How Did I Do?

As the year draws rapidly to an end, it’s time for me to revisit my Hope To Do List For 2010 and see how I got on with my goals...



1. Become Master Ninja at Aikido

Ha! This is never actually going to happen...I struggle to work out my left foot from my right most of the time. Then there's the minor issue of a morbid fear of rolling head over heels (break falling). Amazingly, I did manage to pass my first grading though.

2. Get superfit and svelte

I’m certainly fitter (thanks to the energetic Aikido classes and boxercise sessions with Muscle Man) but as long as there is a source of chocolate on this planet, I’m never ever going to be svelte...

3. Run the 10 km Race For Life

Well, it was more of a jog/shuffle/hobble than a run, but I did it, raising £175 for Cancer Research. Then I walked a half marathon, raising £225 for Macmillan Cancer Support. I’m very glad that I took part in both.

4. See the Dutch bulbfields

I really tried to...but I hadn’t counted on a $%^&ing Icelandic volcano spewing an ash cloud into the sky and shutting down European airspace, just a few days before I was scheduled to leave. I am still fighting for my travel insurance to cough up the money they owe me for my cancelled trip, and along with hundreds of thousands of equally conned people, I’m waiting on the Financial Ombudsman to make her final decision. I'm not holding my breath...

5. Take a city break in Berlin

Didn’t happen. I was a bit put off city breaks after the Amsterdam fiasco. I did get to see Lisbon (briefly as I was at a conference), somehow managing to fly in and out between ash cloud disruptions, and I was wowed by the beautiful city of Seville during the Andalusian adventure. 

6. Visit Canada (or China or Japan)

O Canada!  I had a fantastic trip to Vancouver Island and the Rockies in June that you may have read about in my couple of dozen posts. Absolutely loved it and hope to return soon. As for China or Japan...watch this space as we’re hoping to squeeze in a visit somewhere in the East in the second half of 2011.



7. Stop worrying about things I cannot control

Definitely didn’t happen. I have spent a large part of the year worrying about something or another, most often my dad’s health, which has unfortunately not been too great lately.

8. Overcome my fear of driving

I was forced into this.... with B being away for business and my dad in and out of hospital in another part of the country, I had to do some hairy driving on Britain’s motorways this year. Now, with the icey weather upon us, I’m trying to get to grips (literally) with snow driving.

9. Let go of people who bring me down

Again, this didn’t really happen, although I’ve learnt to sometimes screen my calls….some days I just can’t deal with anyone else’s (really quite trivial, self-inflicted) problems.

10. Plan and save for a new kitchen

This became quite urgent earlier this month, when the door fell off our oven…it’s back on now, but we broke the handle in the process, meaning we now have to prise the door open with a knife and burn ourselves senseless. I've decided I want a sleek black and white kitchen….the designs are in, finances are under review, so watch this space.

11. Learn to cook properly

While having a decrepit oven doesn’t inspire me to undertake anything too complicated, I can make some damn good lamb stew (in the slow cooker), roast chicken and lasagna, and I can bake a great banana bread. What else would anyone want? Best thing I bought this year…an egg poaching pan.



12. Watch 3 classic films

Does watching 'Love Actually' for the tenth time count? Just never found the time this year…probably because I was too busy watching rubbish TV.

13. Watch less rubbish TV, read more good books

Epic fail on this one (see 12 above).

How did you get on with your new year plans in 2010?

The Week That Was....

Well, I DID make it to Lisbon in the end...and back again - just in the nick of time! UK airports are gradually closing today as yet again the volcanic ash cloud shifts our way. OK, Ash Cloud....do your worst for the next three weeks or so but just sod the hell off next month when I want to fly to Canada!

My early flight out of London Luton was delayed for two hours last Tuesday morning while air traffic control cleverly worked out how we could fly around the ash cloud. Sitting waiting in the airport lounge, drinking bottomless cups of tea and watching SkyNews on a continuous loop of just two stories....the aftermath of the UK election and the RyanAir plane that had to make an emergency landing at Stansted Airport (!)... is possibly not the wisest move for someone with a small bladder, who's also terrified of flying and of using the toilet on an aeroplane (fear of hitting turbulence mid-stream, you pee see).

Finally, I made it through Lisbon airport by lunchtime...hopped into a taxi driven by a wannabe F1 race driver and got to my hotel in record time. Dumping my bags, I headed straight out again to find something to eat, ending up at a cafe/patisserie type place up the road from the hotel. The owner quickly realised I don't know a word of Portuguese and pointed to the menu saying, "Meat, Fish, Omelette"....I opted for the "omelette", which turned out to be two fried eggs, bacon, chips and pickled cauliflower and carrots all piled up on a plate. Very tasty, all the same.

