too.

But december is nearly over again, and winter sads will soon be ebbing again (well, soonISH, anyway) and my new years resolutions will coincide with two weeks alone and soon the little red boat will come alive once more, hurrah etc.

In the meantime, though…

The triumph of my year: 2005, by me. (You should take the opportunity of reading some of the others, as well. They’re terribly good.

Humbug.

(Or happy christmas. Whatever. You know what I mean. anyway)

I know I’ve been veh quiet lately. I have been writing in other places that you already know about, and that (well, that and spam deleting, as always) have taken up my little sparce little winter store of spare energy not taken by work. But now it is Christmas. Yay! Holiday! Till TUESDAY!

Incidentally, the Christmas appeal 2005 is still going. So far you, my lovely readers, have given nearly £400 after I asked for donations. I was No1 fundraiser for a while but now I’m not. And I’m getting a bit competititive about it: can anyone help?

xxx

“You see that over there? That’s the BMW version of this van we’re in right now. Except the main difference, you see, is that cost 15k more - and it’s only got 6 seats!!!”

Silence in the rest of the minivan. None of us cared how much the minvan we were in cost. We cared even less how much the minivan were weren’t in cost. What we cared about was getting back to work. What Barry cared about was educating all of us in the World of CarMan.

“Do you know how much it costs to get a BMW serviced? Anyone? Hundreds. I was out with a bunch of chauffeurs the other night, and it’s a big joke among chauffeurs: How do you start a BMW?…”

Our deafening silence clearly served as a sign that we didn’t know, but really wanted to.

“2 - 4 - 6 … Hundred pound service charge! Oooooh, this is busy isn’t it. You know why this is so busy? Edge of the congestion charge, innit. Stupid congestion charge.”

I sat in the back, staring out of the window and wondering why, since he had picked us up in the congestion zone 5 hours earlier so had clearly paid to be in it, he was now skirting round the outskirts of it with all the other people who hadn’t. Call me a dumb public transport user, but I thought that was what the point of the congestion charge was; I thought that you paid the congestion charge, in order to drive in the congestion zone, rather than crawl along the edges, bitching about it with everyone else.

*****

We drove past incredible streets of beautiful houses. Children played outside in the cold wintry air, under the trees.

“God, you wouldn’t want to live there, would you? Nowhere to park.”

A cat sauntered along a balcony on the street that Barry couldn’t imagine anyone wanting to live in. Inside, you could see the twinkling of a pretty tree.

I zoned out, and watched my colleagues - and choirmates, the reason we were out of the office that day - sleeping noddily beside me, while in the front seat the well-meaning short-strawers nodded and smiled politely as Barry banged along.

“Ah yes. That’s a top quality GPS system, you see. Look at this: you press this button, it’ll show you where all the petrol stations are, EVERYWHERE. You see that flashing pump on the screen, there? That’s telling me there’s a petrol station over there.”

There was indeed a petrol station over there. I had been looking at it while the people-carrier grundled slowly past and Barry grundled slowly on. And on.

“There you go. There’s another petrol station coming up. You can tell by the flashing pump symbol on the screen.”

Or, in fact, by the fact there was a clearly a petrol station outside the car.

Outside the car didn’t seem to be much interest to Barry, though. I’d watched all morning while Bary had got lost five times, each time the GPS flashing up little helpful messages and arrows that flipped over as if trying to bite their own arse.

Gradually, and in more detail than any normal person would care for, Barry talked the unfortunate sopranos riding shotgun through every single gadget on the dash. I zoned him out. Or thought I did, until I realised I was getting more and more angry, and couldn’t work out why unril I zoned back in again

“… and can tell what kind it is. So the higher the numbers the stronger the signal, you see. Like this, for example. That’s telling me that there’s a policeman with a laser gun somewhere round here - in a car or hiding around a corner. They get up to all sorts, you know, it’s an infringement on liberties. So I slow down here, and…”

Took me a second to work out that the infringement on his liberties was in fact the idea the a law enforcement agency might be hiding round corners trying to enforce the law.

It seemed that something outside the car interested Barry after all. Speed cameras. speed cameras were Barry’s enemy. Apparently, it seemed, speed cameras were denying Barry his god-given right. The right to speed.

I didn’t get it. I don’t get it. I’ve never got it.

“They used to be illegal, these things, can you believe it? But this one? Well, they can’t touch this one. It’s powered by satellite, you see, so they can’t touch anyone for it. Still, I keep it hidden at the top of the screen, you see, because they don’t like you having it. They don’t… But you get what you pay for, you see”

I wondered how much Barry had paid for his anti-speed camera device. I wondered how much it had saved him in fines. I wondered the same thing I always wonder - if you’re so incredibly bothered about avoiding getting caught by speed cameras…

Why not just drive within the speed limit?

Call me crazy, but I have always wondered about this. I’ve heard many arguments about the evil of speed cameras, the evil of the police in trying to enforce speed limits, the rights of the driver getting lost in all this and.. yes, I know, I know, I don’t understand because I take the bus, but …

But, surely… If it’s safer to not speed, particularly in built-up areas and things, then why would you be so desperate to do so? Why be so proud of your little gadget that allows you to drive at whatever speed you like when you don’t think you’re being watched? I realise that people have rights, but people also have laws to help protect themselves and other people and … really … I’ve never understood this, and this is what Barry was saying, over, and over again, and the thing that makes me really angry.

Barry’s vehicle was clearly his castle. And anything that infringed upon Barry’s right as King to do whatever he liked, in his castle, was infringing upon his human, driver’s, rights. No one, it seemed, had the right to tell Barry how fast to drive.

“There’s a petrol station”

I’m not anti-car, I realised, staring out of the window at the people walking along the bright December pavement. I’m not remotely anti-driver. Some of the nicest people I know drive cars, and they’re lovely.

