Skipton Castle

This weekend, I visited friends who live in Yorkshire, and we went to Skipton Castle and town. Here are some of my photos...

Up Close And Personal

Dear Fellow Aikidoer

You may have noticed that we’re spending quite a lot of time together, barefoot in the dojo. Therefore, can I please ask you just one small thing? If you have toenails that look anything like this....

Get a frikking pedicure! You could take someone’s eye out with those things....and since I am forced to spend an unusually long period of time staring at your feet when it’s my turn to play uke (attacker) and you take my balance...I don’t particularly want to be eyeballing those freaky little piggies.

While we’re on the topic of personal hygiene, you may want to reconsider your choice of anti-perspirant deodorant...by which I mean, if you don’t normally wear any, it’s a ripe old time to start. This would be particularly helpful when we’re practising irimi nage, when my face is pretty much stuck underneath your armpit.

Yours truly

Ninja Nat

...............................................


Back in the days when I still worked in an office, I had one particularly pongy colleague who sat directly behind me. He was a bit of a boozer, usually arriving late at work in the mornings, unshowered and still reeking like the end of the night before. He also smoked heavily, taking frequent ciggie breaks, and thus smelling ever ranker as the day wore on. I was convinced that a cat must have at some point peed in his shoes, so stale and sour was the scent that took command of the air whenever he walked past.

Eventually, we could take it no more...the whiff of this unwashed wonder was aggravating the morning sickness in one of my pregnant workmates, and we were all struggling to focus through the fetid fumes. I decided to go and have a subtle word with our manager, in her blissfully fresh-fragranced, air-conditioned office. I hoped she would tactfully convince “Pepe Le Peu” to perhaps take the odd bath and wash his clothes, maybe go easy on the booze and fags on school nights.

I’m not sure if something got lost in translation ("Pepe" had recently moved to London from Paris) or if my manager just chickened out from telling him outright that he stank (he was pretty crap at his job too), but somehow he walked away from their meeting thinking he just needed to tone down his garlicky food a clove or two. "Pepe’s" solution....to freshen his breath by LOUDLY munching on mints the WHOLE FRIKKING DAY LONG. So, not only did we have to put up with the assault of his fruity odour on our nostrils, we now had to contend with a constant crunching sound in the background.

Luckily for us, he really did stink at his job, and when his contract came to an end a few weeks later....it was not renewed.

C’est la vie!

Weekend Morsels

This weekend, I realised that resistance is futile and I may as well just give up the fight...I am gradually turning into my mother in so many ways. Not only am I obsessed with doing laundry, and always having enough milk in the house, I’ve really taken to cooking with the aid of a Slow Cooker. I confess to buying one quite a few years back, making some half-arsed attempts at almost inedible, watery stews and then putting it aside as, quite literally, “a Crock of old sh*t”.

However, as my new “active” lifestyle is taking up most of my evenings (and takeaway curry four nights a week is just not conducive to achieving a svelte body or funding flights to Canada), I recently revisited this marvellous kitchen appliance, this time with the aid of several simple but successful recipe books, specifically written with the slow cooker in mind (read that any way you want!). Tasty lamb stew, chicken casserole, pork with dumplings, and sausage casserole are just some of the culinary delights I’ve prepared the night before, left to simmer the next day and then gobbled up after a strenuous night in the Aikido dojo or packed gym class.

Tigers in love?

Sunday saw the start of a new Chinese year...the year of the Tiger. Up until quite recently, I’d assumed I was born in the year of the tiger, but, it turns out I’ve been growling up the wrong tree. According to the Chinese lunar calendar, a person born in January 1974 was in fact born in the year of the ox.

“Persons born in the Year of the Ox are diligent, patient and rather remain silent. They are consequent and reliable as friends. But they are easy to irritate and tend to be stubborn and obstinate.”

It was also Valentine’s Day...the day that keeps card makers, florists and chocolatiers in business for another year. B and I don’t go in for V-Day in a big way and usually just exchange cards. I really struggled this year to find him one as I’m not into all the soppy satin hearts stuff (or the bluntly sexual stuff on the other side of the scale)...finally settling on this one that quite amused me and sh*t.

