tissue paper thin 18 July 2012
Well, Miss Alice Cat disappeared for 2 days just now. she’s not herself with her gum problems and i honestly thought we’d seen the last of her. then, she emerged from under the sink this morning without a ‘by your leave’ or a single word of explanation. she’s thin and won’t eat but did take a cuddle. i will bring her to the vet for yet another hopeful intervention in her tooth saga later…if i can locate her, for she has disappeared again! no note, no hint as to where she may have gone. it’s most likely that she has found a handy stash of tissue paper that i intend to wrap the GO ON! tea cosies in (she and her sister Brenda, aka Ariel onceuponatime, just LURV tissue paper) and she is probably busy making it hairy and unusable…
cats? ‘nuff said…
Spidey 16 July 2012
In the brief few moments of sun over the last few days I have been inclined to leave the door to the back garden open. Flies seem to love to visit then and some have to stay on a little holiday when the doors are shut again. Yesterday a particularly noisy one would not stop buzzing the closed door and Brenda went to give it what for. She managed to pat it to the ground but when I went to check that it wasn’t a stinging critter I saw a (much smaller) spider pop out from a crevice in the wainscotting, attack the fly and try to drag it back to its lair. I had never witnessed such a thing as a spider attack. I’m not madly fond of them – their random scuttling runs unnerve me – but neither would I kill one. The same cannot be said of Brenda. On this occasion though she swooped, got the fly, killed and tried to eat it, but didn’t much care for the taste. And spidey lost out on a delicious meal. Red in tooth and claw, the old nature, eh?
Foxy 14 July 2012
Had to get up at stupid o clock as couldn’t sleep and, while wearily sighing, a most marvellous thing happened. As I was gazing out at my lovely garden and, I will admit, talking to myself…probably out loud…two foxes strolled along the back wall. I have never seen an urban Dublin fox and I honestly thought I might die of sheer delight. The two looked like teenagers, all sleek and slim. V v pretty. The rest of the day had a lot to do to come up to the standard of gorgeousness that the foxes set! I am almost tempted to get up early again in case they still by as perhaps this their regular visiting time?
Talked tea cosies on national radio afterwards, which was nice. I think people are going back to giving themselves a wee bit of me time when they brew a brew now as it is one of the cheaper treats you can give yourself and of course it is all the more pretty and enjoyable if you have a lovely cosie to wrap your tea pot in! FACT
Oh, and my bro Ian introduced me to fishmania on tv = erm, interesting. He also said he’d tape me a show called Paint Drying but I can’t seem to find that…
fanning! 13 July 2012
my dears, any of you who are in ireland and listening to the ‘wireless’ around 11 am tomorrow morning, i shall chat with the maestro Dave Fanning about tea cosies – oh yes, we’re HIP, the Fanning and I!!!!
survival! 12 July 2012
oh yes, i MADE IT, in spite of the fact that statistics and (maybe) my own recklessness suggested i might not BUT i ‘celebrated’ A milestone birthday and once again, as predicted, i am 38 so phew and RELAX all.
in the meantime the tea cozies are OUT THERE, and selling (THANK YOU all) and i feel great about that. it means i launched a lil personal and heartfelt business on the day i thought i would spend whimpering in a corner with disbelief that time had ‘caught up’ with me* – as it happens, i had prepared for months, while knitting those tea cozies.
so there i was NOT feeling sorry for myself = hurrah!
i so love them, those Go Ons – yeah, yeah, i know i made them too but that doesn’t mean i don’t adore em! they’re pretty and useful and SO lush – check them out!
SO how did the day itself come to pass gently? well, i was spoiled rotten and brought away to a TOP place called Kilgraney House in Bagnelstown, Co Carlow, where Bryan and Martin run a fabulous small hotel and spa (that’s just saturdays, unless you give prior warning) and THE BEST FOOD i have had in a LONG long time. amazing and wonderful and highly recommended. can’t wait to return.
no, you are not wrong, i have eschewed capitals this evening – just the way it was going and how i roll right now – rebel yell, anyone?
*it didn’t though cos it only does if you let it, i think?
Tomorrow, 11th 10 July 2012
Righto, tomorrow morning at 11 am Irish time the Go On tea cosies will be available from this site! This coincides with me being born a goodly number of years ago * and also on a Wednesday as it happens…I hope yet like them cos I think they are lovely (guess every mum thinks that of her own, eh?)
