One of my very wise ideas is that, rather than buying eachother gifts, my boy and i plunge our squid into purchasing a weekend break away together in the new year.

We both suffer pretty severely from diagnosed S.A.D. and, although we can’t afford a jaunt in the sunshine, it always helps to adventure away to blow away the cobwebs and provide a change of scenary.

With this in mind, I have found a very dangerous website: Uhoh. See: Under the Thatch. I have my eye on a few expensive favourites, such as :: this :: this :: this ::
I could go on…

And so it begins. Xmas conversation in the office.

My colleague has purchased all – yes,all - her Christmas presents already. I’m slightly panicked, slightly in awe, and slightly disgusted by this. But, but, but it’s only just November.

I had a crazy aunt who always used to drop xmas presents off for us during her annual visit in the summer. This always evoked similar feelings of disgust, pity and confusion.

I’m simply not that organised. Nor do i have any desire to be fastidiously thinking about xmas all year round. In December is quite sufficient, thank you very much.

This is not to say that i don’t enjoy buying presents for people – and i do: little presents for folk all year round, in fact – or that i don’t enjoy the process of internet buying, waiting, wrapping and giving.

It is true to say that hitherto i have not been the jolliest enjoyer of xmas day itself per se. It is even more true to say that i am potentially The World’s Most Grumpy Ranter and frequently soliloquise on the topic of How Much I Loathe The Run Up To Xmas with all its commercial trappings, shit music, and spangley tinsel. This i do not like.

I really wish that xmas could just be one day with lots of food, lots of nice crafty bobbins, nice folk who want to spend time in eachother’s company, amazing music, good plonk, and all my favourite tv shows/films on tv. But xmas is very rarely actually like this. And therefore, if i had my way, i would probably dispense with the whole shebang altogether. There, i said it. Massive taboo.

Yet this cannot happen. Of course it can’t. And, inevitably,  i have given in and started internet browsing in the hope that this year i will get my act together and have ordered everything in time for xmas. And i have spotted these via Cup of Jo:

Petite Moss ring and Dark Cherry ring from bluehour at etsy.

Still reading The Magus by John Fowles. Very slowly. Very very slowly. ‘Are you still reading that?’, my boy keeps asking. Yes, yes i am. Mostly beneath my two big duvets late at night and just before bed. I just can’t achieve my usual reading rate now i’m no longer an English student {and haven’t been for coming up to three years now – yikes} and my eyes droop. And it’s a pretty chunky book, thank you very much.

Still wishing the sun would shine a little bit more – although i shouldn’t complain really: we’ve had lots of Trina Days {my friend adores blue skies and crisp temperatures}.

Still wishing i had more motivation in an evening to cook ambitiously. We’re preparing for a Goodbye Old Housemate, Hello New Housemate meal this weekend, though.

Still wishing i had more time to catch up on my music/style/cooking/craft/photography blogs.

Still feeding my boy toxic Lemsips to clear up his dreaded flu.

Still wishing for an adventure. To be planned.

Still taking photos that i should get round to uploading.

Still longing for more shut eye.

I’m home! Home after my week away living with my folks in the little town i grew up in! Home!

Nottingham, how i love thee. Emphatically. Over-emotionally. Slightly inappropriately.

And i have To Do List as long as my arm. Or an arm of average length as, let’s be honest, mine are rather on the stumped and spindley side.

This is what kite flying looks like when the wind decides not to play along.

We ventured out to Calke Abbey in Derbyshire for a walk and kite fly in the fresh air. We left our adventure until late in the afternoon so the light was absolutely fantastic. We took a stroll around the abbey and the grounds of the larger house in the sunshine and with our winter coats folded over our arms. The house had an enviable vegetable garden with enormous, alien-looking squashes and a coal-heated hot house full of chillis, a few of which Jeffers naughtily snaffled to add to his sweet potato fajitas later that day. Delicious. There was also an impressive ice house and grotto.

Gig last night at Bodega Social, Nottingham.

First Aid Kit ::

Second up were First Aid Kit {first ups not worth mentioning}, a Swedish sister duo – Klara and Johanna Söderberg – who we missed at End of The Road this year. They pelted out some pretty great two piece vocal harmonies, supported by a guitar, keyboard and autoharp.

First Aid Kit ::

The lead singer – short, brunette, wearing a great discordant floral ensemble – had a fantastic, earthy, powerful voice, whereas the backing sister  – blonde, miserable-looking – provided a softer, perhaps a little less reliable, harmonising backing presence. They squabbled on stage like…sisters, with sister number 2 berating sister number 1 for talking too much. The set was pretty great with a nice mixture of album tracks and covers – perhaps somewhat obviously they covered Fleet Foxes Tiger Mountain Peasant Song, but very successfully. We left with their latest EP.

