Wednesday 30 November 2011

Driving the Dragons

It's been a tough week, scrambling to get as much as possible packed. I'm just hoping the boys are prepared for how much stuff we HAVE. The vivariums alone take more than 36 cubic feet of space, and there's my bike...

I'm being sent on ahead, folded up in the back seat of an overloaded Ford Fiesta, wedged down the side of two aquariums, a poly box containing the axolotls, a container full of gecko and waxworms (he thought it was an extra long lunch break) and a big basket full of dragons.

His Lordship would be following up tomorrow with our stuff in the vans - I was running ahead to safely transport the animals and make sure the rental property was ready to move into.

Several hours of pins and needles later (Nan likes the... uh, scenic route) we stopped off for some lunch. My confidence boosted by the fact that the dragons had happily dozed for the last few hours, I left them in the car whilst we nipped into Morrisons for 20 minutes.

On returning, I discovered little Hyphen sat ON the basket, restrained from exploring the car only by his leash tied round the handle. I opened the basket and discovered the other three dragons gazing up at me mournfully - Hyph had securely tied his travel companions with their own leashes.

I let Hyphen sit on my headrest to pull faces at the cars behind whilst I untangled the others. Sandy felt a little travel sick and promptly tucked herself back under the blankets to resume sleeping. Old hand Tsam was quite content to continue snoozing and Mocha wanted nothing more than to explore - when she has her leash on, it usually means she's going for a walk!

For more proof that lizards are smart, have a look at this cool little article: http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/news/4513/clever-lizards-surpass-expectations

11 hours of pins and needles is no fun. Is there a world record? Or just a much higher DVT risk?

Friday 25 November 2011

When a day's a good one, you know it.

It's been a very good day today. As some of you know, it was my last day at work before moving Up North - and it was a cracking good day!

For starters, my favourite author dropped back in and laughed delightedly when I asked with a great deal of awkwardness for his autograph.

Lookit! Tom Holt's autograph! Thanks Mr Holt - I got it framed by my cousin John at FastFrames, in a lovely stylish gold frame.


The lovely folks at work surprised me with this awesome cake. I felt bad about slicing it, but that lizard is really tasty! My boss's friend, Lizzy Cornelius in Yeovil, made it. Her business number is 01935 509002 and she's a very talented cake craftsperson. She used loads of butter icing under the smoothly coloured royal icing, and sculpted it round a supremely moist sponge... Bearing in mind I don't much like sponge, this lady makes a DELICIOUS cake - I want MOAR!

My favourite Customer Advisor was in charge of getting a gift it turns out and I was well impressed with his choice - a simple, elegant architectural pendant of silver and green amber. I was also bought an amber bead bracelet, a Chinese dragon for my charm bracelet and a cute little crocodile brooch.

After work, I promptly went to Razook's the hairdressers and got my freedom colours put in. After all, Boss isn't going to frown at my "inappropriate hairstyle" on Monday.

I went for magenta red, deep violet and this fabulous flamingo pink - the best bit (besides the brilliant choppy cut the stylist put in to make the colours "flash" from under my normal hair colour) is that these rather striking colours have an interesting chemical base - it's UV reactive. Stick me under a black light and I GLOW! Weehee!

And the final bit of grand news to really wrap the day up? I found an update from Taunton Crown Court regarding the case I sat as juror on. Obviously I can't name names (at least, not on here) for public data privacy issues, but the man in question not only abused his stepdaughters and young son, but also had over 50,000 images of child abuse on his computer. Or at least, that's as far as the tech lab got before they got sick of cataloguing them all. The actual figure of videos, pictures and more is much closer to 140,000. I won't go into detail about the video they showed us as an evidential piece, but it was highly, highly disturbing and involved a two year old.

He's been made to sign the register for life and has been given a minimum 13 year prison sentence.

Monday 21 November 2011

Boil in a bag? Kinda...

I came home and promptly fell over two large boxes on my doorstep - two fatass boxes, full of MREs. For those not in the know, those are ready to eat rations as used by the Army - in this specific case, the US army.

They're kinda nifty actually; it's all ready cooked, the packs will survive for YEARS without any special care and they come with their own heating packs as they're designed to be eaten on the go. They're also rammed full of vitamin and mineral supplements.

They're not cheap, but the US ones are much nicer than the British versions - and the pound cake alone totally makes it worthwhile. Mmmmm, almond and poppyseed... His Lordship likes the peanut butter packs, and the jalapeƱo cheese spreads you get with the packets of wheatbread. (Which is actually really nice too.) 

On a related note, I was checking out some US military statistics, and this fact made me laugh - the maority of troops use full auto weaponry, usually for suppression tactics (to make the bad guys keep down whilst your troops scuttle to the next position). Now, for each insurgent killed in Iraq and Afghanistan, two hundred and fifty thousand bullets hit... absolutely nothing.

Yeah. That's nearly three tons of ammunition for one bad guy, each time.

Friday 18 November 2011

Yer money or yer confidential details get handed to spammers!

"Come up with a theme for Children In Need!" They said to me.