There was just time for a quick stroll to get my bearings before the conference welcome reception. The city was crawling with police as the pope had just arrived. I caught the tail end of a procession of devotees....

And then the man himself in his popemobile....

Most of the week was taken up by lectures, workshops and hobnobbing networking with some interesting characters from both rival companies and potential clients. I did get a couple of free hours one afternoon and decided to take an open-top bus tour of Lisbon. My photos are pretty rubbish on the whole....my camera has anti-shake built in but is not equipped to cope with a bus on high speed vibrate. Here are a few shots to give you an idea - click on the pictures to enlarge or the links to read more.

Luís de Camões Square

Jerónimos Monastery

Pastel de Belém (custard tarts) at the famous Casa Pastéis de Belém, 160 year old pastry shop

The 25 de Abril Bridge, built by the same company (American Bridge Company) that constructed the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge (not the Golden Gate)

Torre de Belém at dusk

Padrão dos Descobrimentos (Monument to the Discoveries)

Map of Portuguese exploration on pavement below the Monument

Stepping back to my roots

After a delayed return flight, I finally arrived back in London in the early hours of Saturday morning, landing in a country with a new Tory-Lib Dem coalition government, and a new PM in Number 10.

Out with the Old....

In with the New....

Now I need to catch up on all your posts from the past week!

In Limbo

Chimp pic found HERE

I seem to have spent the past weekend hanging around, just wondering, watching and waiting...

Wondering what will be the outcome of the UK's hung parliament - with no one party taking the majority of seats, what will happen next? A LibDem - Tory coalition (they're unlikely bedfellows) or a LibDem - Labour - Minority Parties alliance (on paper more likely but possibly not the best outcome for anyone wanting significant change, and likely to hit funding for England, of all the nations, hardest)? Or possibly an attempt by the Tories to rule without a majority, resulting in power breakdown and another election likely within a year?

This sudden obsession with politics means I spent the most part of the weekend glued to 24-hour news channels, desperate for any bit of information....why did I bother when in reality what's going on behind closed doors is probably so far removed from what's being reported? Still, the need to keep watching could not be stifled by the regurgitation of news-that's-not-really news-just-replays...and not helped by a wet and cold weekend, with not much to tempt me out and away from the telly.

And so I waited. Waited on the political game to play out....and watched helplessly while that infernal Icelandic volcano decided to spew more ash our way and put paid to my travel plans, yet again! I'm due to fly to Portugal early tomorrow for a jolly very important and serious medical writers' conference with five of my colleagues...but, suprise!suprise! ....good old Eyjafjallajökull has started up again, this time disrupting Transatlantic flights (this does not bode well for my Canadian trip next month!) and shutting down southern European airspace.

Up until this morning, Lisbon airport was closed for business....it seems to have just re-opened, but for how long? And if we do make it to the Iberian Peninsula, will we ever get back home again? I don't fancy an epic train trip through Spain to France to get a ferry back to Dover. More importantly, given my serious and uncontrollable  fear of flying, I'm not 100% comfortable with the thought of flying through any ash, dense or not....and there will still be some lurking in the skies above! 

Who knows what the week will bring....

Did You Hear The One About The Volcano?

The Northern Lights seen above the ash plume of Iceland's Eyjafjallajokull volcano.

Photo: REUTERS

Not surprisingly, there’s been a positive eruption of jokes about Iceland’s Eyjafjallajokull volcano on the internet in recent days. In case you missed them, here are my favourites.

But first, just a bit of background for anyone not living in the UK.... Iceland is the name of a British supermarket chain, specialising in cheap frozen foods (other giant supermarkets here are Tesco and Asda). Iceland is also a small country whose banking industry recently collapsed, taking with it gazillions of pounds worth of British taxpayers’ money.

It was the last wish of the Icelandic economy that its ashes be spread over Europe.


Iceland goes bankrupt, then it manages to set itself on fire. This has insurance scam written all over it.


Iceland, we wanted your cash, not your ash.


I came out my house yesterday and was hit on the head by a bag of frozen sausages, a chocolate gateau and some fish fingers. I realised it must be the fallout from Iceland.


Volcano in Iceland. What next... Earthquake in Asda?


Waiter, there's volcanic ash in my soup. I know, it's a no-fly zone.


Richard Curtis is working on a new rom-com about people stuck in an airport who fall in love. The working title is "Lava Actually".


It’s a bit early for Iceland volcano jokes. We should wait a while for the dust to settle.

Jokes sourced HERE

Happy Friday!