Half of FanFarlo ::

Headliners: Fanfarlo, a five piece band from Oxford, UK, who would’ve been more suited to an End of The Road stage and were less suited to The Social which proved somewhat claustrophobic and restrictivegig for such an energetic band with their motley crew of instruments – guitars, mandolin, violin, drums, xylophone, keyboard, trumpet… Great set: upbeat, great vocals, lively… Lots of lovely whistling, foot stamping, oooh oooh oooh-ing and teeth bearing. {Reminded me a little of Clap Your Hands Say Yeah}. Highlight: ‘Finish Line’.  And, ahem, we left with some of their vinyl under our arms, too.

Finalé: Fanfarlo w/First Aid Kit covering Davendra Banhart ‘Rejoicing in the hands’.

Kicked up the arse by Alice’s blog, Quaint Living, I have decided to write my own

Autumn To Do List

1. Go kite flying with my housemates

2. Begin my autumn 2009 diary {because my memory for little – and important – details is shocking}

3. Print a photo a week

4. Cook two different pies

5. Make some mulled cider {maybe with the cider my boy and I brought back from Cornwall?}

6. Cycle with my neighbours

7. Start looking after all my gig and cinema tickets – great momentos that I’m always too lazy/disorganised to look after. Shocking given that I see at least four flicks at the cinema a month and several gigs.

8. Begin our E.O.T.R. momento cd

9. Have lunch with my parents and little sister

10. Treat myself to some new autumn wear – and search out that elusive Breton striped fisherman Coco Avant Chanel-style stripey tshirt!

And so i find myself penniless. I am a Dickensian pauper. No, strike that, things are never that bad.

We attended a wedding this past weekend, for which John was one of two Best Men, and, due to a terribly regrettable and rather wine-induced late night incident, i broke my boy’s iphone. Ahem. Yes yes, i’m very repentent and a very bad significant other. Indeed, i am so especially repentent that i have just purchased him a new one from the lovely Apple Store.

But who knew that it was going to cost me an arm and both legs?! People spend how much on these things?! How. Much.? And What.Is.Wrong.With.You.People? Yes, they’re very beautiful and very nifty. But really?

Anyway, my guilt is sufficient that i have proceeded with this purchase and will reunite my boy with his beloved iphone before the week is out.

As such, i have been terribly organised for the first time in my life – a little ironic, given that i organise for a living – and have produced a monthly finance spreadsheet which colour codes my incomings and outgoings – i even used the SUM function! Oooooohhhhhh. Very tech’ savvy.

Unfortunately, this tech’ savviness has only heightened my despair. There’s nothing more depressing than a minus number in the ’surplus pennies’ column. Boo.

The phones have stopped working at work. Marty is out of the office batting his eyelids seductively at Freshers, practising his young and hip! teen lingo and saying things like ‘whack’ and, er, ‘awesome’ a lot {granted, my knowledge of whack-lingo is limited and could do with a bituva brush up}, perhaps showing them a bit of leg {because vogue says that Leg is In this season ‘parently}, and luring innocents to the cinema. The sky is grey. Everyone is oddly quiet and making comments like ‘Oooh, isn’t it nice to have some peace and quiet?’ which makes me think that they’d not welcome my suggestion of a singalong {not good with silence}.

And so i find that i’ve somewhat subconsciously started creating a mug tower on my desk. This combines both my love of excessive caffeine consumption throughout my working day and my inherent flare and creativity. Perhaps i’ll suggets this as an office competition.

Balls. Just realised that i’m mouthing the words while typing. I reached a new level of office crazy, haven’t i.

On the way to work this morning i got caught in the warm rain and leaves stuck to the bottom of my shoe – a sure indication that Autumn is here if ever you needed one. Though, i’ve been aware more this year than ever before that the seasons are blurring into one another, indistinctly, subtly. Or perhaps my memories of past seasons are simply just the extreme, emphasised, hyperbolic memories of childhood when summers were hot, house-pipe-ban summers and winters were snowy and perishing.

I’ve been really fortunate this summer to make the most of what good weather we’ve had – two adventure weeks, a bbq, a trip to End of The Road Festival in the sunshine…

Often one of the major downsides to working in an office is the disconnection one inevitably feels from nature and the weather outside. This is something that i’ve always suffered with and think that my S.A.D., which  i suffer from to varying degrees each winter, is emphasised by this feeling of divorce and claustrophobia. Fortunately, i’m surrounded by enormous, 360′ windows at work these days which look out over the rooftops of Nottingham. Mmmm…

But now that Autumn seems to be setting in, I am determined to purchase myself some chunkier knits, some sensible shoes, and some new warm clothes – bored of the old, in with the new! – with some new pennies i’ve been given as part of my new, mini promotion {Wah!}. I’m now no longer Communications, Events & Operations Coordinator, but Communications, Events & Operations Coordinator & Copy Writer. That ol’ job title just keeps on growning.To be continued…