1. Happy birthday to the wonderful glitterboy1 and happy belated birthday to the lovely felinitykat! You both rock.

2. It's sunny again! And I am in work, trying to write a very silly article, even though I would prefer to be outside. On Saturday Patsington and I went on our first safari to the rural lane on the other side of the park in nearly a year. The sun was shining, there were beautiful birds everywhere, the fields were full of flowers, and in the ruined 18th century churchyard at the end of the lane was a horse and a (fairly newborn) foal, one of the cutest little things I've ever seen. It was a scene of rustic bliss.

3. Ever since I devoured them all on my honeymoon, I have been meaning to post about the genius of Philip Reeve and his magnificent Mortal Engines quartet. They're possibly the most well-realised feat of the imagination I've ever encountered in fiction - he's created that rare thing, an utterly original fictional world, in which most of the world lives by the principles of "Municipal Darwinism" in giant moving "traction cities" that consume smaller towns. The story races along, Reeve deals with big questions of morality and social justice and memory and what makes us human in an intelligent and thought-provoking way, and, most of all, the characters are complex and real. Amoral, messed-up Hester is one of the greatest anti-heroines ever. And the books are incrediby moving; just thinking of one scene at the end of the last book makes me tear up. In short: read them. And wonder why the hell Philip Pullman's pompous Dark Materials are heralded as works of genius and these book's aren't.

4. Patsington was interviewing gideondefoe on the phone this morning and had to stop the interview for a minute or two because a shouting, puffed-up Ju Ju was having a fight with the identical young cats known to us only as The Twins in the front garden and had to be rescued. We are a very professional journo household. BTW, the new Pirates! book is hilarious.

5. You know when a book looks like it'll be really entertaining and then just...isn't? Take Anna Godbersen's The Luxe. Gossip Girl meets Edith Wharton! It should be so awesome! And yet, it's not, mostly because the author can't write. Bah. Also, check out the "Luxe in the 21st Century" section of the website (it's under Extras). I weep for the future.

Hello, I'm emerging out of the ether again. Remember the days when I posted all the time? Sigh. Anyway, anglaisepaon and starfishchick say five things make a post, and I think I can manage that.

1. We had almost a week of gorgeous summer and now it's lashing rain again. Oh cruel Irish weather, why must you taunt me so? If last summer is anything to go by, this manky weather will continue for the next year, so I suppose I should get used to it (as if the last 32 years wasn't enough time to get used to this country's horrible dampness). Last weekend's weather was ridiculously nice, and against all expectations it even lasted into the bank holiday Monday and, well, most of the week, which I had to spend cooped up in an office, but at least I got to lie out in the park at lunchtime. Oh God, it's thundering now. Brilliant.

2. The current series of Doctor Who is pretty great (I hope you've all been reading my recaps over on Pop Vultures), as is the increasingly deranged Battlestar Galactica. Last night Patsington and I caught up on the last three episodes of 30 Rock. God, I love Tina Fey. I MUST snag an interview with her to tie in with the European release of Baby Mama. By the way, can anyone think of another female TV character who, like Liz Lemon, is depicted looking scruffy and speccy sometimes and be-contact-lensed and foxy when she dresses up to go out, in the manner of an actual human being? Especially in a sitcom? Because I can't. Even the funniest sitcom ladies usually look either groomed and sleek or "comically" dowdy most of the time.

3. I just read Persephone's new reissue of Penelope Mortimer's 1958 novel Daddy's Gone A-Hunting. It's enormously readable but VERY bleak, the sort of novel about women's lives that makes me incredibly grateful for feminism. I've wanted to read her stuff since I read Valerie Grove's excellent biography of her onetime husband John last year, and I want to read more, but I think I might have to read something relatively cosy before I start another one, because two novels about despairing, frustrated suburban wives in a row would make me lose my will to live.

