Ebay and people that dont pay

I got sooooo mad when people win an auction and then just disappear into the ether. It costs money to submit something and you dont always get it back if someone doesnt pay you. Its infuriating. Its worse with people who have hardly any feedback because they can always re-register as someone else and it wont affect them. I deliberatley dont cancel bids from people with no ratings because you have to start somewhere, and I have been caught out 4 times now by people just not paying.
On another note, we went into town and had dinner out yesterday. Barbecue chicken melt sandwich for me and chicken, leek and ham pie for him indoors. Mooched about the shops and bought some cheap horror novels and found a pub with the same name as our local so went in it, and then had to go in some more pubs so they didn't feel left out.
Watched "Seed of Chucky" last night. A bit of an odd film really. Looking forward to "Final Destination 3".
Had breakfast (well, it was 12.30 pm but thats breakfast time for me on a Sunday) in Morrisons of all places. Scranbled eggs on toast. Very nice, although we had to wait a bit. Wiled away the time looking at pictures of Pamela Anderson and Kid Rock getting married. If you havent seen them, dont bother. Its scary. He looks like some bloke in your local that won a few quid on the horses and bought a lot of gold jewellery, and she looks like an air-brushed picture.

Day trip

Yesterday we went to town on a mini pub crawl. Again I emptied Oxfam of cheap horror novels. Then we ate in the Old Orleans Bar and Grill, who give you crayons to scribble on the table cloth with while you wait for your food. I had a cocktail called and Alligator. There was no actual alligator in it. I dont think so anyway.
Its so HOT here at the moment. I don't do hot weather. I dont do warm weather. And I am not so keen on daylight either.
As I type there is a man in my attic mending my faulty header tank ball cock. If its hot down here, it must be volcanic up there.
AND we are off to rehearse with my band in a bit. In a box like room with no air con.

Up with the lark...

Or rather an assortment of sparrows, blackbirds and so on. And I wasn't up with them - I met them from the wrong end. Yes, DC79 had another gig.
Hindley. The place with the stairs. Where we have to take the PA UP the stairs. And back down again. It was a great night as ever.
Except the going home part. Good bits included a chicken burger, free Jack Daniels and congrats for me doing a good sound job. The bad bit was the run around after it was finished. Dropping people off, lifting things, getting a headache and leaving Bolton in daylight. It was 5.30am before we got to bed.
I woke up at 11am (well, a cat stood on me) and I let him indoors sleep in. We took the stupid van back to the hire place , I read an entire Shaun Hutson book,and at tea time we had a bbq in the garden. All home made marinated things and very, very nice. I fell asleep on a blanket on the lawn in the sun and the cats loved us being outside in the garden and rolled about on everything in site.
Absolutely knackered now!

Music

I forgot how much I like the Bad Seeds and Nick Cave. I have remembered today.
"Past the square, past the bridge,past the mills, past the stacks On a gathering storm comes a tall handsome man In a dusty black coat with...."
Any takers?
Its on my new mp3 player . The pink one, natch.

The Chinese Theme

Carrying on from last nights Chinese meal, here is a photo I took in 2004 when we went round Manchester Art Gallery. It was a modern take on traditional Chinese clothing. I liked the colours. Despite the fact I have looked at this photo on countless occaisions, I have only just noticed that there must have been a mirror on the other side of the glass.....

