Drunken ramblings. Never ramble when drunk - fall over. And snow. Lots of snow.

OK, a confession. 

We were given a bottle of stuff last year.  Was it last year?  Hang on, where are we now?  No, not last last year, another year.  Different one.  Anyhow, it was a year, fairly sure about that, it had days in it and everything.  Were given a thing.  Bottle.  Yes. Bottle.  And in the bottle was stuff, and told not to open until Christmas last year (that’s proper last year, not the other last year).

We have just opened it.  We’ve forgotten what it was.  It’s a vodka bottle, so might be vodka, and has small black things floating in it.  Like rabbit pooh, but if there is market for Rabbit Pooh Vodka have yet to hear of it.  Anyway.  Is big bottle of purple stuff  with black things in.  We opened it and tasted it, and it tastes not unlike cough syrup, in fact, almost exactly like cough syrup with pooh in.  We are drinking it with lemonade, which makes it taste like cough syrup with bubbles in, but no-one’s face has fallen off yet, although there are several cases of dispossessed legs.  It’s nice, obviously, because we’ve drunk half the bottle, just wish could remember what it is! 

Newsflash.  Have just tried to eat one of the small black things.  They are incredibly hard, so not rabbit pooh, unless rabbit terminally constipated.  Popular concensus says is probably sloes, but is going very fast for something slow...

In other news, it snowed.  Of course, prodigious consumption of purple stuff made this no problem and many giggly walks were undertaken.  Here are some pictures.  Look at them while I go for nice lie down.

Tiggy.  Not a husky, unless huskies have v v short legs.

My house is up there. Somewhere. No, not in trees, am not Tarzan...

My neighbours.  Lovely and quiet, never have wild parties or anything.

 I love you all, did I say that? All of you...  And now, I’m going to sing.

Editing in process - please leave quietly...

Hello.  I'm just popping by to give you a tiny one today, because I'm knee-deep in editing.  And snow.

The two bear a surprising resemblance to one another sometimes, don't you think?  There is a lot of wading and swearing and numbness, although editing rarely makes my socks wet.  A limited amount of shovelling may also take place, but this is down to personal preference.  This is my snow:-

That's Roseberry Topping there, in the background.  And Big Black Dog, who belongs to TMMQ in the foreground.  And a road, but you didn't need to know that, did you?

And this is what I'm editing:-

And I'm nearly through with the first pass, so, if you'll excuse me, I have to go and shovel...

Brian Cox is not a Fair Isle zombie. And how I emptied the well of metaphors.

Ah.  There you are.  I should warn you that I'm a little low on words today, I've been writing quite a lot lately and I've used most of the words that were in my head, so I'm pretty much left with trying to build a blog out of those that are left.  So, serendipity boo to you all, trouser taser hafting raspberries.

Those were the words that were left - I didn't say they'd make any sense....

You may ask, as indeed you are expected to, 'Why, Jane, are you so low on words, oh you who usually have the vocabulary of a pocket dictionary, if the pocket concerned is quite small and mostly full of tissues, rather sticky Wether's Originals and inexplicably acquired rubber bands?'  And that is a good question, to which I shall attempt to give a good answer.

I am having an attack of zombies.  Also, a tussle with astrophysics.  For I am working on two books at once, the zombies are in the sequel to Vampire State of Mind and the astrophysics are a completely new and different book, and I am having to work hard to make sure the two do not become confused, particularly since part of my research for the astrophysics consisted of watching Brian Cox.  Loveleh, loveleh Brian, to who I must report that I have warmed considerably.

Should you not know, Brian Cox is an astrophysicist, who does a lot of televisual staring at the sky and telling us that that universe is 'loveleh'.  Brian Cox is NOT  a zombie.  Although, thinking about it, it would  make sense, I mean, the man never appears to age, seems to have a lot of teeth, and always looks a bit glossy, as one would if one was largely held together by UHU and a PVA wash.  But still, he isn't. 

I know, annoying, isn't it?

Anyway.  I have been sitting here pounding away, pouring words onto the paper like..err...like a poury thing, pouring something all over something else. Because, along with ordinary words I am also completely out of similes and metaphors.  I can just about manage a small alliteration if I take a really rather random run at it, and don't talk to me in your clanging, skittering way about onomatopoeia!  I am, if I can explain figuratively, trying to knit two complicated sweaters simultaneously, one is an Arran, with lots of twists and turns and fiddly bits where you have to take some behind and knit it there, and the other one is one of those Swedish Serial Killer jumpers with the Fair Isle patterns across the chest and you have to keep changing colours and making sure that your diamonds have really pointy tips.

Arran.  Fiddly.

Fair Isle.  Also fiddly.

And should I get the two confused... well, everyone would receive interestingly knitted Christmas presents, shockingly patterned but fascinatingly tactile. And I would set some kind of new genre, Astrophysicist Zombies.

Loveleh, loveleh brains....

Happy New Year - mind the strange smell and watch out for the pins. Also cellophane.

Welcome to the new series of digits! Apparently this is the first time in..ooh, ages, that all the four digits have been different - amazing, eh?  I have to admit that I'm not good with numbers, to the extent that when I read out a phone number I'm fine up to about three digits in, and then I just start making mouth noises.."oh one nine oh flap budget, twibble argh drool crumb neap" is my son's phone number, apparently.

Anyway.  This new series of numbers is supposed to herald a new beginning! Not just of the year, but we are popularly called upon to make a new start on things when a new year rolls around.  Fortunately I've got wise to the whole thing now, and I can spot a new year coming from months away.  Around about October I start planning new things, getting them in order and lined up ready to go, so that, in January, I can start doing them - this is a cunning plan that you may wish to adopt for your own use.  It fulfills that need to begin new things without them actually being so new that they are alarming and shiny and all stiff and crackly as new things tend to be.  Also full of pins, or is that just shirts?

It looked far too new.  Honestly.  Needed...testing, yes, testing, to check that it was going to be all right.

I do the same thing with years.  I've been breaking in 2013 since last August. New things tend to have a distressing tendency to be a bit strange - they smell weird for a start, normally of cellophane and glue, if you don't believe me just go and have a sniff of that thing you got for Christmas that you haven't got round to unpacking yet.  Go on, I'll wait.

See?  Cellophane and glue.  And sort of stiff round the edges.  So, new years need a bit of wearing in, roughening up, to make them nice and floppy and user-friendly.  I'm sure that 2013, once we get a bit of wear on it, will be just fine.  By the time we can bend it in half we will be perfectly comfortable using it, unfortunately this tends to happen around about November, so you may wish to adopt my habit of starting to use a new year in the summer months of the previous year, you know, at a time when it's not absolutely essential that you use it, so that you can just use it occasionally.  Maybe, say, one day a week.  Then you can begin to use it more and more often, so that, by the time you have to use it, it's nice and broken in and comfortable.

Hang on.  I might be thinking about slippers.  Oh well, never mind, the same principle holds true, if you save things for 'best' you only have yourself to blame if they are uncomfortable when you actually come to use them.  In fact, I'm going to start breaking in several years at once now, just so that they've lost that 'new' smell by the time I need them, so...

HAPPY 2013, 2014 and 2015, everyone!  And if you like, you can start unpacking 2016 and giving it a bit of a wiggle to loosen its digits - you'll thank me in the end...