Discontinued... ??

Don't you just hate it when something you have used for years gets discontinued... I think to myself, how can they possible do that, I use it all the time!! Then again, because its being discontinued its very possible I am the 'only' person using it!!

I just discovered that the cuticle and nail oil that I have been pretty much using since the year dot has been discontinued! I was shocked! I love it because its got the smell, texture and feel of the ones used in salons and so when I do my nails myself it makes me feel like they've been done professionally.

So now I have to find a nice new replacement... all suggestions welcome!

Bon Appetite!

When my darling James is in a theatrical run I like to surprise him with some of his favorite meals for dinner, when I can, as he really comes straight home from work and straight to the theatre. [He is currently playing Shawn Keogh in Playboy of the Western World, in the Millbank Theatre] Today I decided I would make my own personal lasagna, which he loves.

I had every intention of taking loads of pics for you all to see, but alas it was not to be and you are only getting some before and afters of my masterpiece ( I promise to work on this!).

When I make lasagna, its almost a meal in itself. As well as mince I love to add a veg layer too and today I used cherry tomatoes, mushrooms, spring onions, cauliflower, carrots, sugar snap peas and courgettes! Of course I make my own bechamel sauce too, well in this case two, as I burnt the first! The aromas as I type are intoxicating! I've always been a real 'in the moment' cook and whatever I feel like I stick in. So my lasagna is also seasoned with chilli, garlic, cinnamon, black peppercorns, coriander, rosemary and bay leaves! Yummy!!

Tonight I'll serve it with some backed potaotes, a lovely green salad and a bottle of Red! All this talk of food and the aromas have made me very hungry indeed, off to make myself a lovely tuna salad wrap and some air popped popcorn for lunch - Bon Appetite bloggers!

Getting to know you a little better...

During the course of my surfing I read many blogs, some I follow, others I don't. Today on one of my favorite blogs, aptly called My Favorite Things we're all invited to share a little about ourselves and answer 4 simple questions. I've decided opposed to answering in the comment section of the post that I would do the same here and ask you all to share a little more with me too!

1. Name an author you love.

Well I love to read and go through many 'author's of the moment' but 2 I suppose that always stay with me are Marian Keyes and Liz Ryan.

2. Books you love.

I love all kinds of books, amongst my favorite are; Bloodlines, By Liz Ryan, Little Women, By Louisa May Alcott and PS I Love You by Cecilia Ahern.

3. Something that always excites you.

I get excited about getting letters and cards in the post. [No not bills or silly circulars] Proper cards, with news and stories from friends and family. I get uber excited if they are in coloured envelopes!

4. Something you hate.

Dust bunnies, can't stand them! They always seem to hide under the couch and Tilly's day bed.

Want to participate? Leave a comment so I can hop on over to your space. I'd love to know a bit about you too!

Letter to the Universe

So I've mentioned before that I am a would be writer! When I say that, what I mean is, that I would really like to be a writer. There seems to be many schools of thought on what exactly makes you a writer and, it would appear, that having published work doesn't necessarily guarantee you the title! So perhaps I should clarify even more;

Universe what I would really like is to have a writing career that will span a life time. A career that is both lucrative and successful. That my many readers, who are spread across the world, will eagerly anticipate my latest work and that it will bring them joy and happiness. I would like for my novels and books to transcend the ages and be enjoyed for years to come.

I want for my writing career to open me up to new experiences, for it to be rewarding and to allow me to live a very comfortable, exciting and rewarding lifestyle. I would like for some of my books to be turned into movies and TV series. That not only will my work bring people joy, but jobs, that it will allow them to realise their own dreams and goals.

Universe please send to the gifts, talent, luck and resources that I need to reach, achieve and exceed this dream and goal of mine.

Will I look good naked?

