The F Words

Faux-Fight Flashmob = Foamy Festival Frivolity

This is what happens when a hoop troupe, plus loco local ladies, plot a slapstick flash-mob for Stan Laurel's birthday...  (Click me!)

Tis the Season...

... to receive postcards, fa la la la la, la la la laaaaaaaa.

And this week's top postcard tips?

1) Did that postcard you sent from Canada never reach its destination?  Simply write out and send a replacement when back home pretending you are still on holiday.  Enjoy momentarily reliving your travel experience, and know that the recipient will be even more impressed by your efforts / the joy of unexpectedness.  Happy trails!
2) Can't decide which of the many available postcard designs would best express your holiday experience?  Why not send them all?!  In an envelope!  With a single stamp!  Genius.

High on a Hill

Here follows a tale about a girl's first mountain.
*spoiler alert* It's really a tale about the importance of expressing gratitude and empowering others. 

Eight years ago I was a risk-averse city girl who had never been up a mountain.
But then I was lucky enough to encounter one of those rare and special people - the kind that seem to know you better than you know yourself, and who use this power for good not evil.  The good, in this case, being:  getting me to scramble up to the top of Jack's Rake in the Langdales by telling a small, well directed fib about the difficulty of said scramble.

On reaching my first ever summit, feeling euphoric and leaping around singing "The hills are aliiiive.....", I discovered three things about myself:  1) I love mountains, 2) I'm not too shabby at scrambling and 3) I'm waaaay too trusting of people who say that something's 'really easy'...

Nowadays I'm a risk-averse country girl who has been up a variety of mountains.  Last week, for the first time since the first time, I went back up Jack's Rake, and I realised three different things:
1) Sometimes, people do and say small kind things without realising how profoundly these things empower and enrich the lives of others.
2) When this happens to us, sometimes we barely even acknowledge it ourselves, let alone express the due gratitude.
3) My knees may not be as reliable as they were, but I can still shimmy up a near vertical crack in a rock.

Because someone believed in me on one day eight years ago, I have since had some of the best days of my life out walking in the hills.

Wouldn't the world be a lovelier place if we all thought a bit more about what other people have unknowingly done for us, and said 'thank you'? And how great would it be to be on the receiving end, to know that you've somehow done some good for another person just by being yourself?

So I challenge you (and myself obviously, we're all in this together) to pay a bit more attention to the simple yet wonderful things that people do; to express genuine gratitude; to aspire to be a positive influence on someone's life; and to always show ecstatic appreciation of mountain tops by imitating Julie Andrews.  Or yodeling.

And I'll take this opportunity to say a massive thank you to my amazing walking buddy for (amongst countless other kindnesses) holding my banana...

*Guest Artist Corner* #5 Go Go Go Cher Tortoise!

Another successful game-a-thon from Cher Tortoise - raising some spends for Mind, a charity very close to my heart:

(Do you think if I big up the next event enough I might actually get a mention under 'Here are some cool things' on Cher's website?  Or is it just deeply uncool to aspire to coolness?)

*Guest Artist Corner* #4 Banan-ER

This is what happens when you give banana inspiration to a medic:  Emergency Room suture practice!
(With massive thanks and respect to Dr C.)

#6 Bananarama

When it comes to food, I love a bit of anthropomorphism.  Given the chance, I will draw a face* on anything.  ANYTHING.** 
I could write something deep and meaningful here about how and why the human mind is programmed to recognise faces in inanimate objects, why it gives us comfort to humanise the things around us. 
Or I could just show you some photos of bananas instead!

So this month I have mostly been 'banana bombing'.


Beach Banana

A homage to the sexy banana lady I left in a cafe in New York.  Sunning her lithe banana body on the rocks, she pouts seductively for the camera.

Bench Banana

It's actually really hard to take photos of bananas on benches, especially when it's sunny and there are loads of mums and toddlers around.

Banana Bird

I was visiting my knitted leaves at the Woollen Woods with a wonderful old friend - captured here as a beautiful yellow bird amongst the branches.

Banana Drama!!

Mr Banana, nooooooo - don't fall off the cliff into the raging waterfall below !!

Banana Llama Alpaca

It's okay kids, he survived.  Only to encounter a deadly alpaca herd!!  Run for your life Mr Banana!!

Bonus Banana

Some careless picnickers had left a bare banana hidden at the bottom of a tree!  I took the liberty of livening him up a bit.

Today's post has been brought to you by the letter B, and the colour yellow.  Tune in next week to see what happens when I buy too many courgettes at the grocers.

