Unrealistic Aims

I was listening to BBC Radio Five Live yesterday morning when Victoria Derbyshire was in an abortion clinic. The show was really good and I have to admit I was in tears when one of the women was talking about an abortion that she had.

Then a ProLife woman came on. Now, don't get me wrong, I do not think that abortions are good things, I think it's terribly sad when a woman has to make that decision but I really believe that every woman should have that choice. In other words, I'm pro choice.

I don't want to go into the wrongs and rights of abortion though, it's just that the show got me thinking about the aims of the Pro Life people. They want abortion to be illegal, campaigning for the repeal of the Abortion Act 1967. To me, this seems like a total unrealistic aim to have - it will never happen. It's just too extreme and there are too many women out there who believe that they should have the right to choose. They just won't get the supporter base that they need to have such a massive impact that the Abortion Act gets repealed. Maybe I'm just being pessimistic (or optimistic I suppose). Maybe they should have more realistic aims - reduce the number of weeks (currently it's 24 I believe). Reduce the number of legal 'reasons'. Change the views of woman so that there are less likely to choose abortion. You won't ever be able to convince the majority of the female population that abortion is always wrong (in the sense that they will never choose it) but you could make women less likely to choose it. Be realistic and you will have more of an impact.

Another topic that there seems to be people with completely unrealistic aims - vegetarianism. I'm not a vegetarian as I believe that it's unnatural and that by not eating meat we are further removing ourselves from nature. But anyway, I hate it when seem to have made it their personal mission to make every single person they know a vegetarian. It's not going to happen - simple as that. There are too many people who (sadly) simply don't care, those with similar views to myself and those who need meat to stay healthy. Why not be realistic and work towards the reduction of meat people eat and improve the conditions of animals that are bred for meat? You will have a much bigger impact by improving the practices of the meat industry instead of having a totally unrealistic aim of destroying the meat industry.

I'm a member of a large hamster forum and a lot of people on there, including myself, are against the sale of pets in pet stores. I've said it time and time again - hamsters (or any animal) aren't packets of crisps and shouldn't be sold like packets of crisps. But I think a more realistic way to have a impact would be to improve things - improve the conditions of the animals in the stores, improve the way that they are bred, provide more information to potential owners and regulate the sale of animals more strictly. For me the big thing is education - a lot of people pop into a pet store to get some dog food, see the cute little hamsters and buy one without knowing anything about their care. Most pet stores don't have a clue when they talk about the care of the animals they sell which makes things even worse. If they provided the correct care information with the sale they would improve the lives of so many of these pets. I hope that one day animals won't be sold in a supermarket fashion but I think we need to make the smaller steps before we get to that point.

By no means am I saying that every prolifer or vegetarian has these aims, these 'missions', I'm purely talking about the ones who do. I'm saying that if people had more realistic aims they would make a bigger impact, would make a bigger difference, by making small steps at a time which could then lead to the, currently, unrealistic aim.

Phew. Well, that was a bit of a rant. Apologies if I don't make too much sense in places, just wanted to get that off my chest lol.

A New Direction

Spring is in full swing, summer isn't too far off and I feel like I've woken up, almost like I've been hibernating.

The last year or so I've been contained within my own flat, held by my own fears. I know that it's not something I should be ashamed of as it is an illness, one I've yet to recover from. But I will, one day I will. I made some progress just the other week, going out for the third time since I became really poorly. Spent a couple of hours in Tesco (it's a big store...) with my mum. It was great and made me feel really good - it added to my hope, to my determination to get better. In a post the other day I mentioned that I will be starting cCBT and I'm now just waiting for some ink for my printer to come so that I can print off all the booklets I need for it. Once I've got the ink I'm going to get stuck in and I really do believe it will help me. My other half thinks it will too.

The year hasn't been wasted though - I've learnt a lot, taught myself a lot, probably things I wouldn't have bothered trying to learn if I was working full time. My cooking skills have improved loads - I've gone from hardly being able to fry bacon to doing full roast dinners with all the trimmings. I have my other half to thank for my cooking skills though as he has taught me a lot, certainly where meat is concerned (my mums a veggie so didn't eat much meat at home and didn't cook it). I can now, er, sort of, bake too. Ignore the suspiciously sunken effect the cupcakes have...

I can now sew, or at least sew well. I've picked up so many techniques from books, my mum, YouTube and trail and error I'm now confident enough to sell the stuff I make. I've even made my mum jealous - I can do french knots and she can't hehehe! Took me a hell of a long time to learn how to do them mind, it included lots of swearing and a bit of blood here and there too.

And of course, I've learnt a lot about Wicca, Witchcraft and Paganism in general. I'm now at the point where I feel I need to start getting my beliefs down on paper to provide myself with a proper foundation so that I can further explore aspects that I've been hesitant about so far. Which brings me to why I made the 'you'll be seeing a lot more of me' comment in my 'Blog Redesign' post. I've picked up so many bits and pieces, so many ideas and want to start sharing those, a long with my own thoughts, via this blog. Not only as a tool for me (ie getting things 'written' down) but so that I can share with people in the hopes that I might inspire some, help maybe a few and bore the pants off a couple more :P I have loads of ideas for posts, ranging from working with crystals to 'magically' cooking and a few mundane, maybe with magical twists, posts on things I love and enjoy.

