GLITCH’S BREW #3

Hello everyone, How are you keeping? Me? I’m fine, you know how it is. Can’t complain. As usual it’s been a chequered week here at Glitch Towers. Last week was a total write-off because of various family DRAMAZ, and my head is still all over the place as a result. Usually I spend a good deal of my time daydreaming – I love a good daydream. In fact, I’ve come to think it’s vital to my existence and if I don’t have a chance to do it, it knocks me all out of balance. Happily things are now back to normal-ish, so regular service has just about resumed. It does however, mean I have a backlog of things to daydream about, but I guess that’s family life for you.

Slink Magazine

On Tuesday my printed copy of Slink Magazine arrived in the post. Slink is a rare animal indeed. A magazine aimed at curvy ladies, in which all models featured are a size 12 or above. It was an interesting experience, to pick up a mainstream fashion mag (for that is what this is) and not see the same hungry, hungry eyes staring back at me from those glossy pages. I’m used that little pang of wrong you get when you read one of Those Magazines, so I felt quite pleasantly surprised when it wasn’t there. The models in Slink are all sturdy enough to move a large cabinet up a flight of stairs without needing one of those shiny tinfoil blankets and a saline drip when they reach the top, and d’you know what? I’m probably biased because I’m a bit on the… ahem, curvy side myself, but I think that’s sexy… look!

‘milk, two sugars please love, where do you want the cabinet?’

This is the money issue. It carries lots of pieces about how to manage your moolah, including one by moi, in which I confess that I am utterly hopeless at it all. I hate banks and if I never had to enter one ever again I’d be a very happy woman indeed. Alas, unless somebody important decides we’re all going back to the goat-swapping antics of old, I’m stuffed. So I decided I would just have to grow up and start engaging with my cash even if it does hurt my eyes and my brain a lot. I had some help from a wonderful financial expert called Piper Terrett, so it turned out things weren’t really all that bad. Buy the mag to find out more.

To finish off this Glitch’s Brew I thought I’d feature some retro knitting pattern pics (from my extensive collection), because… well, they’re always worth a giggle.

After 56 minutes, Linda and Keith began to wonder if this game of musical statues was ever going to restart.

One day little sister, everything you see here will be mine. MINE.

Hey you! I remember you! Didn’t we used to hang out?

Gaz was away this weekend on his brother’s eighties-themed stag do in Bognor Regis, of all places. I was reluctant to spend the entire duration working on my book about WWII POWs, so I texted as many female friends as I could dredge up from my contact list, and invited them over for a girls’ night in*. I don’t consider myself lacking in the friendship department. If I’m honest I probably prefer to socialize in mixed groups – more banter, more booze – but I have enough wonderful, witty, gin-swilling girl mates for my liking, maybe not quite enough to form say, a netball team (certainly not a decent one), but enough. At least… that’s what I’ve always assumed.

Now, please don’t mistake this for a whinging post about how all my friends flaked out one night and sent me spiralling into an ever-deepening pit of self-loathing and despair. This is not that. They all had utterly valid reasons for not coming – one had fallen ill, another was at her mum’s 60^th birthday party and another (my sister) was just really really tired after working for six days straight at a residential care home. All Totally Fair Enough. This was not about me (even if, for a minute or two, I sort of felt like it was), it’s just really bloody difficult to maintain proper grown-up IRL friendships these days.

It never used to be like this. Back in my early teens it was all about the pack mentality. We moved around in groups of 4, or 6 (never an odd number, as all teenage girls know, odd numbers spell disaster), like a finely tuned machine. It was like a polygamous marriage, only more intense, with a lot more crying and Torvill and Dean, and many more episodes of Fresh Prince of Bell Air. We knew all of each other’s intimate secrets and harmony parts to Eternal Flame. We shared homework, shopping trips, mix tapes, cigarettes, enemies and toilet cubicles. What’s more, we assumed we always would. I remember looking at my mum and thinking, ‘wow – she seems so me-against-the-world-y, what happened to all her besties?’ Well, now I know: This.

I know what I’m about to say is practically turgid with cliché, but these days, what with work, kids, family, commitments, commitments, commitments, I consider myself lucky if I manage to catch up with my closest mates once or twice a month. Some of my favourite out-of-town friends are so elusive that I actually see my dentist more often. This is all manner of wrong and must change, but how? The (non) events of this weekend have proven that it’s no longer enough just to text and say ‘hiya, want to come over to mine for a drink?’ We have to send over event invitations and compare dates on calendars on fridges for weeks on end before, finally, if we’re lucky, we stumble upon one precious clear-Friday-night-in- October-after-the-kids-have-gone-to-bed-but-before-News-Night-finishes-because-that’s-our-bedtime-because-we-have-to-get –up-at -6.30am-to-make-breakfast-and-put-the-bins-out. Hideous.

From now on, I am going to try and treat my friends like they are members of an ever-dwindling endangered species. I’m not sure exactly how, but I will make them more of a priority. Perhaps, if all else fails, I could take a few into captivity and start a breeding programme. Sure, it would be frowned upon at first, but eventually humanity would come to see the method behind my ‘madness’. After a decade or two, I could begin to release them back into the wild. Before long there would be little thriving colonies of My Friends all over the place, and at least two or three would always be available to drink gin with me, and I would never be lonely ever, ever again.

