The old hormones having been a bit 'iffy' over the past couple of weeks. I've been stuck in a revolving door of emotions, happy, sad, angry, ... I don't know how I feel. I've also been very forgetful. On Wednesday I was supposed to pick up my prescription, blood pressure medication, I forgot. On Thursday I was supposed to pick up my prescription, I forgot. Yesterday I was supposed to pick up my prescription, I forgot. It's the weekend my GP surgery is now closed until Monday, I've run out of my blood pressure medication. Not a good start to the weekend. I wrote HUGE notes in my diary and then drove home and forgot to call in on my way.
Yesterday I had a morning meeting in my diary... the same diary I have been looking at all week and noting that I have a meeting on Friday morning. I arrived at work in plenty of time, an hour later I received a rather turse telephone call wanting to know what had held me up. Oops that would be my current appalling memory. My diary was sitting on the desk next to me. After racing off to the meeting I returned to my desk, one of my colleagues asked me how it had gone. My eyes glazed over and I realised that I had sat for over an hour listening but not taking anything in. Ah well I'll just have to wait for the minutes to be sent out.
So if anyone is available to take minutes on my daily doings over the next few days I'll be able to update you with what I've been up to next week or I could just ask for you to be copied into the minutes!!
Did I tell you that I can sing? No... phew, then I don't have to apologise publicly for fibbing. I can't sing, not a note, I am tone deaf. That probably has something to do with the fact that I was classed as being profoundly deaf for four years. After surgery a few years back I am now just classed as being mutton and ignorant by those around me that don't know my history. My hearing is deteriorating again.
So when I was asked to get involved in a project working with the regional opera company I was a little nonplussed to say the least. I protested loudly, (I sometimes forget to adjust my volume control), to the powers that be, 'you want me, but I can't sing, I won't be able to hear the flipping music properly.' Their reply, 'ah but if they can get you to sing then it won't be a problem getting some of our morally challenged bods to sing.' I suppose there was some method in their madness. As you know I am always game for a new adventure and things have been a tad slow at work recently, so I agreed.
Yesterday I set off for the venue with an array of the morally challenged in tow. I did not hold out much hope of engaging them as at least two of them thought they were going to the cinema and one very large chap named Junior told me in no uncertain terms that he was only there as it was this or attending the job centre. So we arrived at the dance studio, yes a dance studio, very elegant, lots of nubile distractions for Junior and his new posse. I smiled bravely at the waiting opera singers who were to attempt to engage my morally challenged crew.
The scene in the studio reminded me somewhat the film Zulu. The three beautiful and elegant performers facing a group of bods with eyes narrowed, jaws set and expressions begging the performers to bring it on. As the studio floor was polished wood, they had been told to remove their shoes, I looked down the row to see an assortment of odd socks, holes, socks that looked as though they would walk out of the room under their own steam and a set of brightly painted toe nails with gems. Very pretty, however the aroma wafting up from the said feet was beginning to fill the vast space. It seemed however that our elegant performers were not in the least phased and their gracious smiles glancing off perfect white teeth remained set in place.
As the day progressed I was astonished to see that my dysfunctional brood who barely a few hours previous had communicated in grunts were now bonding, not only with one another but with the performers. Further more they were beginning to make sounds akin to music and moving in a purposeful and coordinated fashion. There was a definite buz in the studio and no it wasn't the feet.
At the end of the day we were performing, yes performing a mini opera. Then Junior opened his mouth and threw his arms out wide and sang solo, with an incredibly rich baritone voice that made the hairs on my neck stand. A huge grin on his face replacing the previous sullen challenge. The performers had broken into his world and he into theirs and it was then that I realised just how much these three beautiful people had achieved. They understood the facade, they are actors who sing, they simply broke down that facade in a new way.
After the performance we all sat together and it was clear that the people I had taken there in the morning were no longer in the room, they had been replaced by a confident outgoing group of people who were now communicating in sentences, making eye contact and smiling, there was lots of smiling. They had been accepted, holey socks, sweaty feet and all, by a group of people who to them were elite and a world apart. They will all be carrying on with the project over the coming months with the intention of gaining work placements with the Opera. this is however only if they stay out of trouble and behave themselves, a huge incentive as they will not want to loose what they have tasted and savoured. As for me, I gave them a few laughs as I attempted to sing, but my days of singing opera are now at an end and it is back to my usual day job.
There are some, perhaps some amongst you, who do not like this form of intervention. I fully understand that and I don't have all of the answers. I suppose being the Saint of lost causes, I like to at least try and think that people can change otherwise I am simply reduced to being a jailer!
As I float around the ether that is blogland, visiting interesting places and people, (that would be you sweetie), I realise that I have given very little of myself. Well what I mean to say is that I feel that I know far more about you than you know about me. It seems a little one sided really don't you think. (Obviously, you know some parts of me rather more intimately after my birthday post.) Anyways I was thinking... I do that on occasions, it is the start of the new decade and well maybe you would like to get to know me a little better. I could be completely wrong and you don't give a rat's bottom who I am or what I get up to when I am not here.
So being the adventurous sort I am going to give you the opportunity to ask me any question you like and I will endeavour to answer it truthfully. There are, I hope for obvious reasons, a couple of rules. 1. No questions about my profession, I can't tell you what I do otherwise I will be evicted forthwith from blogland. Not kidding. Besides I believe I have given sufficient clues, information to give you some idea already. 2. Please don't ask me my real name or where I live exactly. Yes some of you know, I know I can trust you as my friends. 3. Urm, actually I don't think there is a three...