- a solid round number though
the GO ONs are coming!!! 7 July 2012
Yes, I grew tired of myself and dipped out of here for a record rest.
To be honest, I was busy too.
I acted in the run of GREENER by the wonderful Fiona Looney at the Gaiety Theatre in Dublin – really enjoyed that as did audiences, I am happy to report.
JENNY Q STITCHED UP, my first novel for young teens (i’d say 10 – 13 years or so) is out now in bookshops and has received great reviews and smashing feedback – hooray!
I’ve just finished filming my eps of THREESOME series 2 and you can see those in the autumn on Comedy Central – whoop!
BUT
the big news is that I am launching my tea cozies the GO ONs here on this site 11th July = next Wednesday. There’ll be 50 of them to mark a certain birthday* (also 11th July) and I am so delighted with how they’ve turned out.
There’ll be other seasons too – I am presently working on Autumn/Winter and I’ll do special sparklies for the December Festives, then onto Valentine Hearts in the New Year as well as Spring/Mother’s Day/Paddy’s Day and on. All are numbered and archived and are only genuine if they come from me, complete with a little note telling the story of each GO ON. No 2 are the same, either. I hope you like them!
*I’ll be 38 again from Thursday onwards
queasy 9 April 2012
So, theres a chance i’m getting squeamish in my old age. I’ve been struck by how yuck some of the ads on tv are – e.g. there’s a recent one for a men’s hair product that shows the ‘before’ man diving into the sea and emerging with a lot of fish spiked on his hair, all flapping and (I’m guessing) DYING but then he changes his hair gel and gets the girl. Now, I eat fish so I’m not pointing the finger and saying it’s wrong to kill them for said purpose, though I’d hope it happened somehow humanely and sustainably, BUT I just cannot fathom how that advert is meant to be ‘entertaining’ or even attractive enough to sell the product? Who passed it as a good idea?
The second one that makes me squirm is for a microwaveable burger and involves a rather lazy youngster sat in front of the tv unscrewing his finger, which then wiggles along to the kitchen and cooks him a burger and when he’s eating it later the same finger is screwed on backwards and it’s waggling about = URGH, it just makes me want to hurl and certainly doesn’t give me an appetite for what it advertises.
That is all…
cleavage 8 April 2012
Rehearsals for GREENER at the Gaiety Theatre continue apace and are very enjoyable, though now about to enter the realms of very scary as showtime approaches. The ladies of the company have been out and about doing press and one of those items was to appear on Ireland’s top chat show The Late Late Show. Our appearance coincided with the end of Cleavage Week – now I have to say I didn’t know such a thing existed until I saw that Holly Willoughby had ‘won’ the title. I was understandably aggrieved not to even get a mention because I am told I have a sizable and shapely rack and I mentioned as much live to the Irish nation and anyone who cares to look up the internet version of the show appearance. What I had not expected was that focus would be also thrust upon the wonderful chest area of our esteemed playwright Fiona Looney – she tells me that, for a brief period of time, her bosoms trended on Twitter. It made me feel almost proud, really…Ain’t technology and communication NUTS, too, these days!
sham 19 March 2012
It may not have escaped your attention that this weekend hosted the St Patrick’s Day celebrations. It happened to fall on a Saturday this year but even when it doesn’t the date for the parades and shenanigans is just shifted to the nearest weekend, a bank holiday declared, and all hell breaks loose. And if my mathematics are correct, all Christmas babies can date their conception back to this time in March – proof also, perhaps, that Jesus was Irish and a Paddy’s Day baby…please don’t feel this is blasphemy, it’s just a theory I’ve developed based on semi-solid scientific fact…
This year was tinged with some sadness for us Irish as we failed to beat our ancient sporting foe, the English, at rugby – it smarts quite a bit as we’re not rubbish at rugby.
And it seems the shamrock is, well, a sham…
Now, I don’t need to point out that the name is accurate in as much as the plant is clearly not a rock, not even close. But it seems it kind of doesn’t exist at all! Various professorly boffin types have asked citizens to send them samples of what they consider to be shamrock at times over the past decades and all are in fact clovers – the yellow clover being the one that is most commonly thought of as shamrock. The reason this imposter and its cousins have ‘got away’ with the ruse for so long is that they don’t flower until later in the year (at which time it’s clear that they’re clover and not the nonexistent shamrock) so they look all shamrocks in March. Shocking. Nature is a slippery madam and no mistake…
The cats refused to wear green for the celebrations. They, too, are madams.