Maybe I’m not turning into my mom after all...she’d never give my dad a Valentine’s Day card, let alone one like that.

One Tiger who probably didn't get a Valentine's card this year

Computer Says No!

The end is nigh! Computers are taking over the world....or our cars, at least.

Da Hoff on Da Hood

 Earlier this week, Toyota recalled its Prius model....not to rectify a mechanical fault but a software glitch. All that's needed is a quick update to recalibrate the electrically generated pedal "feel" in the braking system, which just goes to show how deeply computer control is embedded in today's cars.

And don’t I know it!

This morning I received a letter from Citroen informing me that my diesel C3 (it isn’t sexy but it is eco-friendly) needs to be “subject to an operation to download a new software version for the lighting controls.” Apparently, this will “eliminate any potential problems which would cause random switching off of the vehicle lamps”.

So I could be driving down a dark country road one stormy night and suddenly be plunged incognito? Mind you, it wouldn’t be the first time I’ve driven around by night without my lights on...although those other occasions were strictly due to driver error, not a computer glitch. One night a few years back, I was embarrassingly stopped by a policeman who wondered if “Madam knew she was driving without her lights switched on?” I was driving through a town with powerful street lights at the time. However, on another particularly gormless occasion, I drove for a good five minutes down a rural road, with just the moonlight to guide me through the inky blackness, before the lights went on (in my head and on my car!)

I do like my car, but she has one annoying little feature...as soon as the temperature dips below 4°C, a warning “Risk of Ice!” flashes across on the dashboard, accompanied by an ear-piercing beep! The first time this happened, I almost swerved onto the kerb with shock and had to rush home to change my pants (by which I do mean undergarments). This "Risk Of Ice" function has really outstayed its already dubious welcome this winter....I  don't think the outside temperature has inched above 2°C since November....and I can't figure out how to turn the bleeping thing off!

Similar “helpful” but loud messages from my car’s computer system include:

“You need to find a garage now! Only 65 miles of juice left in the tank!”
“Your next service is due in 1000 miles” and
“DumbAss! You left the lights on/keys in the ignition!”

Back in the old days, we owned a decrepit, 1981 VW Golf (I think it was cream but it was hard to tell from all the rust), which had none of these high-tech features. Driving was always an adventure. Occasionally, bits and pieces would fly off and bounce down the road behind us...if the car was still running, we generally wouldn’t bother to stop to pick up the stray bit, as it obviously was not an essential engine component. The car horn was fixed to the centre of the steering wheel....I use the term “fixed” rather loosely as frequently the panel would dislodge and land in my lap while I was driving, rendering me hornless...a great disability in South Africa, where driving with one hand on the “hooter” is commonplace (I had to adapt my way of driving when we moved to the UK...amazingly, most Brits very rarely tap their horn).

Rain leaked in on the passenger side and, as the engine was fan-cooled, the Golf overheated almost daily. We somehow figured out that driving with the heater on full blast counteracted the engine heat...fine in winter but not so cool in the long, hot Cape summers. Not surprisingly, the car broke down countless times...many a morning saw me pushing the accursed heap of rust, desperately trying to get it started...at least to get it down to the local garage for yet another round of repairs.

Strangely, I felt quite sad the day we finally parted company with the old girl...I’d learnt to drive in her, grinding her gears and burning out the clutch. We had no shortage of prospective buyers...in fact for months before we sold her, complete strangers would come up to us asking if they could please buy our Golf. That dilapidated old thing? I started wondering if there were diamonds stashed in her somewhere as the rusty old bucket seemed highly desirable.

Turns out those old VW Golf cars are a mechanics dream....easily fixed and cheap to run, no onboard computers, no software upgrades....just good old fashioned nuts and bolts. Our old Golf (now lovingly restored by her new owner, the security officer/part time "Grease Monkey" at B's old workplace) will probably still be happily running along the steep, windy roads of Cape Town, long after our C3 fails to reboot one frosty morning.