So, you'll be seeing a lot more of me from now on, that's a promise (maybe a hint of a threat...?)! I'll keep you updated where the cCBT is concerned and my progress with it. Fingers crossed this time next year I'll be running my fingers over freshly cut grass instead of a keyboard!

PS - Hope you like the new design of my blog, if you noticed anything that looks totally screwed up or something doesn't work, please let me know. It wasn't till 6 hours of coding that I realised the header only appeared on the homepage :/ I'm not the most observant of people.

Not a Happy Bunny

Summery of the day: I nearly had to crap in a bin.

Background: Last year, god knows when, our boiler broke. Just stopped working one afternoon. We tried to get hold of the landlord but no luck - turns out that his house flooded and his mobile phone (the one we have the number for) was destroyed and he only rarely checks his emails so it wasn't until two weeks later that he got in contact. Someone came out, the boiler was fixed and all was well. A month or so later the boiler broke again but a couple of weeks later magically started working again. It was OK for a while but then broke again. Contacted the landlord (again) who got a plumber out and he fixed it - this was just before last Christmas. We then get the winter water bill - it had gone from about £60 a month to £250 a month. WTF? Turns out the "fix" that the plumber did was only meant to be temporary and the landlord was meant to get a new one installed ASAP. The temporary fix meant that the boiler was using massive amounts of electricity but not doing much with it until finally the boiler tripped all the electricity in the flat - this was in Feb.

From February until recently we have been attempting to get hold of the landlord with no luck - he wasn't replying to emails or anything. When he finally did get in contact again he said he thought that the boiler had been properly fixed the last time the plumber came out. Bearing in mind we had repeatedly emailed him telling him that it wasn't.

Anyway, back to present day. Landlord bought a new boiler - was going to be installed last Wednesday but the one delivered was damaged. Fair enough, things happen. So, a new one gets delivered today, I haven't been feeling well so I stayed in bed and let my other half deal with it. At about 1pm (the boiler arrived at 10:30am) I woke up and stumbled out of the bedroom and into the hallway (where the boiler is) to find the boiler cupboard doors propped up against the wall (fine, would had been hard to work around them) and a plumber drinking tea and looking over the instruction manual of some sort by the new boiler. The shiny new boiler. Oh how I have wanted a shiny new boiler for soooooo long.

Guess what the landlord didn't ask for or get (hadn't even occurred to me to be honest)? Measurements. Of the cupboard. The one where the shiny new boiler will go.

So, this is the result -

Doesn't look bad does it? From this angle, nope, looks fine!

From this angle? Can you notice what the problem is?

Those runner thingies above it are where the doors are meant to fit into - the damned boiler sticks out so much you cant put the doors back in. I measured it - its 5inches too long. Wide. Whatever.

I now have a monstrosity of a boiler for everyone to see as soon as they walk in my front door (the door you see is my front door, I live in a flat). Lovely.

Just for added decoration here are the doors (ignore the metal panels, they will be fitted onto the front of the boiler once its finished).

So, it's just gone 1pm and I realise I need to go to the loo. In both senses of the word. The water is still off, I cant go round to the neighbours (I don't know them) and obviously I cant use the toilet. I thought, bugger this, I'm off back to bed.

I wake up again at about 4pm, the water is still off and I'm busting to go to the loo. I kept looking at our bedroom bin wondering if the plumber, or my other half, would hear me if I did my business in there. Thankfully, my wondering lasted just long enough - the plumber put the water back on before I took desperate measures. Wonderful! I don't have to crap in a bin.

I go into the bathroom, at a leisurely pace of course and sit down. My eyes wander to the bath which had a hose pipe in it. Ok... God knows what the plumber was doing with that. Then this little pile of dust/dirt catches my eye.

I'm puzzled and look up to find two holes in the tiles. I think my eyes bugged out of my head for a second.

A close up of the big one of the left -

I finish up in the bathroom and go straight into the living room where my other half is and glare at him. I did one of those shouting whispers, you know the ones I mean, saying that there are holes in the bathroom tiles. He says, "I know" with this look on his face that either meant "I don't care" or "Nothing I can do about it". Poor man had only had one hours sleep so I didn't get grumpy.

Apparently, when the plumber had been drilling in the cupboard, my other half went into the bathroom and saw the holes, he shows them to the plumber who pulls his glasses down his nose, looks at the holes then pushes his glasses back up and says, "Those walls are thin" and went back to work.

Yes, the walls are thin. Now I would have thought he would have realised he had drilled right through the wall the first time but nope, he did it twice. I can't say anything more on the matter otherwise I will end up smacking my head against the table I think.

After all this do we have hot water? Don't be silly! Course we don't, we have to wait until someone else can drill holes through our walls first! 

Well, what a wonderful day.

Please excuse the rant and the amount of pictures. I'll have a happy, harvest themed post for you soon.