In my life I've been prone to doing many mad and odd things and while I am willingly taking part in this latest venture (if they'll have me) I can't take credit for the idea. About a week ago my bbffff called and said;

'Blá can you talk?' [this should have been my first indication that what was to follow wasn't going to be good]

As it transpired my darling bbffff had decided that we, YES WE, were applying to Channel 4's 'How to look good naked' and had just downloaded the application forms. She informed me that I had no choice in the matter. Now, having never actually seen the program the title alone put me off, as I expected that it would involve, showing to the world, 'what the stork saw'... not a pretty sight in my mind! Needless to say she talked me into it with the lure of copious amounts of vino and nibbles while we fill in the sizable application form!

Today I got around to watching an episode online and while I don't relish in the fact of potentially getting my kit off in front of total strangers I think the experience will be very positive! Thats not to say that if I am actually successful and get on the show, that I won't be ABSOLUTELY terrified of showing my bits to the public, or even a small room of trained professionals!

So tomorrow is the night when my bbfff and I, will strip down to our undies, take the required pictures (hopefully while blind drunk) and complete the mammoth application form in the hope that some big wig TV boss will think that 'our booty' will make good TV!! Wish me luck!

Dirt, dirt, go away and don't come back another day!

We previously established that I am not great at the auld house wife skills, although I must admit over the past few days I've been putting in a HUGE effort. Yesterday I even attempted some baking and while my scones did turn out more like biscuits, today's attempt was a vast improvement! Perhaps there is some credit, after all to the old adage 'Practice makes perfect'?

However I digress, we're having some visitors tomorrow, in the form of 3 of James' Aunts. Sometimes I feel like the family, (his family) has an AGM and collectively decides, ok who's turn is it to take one for the team and head to Dublin and makes sure 'that wan' is feeding our James and that the house looks right?? Anyone else feel like that? Well anyways, regardless, 3 of the Aunts are coming to stay, not only am I in a quandary and a pickle as to where they are all going to sleep, I'm also EXHAUSTED from the deep and thorough cleaning frenzy I've been on. I know I make it sound like we live in a pig sty - WE DON'T... but you know what West of Ireland mammy's are like - they'll look in presses, run fingers along fireplaces and check the fridge for adequate levels of rashers and bacon and cabbages. So because of all this I am stressed!

Stressed and astounded at the amount of dirt there is if you go looking for it!! Needless to say that the house is clean most of the time, but there are those behind the chair and under the lamp areas that perhaps I'll admit to 'sweeping' past on a regular basis. So today I've spent the day trying to clean (when I have a million and one other things I could be doing) and even after the day I've had... well this picture puts it better than I ever could;


Possibly unequivocal proof that I am indeed a desperate housewife (see earlier blog post I am a desperate housewife! ) But regardless I clean, clearly I'm not a perky, or as well dressed a cleaner as the pictures above would suggest, but all this is giving me new appreciation for my Mother. My mother is the picture of domesticity. Even her 'mess drawer' is clean and ordered! Today has made me realise, the tireless and thankless hours she put in year after year while we were growing up and to end I just wanted to say, Thank you Mum.

Tea Cup Tea-light Love?

Am still exhausted from working all weekend but I had to share with you all the cutest present my darling husband had waiting for me when I got home.

I came home, exhausted and with aching feet and James produced a small paper bag... I was like a child on Christmas morning! Inside, delightfully wrapped in pink tissue paper, was the cutest little tea cup tea-light from The Dolly Tub , I can tell you my little face lit up when I saw it! It was the sweetest and cutest little gesture he has EVER done... thank you darling!I may have mentioned briefly before that I now BIG into my tea cups in a BIG way - its the only way I will drink tea and I'll use any excuse to take Granny's tea set out of Granny's China Cabinet (yes I was lucky enough to inherit both!)

I popped onto The Dolly Tub website this afternoon, while sipping my tea, and just fell in love with the other products in her range. Suzanne, the owner, has made me have romantic notions about moving to rural Galway and living in a pink cottage and making tea cup tea-lights too!! You never know... it could very well be 'what blá does next'!

The shower situation has reached defcon 5

For those of you living in Ireland, or following the local 'national emergency' you will be familiar with the situation our recent inclement weather has left us with. I speak specifically of Dublin, as I have not experienced first hand what might be going on down the country.

