20251005 Digest

Yes, it’s been ages again since I last updated.

I am actually insanely tired today because we went to a family wedding yesterday. We didn’t even get back particularly late because it was local to us (thank god), but I never sleep well if I’ve drunk, even if it was only 3 small glasses of prosecco. Plus, the cats were taking it in turns to wake us up. Plus, Storm Amy was making a racket.

At the wedding reception they had a DJ that (once the kids had stopped running around screeching) played the music at such an insane volume it was almost impossible to hear the person next to you. Why do they do that?! It’s not a night club! We spent the last hour there in the hotel lobby outside the function room to get some peace – just myself and Husband, and the relatives over the age of 60!

Of course, I forgot my Loops earplugs again, because I am cursed to never have them with me when I actually need them.

The whole day was very draining.

Also strange to be at the wedding (and in the wedding photos) for a couple I’ve never met! It had at least met the groom by the end (Husband’s cousin), but still never met the bride!

Anyway, I will try to reach back into my memory of the last month to see what I have had going on…

Knitting Group

A quite big thing is that I started going to my colleague’s knitting group. I’ve only been twice so far, and those were quite different experiences. The first time only one other person came so it was nice and easy to chat. The second time I think there were about 7 others, and it was overwhelming.

The group taking place after work near the office is convenient, but it also doesn’t set me up for success (in battling anxiety) when I’m already tired from a full day of work in the office with people. The pub they meet in is also a very busy one and it gets very loud, which isn’t great for me either (might help if I ever remember my Loops earplugs!). Plus, it means I get back quite late in the evening and then it takes me ages to wind down from the overwhelm… and I am a complete zombie the following day, and exhausted for the rest of the week… I didn’t recover until Friday last week. That might get better though if I can build up my anxiety resistance.

I am not totally sure this group is going to be for me yet. Primarily because I am not a knitter or crocheter, and 99% of the group are working on and talking about those kinds of projects. That made me a bit sad because truly what I’d love is some IRL embroidery friends. There was one lady doing embroidery the last time but she was down the other end of the table from me so I didn’t get an opportunity to speak with her until I was on my way out the door. Maybe next time I can get a seat near her.

I will give it a few more tries, and see if I can get used to them and vice versa. They do seem like nice people, they’re just already an established group – some of them for 18 years – and that’s intimidating!

I think I will also still keep trying to find some more people in my local area. The dream would be something I could walk to after working from home all day so I’d have the most amount of social energy available!

Movement 🏃🏼‍♀️

In the Mordor walking challenge I’m up to 1,053 miles and in Lothlorien. My average took a bit of a dip to 7,959 daily steps because I had a few days in bed off sick but I’m still getting closer to breaking 8,000!

I’m well behind on my Conquerer Space Exploration challenges, which I’m just tracking runs for. I keep having to up the time frame! Partly that’s because I’m focusing on trying to work on increasing my stamina so I’m doing shorter more intense runs instead of longer run walk runs. I can do 10 mins of running now, and I’m working up to 15 mins! I’ll get there eventually.

Garden 🏡

The garden has been quite neglected this year, but I managed to get some weeding done last weekend and we cut down the holly trees! Now just need to actually dig them out or kill them off, but for the time being they should be slowed down and drop less leaves. Our neighbour is very happy she doesn’t have to sweep them off her path!

I am enjoying the mix of colours we have at the moment!

What else?

• We had a nice meal with my friends in Oxford to celebrate the wedding. I managed to find a restaurant with a private room so it felt lovely and intimate and we could actually all hear each other speak! It was also fun to get dressed up.
• Blue are doing a reunion tour next and I have tickets!! I cannot wait! We saw them supporting Steps a few years ago and they were so good in our memories they were the headliners. It was actually disappointing when Steps came on! 911 are supporting Blue on this tour and they were another favourite of mine, I used have a big poster of Lee on my wall I’d got from Top of The Pops magazine!
• I fired up Sims 2 Legacy edition on my PC the other week. It’s been a long time since I played it. It’s brutally hard, maybe a bit too realistic! Sims 4 had made me lax! I need to relearn all the keyboard short cuts so I can play it a bit smoother.

Telly 📺

• We’ve been rewatching the Marvel movies. We usually get one or two watched each weekend, the last one was Iron Man 3 so I think Thor 2 is next (which might be good with post-Love and Thunder hindsight). I keep thinking I should make notes and keep a list of my rankings. So far Captain American: The First Avenger is the best.
• We’ve also been rewatching The Righteous Gemstones because Husband didn’t come on board until season 4 and hasn’t seen all the first 3! I love it so much. He actually said the other day it’s the best thing I’ve introduced him too.
• New series of Taskmaster too! The nights are drawing in and Friday night homemade pizza while we laugh at the TV feels right. Episode 3 had me laugh crying in only the way Taskmaster gets me. Reese Shearsmith is my favourite, he has a slightly terrifying intensity that I am very into, I have to say. I’m not quite at Mike Wozniak’s levels of attraction (is that even possible!) but I think I’ve always had a little thing for Reese, though not a thread I want to pull too much because most of his work is deeply unsettling and he played Papa Lazarou the scariest of the scary characters in League of Gentleman! (“Hello Dave” will always haunt me). I am also a sucker for a man in a really nice coat and holey shit his task outfit is hot. It’s a recreation of Richard E. Grant’s Withnail outfit and is gorgeous. Plus he’s into arts and crafts. Irresistible. Oh and also, Ania looks eerily like my sister, down to the mannerisms!
• Also, new Alan Partridge! 🚨 He’s made the first ever documentary about mental health, and it’s fantastic.
• I have Officially decided that I actually don’t like Strange New Worlds now. Season 3 has gone off a cliff for me, and it’s lost the charm. I am so sick of Spock’s love life. How does Ortega’s still have her job?! Why have none of the cool characters – Number One, Noonien-Sing, even Pike – had nothing cool to do?!
• We are also plodding through Star Trek Voyager thought at a slower pace. We’re still in season 1 so things are bedding in.
• The new season of South Park is going so hard for Trump. Good on them!
• While off sick, I watched all of Such Brave Girls on BBC iPlayer. I’d avoided it because the ads did not portray what this sitcom is actually like – it’s brutally dark and completely savage, and it made me laugh in a way I’ve not since Fleabag (but it’s not like Fleabag, it’s much bleaker). You know that painful type laughter where it’s sliced right down to the unfair, fucking ugly absurd truth. All three of the women (single mother and two grown daughters) in this are horrid, unhinged and narcissistic, and the things they say to each other are awful but my God it’s funny. The sisters are IRL sisters which fascinated me too.