One drink always leads to another

Saturday afternoon. "Lets go into Manchester and mooch round the shops" (that was him indoors). "Ok, but let's get the bus so we can both have a drink" (that was me). That was also mistake number one. Waiting for the bus him indoors casually mentions "Oh, I texted Dee and him and Magda are coming out as well." That was mistake number two. We are now intending to go for one drink with friends who aren't driving either.
We got to town at 2 ish and had a Subway. The foot long chipotle cheese steak thing (which we shared - we didn't have one each). Then we went for a drink. Dee and Magda turn up around 3.30pm.
At 6.30 we decide to go for an all you can eat Chinese buffet. No, this is not "one drink".
I drank Jack Daniels and later on "Old Tom", which I had to have a half of because they refuse to serve it in pints because its so strong. Its like a treacly dark bitter. It was declared "Ok" (Magda), "Not great" (him indoors) and "I am not drinking that" (Dee).
Having popped out for one drink for an hour or so at 1.30pm, its now 9.45pm and I have learnt another Polish swear word (Magda is Polish), and been informed that it is possible to take Viagra and then fall asleep...
We got the bus part of the way home until we realised it was heading off to Oldham and we don't live there. Walked the rest of the way. It was throwing it down and we got soaking. Then we did that thing that you ALWAYS do when you are not 100% clear headed. We turned the telly on and "Trading Places" (the Eddie Murphy film) was on, and we watched it all the way through, even though we knew whole bits of it verbatim. There must be a Karmic law that says if you come in from the pub and there is a film just starting that you have seen billions of times before , you STILL have to watch it, making sure you go "oh that bit where he/she does/says that really funny thing is on in a second" etc etc.
We went BACK to Manchester today, and I cleaned Oxfam out of pulp horror novels and bought a Bill Bailey DVD.
This time we DROVE.

Car Saga

Where I work, the building is being turned into flats. Actually they are called "pods". THey are a little bit smaller than your average caravan. The ground floor is being kept as businesses. If you look here you will see pictures from last year of them knocking things down.
Anyway, we now park in the car park round the back. Everyone, tenants of the flats, owners of the buildings and the businesses. On Monday they were spraying some kind of polymer resin type stuff all over the place. Guess what? It went all over everyone's cars. Now, I have a Citroen Saxo. My boss however has a Jaguar XKR. There are Bentleys and BMWs and Mercs and all sorts in that car park.
The builders admitted liability and I await a paint job because the stuff wont come off. However, as it was all over my windscreen and I couldnt see to drive, they said they would get it off. Which they did. With a RAZOR BLADE. Guess who now needs new windows??
Its the sheer stupidity that gets me. Why on earth did they not say "shift your cars" OR put sheets over the cars?
NOW they are being sued from all sides, forking out for loads of work for everyone's cars and you know what? They are spraying AGAIN on Friday!
Does no one have common sense anymore????
I am SO CROSS.

Tan

As any of those of you who actually KNOW me in real life know, I am as pale as a bottle of milk. I have been using Johnsons Holiday skin lotion for 3 weeks now. And I am paler than when I started. WHY??? I know real sun can't touch me through the spf factor 9999999 for albino babies I use, but you would think a bit of self tan would manage it. Not so. Discuss.

Blogger templates

Please can someone tell me how to get a list of things on the LEFT hand side of the page and not the right? As you can see from the dots, I have been editing this thing, and I can't work out how to put things on the LEFT. I want to keep the stuff on the right AND have stuff on the left as well (because I am greedy :-) ) but it just makes everything go weird when I try.

World Cup distemper

Well we are out.
We had a bbq planned to celebrate after the game but we had it anyway.
Pictorial evidence from the man with the world's biggest glass of beer (and no, I don't know what was going on with his hair here either)
A sad day.

Guess who has discovered how to edit her blog template?

ME. Hello vile pink pink background!

DC79 Thatched House Stockport

Another gig, another drink fest. Took the new camera and took it OFF automatic mode for the first time. It kept asking me questions! How on earth am I supposed to know what to tell it when it asks for cf speed x sm ratio? Back to the manual I think. Brother in law John kindly brought a cd holder in the shape of a guitar for us as well, so thankyou John :-)
Today we went to the pub to watch the match and then had salt and pepper chips from the chinese, which are indeed as lovely as they sound.
Am now a vegetable on the settee and I couldnt move very far if I tried.

Do not click on this

When your cats wake you up and you think "just 2 minutes on the internet".
Speakers required.

Happy Birthday Daddy

He is 32 today. I can't get my head round the idea that he is any older than 32 so he will be 32 forever. At least to me.
Here he is, on his 32nd birthday! Happy birthday xx

Him indoors

I totally and utterly forgot to tell you about his birthday on the 1st. We went to Ulveston to do all things Laurel and Hardy (he has an "obsession" you could say), and we did lovely things like go to the museum and wander round the shops and drink and eat and drink and eat and.....you get the picture.
Here he is.