Firstly a small amount of snow and ice managed to practically ground a post celtic tiger nation to a halt. On Sunday we all eagerly (and with some trepidation) anticipated the arrival of a snow blizzard that was to be 'the last coming' only for rain to arrive and wash our meagre, but deadly, snow and ice away. And now, now what do you ask is the catastrophe facing the Irish people? (well maybe not the entire population, but definitely me) NO RUNNING WATER!

It appears, that not only did the snow and ice grind the city to a halt and many of us to our bums, it has also unleashed its own personal kind of havoc on our water system. Leaving a once great and abundantly flowing city cracked and dry. Thankfully the various County Councils have gotten their asses in gear and are all actively repairing and providing water when and where they can, so we are not going without. But the lack of piped, running water has brought with it some interesting personal challenges;

1. My washing machine is stuck mid cycle and wont stop or start because there is no water to complete the cycle - not a major worry but I am sure it is having some untold effect on society that will show itself once I get water flowing through the pipes again. This I fear!

2. I have an inner personal dilemma; can I put the dishwasher on? Sure I've checked out the Fingal Co Co website and they advise to conserve water at all costs (and BELIEVE ME I have, you'll read in a moment some of the extremes I've been forced to) and to only use dishwashers that are totally full -well mine is... but I feel like there should be a number or something I should be ringing in order to get permission.

Why are you being so prissy about this I hear you ask... lets progress onto reason 3 and 4 and it will become clearer.

3. With no water, my toilets don't flush. TMI I hear you scream. Oh believe, that isn't the half of it. Now I Googled it, and you can make toilets flush manually, but you need to water to do that - water I don't have, well not abundantly anyways. So I think to myself, if I rather grossly don't flush the toilet all the time, surely it wont use too much water to flush? 6 bloody litres is what it takes to flush a toilet! A HELL of alot of water, especially when you don't have much.

4. The shower situation. After 3 days of baby wipes and flannelet rub downs you need a shower. Well there is that and the fact you have to wash your hair - OR ELSE. So today I think to myself, we've not used any water upstairs in quite sometime, surely the tank has refilled just a little and I could, at the very least get my hair washed.

I also think to myself if I wash my hair into a big blue barrel I will have a supply of water to flush the toilet with. [This will make a conservationist out of me yet!]

So I get set up. All is going well, hair is wet, shampoo is on, I decide to chance a bit of face wash at the same time. All still going well, I reach for the shower head, turn the dial - NOTHING. No water. NADA. You could probably hear my 'CRAP' in the next town.

I start thinking what the fook am I going to do? So I decide that if I boil some water and mix with some cold down stairs and use a jug to pour over me into the barrel it will have the same effect. Only problem? I'm running out of containers. So I have to mix in the sink. So four trips up and down the stairs gives me enough water to rinse. AND the lovely back and forward motion I have to use between the sink and my barrel (which is too heavy for me to move) with my dripping hair means that my floors are soaking too. Now normally I would HATE this, wet floors drive me crazy (YES JAMES THAT IS AIMED AT YOU) but I think to myself - this is an opportunity, so once the hair is rinsed I get out the mop and clean the floor too! I know, I know, I should be put up for a Greeny Award or something.

So hair rinsed and floor mopped I'm not brave enough to chance the conditioner and I still really need to shower, cause if I don't shave my legs soon we could have another ecological disaster on our hands. So this evening I am high tailing it over to my parents house for a proper shower! Ironically my parents are currently in India working with disadvantages children! Come back I say, your own are disadvantages at the moment!

Just because I have a phone doesn't mean I have to talk to you!

Until very recently I had 5 phone numbers. WTF??!! you are probably thinking!

Let me explain;

1 Main Line Company Number
1 Direct Dial Number
1 Company Mobile
1 Home Phone Line
1 Personal Mobile

Doesn't sound so bad when you list it out like that, does it? In fact its a relatively easy accomplishment for anyone. Throw in skpye, a pager and a few PDAs and I could be easily over passed.

Thankfully I now have just 1 number.