Hmm. Pretty tricky - most of my things are already in boxes, and His Lordship's Fancy Bag of Costumes (TM) is right under all of it. So I put my thinkin' cap on. I still have some scurfty clothes I'm using whilst redecorating - what can I do with that...? Yarr, I know! Pirates!

I found an ancient velvet and satin corset that has fallen to bits in the junk room, recommissioned an ancient white polyester shirt, some old bright filmy scarves, fixed my old leather coat and reshaped a battered old leather hat into a tricorn. Raided the charity shops for a bargain waistcoat and found some piratey earrings and some lovely gold eye shadow (that I know I will use again) in Superdrug. And y'know what? That's not bad. Most motley!

Gosh, I'm wonderfully comfortable in this outfit - I may well have to reuse it. Arrr, hand over yer loot. It's going I'm the charity box matey!

Ah. Whoops. I got to work, and realised I wasn't wearing my work jacket. My keys are in my work jacket. So, here we are, all dressed as pirates - breaking into the safe. Hehe... Plunder all the gold! Or, um, not. But on the plus side, Raised £107 on the Rum Raffle for Children in Need today!

Monday 14 November 2011

I'd headbutt the walls but...


I'd end up with more of this paper all over it. Ugh, sticky swatches of horrid, plasticky wallpaper all up my arms, legs, in my hair, on my face - AUGH!

Three rooms are like this - and it is all the same kind of plastic coated "easy clean" paper that is a real b!tch to get off. In fact, this is a beautiful example of the idiocy of the cowboys - rather than measuring before applying, they've  just sort of thrown it at the walls and hoped for the best. There are bits that go on to the ceiling, other strips that don't meet the ceiling, ditto both for skirting boards, sheets that overlap, some with bubbles, wrinkles, rips...  I'm pretty sure they used industrial superglue rather than wallpaper paste.

It is a nightmare to get off the walls (the steamer can't get through the top coating, and scoring doesn't help much) and sets solid when it hits a people; my shirt is crisp with wallpaper glue and plastic coated paper shreds., and these cowboys have double papered edges rather than measured. Including adding thick strips where they cut it short.

Thankfully an online friend (LD, I'm lookin' at you!) recommended using sandpaper to scrub off the top layer of coating - which really helped! He also recommended a good dinner to recover from the trauma. Luckily I did extra as it turns out my friend Rob was in the area, so we fed him gammon and jacket potatoes as he was dropping by. It saves eating canteen food!

Thursday 10 November 2011

Just crossed a ford in a Ford

Flaming hell, thank god for Crabbies - I was saving it for when I needed it, but I need it now. It's been a bit of a day!

To start with, we got stuck in another traffic collision, the third in ten days. There was a car slewed across the reservation, what looks like an old style black Golf. It seems it was trying to overtake, lost control and then ploughed into a car coming in the opposite direction - in fact, it looks like the eejit that nearly cobbled me over a few weeks back. Still, I wouldn't wish it on anyone.

Police shut the road down, told us it would be closed for at least the next two hours, so we followed one of the cars to get us to the town. First in the queue leading a huge line of traffic, we tentatively crawled down a very steep, very muddy incline before winding up in the middle of a small river - the road the coppers chose to go down has a nice big blue sign reading "Track unsuitable for vehicles."

That's reassuring!

Once I got home this evening, I put a bunch of my uniforms in to wash... At which point the washing machine  jammed itself on "spin" for four hours. With tomorrows work uniform in it. AUGH! Thankfully my lovely man bludgeoned it into electronic submission and retrieved my (impressively) still wet clothes.

Quote of the Day: "man make MASHeen wurk Ugh... scratches furrowed brow - ook. Man done good?"  Yes, yes you did.

Sunday 6 November 2011

Sticky's Story

Hurray! My article made it onto today's "Petpet Spotlight Award!"

I went a little out of my comfort zone to write this mini-article, aiming for a tabloid expose style - which seems to have worked beautifully.

We've all seen the Neopian Fresh Foods Shop, and we've all wondered why it looks like a giant burger. Most of us have even bought burgers from there. At what cost, though?

Today, we dig into the hidden past of one of the most famous retail corporations in Neopia Central, to tell you the story of Sticky and reveal the dark secret behind our favourite shop.

Many ages ago, Neopia was a truly different world. Brave adventurers have since conquered vast regions of the continents, but there are still mysterious land masses waiting to be explored -- and places that are on no map, hidden from the eye of the average Neopet.

Many of you are unaware that at least 80% of the developed world's diet originated in the forests -- fruits like Twirly Fruit, Doughnutfruit, ErgyFruit, Cocolatte Fruit, and even burgers. Oh, you didn't know burgers were fruit?

Well, if you were to venture into the deepest, darkest depths of the jungles, way off of any map, you would be haunted by the memory of a smell -- a faint tickle that makes your mouth water, your heart quicken, and your eyes widen.

Your feet would start to increase their pace, running along a path led purely by instinct through the foliage, until your burst into a heavenly scented clearing: tangs of tomato and spice, the gift of warm bread, the sweetness of gently melting cheese and more caress your olefactory senses.

This is the BURGER FOREST, and it hides a shameful secret.