*If you're lucky, it's a face.
**Seriously, don't leave me unattended with a pen.  Even a Miss Bic.

Find Three More Things

Here are today's hidden treasures from my rambly ramble around the woods and hills:

1) Hedge Milk!

 

2) Bat Cap!

3) The Key to Someone's Heart?

And I found a sound too, but took a picture of it...

*What trees sound like when they kiss*

(I was startled by a loud smoochy sound whilst getting lost in some bluebell woods.  It took me a while to realise that it was the sound of two intertwined branches of this tree creaking as they rubbed up against each other in the breeze.  Beautiful.)

#5d Cards Within... erm...Eggs

After seeing her handiwork last month, mum's other half wanted to get in on the 'cards within cards' action himself.  So I spied an opportunity and slipped a sneaky postcard into his Easter egg...

Here's what landed on my doormat this week, to much delight and chortling:

A thousand words paint a picture, especially when written in such lovely handwriting!
Thank you!

#5c Cards within Cards

Hidden inside a Mothers' Day package.  Returned to a grateful sender as follows (thanks mum!)...

WTF Wyoming!?

Saturday it rained.  I needed some excitement.  Time for a second round of some coin flippin' road trippin'...

I found I had misplaced my trusty Canadian coin, but lo - a US quarter from the state of Wyoming would fit the bill perfectly in its stead.

We set off with a toss limit* of 32 and some general rules about directions, and were immediately plunged into full-on rurality by this dastardly little coin.  It is very hard even to toss double figures when you're on a narrow country lane with no turn-offs** for (country) miles.  By toss 13, and having already been led into 2 dead ends, I had had enough of Wyoming's tricks and just wanted some lunch!

All the best rules are made to be broken.  I could see that this coin was going to lead us, literally, up the garden path, so we decided to stop it in its tracks and head for the nearest place serving food in the vicinity.
As luck would (sometimes) have it, we stumbled into an exceedingly local food festival being held in a village hall!  Anyone for a sample of smoked sausage?

*phnar
**turns-off?

Find Three Things...

Here's a challenge to sharpen your awareness next time you're out and about.
Find and record three things you didn't expect.  They could be sights, sounds, smells, tastes, or, erm, feels.
Here are my three unexpected sights from a walk last week.  They're pretty boring though, so I'm going to challenge myself to do better next time...

"It's so hipster I could die"

Danke für meine Postkarte aus Berlin!

Even Rocky Had a Montage...

This month has been crammed so full of doing stuff, I've not had a moment to sit down and write about it!

So I will try and entertain you with my exploits in this concise summary.

Gatecrashing Ted X

Much as I love living in a charming and occasionally bohemian semi-rural utopia, it requires extra effort to remain at the bleeding edge of modern thinking.  So I keep up to speed with a regular dose of TED.

Imagine my delight then when I was offered a pair of free tickets a real-life TEDx event in the city!  For those of you with no imagination:  I was highly delighted.

(Okay so I didn't really gatecrash.  But we did arrive late and sneak in at the break to claim some good seats.)

Postcard, Postcard

Hurrah - a doormat surprise from a travelling art-physics-ist, and a return of a card requesting some art, done on the wrong side of the card no less (a true maverick).

Experimental Craftiness

This is where the leaves go when they leave...  And I also had a stab at a new thing - felting a bird!

Road Trip Wedding

So whaddaya gonna do when you get a wedding invitation from someone you haven't seen in almost a decade, for a weekday wedding on the other side of the country...?

ROAD TRIP!!!

Despite knowing absolutely nobody except the groom, I hit the M6 at silly o clock with my plus one, and after the inevitable satnav mishap, dashed into the venue at the last minute trailing suitcases and respectable frocks on hangers.  Richard Curtis eat your heart out.  What a deliciously perfect wedding it was!  I even almost cried!  Ah love love love, tis a wonderful thing.

Oh yeah then I accidentally set fire to the menu at dinner.  But destruction karma being as it is, I also got my windscreen smashed by a rogue golf ball / base jumping pheasant.  Swings and roundabouts innit.

Why Don't You Write Me Bristol?

Aspiring guerrilla artists in the Bristol area - look out for my hidden postcard please and tell me a bit about yourself.  Just a bit mind, data protection and all that...  Here's a clue:

  

Bloody love Bristol...

Some selected holiday snaps...

Always fade out in a montage

If you fade out, it seems like more time has passed in a montage...  montage...

And the award for the most creative way to return a borrowed pen goes to...

