Sunday Summary Monday Missive Wednesday Witterings

Oh, hi there, remember me?

I'm that oddity who promised you a blog post and then cruelly stripped it away from under your nose because, well, life got in the way. But now I'm back! From outer space! (Well, I'm no Tim Peake but I'm at the parental homestead and the rules of gravity are different here so, close enough.)

I should mention that I'm now on shared wifi so access will be sporadic at best over the coming days. 

I'm also frantically trying to get this post done before the next social engagement/wander round the block to look at the pretty lights in the vicinity with Ma QB. So, I apologise now for the brevity and lack of inspiration/usual QB punnery.

So anyway, how can I justify the time spent not posting on the blog? Let's see, shall we?

This week, I have mostly been ...

Reading 

I'm going to be honest: this book may have had huge acclaim and won an inaugural YA award ... but unlike The Handmaid's Tale {Margaret Atwood} on which it is very obviously modelled, OEY belongs in the here and now, and in ten years' time many of the quasi-subtle cultural references will be obsolete.

And thank goodness for that.

Watching

... more Christmassy things, whilst doing Christmassy things!

To wit:

{Love Actually}

{National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation}

and this episode of iconic 90s teen drama My So-Called Life: 'So-Called Angels'. Couldn't tell you if Claire Danes exercises her notorious cry-face in this episode but she's infinitely watchable anyway.

Listening

... to Christmas music. Much of Christmas music. All of it. Latest additions to the QB Library of Christmas cheese:

Oh, and this. This is just wonderful. (Thanks to Jan and Ma QB for this one!)

Meeting my Voicerox Family for Drinks

On Tuesday a small, select bundle of VR Lovelies gathered in a local public house-like establishment for pre-Christmas drinks.

Admittedly it was a considerably smaller, more select bundle than I'd anticipated but it did mean I got to have a very excellent chat to one of our newer members, which transmogrified into him giving me some Pinterest-worthy life advice.

So that was nice.

Of course, the requirement to chat overrode the requirement to curate ample blog fodder so I'm afraid no photos of actual people.

But, a big thank you to those who braved the weather and pushed through the inclination to stay at home and ride out another evening of pre-Christmas panic to come and join us!

Carol Singing

Then, on Wednesday, I alighted from my train fifteen minutes late, which was actually not bad-going given the state of play across the network all week last week egads seriously Govia/Southern, woman up and fix your freakin' network with the money you extort from us yearly, you soul-sucking lugworms.

Sorry. Got carried away then. Where was I? Oh yes! Carol singing! I alighted, yada yada, went down some steps, yada yada, and found my church family singing carols in the station underpass, as is our wont every year. So I sang some carols and stuff. And it was a bit lovely. There were harmonies and everything.

I think we may have cheered up a few beleaguered commuters. Well, we tried to, anyway.

Enjoying another Christmas dinner!

By Friday night I was all ready to:

but I still had some

to do so over I went to the church hall for the annual Ladies of the Parish Christmas Meal.

Again I failed to provide ample blog fodder because of this whole talking-to-people habit I'm trying to refine but here is a picture of the rather wondrous and festive Christmas table that welcomed us!

The food was yummy (especially the puddings) and there was even mulled wine at the door; there were various quizzes (including a game that involved identifying 24 household objects through mini stockings), and crucially, good company and cheer. Oh and a Secret Santa -- always fun!

Decorating QB Heights

Yes, finally, on Saturday, I cranked up the tunes and, in between sending out the last of the cards and presents, and panic-laundering everything in readiness for the trip back to the Parental Homestead, managed to put up the last of the decorations also.

On a day-to-day basis QB Heights looks like a flippin' minefield of Belongings so I think there may be a Feng-Shui February on the horizon for 2016 or maybe even a January De-Junk.

But I overlooked that and basically chucked fairy lights, Father Christmases and candles on every available surface:

{Nativity scene in the Home Bar. Sacrilegious? Discuss ...}

{My Special Santa, with his twisted foot and hole
in the head ...} 

{Notice the homage to humped creatures
and the TINY TREE ... #festive} 

{There is no such thing as too many fairy lights}

{The boudoir on a Christmas tip | Notice my neat arrangement
of baubles. Classy. Always.}

And in case you were worried that QB was deprived of a tree, fear not: there was one ready waiting for me at the Homestead, bought off the market last year and too big to store at QB Heights during the year so cultivated by Ma QB since last December. And doesn't it look quirky now?

No prizes for counting the flamingos this time. Sorry.

Enjoying Christmas Dinner with my Lovelies

Then ... after all that ... and a church service on Sunday morning, I headed up to the Toby Carvery (or, the Carby Tovery) for a Christmas lunch with my Lovelies. And mighty glorious it was too. The best pre-Christmas send-off I could have asked for.

{Photo by Jos}

{Photo by Jos}

With big thanks to Jos, Charlie, Fern, Ken, Al, Amber, Finn, Steve and Keira for rocking up and being superb. And to Jos & Charlie for the magnificent giftage. And again to Jos for taking decent photos when I once again managed not to!

Singing | in our annual Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols

{St Matthew's Christmas Tree looking a bit splendid}

Perhaps it's because this year has flown by (cliché cliché ... writer flagellates self for use of patently overused expression), perhaps because the weather is so g'dawful and limp, and not wintry at all (Honey, I Broke the Planet) -- or perhaps because we felt 'mildly' under-rehearsed -- most likely the latter -- but I was certainly not ready for it to be NL&C time again!

