Plumbing

Most of my life I have been blessed with what my Dad calls 'brawn' in various shapes and sizes; that is, people - usually men, who come charging to my rescue whenever I'm faced with an unpleasant situation such as heavy bags and steep stairs at train stations, various DIY/house upkeep tasks, and of course car stuff such as oil and water checking. Now, to satisfy all the feminists reading this I know I can do all these things myself, but frankly I prefer not to have to. Unfortunately as most people are aware I currently live in Africa and most of the people I might usually call upon to perform such tasks are either on furlough or live on a different continent. I have previously proved my worth as a flatmate when I managed to fix our gas bottle when it wasn't sending the gas to our stove (although admittedly that was partially on the advice of a 'brawn' and the guy from the shop carried the gas bottle upstairs for us). Today was another opportunity for me to prove my previously hidden gifts for independence as I was fairly fed up with waiting three hours for the kitchen sink to empty of water. So, I rolled up my sleeves (metaphorically of course, real sleeves in this heat would be ridiculous) and took the pipe-thing out, cleaned it and fixed all our problems with just a nailfile and a roll of kitchen roll. And it worked! The water drains and everything, although the nailfile is ruined. I'm feeling very pleased with myself right now. I wonder what I'll amaze myself with next... Maybe I can make shelves or something?

Anniversaries

It has come to my attention that today is something of an anniversary: exactly one year ago today I disembarked from the Doulos and headed home (rather traumatically as anyone who's heard about my airport fiasco will know).
I can't believe it was only a year ago - it feels like another world.
I like lists so here is one of some of the things I miss about the ship:
1. My wonderful friends
2. Being rocked to sleep by the waves
3. The luuurve factory
4. Exploring all the new countries
5. Bookshop - especially after closing when we turned the music up and partied it up shift 2 style
6. Tea parties
7. 'Cat Halford, dial 9, Cat Halford, dial 9' - so much more exciting than regular phone calls
8. Carpet parties - Asian instant noodles with chopsticks, yum!
9. The Panic.
10. "Attention Ship's Company, there is now free ice cream in the coffee bar, please remember to bring your own mug". Mmmmmboy

Leaving on a jet plane...

Look, I'm posting two days in a row. I think we all know that's not going to last...
So, in 25 days I shall be leaving Senegal, on a jet plane, for England! It's nice because I'll be coming back so have no sad 'when will I see you again?' goodbyes or anything like that; just a nice uncomplicated holiday. Well, not entirely uncomplicated as I have lots of people I want to see and very little money with which to do it. Still, I'm extremely excited about it - I started a list, it got extremely long but here are the current top 5 things I'm looking forward to:
1. Ellen's wedding - the official reason for my return
2. Seeing my wonderful friends from near and far (well, everyone's far from me but some are coming further than others and I'm VERY excited)
3. British weather - rain, low humidity, what more could a girl ask for?
4. GREEN. I like Senegal, but I was not born to live in a desert city.
5. No strangers proposing to me on the street for almost four weeks. Heaven.

British food should be up there by rights but that would be a whole new list.

Most romantic song ever...

So, I have to steal the blogging of another - my wonderful ex-roomie posted this and I have to say, I could not agree more. Romance doesn't come any better than this

http://justrachet.blogspot.com/2008/08/all-you-need-to-know-about-me.html

http://justrachet.blogspot.com/2008/08/amendment-to-all-you-need-to-know-about.html

Especially for Liz...

You see, if you complain that I haven't posted for three months then you might just get a posting all to yourself. Which may or may not be a good thing. Although, sorry Liz, you only actually get a subject heading. And you may not like the content of this post...

So, what's new in Cat-land? Well, just that actually - a cat. A kitten to be more precise. She's a cat of many names, christened 'Rosabelle' by the small child that found her (two days before going on furlough, hence the game of pass-the-kitten we've been playing) this was deemed too big a name for such a small creature by the first family that took care of her in her owner's absence who proceeded to call her by the (highly imaginative) name of 'Kitty'. I was next in line to take charge of her well-being - a task some might deem me unsuitable for as I promptly renamed her 'Kebab', which is what I have been threatening to make with her if she gets annoying. However, I am fast coming to the conclusion that kebabbing is too good for the little demon. She's small, grey, stripy and demon-possessed at least 95% of the time. If L.M.Montogomery hadn't got there first (see Rilla of Ingleside) I would be calling her 'Jekyll&Hyde', heavy on the Hyde.

Now, I do not have any pictures of her in the act of attacking - I'm usually far too busy trying to get her off to find my camera but I do have a picture of her looking cute and then the damage she's done to my arm so far.




I used to have a book called '100 ways to kill a cat'. I may still have it but it'd be in England so not a whole lot of use to me. If anyone has any ideas... Or recipes...