...Mr Skimble Shanks, for this little beauty that further brightened up my already bright day!

Take one borrowed Miss Bic for Her* biro, and cunningly disguise it in a padded envelope sent from Singapore, complete with customs declaration marks.  Make and print a fake label with the pen owner's work address, and attach to the front of the envelope.  Put this envelope inside a company internal mail envelope and send to the pen owner...

Maybe it's just cos it's Friday, but I was tickled pink to receive this surprise foreign package at work.
(I was also very glad to get my pen back, as my other one has just run out**.)

Thank you! 

*Other gender-specific writing implements are probably not available.
**As a woman, I can't be trusted with more than one pen at a time.

*Guest Artist Corner*#3 (or "Oh yes he did...")

So last year my Partner-in-Crime decided to write a pantomime script, as you do...

I'm very proud to say that not only did he write possibly* the best pantomime script EVER, but I had the privilege to act in it alongside some of the loveliest and talented people you could ever meet. 

The whole thing was so joy-inducing it makes me want to be in panto forever!
Thank you thank you thank you, everyone**. 

* Disclaimer: I've not actually read that many panto scripts.
**Including the little boy who said that the Page (me) was his favourite character, because of being so happy all the time!  Bless! 

My friend went to BETT...

My doormat has been disappointingly empty of late...  so let's hear it for the company internal mail system!

Here's a lovely surprise I received in a big shiny orange envelope, courtesy of fellow blogger and all round top bloke Mike:

A musing on mail:
Maybe the use of superfluous postal admin (Mike works just downstairs) adds to the excitement of both sending and receiving something.  Why hand-deliver a birthday card, say, when you can pay the Royal Mail 60p to do it for you in secret?  Does the added risk that it may never get there, or at least on time, make the whole thing a bit more of an adventure?  And does the recipient feel a bit happier knowing that someone has gone to the extra trouble of formal postage?

A New Leaf

The new year brings new experimentality in an unlikely guise...  KNITTING!

I entered into a friendly challenge: learn to knit (from scratch) in 2014. 

I was going to leave it until later in the year, but then a late night text message from my friend / challenge opponent ("I'm knitting!" said she!) nudged at some dormant competitive streak within my psyche.  Oh yes, I thought.  It is ON!  I went out and got me some 4 mm needles and a ball of double knit that very next morning.

I never knew I could get so addicted.  I have shown more perseverance in teaching myself to knit than with most of my past relationships.  I have calmly unravelled bad row after bad row, and just cast those stitches back on again and again, never once feeling the bite of frustration or temptation to give up.  After all this time I have found the thing to teach me patience, that most elusive of virtues!

Serendipitously, I stumbled across a beautiful local art project (Canopy) requiring knitted submissions by April.  So I upped my game from 'knit one purl one', and have been knitting my first leaves to hang in the woods!

I'll update you on my progress throughout the year.

Retrospective Resolutions

This post has been exactly 1 year in the making...

At the tail end of 2012, my friend and I were discussing potential New Year's Resolutions for 2013, and she told me about an idea she'd heard about as an experimental alternative.  Instead of setting yourself goals for the year ahead, the aim was just to live life as it happened and write down on a bit of paper every good (but unanticipated) experience that you ended up having, and put the bit of paper in a jar.  Then at the end of the year you can see all the things you never resolved to achieve but did anyway.  We decided to give it a go...

Undeterred by the lack of an actual jar (I used a broken mug with a plastic lid instead, y'know just to keep it real), I got the year off to a good start with some spontaneous and serendipitous midnight morris dancing, so into the jar mug went my first 'resolution'...

I hadn't expected to fill up the jar.  In fact I had no expectations at all of how my year was going to pan out, which left me wide open to grab all the adventures that would come my way.  The beauty of this challenge is that it forces you to notice everything you do that makes you feel something, which in itself amplifies that feeling.  Note by note my year progressed, and my cup ranneth over...

Last night I emptied my mug and read every single note I'd put in there.  There were at least 10 notes for each month of the year, and for some months I wondered how I'd ever got any sleep as they were so jam packed with experiences.  And I remembered every single experience, because I'd actually taken notice of it at the time, and reading these little reminders made me feel it all over again.

I am overwhelmed with gratitude to all the people mentioned on my notes - you know who you are.  Chances are, if you're reading this you'll be one of them.  I only hope I've done my job right and brought some joy to your 2013 too, or that you at least know how much I've valued your company.

Happy Old Year my friends, and let 2014's adventures commence!