Confessions Of A Technophobe

Blaim it on my Catholic upbringing (13 years in a fortress school ruled by anally retentive strict nuns) but I have some confessions to make...

I am completely useless when it comes to figuring out any new gadget...mainly because I am just too lazy to read the manual, tending to only consult it when things go awry. I take the same approach with recipe books....they're great for gleaming ideas of combinations of ingredients, but I find the weighing out and measuring lark far too much of a hassle....it reminds me of tedious lab work, and I thankfully left that behind years ago.

This technophobia/extreme laziness explains why I've had a new phone with camera (and many other unused but no doubt handy features) since last August and have just never worked out how to get the photos off it and into a useable medium. Then Natalie sent me on a guilt trip (another Catholic trait) yesterday when she asked if the photo of a rainbow in my last post was my own work.... I had to admit that it is not. I do, however, try and use my own photos whenever possible...and I knew that I had at least one picture of a rainbow stored on my phone.

So, finally.....drumroll and fanfare.....here are two (slightly less spectacular) rainbows taken by yours truly with the camera of my hTC phone...

Over a field near our house

Dunstanburgh beach and castle (Northumberland) 

And some bonus pics of sunsets - also taken with my phone camera....

Finally, a sunset and a rainbow taken last month in Norway with my Canon Ixus 990 camera...

There IS a rainbow there too....on the right!

The Weekend In Colour

It was a dismally grey, foggy weekend, yet I found a whole rainbow of colours....

Red – the sanguine hues of “Spanish” chicken casserole....I tried out an old family recipe that marinades chicken thighs in onions, red peppers, red wine, chicken stock, a hefty dose of paprika, bay leaves and whole peppercorns (Note to self: invest in muslin spice cooking bags as whole peppercorns may be delightfully crunchy for a moment, but soon become overpoweringly peppery, and fishing them out of the pot with a slotted spoon is the culinary equivalent of watching paint dry).

Orange – the brash tone (akin to the toxic E number 111) sported by a well-known no frills airline....I’ve booked cheap flights to Amsterdam for mid April to (hopefully) coincide with the tulips in full bloom.

Yellow – lashings of custard over sticky toffee pudding....catching up with an old friend over lunch in a cosy pub in Cambridgeshire, discussing life, love, the universe and everything else.

Green – the lush forests of the Canadian Rockies in summer, gloriously portrayed in glossy travel brochures...and the shade of B’s gills when he clocked the price of a fortnight’s holiday by said forests!

Blue – the colour the air turned when, after two months of searching and finally finding bathroom accessories befitting our newly renovated cloakroom (temple to the revered Gas Bill), an accursed screw snapped during the fixing of the “Stockholm” swivel chrome hand towel rail (not from Ikea!). We will now have to pay Handy Man to extract the broken screw from its socket, a job probably entailing knocking a chunk out of the freshly plastered wall, replastering and redecorating...which goes to show we really can’t be trusted to do any DIY and should just leave it to the professionals... or continue to live in an authentic 1970s hovel.

Indigo and violet – the high fashion shades of the bruise extending from my shoulder to my elbow...the result of an Aikido roll that went horribly wrong last night. I’m also limping with a badly stubbed toe, and my back feels like I’ve been left on a medieval torture rack overnight....that’s what comes from going up against Tattoo Man.

Hope your weekend was as colourful.

Gaseous Omissions

The single most important item you will ever need to live in the UK is....no, not an umbrella...but a gas bill! A gas bill is like the Holy Grail, the Elixir of Youth, the Fount of All Knowledge and indeed the Dog’s Bollocks all rolled into one. Without one, you are a persona non grata. Without a gas bill, you cannot open a bank account...and without a bank account you cannot rent a flat....and without renting a flat, you cannot get a gas bill, so you cannot open a bank account....you get the picture?


