We Have Booked Our Honeymoon

Well hello there.

Self-explanatory title this time, you'll note. We've only gone and booked the ruddy honeymoon.

Somewhere in the distance, a crowd roars in celebration. *raaaaaaaaawrrrrrrrrr*

Am considering a minor celebration as I sit here in the English office, otherwise known as The Bunker (there's no natural sunlight, you see. And low ceilings. Debs referred to it as being "like the bloody Cabinet War Rooms in here" yesterday and I nearly choked on my tea).

 A little conga, perhaps. A solitary Mexican wave. A shimmy around the table.

It's taken what seems like forever to make our choice. We thought about going to Northumberland and doing some serious walking. But then we decided that would involve camping and after last summer's debacle in France (err, do you like sand in your sleeping bag? No? Shame, 'cos it's BLOODY EVERYWHERE!) we came to the conclusion that wouldn't be un bon idee.

Then we thought about Italy. I fancied Croatia or somewhere else a bit Eastern-European. But then the ex-factor reared its head (can you really go on honeymoon to a place where you/your beloved has been with an ex? I don't think I'd be overly delighted with that prospect). 

Then it became less of an issue and we started to toy with the idea again. Ooo, Italy. Ooo, pizza. Ooo, vino. Ooo, Mr and Mrs Smith. Pretty website. Pretty boutique hotels with exposed stone walls and roll-top baths and oh Lordy, Adam, look! They offer breadmaking classes and - 

- ERR, YOU WHAT? £340 a night?

We've decided we're not Mr and Mrs Smith. We're Mr and Mrs Bedford. Or will be, anyway. And we need a more budget-friendly option.

Sardinia? Argentina! New Zealand? Bit of Australia? Combination?

This is our honeymoon, yeah?

This needs to be the best holiday of our LIVES. The pressure is ON, man.

What's the best holiday you've ever had? Where's the best place you've ever been?

Blank faces.

Umm, Northumberland?

Do you remember that weekend in August when we stayed in a fairly average B&B and the Polish owner shouted at us for not wanting the full English in the morning?

Ha, yeah, that was funny. We got some serious mileage out of doing impressions of her.

And when we went on the boat trip to the Farne Islands to see The Amazing Varieties of Bird and Wildlife.

Cue Geordie accent over the ship tannoy: "As yer can see, MOAST of the bords have migrated to Africa...."

And all we could see were views of totally deserted bird-shit-covered rocks. 

Yeah, and then we got engaged there. In Rothbury. 

Where Raoul Moat shot himself. 

Yeah. And the man in the B&B was the campest creature ever.

'Bellini? Bellini?' Aye, gan on then, I'll have a Bellini. Ta. Oh, whats this? A hot flannel? Err....OK.

I love Northumberland. I love the wild skies and the deserted beaches. It's as beautiful as Cornwall (FACT), but not as trendy. The coastline is amazing. The air is so clean and tuckers you right out. The pubs are ace. It's friendly. It's Northern. It's just the BEST.

And, as a decision, it just seems RIGHT.

And LOOK AT WHERE WE'RE STAYING:



I am so excited I can barely BREATHE.

That is all for now.

Sunlight is a Thing To Do. And it will Cheer You Up. Promise.

Googling Auden for Year 12, I came across a blog. It's called The Wondering Minstrels. It seems to have been dormant for a while, but when it was active it worked on a simple enough concept. They published a poem a day, and give some background to it. And stacks of people then commented on it.

This is the poem I came across. It isn't Auden (although there IS a Larkin poem underneath it). I read it and felt...sunny.

And after a terrible Sunday, an unspeakably dreadful Sunday night and a fairly hideous Monday, it was just what the doctor ordered.


The Word

 Down near the bottom
 of the crossed-out list
 of things you have to do today,

 between "green thread"
 and "broccoli" you find
 that you have penciled "sunlight."

 Resting on the page, the word
 is as beautiful, it touches you
 as if you had a friend

 and sunlight were a present
 he had sent you from some place distant
 as this morning -- to cheer you up,

 and to remind you that,
 among your duties, pleasure
 is a thing,

 that also needs accomplishing
 Do you remember?
 that time and light are kinds

 of love, and love
 is no less practical
 than a coffee grinder

 or a safe spare tire?
 Tomorrow you may be utterly
 without a clue

 but today you get a telegram,
 from the heart in exile
 proclaiming that the kingdom

 still exists,
 the king and queen alive,
 still speaking to their children,

 - to any one among them
 who can find the time,
 to sit out in the sun and listen.

-- Tony Hoagland  

I really like love the lines below:

"...among your duties, pleasure
is a thing,

that also needs accomplishing..."

Damn straight it is.

So smile. Be happy. Try to work hard, because that's important, you know. Working hard. Do the boring-but-necessary stuff like buying stamps (argh, I forgot) and a tax disc (oops). But also make time for the sunny stuff, because that's as important.

I've just had good news of a moeny-related nature. Could this be why a chirpy poem about sunlight and love has perked me up? Materialistic little me? Never.
     

Remedies for Stress

Man, I'm hungry. Hungry like the wolf, in the words of Duran Duran.

This week has been crazy at work. No, sack that, 'crazy' just won't do. It's been CRAZY. Crackerjack crazy. Kerrrrazzzy. But, I ask you this: do you ever find that things can get chest-tighteningly-horrifically-stressful and you think you might just do something desperate...only for everything to suddenly melt away and for you to suddenly feel a bit, well, serene?

Maybe not. Maybe that's just me. Or perhaps I have some very valid reasons for being able to manage my stress levels at the moment.