I’m anti-Barry. I’m AntiCarMan and AntiSpeedCameraDetector and, oh, I don’t know, I guess I’m a bit Anti people who break the law just because they believe they and their cars should be immune.

Sorry Barry.
Thanks for the lift, though.
Sorry about the tip.

Nono - here’s a tip.
Try driving slower.
It’ll save you money. And fret. And brake fluid.

And maybe lives.

Just a thought.

I know.
Quite quiet, but not quite quit, I assure you.

Winter has just caught up with me, and pounced.
I will say something of note perhaps later, perhaps not, but I wanted you to know, I am constantly trying. And failing.

It is like typing through treacle.

Kindly doodled by Andre

Gaudy baubles. Gaubles.

I will tell you more of this at some point, in the meantime:

All my photos from Basel, Switzerland are up. I went to Basel. It was tourism-sponsored trip type thing. It was fucking ace.

I will explain more when I can.

But for now - apologies for quiet, and for not being very good when I am here. Much work. Much extra stuff. Sads. Life. Busyness.
I will proper return when the list as long as my arm is maybe down to the size of my finger and I stop crying and wanting to fall asleep all the time…

In the meantime - you can buy these, you know. I mean, you’d have to go to Basel, but in theory you can… I have pink flamingo for the top of my tree.

The other day I said I wanted to go to Vegas, and some lovely, lovely people said that if I wanted to go, they’d all chip in.

Well, as it turns out, I just can’t go. But it made me think. At the office, we’ve been working very hard on working to set up the online bits of This year’s Guardian Online Appeal, and it’s very difficult to read so much of the material here, look at the images, listen to the stories and songs, watch the films etc without wanting to do something to help.

I feel unqualified to explain, but the focus is on the Aids epidemic in Africa, and if you still felt wildly like chipping in to something, I’ve set something up that you could throw some virtual spare change into if you had it just lying around in, like, a virtual credit card change-jar or something.

It doesn’t have to be much - of course. I’ve set a target on the page, but frankly whatever we can raise would help. £15 buys a month’s supply of drugs for one person, to give a rough idea. There’s much more information on the appeal pages. Basically, whatever you can spare would be great.

Oh, I’m sorry, I never know what to say about serious things and such. Look, it’s a very good cause and that’s all I’m saying about it. You can read a lot more about it at that link right there (This link right herel). You can also set up your own fundraising page, for your own blog, or, you know, whatever.

This is not a demand or an obligation, I mean, I just thought about how muh I was going to spend on food, wine, and even a tiny amount of th presents an things, and after that, just a little extra donation didn’t seem that much.

God, I feel like a cold sales woman. But look. If you ever thought you might like me enough to buy me a Christmas present - can I ask you to stick some money here, instead? Thank you muchly.

Really.

(Please understand it has been an immaculate act of will for me not to include a sneaky wishlist link somewhere in here - for that alone, I think we deserve some reward…)

Seriously - while it is December, I implore you - read ‘Tis the season as well as little.red.boat, presuming you read little.red.boat, which you must do slightly, having got to the end of this appallingly constructed sentence.

It is rather off the cuff, it is a rod we make for our own backs, but I really bloody enjoy doing it, and it’s for such a short time that people very rarely know it’s there.

For newbies: It’s the Christmas advent calendar blog that my sister and I have been writing for the last few years - this year it may have some surprise special guests (maaaaaybe…), but mainly, it will just be lots of writing, pictures and ‘other’ about surviving the holiday season. Best Before Date - well, Christmas.
Do read it and read the archives, if you like - and if you find something you like, tell your readers it’s there. Ah gwan, I don’t ask much. Apart from, like, christmas presents. And sometimes money.

Speaking of money, the other day I said I wanted to go to Vegas, and some lovely, lovely people said that if I wanted to go, they’d all chip in. Well, I can’t go. But (and it’s a big but, mine…) if you still felt wildly like chipping in to something, I’ve set something up that you could throw some virtual spare change into if you had it just lying around in, like, a virtual credit card change-jar or something.

It’s a fundraising page for this christmas appeal right here, because … well, because it’s a very good cause and that’s all I’m saying about it. You can read a lot more about it at that link right there. You can also set up your own fundraising page, for your own blog, or, you know, whatever.

This is not a demand or an obligation, but if you ever thought you might like me enough to buy me a Christmas present - can I ask you to stick some money here, instead? Thank you muchly.

That’s all, really.

happy tuesday.

I like flying, and in the last few years I’ve seemed to fly a lot - but always, always economy class.

Yesterday was my very first business class flight ever, and, as an experiment, I decided that I would take everything I was offered, never refusing, and never making a diliberate effort to ask for more, because I wanted to know just what, exactly, people pay several thousand pounds a flight for.

In the course of my experiment, I was offered, and accepted:

- One glass of champagne, plus half-glass refill;
- One packet “Happy Mix” cocktail snacks;
- Three glasses of water;
- Red wine; Five glasses (A light Swiss, from the valley region)
- Dinner. One beef stew, with vegetables, sauerkraut, bread roll, nice cheese, butter, salad, and balsamic vinegar/olive oil dressing;
- Another bread roll, with nice cheese (rolls, cheese: two);
- Lindt chocolates, three - from expensive looking box;
- Two swissair complimentary chocolates
- One coffee
- One brandy
- Herald Tribune.

Yes.
And how long was the flight?

The flight was an hour and a quarter long.

I flew the same airline three days earlier in economy - you know what I was offered? Glass of water and a muffin in a bag.

I had no idea what life was like on the posh side of the curtain, and now consider myself lucky to be an economy traveller.
Because that business class shit is really really bad for you.