Bit of a cut back you might be thinking. Well the closure of my company clearly did away with 3 of the numbers but long before that I can started to cut back. Why, I hear you ask?

Do you have friends or family who if they don't get you on one number, try you on the next and the next leaving you those annoying, ' Oh you must be out/busy/ in a meeting I'll try you on [ insert other phone option not previously tried here]? You don't? Well I do! Some members of my close personal circle, who would happen to have access to all these numbers, would even go so far as to start calling my husband or other friends they might think I am with if they don't get through to me.

Now you will be forgiven for thinking, that to execute such a phone tree in order to speak to me, that there must be some sort of huge emergency or horrendously important message or question that needs answering, for the most part there isn't. Normally its a ' are you coming for dinner on Sunday?' ' or 'can you check you received the test email I just sent to you cause you haven't replied yet' or some other inane task/ topic that could easily be dealt with when I call back in the next 10 or so minutes. [Patience is not a virtue many of my inner circle possess! - Clearly!]

I suppose I am diverging a little and I really should be targeting my rant at those of the 'older' generation (sorry guys, but its true!). I imagine having grown up reliant on a once a week postman, smoke signals or homing pigeons, the invention of the landline and then the mobile phone has greatly increased the quality of their lives but seriously guys; JUST BECAUSE I HAVE A PHONE DOESN'T MEAN I WILL or WANT TO ALWAYS ANSWER IT - IT'S NOT THE LAW!!

Funnily an EXTREME incident of 'not answering your phone' occurred last week. [Thankfully not to me] The exchange, or at least partial exchange, took place between 2 people who are very close to me and both are of the 'older' generation. In the interest of safety lets call them Bill and Ted.

Bill sends Ted a text message. [Ted is on his holidays]

Ted receives the message, but does not reply to Bill immediately. Ted does however forwarded on the news to others, including me.

2 Days pass and Bill rings me. Ironically I don't answer, he leaves a message and I call back 30 minutes later.

'Blá thank god you called!'

'Is everything ok Bill?'

'No! I think Ted's phone has been stolen.'

'You do? What makes you say that?'

'Well I text him 2 days ago and he hasn't responded!'

'I don't think so, I had a text from him yesterday. Besides he would call/ email/ make contact if it had.'

'Oh right, you are probably right.'

So Bill and I finish up our conversation and I think nothing else of it. The following day Ted happens to phone me, we chat for awhile and I relay the 'Bill drama' to him. I think no more of it. Today I log into my email, an account I am not in everyday and I have an email from Bill.

'Blá Ted's phone has definitely been stolen. It's now almost 5 days and I haven't heard from him'

So I am sitting there thinking... someone clearly has high opinions of themselves, because the only reason they wouldn't get a reply is because the phone was stolen and not the fact THEY ARE ON HOLIDAYS!

Of course don't worry I told poor Bill that Ted was fine, that I had spoken to him and his phone was fine! But really does everyone think/ believe just cause we all have mobiles that you are guaranteed/ have the right to speak to us?

In my world... You Don't!

Rant over!

I'm a desperate housewife

I'm a desperate housewife - no really I am. Domesticity was never a strong point of mine. I like things clean and tidy and yes I do have come OCD tendencies, especially when it comes to my hot press but for the most part the extent of my home economic skills are very cosmetic and really don't run that deep.

I'm not that type that remembers or even knows how to defrost a fridge or clean an oven (even though mine is supposedly self cleaning - what exactly does that mean anyways??), I know how to use 2 settings on the washer and 3 on the dryer. I youtubed 'how to fold a fitted sheet' and my dishwasher HATES me.

Knowing all this it surprised me and the 2 darling men (my hubby and little brother) that I live with when I announced that after closing up my company I would like to try and be a housewife for awhile. Needless to say they both sniggered, but agreed -I suppose to see how long I would last. I lasted about a day, the stretch of endless housework with no other distractions was too much for me and so I decided to write a second book as well. So technically after 24 hours I wasn't just a housewife but I was also a writer.