Oh the Stupidity

We all have those "Doh" moments when we realise we've done something really stupid. I was thinking about the little stupid things I've done in bed the other night, I don't know what my other half thought - I was giggling away in bed while he was in the living room... lol! Anyway, I thought I'd share those silly things I've done with you while I have my morning coffee.

A few weeks ago I walked into the spare bedroom, right up to the bed so that I could put something down onto the bed. Guess what I had left on the floor, by the bed? A candle holder. Doesn't sound too bad does it? Thing was, it wasn't just a bog standard tea light holder - it was a pillar candle holder with a SPIKE in the middle. The spike went straight into my heel, I squealed, pulled it out and called for my other half who said there was only a tiny bit of blood but he would call 999 if I wanted him to while smirking at me. Sod. I'm not quite sure which part was more stupid - leaving the holder on the floor or paying so little attention I stood on it. The candle holder, a long with others like it, went straight in the bin that night.

I cant remember if this was just before the candle holder incident or just after but I was in the kitchen, coring an apple with a gigantic knife. Did I cut a finger? No, I cut my belly. I stabbed myself in my belly coring an apple. 'nuff said.

Here's a non self harm one - the other night I was sat with my other half while doing a crossword (my current obsession), the clue was something a long the lines of "a joint in the arm", I promptly said, "Well, it cant be elbow unless elbow is spelt with a w at the end, unless "Swimmer" is wrong". My other half turned to me with a strange look on his face and said, "But it does end in a w....". Oh. Oops. I knew that elbow was spelt with a w but for some reason that bit of information had slipped out of my brain when I was doing the crossword. >.<

Many years ago, when I was still living with my mum I made some rice (it was for the dog who had an upset tummy, bland food settled her tum). Or at least I attempted to make some rice - I put the rice in the saucepan and put that onto the hob. Forgetting the water completely. After a while I realise what I had done, picked up the pan and put it straight onto the worktop. The hot pan on the cheap worktop. Result? Melted hole in the worktop.

Did I learn from that mistake? Na...

Couple of years ago I was cooking potatoes to mash - I remembered the water this time but forgot to keep an eye on them. They ran dry, I panicked, grabbed a chopping board and put the hot pan on that. The chopping board was plastic. We now have a lovely while chopping board with a large melted ring shape in the middle. At least I didn't melt the worktop!

Well, I think that's enough of my silliness for one day, I've finished my coffee and should get some housework done! I hope you're all having a wonderful week!

Domestic Goddess Fail

Firstly I'd like to apologise for not posting this last week or so - my mum was staying so as you can imagine, I was exceptionally busy!

I'm really glad that my mum came as I'd gotten myself in a bit of a pickle. The photograph on the left is  my ironing pile. I may have "forgotten" about my ironing for a couple of weeks. Or three weeks. I'm not really sure as I'd been avoiding the spare bedroom (where the ironing was) and I'd been grabbing clothes straight out of the tumble dryer. Awful aren't I? Definitely a "Domestic Goddess" fail moment!

I'd managed to get the flat looking reasonably good with the help of my other half before my mum came but there was still that pesky pile of ironing that needed doing. I was a terrible daughter though - I fluttered my eyelashes at my mother and she rolled up her sleeves and set up the ironing board. Couple of hours later it was all done. Goodness knows what I would do without her... Thanks mum!

My wonderful mum also helped me do some sorting out. Both me and her love crafty things, from sewing to cross stitching to knitting to scrap booking so as you can imagine, both of us have rather large "stashes". Mine was in a storage box that just wasn't big enough and it was impossible to find anything without emptying it out and sifting through it.

So... We went shopping for baskets or small storage boxes, went to B&Q once but it was going to cost £20+ to get the amount I wanted! No way I was paying that so we nipped into Tesco and they had some white plastic baskets that were really cheap and perfect for what I wanted. The photograph above shows my new baskets, each one having different things in them and oh my its made it so much easier to find what I want! I want a piece of ribbon? I go to the ribbon box. I want to do some cross-stitch? I get the cross stitching basket out. I'm a very happy bunny! I do have my fabric, sewing machine and jewellery making bag in another cupboard (to the left of the one in the picture) but I can now access those really easily too. I'm looking forward to getting crafty now!

I'm also going on a mini diet. I need to loose some weight and generally become healthier so I've decided to cut out/down on a few things including biscuits, cheese, bread, butter and cream. I haven't had a biscuit in four days which is good seeing as I was eating a packet of biscuits a day. I'm hoping that cutting down on the fatty/sugary stuff and being more active I will be able to slowly cut down my weight. I'm not interested in loosing loads of weight in a short space of time as to me its not healthy and it usually doesn't last - you just put the weight back on. Wish me luck for my new diet, I could do with as much encouragement as I can get!

Well that's a mini update on me, I have some plans for posts this week including ones on incenses mixes, altars and my personal Book of Shadows. I will also be getting involved in the Witchy Wisdom Post-It Note Tuesdays (click on the logo in the sidebar for more info).

Hope you are all having a wonderful week!