Yesterday eve turned out quite busy in the end. Did a mercy mission (my last good deed of the year), and took a drive out to Sutton Gault to pick up a 'baby stair gate' which had kindly been donated to me via www.freecycle.org. I had posted a "Wanted" on there for one, because Doug and Angie's dog Molly has had a suspected stroke in the build up to Christmas, and the poor old girl kept falling down the stairs. Freecycle is bloody great (they have them in lots of different areas worldwide). I am in the Cambridge branch, and have found it a blessing. You can issue requests for things, which may or may not be successful, and you can get rid of things you don't want. Things that are too good for the rubbish tip, but too fiddly to sell. We have offloaded an old composting bin and a bookshelf on there, and there are even people who will remove rubble or soil, if they want it for gardening. I think it is a fabulous scheme. The couple that donated the gate were very sweet - they lived in a fairly remote farmyard near Ely, and ran a kennel there for rescue dogs (http://www.poplarfarmkennels.org.uk/). They seemed entirely committed to their cause.
After that, I cooked kedgeree and we headed off to the cinema to see Flags of Our Fathers, which was excellent. It must be difficult to find a new way of shooting war scenes - especially a landing on a beach, but this was really well done. Very sentimental, as is the way with Clint Eastwood directed movies, but excellent and thought provoking nonetheless.
Tonight I am just going to be shopping/cleaning for the grand visit. Not entirely sure where or how to entertain Mum and Dad in the next couple of days (Mark is working), but am sure I will think of something! On New Year's Day, Mark's parents are joining us for lunch, and Mark and his Dad are going to watch the football, so hopefully the weather will hold out for them (and for us - would be nice to get out for a walk and burn off the booze/good food from the night before!).
Today am refining my New Year's resolutions list... it has some firm faves there, and some new ones:
- Lose weight! An obvious one... ALWAYS looking to lose that stone! This time there will be no fannying around.
- More exercise... REALLY must get the running club back in order. I was doing SO well, but have been disgustingly lapse since my return from Asia. One of the guys in the office is pushing for a few of us to sign up for a 10k run in Spring, which a few weeks ago would have seemed easy... but at the moment it seems like an insurmountable challenge.
- Go blonde and grow hair... a new twist on a firm favourite. I like the challenge of trying to turn my now red dyed hair blonde without ending up with a full on ginger hue. Growing my hair has been an aim since the first day I had it cut off, circa 1983. I might compromise and aim for a very short bob...
- Save some money!
- Do some voluntary work.. perhaps mentoring for the elderly?
- No drinking alcohol in January (have done this successfully for the last two years), and maybe cut down for rest of year?! Have cut-down HUGELY since leaving Norwich, but it would be nice to take it a step further.
- See my friends in Norwich/London/Surrey/Leeds/Bexley-on-sea... generally catch up with ALL those people I have been meaning to catch up with, but never do!
I think that's enough to be going on with for now... ;-) There are a few others we won't go into here... wish me luck!
Hope you all have a fantastic and happy and drunken New Year, and let's look forward to an exciting 2007!!
Much love,
Hayley
xxxxxx
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