4. Lots of wedding guests very kindly gave us cheques as wedding presents, which had been irresponsibly sitting in a box in our kitchen for the last two months, and the other day Patsington finally went through them all and took those that were made out to him to the bank. However, as he discovered when going through them, all the ones from his relatives on his father's side were made out to Patrick and Anna [Patsington's surname] or even, in one case, Mr and Mrs Patrick [Patsington's surname]. He took them to the bank anyway and was told that the other person would have to sign the back of them before they could be lodged. Except that person doesn't exist. Anyway, apparently as a married woman my identity is so vague in the eyes of the banking system that I can actually sign my ACTUAL NAME on the cheques and that is enough. Hmmmmmmm.

5. I adore Coronation Street, but it's been a bit grim lately, apart from the joy that is the wonderful Becky. Actually, the average episode of Corrie is still funnier than a lot of sitcoms, even with upsetting storylines about babies dying, but still. And Silver Street, the radio soap on the BBC Asian Network, is also pretty depressing, what with Zak being unjustly arrested as a suspected terrorist and Fatima's horrific accident. I've got a couple of week's worth of Archers podcasts to catch up on - Lord knows what's been going on there, it seems to be a bad time in soap land. Although I must give a huge, albeit belated, cheer for Pat in The Archers and her wonderful turn in court last month. I almost cheered aloud in the park as I listened to her stand up to the snide prosecuting barrister without ever losing her cool. More uplifting moments like that, please, soap producers.

Remember the days when I used to write regular, normal LJ entries? Sigh. Anyway, I'm emerging from the ether to remind y'all that I'm still alive, albeit very stressed. Here is what I have been doing over the last couple of months/

1. Procrastinating
2. Stressing over wedding preparations
3. Grooving to late-'70s Talking Heads, aka the best music in the world
4. Trying to write a book
5. Kvetching about work
6. Baking bread

Sadly, that's about it. Some day my life will be, if not particularly exciting, than at least unstressful enough to allow me to write regular tedious LJ posts about my freakish feline. Bet you can't wait!

Oh, and here's a very entertaining piece about the decade's most misogynistic films. Enjoy!

1. On Friday my entire immediate family (apart from the one that's in London), along with Patsington and Mr leedy, went for a vast and very enjoyable feast in our favourite Chinese restaurant, where we gorged on twice cooked pork, spicy aubergine and ma po tofu. Yum yum. The most exciting thing about the entire evening, of course, was that I got given lots of PRESENTS, as the Amazon order containing books, CDs and DVDs intended to be part of my Christmas present from my parents and my aunt finally arrived. And contained a Beverly Hills 90210 Season One box set! Oh yeah. I've watched the first three episodes and they are hilarious - even cheesier than I remember, if that's possible. And oh my God, could Brandon be even more of a condescending arse? And could Kelly be dressed any worse? She'll have to try very hard to top the denim cut-off shorts worn over blue polka dot cycling shorts and topped off with a a blue waistcoat. My eyes, my eyes!

2. The evening also included my aunt giving me a belated birthday present of 100 quid and the order to spend it all on "frivolous things". So I took it into town on Saturday and bought lots of lovely cheap clothes, including several little smock dresses from Penneys and H&M, a delightful stripey jumper (H&M) and an even more delightful little black hoodie with fitted, slightly puffed-at-the-top sleeves, covered in faint silver stars (also H&M). And I caved in and finally, months after they made their sneaking return, bought the first pair of leggings to grace my person in about 16 years. I couldn't help it! The reason I was holding out was because it seemed frankly creepy to wear leggings under little frocks, something I last wore aged about 14. But sod it, it looks cute, and my new smocks are delightful. I just don't know how to cope with the freezing cold ankles and feet that will inevitably ensue...

3. Last week Patsington and I took a break from our marathon viewing of the absolutely brilliant Bleak House to watch another Christmas aquisition - the Mighty Boosh live DVD. I was sadly disappointed by the uneven second series but oh my God, the live show is hilarious. The grand climax...with the flying...I don't want to give too much away, but I was crying with laughter. The trailer has some clips...