*I hate the term girls’ night in. It suggests facemasks, pillow fights and Dirty Dancing on DVD. This is unfortunate, because I have no interest in any of those activities. Facemasks are for benders.

GLITCH’S BREW #2

Hello everyone. I bet you thought I wouldn’t remember to do it, didn’t you? Yeah, me too. Anyway this should be quite a colourful Glitch’s Brew because this week I’ve been… well, see for yourself.

I made this fascinator to wear to my Aunty’s wedding in a couple of weeks time. I am in two minds as to whether it’s beautiful or hideous. It was inspired by something I saw in an issue of Molly Makes magazine. I can’t remember who made it (sorry) but it was lush – much prettier than this one. Here’s my version.  I’d love to know what you think.

A while ago I found this vintage quilt in a charity shop for £18.00. It’s unfinished, with newspaper backing and tacking all the way around each hexagon. It’s going to take me ages to finish properly, but I had to have it. Just wait till you see the back…

Each one of these little newspaper hexagons is like a tiny inexplicable snippet of history. I’m not sure I’ll ever want to get rid of them. Through studying them, and the crazy psychedelic patterns obv, I’ve been able to date this quilt to after 1964 and before they banned cigarette advertising in the media.  I know… Miss Marple!

While all this was going on I was also actually working.  I am currently researching a book about Prisoners of War during WWII (yes. random) and, in the course of said research, I stumbled upon this amazing documentary on The Long Walk, courtesy of the blessed BBC Radio 4. If you have a spare 30mins I would really recommend a listen. It will BLOW YOUR MIND.

Alternatively, if you fancy a giggle this is ACE. COOOGAR

FREELANCE

I have dreamt of making my living from writing ever since I was a little girl. Over the years my dream has led me down various paths, more than one of which culminated in some form of humiliation. When I was 10, my work was shortlisted in a national poetry competition run by a major high street brand (I think it was WHSmiths). My elation was unbridled, that is until my headmistress insisted that I stand up in assembly and read both poems in front of the entire school – with accompanying sound effects. I’ve never experienced fear and embarrassment like it, before or since, and it’s really a miracle that I ever picked up a biro again (I am a huge masochist). I never took the chance to thank her for that particular act of kindness. Thanks Mrs Loader. I will forever remember you in my prayers.

When I was 15, when everyone else was under Eastbourne Pier heavy-petting and listening to Cypress Hill, I was busy writing for a community paper for young people called The Generation News, which was run by The Eastbourne Herald and distributed in all the schools in the area. It was around this time that I first smelled a newsroom - intoxicating - the first time I saw my work in print.  Perhaps unsurprisingly for someone who spent their teenage years on work experience, I’ve never dabbled in crack cocaine, but I imagine the feeling you get is something like that. Magical, exhilarating - a proper buzz. Nobody read that paper. I doubt my parents even flicked through the pages. These were, after all, the musings of a bunch of 15-year-old dweebs with bad hair and even worse spelling, but I couldn’t wait to recreate that feeling. I still can’t.

So, (well) over a decade later I am finally taking the plunge and going freelance. I’ve worked in publishing for 7 or so years. I’ve learned that the book trade isn’t all massive advances and evening soirees, and I still LOVE IT (I am a masochist). I’ve been thinking like a freelancer for a long time now – juggling work with kids with magazine writing, but suddenly it’s a reality.  The safety net is gone. GONE. It’s just me, myself and I (and one day probably an accountant – I hate maths). Am I scared? Not as scared as I was that day in assembly, but something approximating it. I wake up and go to bed wondering WILL IT WORK? At 11.30 at night, after another graveyard shift working on a book about… graveyards, I think to myself  ’no, it almost certainly won’t', but then a little bit of sleep can do wonders for your dreams, and the next morning I think ‘maybe, maybe it will.’

Please get in touch through this site if you think I could bring something special to your brand literature. I love a challenge (I am a masochist).

Glitch’s Brew #1

Welcome to the first ever edition of Glitch’s Brew.

‘What in the devil’s name is a Glitch’s Brew?’ I hear you cry! Sounds nasty, doesn’t it? Well, actually it’s really not.

Glitch’s Brew is a new mini feature here on the blog in which I provide you with an infusion (ok, a list) of exactly what’s been going on in my head over the last week or so, what’s caught my attention in good ways and bad, and introduce you to some of the people I’ve had my eye on. Here goes:

Loving…

Crochet rainbows:  They’re little, they’re colourful, they’re cute – I just wish I knew what in God’s name to do with them. Combine them with stars and clouds in a garland of some description (I’m not sure about garlands – they’re a bit too much like bunting for my liking (see below)), or just turn them into one of those funny little cowboy ties – you know the ones I mean. Decisions, decisions.

That Hollyoaks ad: the one in the woods. I hate Hollyoaks (I really really do), but there’s something about this song. It’s called Shut Eye and it’s by Stealing Sheep

The Dainty Squid: Check out this gorgeous blog, and that hair is like… dude!!! I just wish I had the patience to do something like that myself.

Loathing…

Red, White and Bleugh: Union Jacks, bunting, Union Jack bunting. I’ve been having intensely negative feelings about both for some time now, so the last couple of weeks have really been quite a struggle. I’m glad it’s over, frankly.