Coming to inversions

I have found somewhere with wi-fi and a plug and I am going to attempt to update my blog with PICTURES, hooray, before I have to dash off to buy yet another aubergine before I meet my friend for lunch, you see the glamour of my life. Firstly, however, there is a deeply unfortunate development I'm afraid I have to tell you about.

I have changed jobs, and I now have a job where I am supposed to roll up reasonably on time looking professional and say things like 'and have we factored that in to the project plan'. What actually happens is that I roll up looking just on the relatively acceptable edge of bizarre and fight over the coffee in the machine AND WIN (memo to self, try to cut down). I am not helped, however, by some particularly vocal harrassment I encounter along my route. And I can't avoid it! There's no other way! That's the way I have to go past!

Why hello

This is Bad Stripy Cat. This cat strides out and shouts at me when I pass him. Sometimes he shouts at me when I am 10 metres away and because I am an idiot I shout back. 'Mrrrrrrrrrooooooow! Mrooooooooowwwww!' he shouts, furiously, and I call out, hello kittycat what's going on with you today and then we have a conversation.

Me: What on earth is it, puss cat?

Cat: Mmmmmrrrrrrrooooww! (Furiously)

Me: Are you alright? What's going on?

Cat: Mrow mrow mrow mrow MMMMMRRROOOWWW!

Me, sympathetically: Poor Pusscat! Did they really?

Cat: Mrow!

Me: I've got to go to work now. I'll see you later.

Cat: MMMMMMMMrrrrrrrrrroooooooooowwww.

Me: Don't make me feel guilty. I've got a busy day. I've got to go!

Cat: Mrow. (sulkily)

Sometimes passers by join in. That is how loud this cat is. I mean, I am not easily embarrassed, but the whole situation is just very difficult. Because I am an utter sucker, and it now happens to me so often that cats just stride out and shout at me as I am passing innocently, I perform a brief health check while I am stroking them in case they are unhappy. I have a white pussycat friend on another road who I think is too thin, and once I flagged down his neighbour (no, really, I did) and quizzed her about the cat's medical history so I could judge if I needed to put the cat in my bag and rescue it or not. She was a very middle-class lady with fuschia lipstick. The cat is fine. It is old and has a longstanding medical condition for which it is under the care of a vet. Bad Stripy Cat, however, was fat, warm and sleek. I do not know what he is trying to tell me. I do not know.

Quilt of boringness

This is my quilt I am making. It is the Quilt Of No Brain. It is 6.5 inch squares joined together and I am going to add a pink border and then I am going to wrestle with batting and swear. I have so many quilts and blankets on my bed at the moment that one day I will probably be discovered smothered under them and then who will Bad Stripy Cat have to shout at in the mornings, hey?

And finally I wish to report an utter triumph. This is the move I am working towards on pole at the moment (picture from this book – this is an expensive but helpful book).

Imagine me with gritted teeth shouting 'no it's ok, I think I'm locked on'

Actually, I can do this move, I just do it in a ratty tshirt rather than a bikini and I have a tortured expression and someone has to hold my head so I don't drop on my neck and break it, which would be unideal. However, this is the move I NEED TO BE ABLE TO DO BEFORE I CAN MOVE TO THE ADVANCED CLASS:

I don't even know why this pig is so hard. I think I approach it in a limp-wristed feeble manner

Readers, it has been agonising and I am not there yet. Every week I whimper at the mention of inversions. It has not even been that I am nearly there, I am just so completely wrong that I thought I would have to give up and get another hobby which did not involve chalking my inner thighs. However, last night I nearly managed it – I touched my legs above my head on the pole and I think I have got the right action. So I feel there will be inversions in my future. Inversions! I am going to open the biggest bottle of champagne you have ever seen when I have managed it. I am chuffed with myself. It has taken some perseverance. Again I muse on why I chose such a difficult sport but there we go. Perhaps it chose me?

A cautious hello

I’ve been quiet over here, haven’t I? I won’t do the traditional ‘sorry I’ve been awol’ post because, well, reasons, but I am sorry, because I have missed my blog and I’ve missed all my readers. I even had a glass of Chardonnay the other week and nearly did an update and then I didn’t. Anyway. Here I am, and I don’t know if this means I’m blogging again but I don’t know that it means I’m not so I’ll just chat and we’ll see how we go. Does that sound like a plan? I think it sounds like a plan.

So. Readers, since we last spoke here is what has happened: I have been sucked – schluuuuurp - into the yoga sorority and I have bought a year’s membership at Cam Yoga. I am not going to tell you how much that is because I confessed to my brother earlier and even he was shocked, and Dan is fairly unshockable. So obviously you are desperately curious now and are going to google, and when you have picked yourself back up off the floor and rearranged the cat who you knocked over in the shock of the moment, you are going to comment and say, how could you afford that, and the answer is, I could not but they make this marvellous thing called a 0% interest balance transfer credit card and I am bored of being sensible*. So over it! In my defence, it is cheaper if you do it upfront. It’s no worse than a gym membership, honest guv, and if you average it out over the year it is actually just like the veg box (yes, I did go through quite a complicated mental process of moral justification before, and nightmares after,) and by the end of the year I imagine that not only will I have achieved spiritual enlightenment but I will also be able to do a wheel pose. My resolve did not even quiver when I went to Hot Yoga last week and the teacher manoevred me into a half lotus which I don’t think was a dignified experience for either of us, given that we were both dripping with sweat and I have this mental block where I can never understand if I should be gripping something overhand or underhand.

Hmm. What else has happened?  I hit pay dirt at a recent vintage fair – I’ll show you when I’ve charged the camera and found somewhere convenient with wifi. And I’m in the middle of an evening class on physical theatre. I chose this evening class because it was literally the worst thing I could imagine doing so I thought it would be good for me, and do you know what, I think it has been. I walk a narrow line between thinking, hmm, perhaps this is kind of fun and thinking What Am I Doing Do Not Touch Me This Is A Foretaste Of What They Will Make Me Do In Hell. And I’ve been officially told in pole dancing that I need to have shorter shorts. Here’s my advice: don’t google ‘pole dancing hotpants buy uk’ and expect to get something you fancy wearing. I’m 38! I go to Waitrose! I’ve got limits! I’m going to go back to Sweaty Betty and bleat.

I knit something as well. I made Stitched Together’s (can't link on this computer, but, www.stitchedtogether.co.uk) beautiful shawl. I might take a picture in daylight. I’m planning my next shawl now. I might have the yarn for it (examines lapels thoughtfully). I might need input on the pattern (examines lapels thoughtfully again).

OK, so I blogged. A bientôt? We’ll see!

* Even I think yoga is a bit of a feeble way to rebel. Other people do promiscuity and cocaine, I do the Right To Go And Do A Down Dog Whenever I Feel Like It. What will I do for an encore? Get into debt buying sensible pants? Eat slightly more than five vegetables a day? Walk round John Lewis with a bad attitude?