My book however is now finished and awaiting to be snapped up by a huge publisher for millions and so with plans to begin book 3 in February I am taking a short break from writing and am back at the full time housewife thing again. This time I know I can focus, I've been researching 'fun and rewarding' projects I can do! YAY ME!! #sigh# But hey I figure these things need to be done, and as the recession took away my cleaner (come on you all knew I had one) they are left to me as the housewife to do them.

So yesterday I made a list of the first ones; I was going to clean out Granny's China Cabinet and clean the china. I was going to clean out my two glass cabinets and all the glasses (I noticed yesterday while filling the whiskey decanter that it had become rather dusty in there.) and had 3 loads of washing and I was going to give Tilly, my darling furbaby, a big bath. After which I was going to take a long hot bath while a delicious dinner cooked and I would be gorgeous and presentable when James got home. The perfect picture of domesticity.

BUT THEN, I got up, went to the bathroom to wash my face and a small trickle emerges from the tap. I scratch my head and think, hmmm that is funny. I walk about the house testing other bathrooms and find a similar situation. I think back and yes I do remember in my sleepy sombre hearing James have a shower this morning and I look to the floor for the evidence of a damp towel and sure enough its there soggying up the carpet. I walk downstairs and turn on the kitchen tap - it has a steady stream and I get confused. Perhaps something is only wrong upstairs. I look in the utility room and see the washing machine has stopped mid cycle and begin to realise this is a little more serious. So I get on twitter to see what the craic is. It seems I am not alone, from my twitter and texting research I can see that Fingal Co Co are 'throttling' the water supply (don't you just love that term?) and I wait patiently for an update as to where my local tanker will be.

So I bet you are all wondering as to where I am going with this entry, well I'll spell it out for you, for those who haven't had it all click into place. You see if you will remember in my aforementioned paragraphs I had mentioned that it was my housewifely intention to do ALOT of cleaning/ washing/ bathing today - and what does one need to do all this? WATER!! So it would seem that while I am definitely a desperate housewife, on this occasion it actually isn't my fault! YAY ME!!

Is a once great passion and talent lost?

I began my musical career at 5. My doting parents decided that if I was old enough to start school I was old enough for music lessons and so at 5 I began to learn both the Harp and Recorder. Inherited from my father, an accomplished musician, I had a some talent and so I took to both instruments with ease. I detested music exams so after only sitting two (both passed with distinctions) I refused all others.

I was a Harper for 5 years until I was 10. Harp teachers where as rare as hen's teeth and I was quickly out growing my ballad harp and would soon leave school, whose traditional harp I had I permanent loan and would have to give it back, so my career as an Irish Harper soon came to an end. I still have my very first harp, a small ballad harp, not 3.5 foot tall. I hope some day my own kids will learn to play on it.

From the recorder I quickly progressed onto the flute. This I played for Royalty, Political Dignitaries and in Classical Concerts for almost 10 years, all throughout my youth. As my exams beckoned, at 17 I lay down my flute and packed the navy blue leather case into a press. The flute traveled the world with me but never saw the light of day again.

Over Christmas my father asked if I still even had the flute and it got me to thinking as to where it was. Today I went in search of it and found it buried at the back of the wardrobe underneath boxes and behind old video camera cases. I took it down and gingerly opened the case. It twinkled back at me in perfect condition and my fingers tingled as I picked it up. I was surprised when I was still about to make in play, but clearly my talent is somewhat rusty, which makes me sad. Once I could really make music but now my fingers stumble over notes and my breath doesn't quite stretch to pitch.

I wonder, 10 years later, can I get back to where I once was? I think my glory days of the National Concert Hall are behind me, but it would be nice to be able to show my husband, who has never heard me play, how great I once was.

So I am wondering, can our great passions and talents be lost forever if we don't use them? Only one way to find out I suppose... watch this space!

An addiction that is just wrong!

In my life I have many guilty pleasures and many things that yes, you could say I am addicted to. Some are more acceptable than others. One addiction, that even I will admit to being just plain wrong is my addiction for watching 'Jon & Kate Plus 8' -I'll wait now while you all shake your heads in disdain.