After all, no one in my family is horrifically ill. Unlike a lady I work with, whose daughter has been diagnosed with something terrible. I just remember this time last year when Dad was in hospital and shudder a little. Ugh.

I'm not ill, either. Being ill is wearisome. My immune system is proving to be a hardy little bugger this academic year **touching everything wooden around me, including my noggin**

And, to quote a farmer who sent us a Christmas card full of pragmatic advice and good cheer this year, "What is there to worry about when home is good?" Indeed.

And, finally, well the "the sun rises in spite of everything/and the far cities are beautiful and bright."

Gaaah. "There will be dying, there will be dying, but there is no need to go into that." Is that not sublime?

And that really is proving a bit of a mantra of late.

And what to do when mantras aren't enough? Have a mini-Heineken. Go on. Try it. It will change your life.

I Should Have Baked You a Cake.

Save the Date

My sister and her fiance's Save the Date/Christmas cards. Apparently they had an ACE day making the snowmen, eating carrots and digging my First Holy Communion veil out of the loft...

Eire. Christmas.

It is Christmas. Well, it’s Saturday 18th December, which is good enough for me. I have broken up from school. What’s even more shocking, though, is that I reached some semblance of a straight edge in my final week (i.e. shifted a sh*tpile of marking and sorted some administrative cack).

Don’t get me wrong. I still have tonnes to do (“To be a teacher, you have to be satisfied with having lots of loose ends, I think. Like, all the time...” – a slightly-less-world-weary McDonagh in 2005. She had her head screwed on, that girl). But it’s manageable.

We are off to Romantic Ireland (a fiver a pint! Woo!) for a few days post-Christmas-itself and I CANNOT BLOODY WAIT.

Things What I Think We Should Do:

Go to Kennedy’s (pub in the actual middle of nowhere. The sign is a 70s-era joy-to-behold-monstrosity complete with a martini avec olive on the sign. I doubt anyone’s drank a martini in there EVER) and have the craic with the locals. That’ll be Uncle John and Frank Spellman, then.)

Head to Nathy Brennan's in Tubbercurry for much of the same craic. It's a hardware store AND a pub. You can buy, err, nails and drink pints simultaneously.

Go to Yeats’ grave and swoon over the ‘Had I The Heavens’ Embroidered Cloths’ sculpture.

"But I, being poor, have only my dreams..."

Go swan-spotting in Sligo. There are real ones...

And bronze ones...

Take a seaweed bath in Enniscrone, complete with saltwater shower. Mm.

Enjoy feeling like a peach after aforementioned seaweed bath.

Visit Croagh Padraig. Attempt to climb it. Or at least think about attempting to climb it. Have a squiz at the Famine Memorial.

Go to the traditional music (ceol) session in Gurteen.

Go to Galway. Visit more family. Take the ferry to the Arran Islands and have a drink in Joe McDonagh’s pub. Look at the beautiful Gaelic inscriptions on the graves. Oh, I am a maudlin creature.

See the Davey girls in Clonmel, Tipperary. This may involve drinking and dancing. Less maudlin.

Visit a load of family. Have cheeks pinched by overzealous aunties. Drink several Irish coffees. Eat lots of sandwiches.

Bring. It. On.

Hurrah for Christmas!

I Don't Like Mondays

I've had a super-pleasant weekend, thanks for asking.

On Saturday, the boy Bedford and I woke up at a time not pre-ordained by an alarm. Yes, that is correct. We Did Not Set No Mobile Phone Alarum Bell. I cannot put into words the deliciousness of a lie-in after a particularly hellish week.

Oh my. It was rather glorious.

I say the week had been hellish. Well, it had been busy, anyway. The brothership had been down for a couple of nights, you see. He's decided that he wants to be a teacher and spent Thursday and Friday in some Leeds' schools. I don't think I'd fully realised just how sedate mine and Bedders' lives have become.

We do stuff, don't get me wrong. We work loooong hours, for a start. I'm out of the house by 6:45am, generally, and he's not long behind me. Frequently, then, midweek, there's an evening at a friend's for tea, and there's my regular tutoring slot on a Wednesday. I try to go running a few times mid-week and we might head to the cinema or out for tea one night if we're feeling particularly decadent.

However, we don't have a telly. Not in a "We've-Made-A-Conscious-Choice-Maaaaaan-And-We're-Too-Cool-And-Hippy-Esque-For-Televisual-Entertainment" kind of way. No, no. Bedders moved in last June, and I moved the telly a few weeks before into the cellar as he was bringing a little flatscreen job with him. It was infinitely preferable to the huge, 15 year old, several stone in weight bad boy that I nearly damaged my spine carrying down the cellar steps.

But it turns out we don't have an aerial. Or something. We haven't figured it out. But clearly we're not that bothered as we're still television-less.

Devoid of telly. Gasp. Horror. Imagine.

James couldn't get his head round it. Said telly DOES have the capacity to play DVDs, however. And so we were treated to all 6 foot 2 inches of brother James stretched acorss the sofa, lights off (they interfered with the picture, apparently) and Brokeback Mountain blaring. It's a good film but, man, that maudlin mouth-organ/banjo soundtrack really starts to grate when you're attempting a bit of work.

So on Saturday we left our troubles behind us, cycled up to Headingley on the aforementioned 1940s bike and Bedders' foldaway beaut and did some food shopping. And today we went to the Reliance in Leeds with the parents-in-law-to-be and their friends.

It's a lovely spot.

The sausage and mash was sumptuous, I tell thee.

But I'm procrastinating. I need to do some school work.

Badabing. Inabit.