and a year has gone by...

Well I've been pretty shit on this page all told, haven't I. To be honest, partly it's been the hassle of the blog moving to google add addresses, which I only got recently, and you had to go through the rigmarole of getting about five emails and retyping in passwords etc. And, well, I'm lazy. And also - a lot has been going on.

To bring you up to date, since last May, Greg and I have moved to Battersea, are expecting a baby in all of three weeks and got engaged just after Christmas! I'm in a completely different and unexpected place to what I was this time last year; I could never have predicted it all, but I guess that's part of the fun of life. I just feel "serene" which admittedly will take away from some of the acidity of this blog. But I'm sure not entirely :)

When I found out I was pregnant I totally freaked out. Burst into tears. I just felt I wasn't ready on so many levels to be a Mum! I've never been particularly maternal, and actually questioned whether I ever wanted children on more than one occasion. It was just after my 30th too, when I got absolutely royally sh*t faced and was vomiting for three days afterwards (the first clue!) But because Greg is who he is, I realised that everything would fall into place, because the only thing I'm sure of is that I want to be with him - everything else is secondary to that. Having children with him had crossed my mind i.e. from being quite anti-children I'd surprised myself by thinking that it wouldn't be such an unappealing propspect if it were with Greg. But for it to happen when it did - a shock - me and weekends away and wine pretty much meant that the Pill wasn't being its most reliable, mostly because I hadn't taken it regimentally and daily! So the past eight months have been demanding and have often taken their toll on me physically and emotionally, but thanks to Greg I do feel like I can finally do this, and we can do it together. He was born to be a dad. In all honesty when I feel this baby move inside me now and think of who is the dad, I can't believe my luck. I feel as though things could not be better. All these cliches that used to make me roll my eyes - well now I will eat my words because until you experience what this feels like, you can't know the intensity of it. To have a baby with someone you love, to literally have made someone together who you are going to commit yourself to for the rest of your life.. it's overwhelming and it's still something I'm trying to fathom. Every time I think of Greg holding our baby for the first time I cry. And every time I think of him asking me to marry him it's the same.

So. I am no longer quite as, well, generally pissed off with things as I was a year ago. Don't get me wrong, just because everything has gone right for me recently, it doesn't mean that I don't get easily irritated by tube commuters (esp. being pregnant!), call centre workers and generally anyone who seems to gain pleasure from agitating those around them, but I just wanted to spread the word that I can be positive now and then. The voice of discontent regarding the grind of daily life will be back before too long, I promise :)

Losing things

So I spent an hour and a half looking for my passport last night. I found it, after all this time, in a random and very confusing drawer containing:

• a satin dress I have worn once
• a very tight jumper I can't wear any more because it would be indecent
• pair of laddered tights
• tiny/useless clutch bag
• a book I have yet to read
• bundle of mismatched socks
• half used jar of moisturiser
• a pound in change
• a screwdriver (?!)
  
• my lost inhaler(bonus)
• 2 pillowcases that don't seem to match any duvet covers we have
• marmite (?)
• four pens - 2 don't work
• 3 magazines
• a flip flop
• 3 earrings without partners
• a James CD cover with no CD inside
• a bag of bills from 3 phone company
• a disgusting coloured lipstick
• a pencil sharpener.
  

Anyway the point is WHY were all these items thrown into one random drawer - invariably, I don't need most of them, so it is mystifying as to why I don't just chuck them out. It's not like there's loads of space for random objects to sit in a drawer that could be used for proper things that other people use them for. Like clothes. Or be like a '50s housewife and have all my linen folded (I'm not taking the piss I've genuinely always admired such clear uses of drawers and such rigid organisation! - I am incapable of that).