For years, Neopian Fresh Foods has been clearing huge swathes of the forest, to create produce for the shop at an immense profit. The swamps are being tapped right at the spring for the valuable red ketchup that bubbles up from the ground; the fruit from the trees is harvested and the wood used in massive ovens onsite to cook them before being boxed and shipped out. Easy to harvest, the burgers grow on trees in clusters -- ideal for fast, ready-to-eat meals.

That yellow Chia was only too happy to shout: "Now we restock 3 times as much!!!" as the forests burned and grilled.

A hamburger is cheap food that is a enjoyed all over the world. Is it worth losing a rare and wonderful part of our world, though?

I'm glad to inform you, however, that it is not all bad news.

In fact, a gherkin picker was collecting some of the windfall from around an unusually large gherkin bush when one pickle decided not to be picked -- and bit him. The Chia made a baffled grab for the feisty fruit, but then it scurried back to hide amongst the roots. You could say he was in a real sticky pickle...

Further investigation revealed it to not be a moving gherkin, but rather to be a peculiar little reptile, using the pattern of the gherkin as a clever defensive disguise -- after all, few animals like the taste of raw pickles!

Neopian Fresh Foods promptly realised the damage being caused to the little creature's habitat and (thankfully, before it was too late) they have been putting conservation methods into place over the last couple of years. They have since successfully restored 75% of the forest previously used for food manufacture.

Since the forest redevelopment started, a road was cleared through some of the undergrowth, which has encouraged adventurous beasties to occasionally crawl out of the Burger Forest and Tomato Sauce Swamp. Most discovered that the outside world was big and scary, without a pickle tree for a home. Some of the little guys, however, headed for the GIGANTIC burger that they could see far off in the distance.

As soon as the little Pickles were spotted wandering Neopia Central, conservation workers hurried to return the Pickulsaurs to their original homes, though a few got away... and that's how Meglos came to find Sticky -- who revealed the truth.

"I love Sticky, my Pickulsaur!"
"Brrrflp..."

Friday 4 November 2011

Aaaaaand breathe!

Sorry for the delayed updates, it has been a bit manic this week! So far we have been trying to find:

A house to buy, a house to rent, a removal firm that will handle the reptile tanks, quotes for painting and decorating at a reasonable price. I've been amused by "someone" spreading vicious rumours to my friends (unsuccessfully, I might add.) and I have been trying to secure a transfer, resulting sort-of temporarily resigning.

This is due to work's "budget restrictions". I may have a job up North almost immediately, but more likely not until the new budget hits in January - but actually, that suits me quite well. I have some savings set aside to manage a little while unpaid, and it gives me time to sort all the house moving and associated problems, as well as some time to relax. It also gives me an ideal opportunity to have a scout around for a possible new career direction, as I'm fed up of permanently being a cashier - I have many, better talents that aren't being put to good use. Quite frankly, I'm an awful cashier. I'm a good seller though, with years of experience.

Wednesday 2 November 2011

Marvellous Mocha - the fire breathing dragon!

Well, a whole bottle of Tabasco sauce really helps.

This week's been a tough one for the little madam, as I've been pushing her comfort boundaries hard. She still has a finicky thing about having her hands touched, but the reward and treat system has been working wonders, as you can see - she'll do most things for a handful of American Nature Zone Beardie Bites.

She's becoming a brave little dragon, with a very laid-back nature, even to the extent of standing up to Sandy in the food queue. It seems that tinned dragon fly larvae are much too nice to let anyone chase our tough young rescue away from!

That's not to say she doesn't have bad days; I tried to retrieve her from the Tiki Hut the other day and tapped her tail first so as not to scare her too much. Well, she soon told me she didn't like that, hunkering and husking. So I laughed at her until she stopped and blinked at me indignantly.

She was very happy when I did return her to her tank though, as I recarpeted her tank in a good Wimbledon green Astroturf. A bit concerned about stepping on the weird green stuff at first, though has since found it to be very comfortable.

She also discovered that her favourite thing now is to push her food bowl along the slippery "grass", stuff it into her log hide and then sit on her platform sniggering as I try to fish it out - every day without fail.

So I found some cute little tennis balls to keep her occupied, instead of wedging her bowl. It kind of worked. She still likes wedging her dinner in the hut, but she is also enjoying jamming the balls into corners and pushing them around her tank.

I found her last night, wedged between the wall and the leg of her table, happily asleep with the yellow ball... I'd have taken a picture, but I didn't want to disturb her.

For someone with few facial muscles, Mocha sure knows how to smile, because she LOVES bathtime. It's water bowl to the power of 10 - and warm!

I snapped this picture because she was making me laugh, running up and down the bath sampling the water from different locations - here she's annoying Hyphen by drinking the water right next to his tail. There were LOTS of different tasty waters to try; by my hand, by Sandy's feet, next to the bath plug...

She even knows the colour of her towel now too - she's got Kyle's fuchsia pink one and is learning that when her towel appears it's the end of bath time - she can scramble up it and out of the bath to get dried and warm in time for lunch.

All the exercise is working wonders too, and her little muscles are now starting to bulk up as she puts on healthy weight.