How I wish they had done the show in Dublin! It worked so well on stage - the musical bits, the sets, the ad-libbing - it was all fabulous. I do love the Boosh. Also, they are both inexplicably hot (especially Noel Fielding. Mmmmmm, Noel Fielding. Who else could pull off a sparkly catsuit like that?). Speaking of whom, did anyone else see him team up with Russell Brand on that Big Fat Quiz of the Year thing on Channel 4 (if not, you can see the entire thing on Youtube)? They were fantastic together! I wish they really would make that show about goth detectives. I'd watch it.

4. Ju Ju's baby wrangling powers are undiminished! We had an infant visitor on Sunday afternoon, a delightful chubby-cheeked nine-month old, who went into literal paroxyms of joy at the sight of the stout feline. Ju Ju was bizarrely serene with baby Rosa, as is apparently and mysteriously her wont when faced with babies, and allowed Rosa to poke and pet her (while being held firmly in my arms). Why do babies bring out this kindly side of Ju Ju? It's a mystery.

BAD THINGS
This month's Observer Woman supplement is a "fashion and lifestyle special". Except, isn't that pretty much what Observer Woman is about every single month anyway? I despair of that rag, I really do. Especially when you add in the hideously offensive and downright classist and racist article about Coleen McLoughlin in the Review section, which is filled with more patronising generalisations about Irish Catholics and the British working class than you'd think possible in a two page piece. Fuck off, Observer.

GOOD THINGS
I went to see Pan's Labyrinth last night and loved it - the perfect blend of truly amazing fantasy and genuinely disturbing gritty reality. The violent bits are, however, very violent; I had my eyes closed and my fingers in my ears during one of the more graphic scenes. But the whole thing is absolutely fantastic and is strongly recommended.

The weather is very wild and wet and blustery and yet I actually prefer it to the usual damp drizzle. There's something exhilarating about more extreme weather. Today at lunch time Patsington and I donned hats, scarves and boots and tramped through the park to the Horse and Hound pub for a (delicious and snug) pub lunch. Afterwards we stomped back again through the deserted park, surrounded by slightly scarily swaying trees. It was so windy I was almost blown off my feet at one stage (Patsington said he was going to have to tie a string to me and fly me like a kite) but oh, it was fun. And then we tumbled in the door and curled up on the couch and watched the Coronation Street omnibus and afterwards I put on Ella Fitzgerald and read a Georgette Heyer mystery (I'd never read her detective novels until recently and they're absolutely brilliant - character driven and very funny but with genuinely clever mystery plots). Blissful.

And it's Advent! It may be many years since I went to Mass every Sunday and I have no desire (or belief in Catholic dogma) to go again, but I must confess I feel a little twinge when I remember the excitement turning up at the Church on the first Sunday of Decemeber and seeing that the first candle of the Advent wreath was alight. But we develop our own Christmassy rituals, and right now my house's one is listening to Sufjan Stevens's fantastic Christmas album box set. So strange and beautiful and somehow really Christmassy.

And finally - is anyone else strangely charmed by the successful Take That comeback? Because I really am. I've always had a soft spot for the That, even though (or perhaps because) my youngest sister was absolutely obsessed with them back in their heyday, meaning that for a while I came home from college almost every evening to find her watching Take That: The Party, Live at Wembley. I always found the lads themselves kind of likeable, and, call it Stockholm syndrome, but quite a few of their songs broke through my indier-than-thou music snobbery, including, of course, the unashamedly great 'Back for Good'. So I'm glad that after all Robbie Williams's sneering, their comeback has been not only a huge commercial hit, but a critical one too - the album is getting good reviews. I won't be buying it, I might add, but I'm weirdly glad that lots of other people are.

Right, back to the couch and Georgette...

Emerging from the tunnel yet again, this time in bullet points, to prove that I am still alive.

1. On Sunday I went to see Talladega Nights. It was not nearly as funny as the glorious Anchorman - the humour was much broader and more obvious. There were a few utterly fantastic lines though. Who doesn't "think of Jesus as a mischieeeeevious badger"? I know I do!