So yes, I think I have a "deal with it tomorrow" tendency. Take the dress. I bought it once, for a Christmas party, about four years ago. At the time I liked it. Now, I don't. Nothing wrong with it, it's quite nice, but when you've gained a bit of weight and have decided the length is a bit granny-ish -I really don't know why I didn't spot that at the time - you will naturally put it aside or in a random drawer - not the nearest charity shop bag. I don't know why. It's not like I'm going to change my mind on the length of the dress, for example. But then, I always think I will, i.e. I think that one day I will re-like the dress? I wish I got lent dresses to wear to events, that would be EASY! You wear it once, hand it back, and then you are never in this quandry - you paid £50 for it, so out of guilt you keep it, but then you don't really like it, so it's pointless keeping it....

Well all that aside, I really do need to stop losing things (a passport is a pretty vital lose). So I have decided a brutal approach may be required. Which means my wardrobe is going to decrease by about 70% which Greg will probably be pleased with. God. Who has all those items in a bedroom drawer? It's really bad when you annoy yourself with your general shit-ness at something.

"Friends"?

So I'm getting a little tired of one or two people who claim to be interested in me and my life and yet I hear the grand part of, well, nothing from them for most of the year.

If I receive a wall post, or an email, or a text, or a phonecall, or a voicemail....I reply. An old fashioned notion perhaps, but I'd like to think it's a polite one. Recently, I've contacted a couple of people (because they contacted me first as well!) with a reply, and a question as to how they are...and nothing back. This really gets my goat, especially more so when I didn't even make the contact in the first place.

Oh, I may as well make another list. What annoys me is:

• People who communicate - especially messages - through mutual friends, as though that counts as direct communication. Grow up and make the contact directly.
  
• People who ignore group emails, even if there are only about three people on the group message, and it's pretty personal with individual parts addressed to individual people..and then reply with one line that is irrelevant, or (even worse) a forward that says, "Forward this to sixty two people within the next 3o seconds or you will DIE", that sort of thing.
  
• Similar to the above, people who you hear nothing from all year then you get an email with "Fifty facts about me!" - I don't particularly care about your facts when I don't even know how you are, or where you are living.
• People who expect me to know how they are feeling/what is going on in their lives when they have not made contact?

I guess the point is, if you are friends with someone, you make the effort to be interested and reply, even if it's sporadic and only once or twice a year. Two of my best friends are em and Niamh who I met seven years ago, and only seen three or four times since. We go for months without contact and then will send one drunken text and it's all fine. People who do any of the above - well I guess as we all get older and wiser you realise who it's worth keeping in touch with and who it's not, and you realise time is accelerating at a scary pace...and I suppose you realise that the people who ARE amazing friends are worth ten of the ones that aren't. And that's a very cathartic thing to realise!

You can't really eat what you want..

Just because you have lost a few pounds. They go back on. Straightaway. This weight loss is harder than it should be!

Who commissions these?

Who the f*ck is the marketing director at Lufthansa because I want to punch him hard. If you've heard the advert on the radio you will know what I'm talking about. That kid in the advert will never have any friends and I seriously think he will get badly bullied at school for how much he has hurt people's ears. I also hope he never laughs like that when he is a teenager - no adolescent girl would deign to be seen in public with the possessor of such a horrific laugh.

I complained online to them today regarding the radio advert and how much it offends my ears, and it took me to a German page with no translation option - clearly their website is not "user friendly" for complaints, and so they are trying to dissuade people from complaining - I'm not surprised as they must get a LOT. I hope, if you are currently weighing up the pros and cons of different airlines prior to flying, you will not fly with Lufthansa.

Kid: But WHY are we going on holiday?
Mum (what she should respond): Less of the "we". You are not going on holiday. I, meanwhile, am going to Italy to lie on a beach. You, my son, although it pains me to admit so, are going to hardcore elocution lessons for the week and you are not allowed within my earshot until that disgusting laugh has been eliminated completely. Do I make myself clear?

Now, I might fly with them if I heard that exchange.

Amazing...

How someone thinks it's ok to MUNCH SPICY NIKNAKS NOISILY on packed train.

Phone calls home

Do you ever phone your mum and get the cool response "Oh, hello stranger."

Next time I get that I'm going to blast a hairdryer down the phone or something and shout "oh it's very windy I can't hear you, speak to you another time, bye."