Frizz

Almost finished my Xmas shopping – finger aches from holding too many bags.

Strange but true, getting into the holiday spirit, met two people who had both taken knifes to their fingers recently.

The shops all seemed to be short staffed, the worst one being Jessops...very boring.

There are various people I'm having trouble getting presents for – you know who you are! So if the finger's not too bad, will venture out again tomorrow – usually Xmas Eve is a great day to go shopping, most people aren’t mad enough to leave their buying that late, everyone is excited about the next day – all in all very jolly. Also, I think I might have finally decided on a digital camera I like – at least I got excited in the shop.

Just started reading Scarlett Thomas's PopCo.

Hey Mike thanks for the comment!

Saw The Producers last night, Simon, who is busy decorating the Christmas tree says fabulous. I say marvellous or Simon says that's what I could say. It was great fun, a wonderful cast and production, kinda magical, very funny, only we both say it went on a bit too long. It wasn't full, so we managed to move from the back to the middle of the stalls and spread ourselves out over one row… my mum and T were there to – it was a present from David – thank you.

Talking about fascism have just finished The Plot Against America- the best book I've read in a while – read it now.

Interesting Tuesday evening, ended up using our biggest and sharpest knife to try and cut a piece of cheese, missed the cheese and went straight for my finger. Made my mum take me to A & E...her not being very pleased at having to give up watching Holby City for the real thing. Very luckily I'd cut it in such a way that I couldn't have stitches, so the Sister on duty kindly sorted me out and saved me from the two-hour plus waiting time. I can only say that it was very horrible, involved lots of blood, and the worst thing being the thought of how deep it is….yuk! I sure ain't no doctor…

I watched The Corporation on More4 – try and catch it when it's on again. It's not an easy watch, but worth staying with it, some of the information is both thought provoking and shocking and when ignorance is really no excuse, surely every bit of information on this issue, that takes us out of our comfort zone, ought to be given the time of day.

For more information check out the website: thecorporation.com

Have been stuck at home in bed – and the weekend before Christmas… poo… spent yesterday writing cards and watching DVD's. Finally saw Love Actually, which was ok and the right time of year to watch it, not sooo slushy. Have been buying xmas presents online, which doesn't seem quite right, far too easy and none of that Christmas good will you get walking around the shops at this time of year.

Had a lovely day with a kids free Anna. As we are both freelancers, we had our xmas lunch together – great idea. Had a lovely Thai in Wimbledon village. They have a new Ottakar's bookshop, so I bought John his first Dr. Seuss book…will be fun to read it to him.

Tonight, see if you can see the moon, it's going to look very big and very bright as it will be at its heighest point and it's not going to happen again until 2023.

As predicted, I failed to resist the gluten and have managed to get down a fair amount of cake – mostly my own. The lunch at the library was very pleasant and the vanillekipferl disappeared very quickly.

Writing about the braces yesterday spurred me on and I finally managed to book an appointment – at the moment it's for early February, but there's a chance of a cancellation before. Now I need to go to the dentist…

Flightplan - better than expected - and I love Orange wednesdays...what a wonderful idea.

For the last, I don't know how long, I've been umming and arring about getting braces on my teeth. It's a really horrible prospect, but my top teeth are bashing away at my bottom teeth – I've managed to chip them twice already. I've just realized though, that as this is the absolute worst time of year, if you aren’t supposed to eat gluten, I should have bitten the bullet and got them for Christmas, so I couldn't eat anything, even if I am tempted – which judging from yesterday and I'm sure later today I am.

Ok, so talk about ignorance…. who knew the Narnia books were about Christianity (trust my school) – which I've been reading in the papers all weekend. Well, whatever it was about the second half was boring… and we weren't smiling at the end because we thought it was sweet, but because we thought it was silly – which was a shame.

John's party was lovely, only I missed the magician – and John told me off – and I had to apologize to him, I really didn't think he would notice. I tried to explain to him that by coming late I could stay late, which I did, but that argument apparently doesn't hold weight with four year olds, which I guess is fair enough. He did give me the most lovely smile when he saw me.

I've spent the evening making vanillekipferl and Mrs Fuch's cake with my mother (we were going to do a Marble Kuchen but decided that it was too complicated and too late) - I haven't done any baking for a long time, and it was fun. The Library has it's Xmas lunch tomorrow, so what I've managed not to eat, I'll try and remember to take with me :) ... help all that gluten...Anna thanks for all the biscuits and bread on Saturday...get out the tape measure, my tummy has grown.

I've changed from English style knitting to Continental style – going back to my roots… Camilla taught me in the summer, but I could only get my head around stitching and not purling, so I've now managed to learn both thanks to the wonderful Stitch and Bitch Handbook (see the sidebar link). I've changed because C and M were knitting about four times as fast as me and it does seem easier and quicker once you get the hang of it. Although at the moment I'm still having trouble holding the yarn…any advice?

John's birthday tomorrow – I'm looking forward to the gluten free goodies that Anna has promised and seeing The Chronicles of Narnia in the evening… I still remember lying on my blanket in the hall at primary school listening to this woman who would come in and read us the Narnia series.

We won – we went to the council meeting this evening and all eleven councillors voted against the application our neighbours had put in. It was simply amazing. I wanted to go and shake the hand of every single one of them.

the Henri Rousseau exhibition at Tate Modern, wonderfully curated it includes a room where you can watch old films of Paris, see photographs and pictures from the world exhibition for which the Eiffel Tower was built, really informative it puts his work into the context of the time. Amazingly, he was completely self taught, even though he painted jungle scenes he never travelled outside of France, instead he got his inspiration from the stuffed animals at the Natural History Museum and the exotic plants at the Botanical Gardens. So, very much the Victorian and bearing that in mind, he would never have seen the animals he painted in motion, experienced their gracefulness and perhaps that explains their two dimensional quality in his paintings. Go see… it's on until the 5th Feb. Thank you Amos for telling me about it.

Am writing this on the train on the way to the Tate. Am using the browser on my phone, it's kinda slow, but i'm amazed it's working. The train is going at about two miles per hour...don't like to boast but i'm texting faster...

At last I made it to Mekella's group, which got me knitting again…. another scarf. I haven't got very far as I've had to unpick it twice already to get what I wanted – pattern and width, but all set now. Met Scarlet (what a great name), who's just finished her yoga teacher training with a teacher she was raving about and one person who makes yoga mats which sell for £50 +. Both Scarlet and I looked on bemused – who pays that for a bit of carpet underlay? You'd be too scared to sweat!

My mother dragged Simon and I along to one of the local golf clubs – not the "Jewish" one Irene… for drinks with the local friendly estate agent. We sat ourselves down at a table and realised we'd placed ourselves right by the kitchen door – so we got first pick of all the food. We spent most of the night with an acquaintance of my mothers who of course? ended up being Second Generation…she was there with her daughter…who is an alternative therapist I saw for a treatment a few years back… she has lost an amazing amount of weight and I feel terrible because my only comment was "oh my god", before I realised what I was saying… from her reaction I'm sure she'd had it before. I feel bad.

I think I might end up having a nervous breakdown over the land issue we have going on… it's not an inheritance you'd wish on your worst enemy – or something like that.