I know, I know, there is so much about this show that should make me turn it off and possibly throw the remote through the set in disgust, but for some reason I just can't get enough of the show. I'm not quite sure whether its the cutness of the kids (come on, even you can admit they are pretty darn cute), the loudness of Kate or her slow emancipation of her husband Jon that keeps me watching but I do.

What scares me the most is, that I can actually see strong personality similarities between Kate and I and while I cringe at some of the things she says and does, I know its mostly because I am thinking, crap do I look/ sound/ come off as bad as that when I say/ do that?!

AND not only do we share similar personalities, but like Kate I too suffer from PCOS and currently my strongest option for a family is also through IVF. So perhaps my inability to turn off the TV is really some inner perverse desire to become the Irish Jon & Kate Plus 8? Well I'm not sure that James & Blá Plus 8 would have the same ring to it and the fact that my darling hubby and brother have already 'laid down the law' and said under no circumstances am I having multiples sorta puts a kink in the works too. Perhaps I will just have to come up with another way to have my own reality TV show and make my millions. Besides I am totally against child labour!

I like to tweet

I like to tweet. Mostly my tweets are random, inane thoughts or task I am either in the throws of doing, about to do, want to do or am considering doing. Rarely will you find a profound thought or quote that I have siphoned from some website or book or copied from my page a day calendar. Unless of course that is I am 'RTing' something someone else has posted. Sometimes I think to myself are my 121 followers really all that interested that I am drinking strawberry and cranberry tea or that I am about to go and clean my cosmetic press but then I think to myself - if they don't like it, they can just unfollow me.

Among the 234 that I follow, some of whom I'm not quite sure how I ended up following, most of them and their posts consist of quotes or thoughts they have taken from someone famous, dead or someone dead and famous or a statistic, snippet or tib-bit they came across on the news. Rarely do anyone of them post what they are doing, thinking or about to do or think. And then I read blog posts about the 5 questions to ask yourself before you tweet and I think, shit I really do have this tweeting business all wrong. But then I think to myself (and yes I do alot of thinking about this) its my twitter account, I'll tweet about whatever I god damn want to and if any of my 121 followers don't like it I'm sure with the collective 1,968,750,898 people they are following my little twitter will be far down their tweet deck feed in no time. Besides you never know, one of these days I might actually tweet something utterly thought provoking and challenging and if you unfollow me now you'll miss it!

Frustrated...

Some of you might know that I am a struggling would be writer. Miraculously I do already have 1 published book under my belt, a how to book on wedding planning, Distinctive Weddings, Tying the Knot without the Rope Burns, however its long been my passion and dream to write novels. I finished my first novel, which I am now calling 'Purple Tulips' mid November and today I finished editing the second draft.

When I was only a mere 12 or so chapters into the book I sent off the first few chapters, a brief synopsis and some reviews of my published book to 2 agents looking for representation. 1 was an agent based in London and the second based in Dublin. I decided for this book that I would use an agent as I am still not quite sure how I managed to secure a publishing deal the first time around or what actually went down and as I would truly like to make writing a career I thought it would be a good move.

About 9 weeks after first sending away my partial manuscript I got a rather nice, but confusing email from the agent in London. They politely refused to represent me on the basis that Distinctive Weddings, Tying the Knot without the Rope Burns - was not in the genre they helped published. Once I got over the momentary disappointment I realised I had had a lucky break, clearly these guys weren't really that on the ball if they hadn't figured out from the reviews, and publisher details that the book was already long published. I was grateful for the lucky escape.

To date I haven't heard from the second, Dublin based agent. James has been encouraging me to phone or email them to make sure they actually did get the submission and see if they have read or have any sort of indication as to when they might get to it. I'd been putting this off, nerves, fears, anxiety... the whole lot had stopped me. He prompted me again this morning and what with finishing the second round of editing I would so desperately love for it to published. I think its a fun, thrilling story that I would love to share with the world. So feeling rather brave and positive I sent off an email. And now... well now I am sitting at my computer willing a response to filter through and begging that it doesn't at the same time... unless its a positive one of course!

