Tear in your hand

I’ve been busy. I’ve found throwing myself into bookcrossing and reading and house hunting helps to distract myself from the fact that things are getting steadily worse in this country at the moment. I think if I thought about it for too long, I’d lose the will to get out of bed in the mornings. I think there’s been a small victory for the terrorists, frankly, in the shooting of Jean Charles de Menezes , judging by the reaction of some people (in that, well, it’s sad but necessary in this day and age). I don’t blame those that pulled the trigger, I’m sure it was a tough decision to make and they themselves are damned if they do, damned if they don’t. But I do blame the ‘higher forces’ in this, the intelligence for example. Plus, if he was such a threat, why was he allowed on the bus, given that this month there have been two separate incidents on a bus. And who can blame him for running? If I was in Stockwell, being followed by men with guns, I’d bloody run as well. The whole thing leaves a nasty taste in the mouth.

Anyway, I’ve been distracting myself. Following the success of the bookcrossing UnCon at the beginning of the month, I volunteered myself for the committee for next year, and was ‘hired’. So far, so good. Ask me in 10 months time whether I’m regretting it though. I’ve also been looking at ways to promote bookcrossing in the Newcastle area and hope to have set up an OBCZ (a permanent shelf in a cafe or similar for bookswapping purposes, for those that don’t know) over the summer. I’ve also slowly been working my way through the 25 books I brought back with me from Birmingham.

What else? Did I mention house hunting? Yes, we’re moving. Well, not any time soon, but we’re looking to buy a house all of our own. The market is starting to drop little by little and with Duncan’s new permanent job, we now have the means to get a mortgage. I went to a well-known mortgage company last night who ended up declining us for a mortgage due to my bad credit. But it’s all good, as Duncan earns enough on his own to get us the kind of mortgage we were looking for anyway and we now have an offer of a mortgage with them, we just need a house. I’ve been trawling websites for the last couple of weeks and we’ve seen one or two possibilities. There’s no rush, we have a contract on our flat until my birthday in January, but if we want to sort something out before Christmas, now is probably the time to get shifting on this. It’s been fun so far.

I’ve also been very good and dieting away on Slimming World. I have all the books and have been doing it from home, without going to the meetings. I’ve so far lost 6 lbs in the last 4 weeks. I’m hoping that dropping at least 20 pounds more will lead to big changes with my pcos and negate the need for infertility tests and treatment. In addition, I’ve signed up for this Generations Breast cancer study and have been filling in questionnaires and have to have blood drawn next week.

I was told, before the wedding, that afterwards, brides have been known to have post-wedding blues because there’s nothing to do, nothing to plan. I’m certainly planning more now than I was then, I don’t have time to be down.

Until there is a next time…

xx