2. We went for a drink afterwards but poor Patsington was shattered and had to go home early. Please spare a thought for Patsington right now, because he is very tired and stressed and overworked. His new album is coming out in a few weeks and he is working himself up into a frenzy about it. But he shouldn't be, because it is fantastic! I think he is expecting an Andy-Millman-in-last-week's Extras scenario, minus the taunting David Bowie...

3. Harper Collins keeps sending me big boxes of books. This sounds good in theory, but the contents are often, shall we say, not to my tastes. Three words: Wayne Rooney Annual. Also lots of appalling new age "how to talk with ghosts via crystals" nonsense. However, on Friday there was a pleasant surprise: a box filled with a lot of decent non-fiction from Harper Perennial, including Robert Fisk's vast new book. There was also an initially unpreposessing box filled with an entire series of trashy fantasy/crime novels by someone called Kim Harrison. I picked one up just to sneer at it and found that while it was indeed very, very trashy, it was actually pretty entertaining. It was rather like I hoped the Anita Blake novels would be, until I tried the first one and discovered that it was so badly written I couldn't get through the first page. Also, unlike Anita Blake, it's not idiotically lurid and graphically violent. Hurrah for entertaining trash!

The most ridiculous thing about this Kim Harrison book, though, is the fact that the author is utterly incapable of writing dialogue for scenes of either romance or conflict. The regular dialogue is perfectly adequate, but in really dramatic scenes, it all goes insanely wrong and people taunt each other with lines like "go stuff a tomato, Nick Nicky!" It reminds me of Russell Brand saying that while of course he has no idea how to fight, when he's been in a potentially violent situation he's found himself using a sort of nonsensical fighting talk in a kind of tough Ray Winstone-esque voice: "do you want to dance round my garden, princess? Do you want to eat my fairycakes?"

Russell Brand's trash talk makes about as much sense as the dialogue in this book.

4. I saw Little Miss Sunshine on Friday, and absolutely loved it. The, um, grand finale made me laugh and cry at the same time. Which was messy.

5. Work is still kicking my arse, as is stressful life in general. Patsington and my dear chums are, as ever, a constant delight. What is not a delight is the bizarre voice used by my colleague at the next desk when on the phone. In real life she speaks perfectly normally and I like her a lot, but her phone voice is this bizarrely sugarly up-and-down voice that seriously makes my skin crawl. OH GOD SHE'S DOING IT AGAIN MAKE IT STOP FOR THE LOVE OF GOD! STOP BEING SO FUCKING PERKY!

6. daegaer, barsine and I competed last night in a table quiz hosted by none other than slovobooks. Alas for us, it was a science fiction/fantasy themed quiz, subjects on which none of us are exactly experts (especially me and barsine). I sent out a desperate call for a fourth team-mate yesterday to no avail, so we competed as a trio. And oh, it was a far cry from barsine's and my gloating triumph in the children's literature table quiz last year. But luckily not every question was on the ostensible theme, and we actually got quite a fair number even of those that were, which allowed us to gloat just a little bit. I even had my usual bizarre "how the hell do I know the answer to this?" moment when I correctly answered a question on cricketing terms (perhaps all those years of reading boys' school stories paid off at last). We were robbed on the flotsam and jetsam question, though. Robbed, I tell you!

7. There was a two-for-one on Penguin Classics on Eason's on Sunday, so Patsington and I got a book each. He chose Machiavelli's The Prince, I chose Earnest Hornung's Raffles: The Amateur Cracksman. So, taking these choices as indicative of our personalities, we can deduce that Patsington wants to be a creepy power-crazed manipulator, and I want to be a gentleman (or woman) thief.

Now, back to work I go...

1. Sun! Sunny garden! My working day consisting of sitting in aforementioned sunny garden reading review books!

2. Getting to interview Julia Quinn (hopefully in the next few days)! I love her books. They are fluffy without being stupid, and unlike many romance novels, they're actually, well, quite romantic. Perfect brain candy.