Oh giddy aunt I am probably going to live to regret this.
mapstew said... Well we know you have at least one piercing, but do you have any tattoos?
A) Ok I have to answer honestly. (Take a deep breath St Jude, and remember The Captain reads your blog). Yes, I have a rosebud tattoed on the inside of my left hip it was hidden in my birthday photo.
Sorry Captain, did I mention the tattoo as well???
Jimmy Bastard said... Did I leave my watch on your night stand?
A) Oh that would have been, perhaps, a dream my dear Jimmy. (Don't worry the package is in the post as we speak.)
I understand the working one as you know, so how about 'if you could be anything you wanted, what would you do for a living?'
A) Hmm a difficult one... In my final year at school I had to complete my careers guidance form, it asked what I would like to do for a career. Being the sort of girl I am I wrote, 'be a lady of leisure or marry a millionaire. Actually it would be one of my great loves, a marine biologist. You can't beat digging about in a bit of fucus vesiculosus or laminaria sacharina. Kevin Musgrove said... Have you ever been startled by a tortoise?
A) Well sweetie it's funny you should ask that. The answer to that is yes! In one of my previous incarnations I worked at a wildlife hospital where they had a posse of tortoises who roamed around the grounds and slept in the potting shed. One spring morning I was rudely assaulted by Bertie the only male tortoise when he became aroused by my wellies passing by. (Tortoises are not renowned for their good eyesight.) A male tortoises idea of foreplay is slamming into the object of his desire. They are somewhat noisy lovers and being humped by a randy tortoise is a painful experience.
@eloh said... Have you ever been touched by a monkey?
A) Well I was terribly touched when a monkey offered to carry my handbag for me whilst I was visiting Gibralter. It was something of a tousle to make it give the bag back though.
A) Yes! When his Lordship and I were considerably younger we were once 'caught' in a rather embarassing embrace by the local bobby in the back seat of the Fat Controllers' (his Lordship's father),car, he wasn't with us by the way.
Lee said... So, all this confession... do you feel better for it? Just curious.
A) Hmm, they do say that confession is good for the soul and as a Saint I have to maintian mine on a regular basis.
Pat said... Is there anything you haven't yet done that you would like to do?
A) So many things, but perhaps top of the list is a journey to the Antarctic, or perhaps base camp at Everest, sadly I am not permitted to attempt the summit due to high blood pressure. I would also like to see my book published at some point in the future.
white rabbit said... Do you think I could plait my nostril hair? If the answer is 'yes' is thios advisable?
A) Whilst on a trip to the Bahamas once I met a lovely old lady in Nassau who used to sit each day outside the straw market. She made her living braiding hair. I saw much of her handy work as we returned to the airport to board our flight home. She was very persuasive and there were several gentlemen sporting braided beards, moustaches, leg hair and yes nasal hair, there were also a couple of bald chaps who walked with a slight gait that suggested she was indeed a tenacious lady. Therefore the answer is yes you can plait your nostril hair, however in the current weather and the tendency for drippy noses, I would advise against it, unless of course you consider nasal candals fetching dear.
Charlie said... In all the time I've known you, I've pictured you thusly: a saintly Englishwoman who is a bit eccentric, a bit dotty, a bit frumpy, a woman who always wears a print housedress and support hose when her ankles swell up--in short, a much younger version of Mrs Beeton, or perhaps Mrs Beeton in training.
With your last few posts, you've wiped that picture completely off my mental hard disk. In short, I'm shocked. I was up almost half the day yesterday, about fifteen minutes last night, and I cannot think of ONE question to ask you.
I don't think I want to know any more.
A) My dear Charlie I am many things to many different people, my last posts are only one facet. Knowing you as I do I do not believe for one minute that the picture you paint was truly how you saw me. I am still and always will be your Saintly friend... should I say live long and prosper at this point? By the way the Sonoran desert is a wonderful place, I once took a trip with an ex vietnam war helicopter pilot through the Red Rock canyon. ;0}
tNb said... Tell us about your favourite pair of shoes? (you can tell so much about a person by their shoes)
A) Well hun here goes, I actually have a shoe closet. Lined with shelves with all of my lovely pretty shoes in their boxes. I have never counted how many pairs of shoes I have but suffice to say the closet is full and the boxes are stacked on top of one another. Oh dear, can I only choose one pair? This is very difficult as I love them all, for different reasons, for instance there are the beautiful cream silk hand embroidered shoes with the dainty stilletoe heels, that I wore on my wedding day. Then there are the black killer heels that feel like feathers on my toes, they cost me more than I care to admit, they are my jimmy choos, and the first time I wore them was to a charity bash in London, George Clooney and Brad Pitt were there, (it was at the time of Oceans 11), it must have been love, I spent the night ogling my wonderful choos. But if I am truly honest my favourite footware has to be my slippers, they are fluffy mules that slip slop as I walk so that his Lordship always hears me approaching, but when I put them on it means that I am home and it is time to relax at the end of the day.
Stinkypaw said... Why do you keep cards you received?
A) Because I like to be reminded that there are nice people out there who have taken the effort to send them.
Addendum; 15th January. I promised to be honest, all of the above answers are true.
I try to see the best in everyone, even when it is well hidden. I love shopping, no not supermarket type stuff, EXTREME SHOPPING!! But don't think I'm an out and out girly, I've explored the Arctic,tracked Polar Bears, swum with sharks, worked in a city at the height of terrorist attacks, and I once nearly got squished by a 15ft python.. but that's another story.