Me: “Hello. I’d like to open a bank account, please. Here is my passport, my driver’s licence, my employment contract, a letter from my employer, my first month’s salary cheque, my life savings, my dental records, a DNA sample, a urine specimen, my left leg, my right arm and my brother’s first born."
Bank Nazi: “You’ll also need to provide us with a gas bill."
Me: “I don’t have one yet, as I am staying with a friend until I can rent my own flat. Unfortunately I can’t do that until I have a bank account.”
Bank Nazi: [deep intake of breath] “You see, since 9-11 we have strict rules about who can open a bank account and we have to have evidence that you are who you say you are.”
Me: “What about my passport and my driver’s licence...both bear my photos and my name?”
Bank Nazi: “We would still need a gas bill. It’s proof that you live at the address you would provide. We need this to stop terrorists and money launderers, dontcha know?”
Me: “So....you guys install CCTV cameras at all your customers’ homes to check they really do live there and haven’t since moved or didn’t just get a friend to put their name on the gas bill? Also, they could still be terrorists and money launderers....who have gas bills!”
Bank Nazi: “Application denied.”

Eventually, the manager of a lesser known building society took pity on me and miraculously gave me a banking account....he was probably worried that a crying, slobbering, one-armed, one-legged woman begging for an account in exchange for unmentionable favours was upsetting the other customers.

And so the day arrived when we could finally move out of the home of our long-suffering-and-deserving-of-a-knighthood-or-a-Medal-of-Bravery-at-the-very-least Best Friend and into our own, very empty abode. We needed furniture in a hurry...so that would only mean one place: Ikea! Shopping at Ikea is never a fun experience...given a choice between a visit to the dentist and a trip to buy another Billy bookcase, I’d pick the molar inspection any day. I’d highly recommend you read UberGrumpy’s hilarious post HERE  to get an idea of just how awful any trip to the Swedish flat pack furniture giant can be.

Our mammoth shopping trip that day was no exception. It was a Saturday, and the place was heaving. Half the population had decided that as they were sick of their children screaming at home, they would spread the joy and take them shopping for a new coffee table...in a great big warehouse with just the right acoustics to really show off their vocal volume.

However, as annoying as naughty kids in a confined space can be, the elderly can be worse. At what age do you stop feeling the need to join a queue and instead just push to the front? Is it something to do with failing eyesight? Do you genuinely no longer see the massive queue of frustrated shoppers who’ve been waiting an eternity for the elusive Ikea staff to put in an appearance at the “Seek Assistance With This Item” point? Or do you just get to the stage when you think “F*ck you! I don’t have much time left on this earth and I sure as hell am not wasting any of it in a queue!” I think it’s most likely the second scenario... it certainly was the case for the old bat who pushed in front of us that day. Nothing wrong with her eyesight - I know this as we ran into her again at the checkout point, where she was in front of us paying for three items, all with different means....a cabinet (£299) paid for in 1p and 2p coins, an armchair (£80) paid for with newspaper coupons, and a bag of 100 tealights (£1.69) paid for with a credit card.

Two lifetimes later and we were through the checkout and contemplating filling the hired van with three trolley loads of flatpack boxes. It was peeing down and tempers were generally frayed. We decided the best plan would be for BF to go and fetch the van (which was parked in the next town), B would wait under the sheltered entrance with the trolleys and I would “reserve” a highly sought after loading bay. And so I came to be standing in the middle of an Ikea parking lot, in the pouring rain, hoping that a great big truck would not just blindly reverse into the loading area and merge my seething body with the tarmac...when who should come up to me but the queue-jumping, coin-packing old bat to ask me.... “Are you reserving this spot?”

“No [you stupid old cow!]...I just love standing in the bloody rain!!”

Grrrrrrrrrrrr!!!!!

Luckily I managed to restrain myself from wrapping my hands around her scrawny neck and squeezing the last little bit of life out of her that day. Otherwise, I would have been held at 'Her Majesty’s Pleasure' and therefore not been at our new flat when, one month later, that magical envelope bearing our very first gas bill was pushed through the letterbox and landed with a satisfying yet gentle thud on our doormat.

Today, that gas bill is framed in gold and is on display in pride of place (the downstairs lavatory) such that all who visit our humble home may ponder the significance and the power that seemingly worthless piece of paper holds, while they worship at its throne....