That said, I think we got through it. At the very least we mastered the trickiest of the carols, Bethlehem Down, thanks in part to the recordings I found on soundcloud that broke down the music part by part. (#humblebrag)

When done properly, it should sound a lil' bit like this:

And I was certainly feeling a lot more festive by the end of the service.

Well, I ought to keep back a few details of this week for the next post (whenever I have time/inclination to put it up -- Homestead Time is not the same as QB Heights Time so I'm afraid I can't promise a day on which the Summary will reappear ... I'm struggling enough to carve out time to spend on Pinterest and to hunt gifs for this post while not bleeding the house wifi completely dry) so that will be more or less it this week except for, of course:

Pinterest Pin of the Week

Weekly Web Finds ...

... will have to wait until I find more things on t'web worth sharing.


So it just remains for me to wish all my lovely readers, you FOQs, you, a Merry Christmas. May it bring you all you hope for. Thank you for your continued readership and support this year. You've been epic.

qb xx

Sunday... oh, wait, no, it's Monday... Summary

In a slight change to the belatedly published programme, I have decided to recount my week using the medium of interpretive dance as channelled through this awesome squirrel:

No? Nope, that's not going to work.

This week, then, I have been mostly...

Designing Wrapping Paper

{via webstagram}

which, while being quirky and individual, was time-consuming and ergo not sufficient for the ensuing task of:

Wrapping Christmas Presents

{Disclaimer: I do not own, nor have I bought for anyone, a cat. I just found this gif amusing.}

Singing in our Nine Lessons and Carols Service

Our Nine Lessons and Carols Service takes place on the last Sunday before Christmas, and is an atmospheric candlelit service of carols and read lessons telling the Christmas story. I'm in the robed choir, and between the congregational carols and readings we sing selected anthems. This year's selection:

Break Forth, O Beauteous Heavenly Light | Bach {unaccompanied}
Adam Lay Y Bounden | Setchell {unaccompanied}
A Tender Shoot | Bartholomew/Goldschmidt
On Christmas Night All Christians Sing | Ledger arrangement
In Dulci Jubilo | Archer arrangement
Christmas Lullaby | John Rutter
The Coventry Carol | Shaw arrangement {unaccompanied}
On this Day Earth shall Ring | Hylton C Stewart arrangement

It all went well, I thought, with the exception of the final piece, above, which we hadn't rehearsed in weeks... Anyway.

Almost-full playlist {albeit not sung by my choir!} here on Spotify:

Celebrating Christmas with Kith and Kin (and Kolleagues)

As a little treat to celebrate Friday being many of our last day in the office, my team and our friends in Sales threw a cheeky little champagne brunch complete with smoked salmon, blinis (not Bellinis), crackers, mini cheesecakes... and Prosecco + OJ Bucks Fizz. 'Twas a veritable feast. Hic.

{this is a visual representation, not the real meal...}

We then proceeded to the most local pub (which smelled ever so slightly like sulphur until the reasonably cheap wine numbed our nasal passages) for an afternoon of libation and revelry.

And Christmas jumpers.

Monitoring my Zzzzs... | with Sleepbot

A couple of weeks ago I spied a blog link by Joanna Goddard of A CUP OF JO on a sleep-monitoring app she's been looking to try (Sleep Cycle) -- this app isn't available yet for Android devices but I was fascinated by the mechanics so I downloaded a free, decent equivalent: Sleepbot.

How it works: Sleepbot records and monitors your movement and sound patterns when you place your phone beside you in bed. (Admittedly this is a questionable practice if you suspect that mobile phones do untold damage to our brains while in close proximity...) It wakes you up at your designated time if you need to wake with an alarm (so, very much like an alarm clock then!!), and records your hours of actual sleep and tallies this up to your required hours and tells you your nightly sleep debt.

{screengrab from online Sleepbot account}

I sleep alone (well, if you don't count the lavender-scented Bagpuss heat pillow as company...) but always wondered if a) I snored b) I sleeptalked and c) I really thrashed around in my sleep as much as my twisted duvet of a morning would indicate. Sleepbot will tell you this.

{via Google Play}

This is probably of no interest to anyone but me but the app revealed that, incidentally, a) no, b) not usually* and c) not especially.

I say not usually... one recording last week featured a whispered voice at about 4am that only sounds a little bit like mine... Spooky.

Rewatching | Pitch Perfect

Not a Christmas film by any stretch (unless you, like me, are able to draw parallels with the choir politics around this time o' year...). I love Rebel Wilson in this. (And in Bridesmaids.)

Mermaid dancing, that's a thing. Yep.

Other gems found on the internet (not always by me -- workmates Evie and Nick are also solid contributors!):

The Santa brand book -- keeping Christmas on-brand

10 common Christmas card dilemmas

What does the X in Xmas symbolise?

Bilbo Baggins is a girl -- redefining gender in popular literature

Rediscovered this great article in my Evernote archives -- Why YA isn't taken seriously

10 bizarre items found in cool offices (a slide and a plastic llama would definitely make me more productive)

Michael Morpurgo to be Booktrust President -- yay!

I think this has been kicking around on the internet for a while but still: Dad illustrates the bizarre things he says to his children

That's all for now -- so it just remains for me to wish you a very QUIRKY CHRISTMAS, reader(s)!

xxx