So as you can imagine UTTER FRUSTRATION does not even begin to describe how I feel right now... sorry for the rant!

Complete Standstill!

I love my country, I do, but I really wonder about us at times. Each Irish person would agree that Ireland's weather would never be described as tropical, enjoyable, or perfect and to refer to it as continually 'good' would be a stretch of the imagination. Our lack of agreeable weather is probably what stands between us and being voted one of the most desirable summer holiday destinations on the planet. But despite us all knowing and agreeing with this, if our weather deviates beyond its 'pre-approved' level of suckiness our pretty little nation grounds to a halt.

Point in case our current spell of frosty weather. When the frost and snow first descended we all thought - how cute, magical and christmassy. Isn't this just a lovely way to spend the holidays and start the new year. Now a mere 10 days into what many (outside of Ireland) would consider a bit of inclement weather, we as a nation batten down the hatches, extend the snow day to a snow week and bulk buy snow boots and tesco's special offer dishwasher salt to grit our drives. Which is ridiculous really when you are not actually going anywhere due to the aforementioned 'snow week'.

Now I'll admit its cold, bitterly cold, infact possibly the coldest I have every felt in Ireland. And yes I have snow and ice, in fact my drive, car and both the path and road outside my house haven't thawed since our 'cold snap' first descended but really people are we going to let a little snow and ice get the better of us??

Apparently so... I'm just glad its not as bad as this, otherwise what on earth would we do???

Need to stop eating!

So like the majority of the population I began 2010 with the intention of eating healthier and exercising ( I refuse to use the dreaded 'D' word). But for the past week all I can do is eat... EVERYTHING - be it healthy, dripped in fat or partially cremated I'll chow down on it.

Perhaps I have worms? hmmm....

Regardless, I desperately need to do something about it or Ten Ton Tess will look like my slim glamourous younger sister! Am off in the morning to buy new runners - the first time in my life I am actually going to buy proper purpose-filled runners - I've even enlisted the help of a seasoned runner buyer to show me where to shop - clearly my usual shoe haunts wont prove fruitful for this kind of purchase.

Anyways wish me luck - am a little apprehensive - what sort of foot apparel does one wear when shopping for runners?

Diet Coke in a sauce?

The hubby and I have been turkey'd out of it this year having subjected ourselves to 2 Mammy dinners and being packed back up to Dublin with a 50lb bird in the boot by the Mammy in law. So when last night it came time for dinner, the first we would cook for ourselves in so many weeks, we decided we wanted something as FAR away from turkey and a whiff of Christmas as possible. So to the cookbook we went, well to the online cookbook we went.

With our freezer filled to the gills with lamb (both legs of and lamb chops, [don't worry the over-sized bird is nicely chilled in my mother's freezer]) we decided it would be the meat of choice and went in search of an appetizing sauce. Our first attempt at a cream and mango based sauce quickly got poured down the sink and it was then we stumbled upon a recipe whose main ingredient was a can of Diet Coke.

I see you now with your peaked interest and raised eyebrows and hear you asked yourselves, can these people be mad?! We questioned our own faculties and I am sure that somewhere on God's Green Earth Gordon Ramsey swore that little bit harder, when the cooking God's delivered the news to him of our Diet Coke based sauce plan. None the less, we ventured forth to the kitchen once more and timidly took the Coke from the fridge.

To the can of coke we added about the same again in tomato ketchup (please don't cringe just yet), some tomato puree, a few dashes of bloody mary mix (our own addition), some crushed sea salt, chilli, cracked black pepper and garlic and brought to the boil. We stood dubiously over the hob contemplating whether or not to chuck it out too but slowly an amazing aroma wafted up through our nostrils and our taste buds begin to tingle and mouths water.

We poured our Diet Coke sauce over our oven cooked chops and seasoned with some fresh parsley and sat down to the table to taste our masterpiece. The explosion of flavour hit us and we hungrily licked our plates clean... the sauce was so delicious that we're having the same again tonight!