3. Life on Mars. I missed it when it was on, but daegaer gave me the entire series the other day, and it is so good. Time travel! Comic '70s pastiche! Genuinely exciting crime drama! It's got it all, really. Also, many of the female characters dress rather like I did in college. There was a reason that my style icon back then was Mary Tyler Moore.

4. Did I mention the sun?

5. My mad bag-making skillz. Since learning how to make a bag with a gusset (oh loathsome word), there's been no stopping me (and my sewing machine). I have now made several bags of various sizes, my prefered style being vintage-style printed cotton under a layer of clear oil-cloth. So easy, and yet strangely satisfying. However, I don't really need this many bags. Guess what you're all getting for your birthdays, chums!

6. The Woolen Mills trimmings shop (see above).

7. Patsington's amusing visions of his sister's wedding. She's getting married next year, and Patsington's mother J has, to the surprise of all, turned into a bridezilla-in-mother-form, even though the bride herself does not care about having a big fancy wedding. J, however, does, and the wedding is getting more and more elaborate. Which has become something of an affectionate joke between me and Patsington. For example:
Me: So, what are the latest plans?
Patsington: They're going to be preceded by a swan as they go down the aisle.
Me: Oooh!
Patsington: But the poor swan can't walk very far.
Me: Why?
Patsington: Because of his diamond shoes, of course!

I think he has a bright future as a wedding planner, don't you?

Did you miss me? Or indeed notice that I was gone? Well, I was, in various parts of Galway, since Thursday afternoon. And now I am back. And insanely tired, and hot, and head-achey. And I arrived home to find that Patsington's dad went and painted much of the house when I was away! Which was pretty damn nice of him. So now our bathroom is a gorgeous primrose yellow and our hall, stairs and landing is, well, magnolia, but that's much nicer than the blah off-white it's been for years. Anyway, here are some things I've done since I was last online.

1. Worried about my sister in London, who is fine. Although I have to confess I'm a little freaked about going to London now, which is idiotic of me. I think it's because ever since 9/11, I've been scared something like this would happen in London, possibly while my sibling was on a train, and every single time I've been there since (and I've been over there quite a bit - I went to London the week after 9/11 and, as usual, I've gone over about three times a year every year since) I've been worried about something happening on the Tube. And now it has. Anyway, I'm still going over, of course. And I am planning to take a couple of day trips out of the city, as I'm going to be there for five days - is Cambridge do-able for the day? Or would travelling there and back take too long? I've always wanted to go there, but I have no idea how regular and/or fast buses and trains there are from the city.

2. Speaking Irish. Yes, I went back to my old colaiste samhraidh and had to speak Irish the entire time AS IF I WERE A STUDENT THERE AGAIN. It did come back remarkably quickly, which was rather strange. Without thinking about it, I found myself using words I thought I'd forgotten. I did, however, have a tendency to put in German words, particularly prepositions and expressions like "und so weiter", but that's what not doing Irish since 1993 and doing a four year German degree does for you.

3. Watching Patsington's film receive a very enthusiastic reception in the Shorts section of the Galway Film Fleadh. Hurrah for the bold and triumphant Patsington!

4. Played with the very friendly dogs belonging to our Galway friends and hosts Gugai and Cherie.

5. Nearly fainted from the heat while wandering around my favourite bookshop in the country, Charlie Byrne's. I found a copy of Genius at the Chalet School, and a couple of Gerald Durrell books, but it was relatively slim pickings for Charlie Byrne's. Usually I find books there that I've been seeking in vain for years.

6. Gone to an exhibition of art by a friend of mine and Patsington's. Her stuff is fucking amazing but, alas, very expensive so we couldn't buy any of it. It was an exhibition of stuff by both her and a group of her art mates, and the quality varied widely, but there was one piece I really, really loved and was sorely tempted to buy, as it was in the almost-affordable range (€200). I kept thinking "well, I know I didn't earn very much last month, but it's such an amazing piece and it'll be an investment, and it's not like I don't actually have the money in the bank..." However, while I may have that money in the bank, I certainly can't afford to spend it on one painting, so my art collecting days have not begun.