Once again time has passed.. it is now New Year's Eve and I am back at work..... Christmas was excellent, had a lovely time, it was very quiet fairly non-alcoholic but lovely nevertheless!

It is now a week before Christmas.. and I haven't written anything for ages... Probably because I have been away for a long weekend and been having an absolutely lovely time in the best of company..... now back at home/work and feel a little alone and deflated today...... can't all be up there on some happy smiling little bubble all the time I suppose....... but my god it has been a lovely bubble indeed! So I have been to see ART, the play, Harry Potter (2) and buzzed around London on the back of a little scooter which is certainly an excellent way to see and travel around the place. Lovely to do all this stuff but it was the company that really counted, Pete , many many thanks for making me smile so much! So, lots to write about but feeling extremely tired this afternoon. Also saw 'Wit' last night on the TV with Emma Thompson, which was an excellent film.... oddly reminded me of ivansxtc in that it dealt with death in such a matter of fact, 'lets deal with the realities of this thing' sort of way. It was very very good, although James phoned just at the end when Donne's final stanza was being spoken, so I missed the last and most utterly poignant moment that the whole production had built up to. But it was nice to hear from you James, its been weeks mate!! Oh yes another point.. anyone any good suggestions for New Year??? Pete is away skiing with his children and I would love to be able to get out...... Neela? Any suggestions????

So much has happened in the last three weeks really that it is difficult to accept any of it as reality. Last night I cooked a meal for my two sons, nothing unusual in that but everything has changed... Josh is now living in Cambridge with Hayley a very pleasant girl who I met for the first time last night.... I realise that this might not seem at all unusual .. parents meet their children's boyfriends/girlfriends all the time.. but I have never met any of Josh's ever!! Last night was the first time he brought someone home and he is 22 next month!! Weird, does this say something about how crap we are at relationships in this family I wonder??? hmmmm

You know how we can trudge on in life with an image of self, an idea of the sort of person we are and then something happens and it just makes you aware of how others see you?? Maybe that's what happened last night and is happening with the new relationship I am in with Pete... I am becoming aware of my incessant self absorption! This blog is a fine example of it indeed! I have become aware that I want to tell my story first, that I reply to text messages with stuff about what I am doing rather than with questions about 'the other'... that I dont even really listen to others stories about their lives. I must work on this as I really truely thought I was quite a caring person, that I was anything other than selfish but ummmmm no I am embarrassed to say I am as self absorbed as I accused Fabian of being. At least he was aware of his failings!! So! onwards in a self improving way .. how are you today?? I would love to hear from you about your stories/ adventures/ dreams /desires/ or even of the mundane stuff of life, the little details.......

There is other good stuff happening too.... Jake last night said he plans to be a bar manager within 3 years and I have never before heard him utter anything like an ambition !

and Pete is utterly sweet!

It's a good day today, no sign of a grey blanket anywhere! and the most important news is my eldest, Josh, has got a flat here in Cambridge. He already has the keys so is spending the next couple of days sorting his stuff and moving. The weird thing is his girlfriend is moving in with him and I still haven't met her! I presume I will though very soon!

Had a night out with the girls last night, wobbled home on the bicycle convinced I could ride perfectly normally! Ha! Pleasant evening....

Isn't it weird that you never know when the last time you sleep with someone it is the last time... only hindsight gives that sort of knowledge...

Thoughts on a sunday morning, on a very grey day....

Have had a week where, for a couple of days, I felt the Grey Blanket descend over my head and give the world a nondescript and uninteresting hue. This happens every once in a while and generally I look back and realise it is all to do with hormones. That there seems little I can do about it, it is just the way I am. But who am ? Where is the sense of continous self within those two days a month? Am I a different 'me', I certainly see the world very differently. Chemical imbalance creating a different persona, but are they both 'me'? So I was just pondering further... lets suspend disbelief for a brief moment and just suppose the idea of heaven to be a reality... what if I died on one of those pre-menstrual days and, by some stretch of the imagination, qualified for a place in heaven, would I spend the rest of eternity in a blue funk wandering around with the proverbial Grey Blanket over my head forever??????????????? Grey thoughts indeed......