New camera

And this was the first picture I took..... I had no choice really :-)

I am what I am - sadly :-)

I spend a bit of time reading a lot of "crafting" blogs. Its mostly American ladies with young children who seem to have access to the best charity shops in the world, and who then make gorgeous stuff with the material and things they find there for about 4 cents. They have lovely houses, cook pretty cakes and spend every other day at the beach with a hamper full of home made cheese and wine. They dont get me all annoyed or anything - I just wonder where do they find the time??Ok, some of them don't work, but they do have kids, which surely cancels that out a bit. I realise that if I lived in America, I too would probably be able to afford a big house somewhere nice rather than the elderly, falling apart tatty shoe box I currently live in, but when you see all those bleached wood floors and home made curtains and tended gardens (mine is a jungle of mis-matched plants bought on the spur of the moment and planted wherever there is a bit of room which explains why a rather worrying sycamore tree planted as a seed 6 years ago is now becoming a tree hanging over the rather worried next door neighbours garden), it does make me wonder - HOW do they make it all look so easy and so nice?
I guess my problem is this. I can clean up and paint the kitchen. Or I can go and rehearse with my band/sit in the pub with him indoors/play with the cats in the garden/read a book/write and so on and so on. The "and so on" wins every time. I will be old soon enough, and then I WILL have the time and inclination to live in house beautiful. In the mean time I will drink just enough Aussie red wine to ignore the faded paintwork, listen to enough loud music to ignore the pile of washing that wants putting away and go and play my guitar in a tiny, heat filled room with a load of sweaty blokes just long enough to make the un-made bed not matter.
I am not a sloven - I am a bohemian :-)

This weekend

Went to the pub to watch the England game. Drank way too much in the day and fell asleep on the settee after tea, woke up at 8pm and thought it was 8 AM and got terribly confused for a short while.
This morning did some gardening and discovered that the bit of wormwood cutting that gothboy gave me has turned into a mini bush now! Maybe I will make Absinthe. And maybe not. Harvey likes to nibble the wormwood and then and go and lie under the hedge in a louche way. I wonder if you can get chaise longes for cats? And maybe a cat- sized smoking jacket and a couple of poetry books would suit him...

World Cup fever...

...is upon Faery Towers. Him indoors is in some mad sweepstake at work, is rushing home from work early and trying to arrange everything around the games. He's even got some bunting in his car. I must admit, its quite exciting.
Apparently the Germans cheat :-)

Friday Night, Saturday..erm Night, and Sunday an' all

OOO I HAVE a life!
Friday. Me and him indoors hauled ourselves over to Farnworth to see a mate and we went to see Sinnerboy, a Rory Gallagher tribute band, at the Moses Gate. It was awesome. We got really drunk, had a kebab on the way home (kebab house run by scary bikers and I bet they get NO trouble in there),and I watched 2 16 year olds have the world's stupidist non violent fight ever:
16 year old number one (encased in pastel shirt, chinos and razored hair) - I'm gonna have you!
16 year old number one's girlfriend (encased in white shoes, orange skin and velour pants) - Leave it, He isn't worth it...
16 year old number two (dressed EXACTLY like 16 year old number one) - Yeah, I'm gonna have YOU!
Cue #1 swinging a John Inham style punch at the other, missing, falling over, teenager #2 doing almost EXACTLY the same thing, girlfriend starts crying, and all parties leave in opposite directions. Embarrassed probably.
Saturday. Met two lovely people (hi Crystal and Granville!) for a meal at Nawab near us. For once we walked so we could have a drink. We don't normally have starters but it being a social occaision we joined in and I am glad I did. Paneer tikka. Like chicken tikka but its not chicken its CHEESE. HEAVEN.
Had a few spoons of wine, chatted and off to bed. Not all together obviously :-)
Today - been rehearsing with Born Idle. My proper band. Not that other band. I have also got a new camera courtesy of the boss, so I took a picture of my stuff..... The silver foil is my cheese sandwich wrapper. Not very rock and roll but I like to be prepared.