Reflections

Pink frock and fur stole reflected in the glory of an XK140.

Goodwood … what's not to love?

Shed

Jabba Jabba Hey

Loads and loads of lovely frocks at Goodwood this year, some … er … larger than others.

Hurricane

Seventy five years since the Battle of Britain! Goodwood this year had more Spitfires and Hurricanes than I have ever seen one place. An awesome and emotional flying day.

It's That Time of Year Again

Apologies to one and all who are heartily sick of racing car and fashion photos every September, but it's the one time each year I can step outside of reality and wallow in my fantasy world: the golden age of motor racing (and great frocks).

Back in the real world, the planet is going down the shitter (the same place my relationship just went), though bizarrely and wonderfully, a real Socialist gets elected as leader of a major party so I have someone I can vote for for the first time in decades. Enfranchised at last!

But stuff all that … Incredibly loud racing cars and girls in pretty frocks beat the real world hands down. If you are sick of racing cars and fashion pics, look away now (and for some time to come).

Go There, Spend Money; You Know You Want To …

Go where?
Why to http://homegrownboxes.blogspot.com of course.
My wonderful friend Robyn, who started this blogging lark the same time I did has launched a new blog to show just what a crafty woman can do with stuff and imagination.

Go take a look, then follow the link to her Etsy page and buy early Christmas presents for yourself and your friends. You know it makes sense.

A Cuppa for Petrea

Here's the link you couldn't see, Petrea. I have already ordered one of these and will use it to brew green tea at the office.

More Intelligent Design …

Holy crap. I have got to get myself one of these.
And PLEASE check out the Mister Tea link at the bottom. I want one of those, too!

Intelligent Design

I love this world.

Four, Apparently …

That - it turns out - is the number of architects required to change a light bulb.

Not just any light bulb; one of those inset downlighter spotlight doohickeys in the shower room. Corrina went to change it as the caretaker is on leave and found there was no obvious way of getting the darned thing out of the ceiling.

So … four of us turned to the interweb and a six minute video of a large gentleman from the southern states of the Colonies whose painfully slow-drawled accent we adopted for the task ("un-cullee-up thuh spuh-ree-ung" etc.) .

Armed with a stepladder and a laptop showing the video, the gallant quartet donned hard hats and fluorescent tabards and managed to follow the precise instructions to … er … wriggle and wrench the thing out of the ceiling.

At which point the "spuh-ree-ung" unsprung itself at a rate of knots, spraying the room with small pieces of plastic and metal and eliciting a satisfying scream from Corrina.

Yet more "spuh-ree-ung cullee-ups" held the bulb into a plastic "ree-ung" which required the quartet to take turns at wrenching and swearing until eventually it all came apart.

The new bulb was a doddle to plug in. What was not a doddle was assembling the divers small plastic parts and "spuh-ree-ung cullee-ups" into something resembling a light fitting. The man in the video had failed to mention the inherent explosive qualities of the thing and its eagerness to violently disassemble itself. He offered no help in putting it all back together again. Humpty-Dumpty was nothing in comparison.

And so … several minutes later and after successive abortive design attempts we somehow managed to manufacture something that  (a) looked like a light fitting, and (b) contained all the parts collected from around the room.

Getting it back into the ceiling was entertaining in that the "spuh-ree-ung cullee-ups" acted much like mousetraps, snapping shut on any fingers attempting to manœuvre the thing into position.
Cue divers alarums and some imaginative profanity.

We now - at last - have a working light in the shower room - whoop-de-doo - but have decided that when the next one goes we shall wait for the caretaker to get back from his holiday rather than attempt such a monstrous task ourselves.

Downlighter spotlights? Fuck 'em!