Rose Hill and Iffley Low Carbon Group

This post and event fits with quite a few of my return from travel resolutions. Whilst out with Rose Hill Runners (exercise check!) one runner mentioned the event that the Rose Hill and Iffley Low Carbon Group were holding that Thursday 29th September at the Rose Hill Community Centre.  I was keen to go as it fitted with doing local community things and also Eco things. John was kind enough to come with me. We arrived just on 8pm and I was pleased there was someone inside directing us to the talk. She said to someone else 'its standing room only' and I wondered if that was a joke. But it turned out to be true and they were awaiting another delivery of chairs which we were delighted to see arrived curtesy of our larger than life neighbour. There must have been over 100 people in the room. 

I enjoyed, as I often too, smiling to myself and marvelling at the assortment of people there who are quite different from the circles I normally frequent. And yet I was feeling that these were in theory the sort of person I was hoping to become more towards. The chair person of the group started by defending the photo of her in a car saying it was the local electric car share. 

The talk was by Alan Rushbridger whom it turns out many people have heard of. He was Editor of the Guardian and is now Principal of LMH College. He wasn't a good speaker and many in the audience couldn't hear. I was glad that I just could. He spoke about the reasoning and planning of the 'Keep it in the ground' campaign that he instigated at the Guardian which I was disappointed to realise I had completely missed. I felt pleased that they had run the campaign. 

So an interesting evening and very pleased that I was able to go and be part of it. 

Folk at the Isis

I'd love to know what this group or this event is really called. But it's fun to be here. We've only been a couple of times before. I think they meet on the second Friday of the month at the Isis tavern. It's a great thing to witness and although I'd loved the ability to be able to join in, it's also wonderful that I can enjoy it fully from a spectator's point of view. 

It's an evening in spontaneous music and joining in with whatever instrument you have brought. There's singing and poetry and Viking hat wearing! It's often quite noisy and there's still people bringing food round. It's filling up more and more as people come out of the cold.  I love the feeling of people joining in. We currently have a rendition of 'all about the bass' and earlier we had a tune that I'm sure I enjoy dancing to in Scottish dancing. We are sat slightly round the corner here so it's mainly listening rather than watching. I did enjoy the sight of the kazoo and tiny tambourine though - that's maybe what I could aim towards! 

I really enjoy the feeling I get at times like this of both feeling I'm in a scene in a film and also like this is proper life and these are the moments I need to treasure. A special feeling that both lifts my heart and can make me a little teary too! 

 This last one was taken for the viking hat in the background. "Thou shalt respect the hat and thou shalt not hog the hat".

Baking - Shortbread

Baking - I really enjoyed having the time to learn to bake a bit in Uganda and want to try to make the time to do it now as well. I want to keep practising the same recipes until I can do them quicker without having to keep checking the recipe. 

I decided to try and record some of my baking attempts on here to kind of make myself feel I'm achieving something! Several years ago I was given a shortbread mould for secret Santa. I tried using it once and wasn't very successful. I tried it again in September on return from GYIL. Again, I couldn't really get it out of the mould - but at least the shortbread tasted ok! I did a bit of googling and found lots of people had had the same problem with this mould. So I tried again using some of their suggestions. It wouldn't come out initially but after a little prod with a knife out it came in a few sections. 

The trouble was I had totally changed the temperature and timings so I've no idea what really worked. And it was more crumbly this time and dough-y too! And I decided to add some chocolate this time too. So some more experimenting to do before I could feel confident to serve it to someone!! 

But at least I'm trying! 

Starting to think about packaging and plastic

One of the changes we were hoping to make since travelling was to head more towards a plastic free life.  Here's what I wrote in my end of travels blog:

Packaging - I want to think more about what I buy and try to buy things with less packaging. In particular, John has become good at thinking about plastic. He bought the book 'plastic free life' in California when seeing an exhibit at Monterey Bay Aquarium about the amount of plastic sea animals ingest. We are planning to research local places where you can go refill washing up liquid bottles etc. If anyone knows of any places around Oxford or has any good tips then do share! 

I thought this blog would be a good place to keep track of how we are doing on this journey. I still haven't read the book which will be an obvious good step to take. But I do declare I am much keener on the idea than when John suggested it. I thought it seemed so impossible at first, but now I'm feeling excited about taking steps in the right direction. I spent a little time on the internet which encouraged me. One day I feel I'd like to have milk delivered but it just doesn't seem plausible to a flat. 

One small step we have taken is to buy bars of soap rather than liquid soap in plastic bottles. Another is not to buy pre-packaged vegetables but rather loose, although it's still tricky to get supermarket delivery not to put them in bags. We have also been a few local shops on Cowley Road and bought veg and grains there. One thing I am conscious of at the moment is that many greetings cards seem to come in plastic wrappers which is a pain. 

I'm not quite sure what to call this change we are trying to accomplish, mainly being unsure what to tag this blog as! Should it be Eco, environmental, plastic free, packaging? Plastic free seems a bit extreme, but plastic reduction seems a bit boring! And as you can see from the post title, I was totally lacking excitement there! Suggestions welcome 😀 

Karaoke

I was shocked to discover I don't seem to have done a karaoke blog post. I think it is time I quickly rectify that! My friends and I have probably been karaoke-ing for close on a decade now. We almost always go to the same booth at the Lucky Voice in Soho. I realise that when I tell people I am going to karaoke, the assumption is that I will be singing in a bar. And I couldn't think of anything worse!! Whereas being in our own booth with our own choice of music blasting out and dancing around is one of my favourite things! 

I love that we are all so into it now. I still feel I probably love it the very most but it's not like there is one person feeling awkward or joining in less. I also love that I really really can't sing and two of my friends in particular have lovely voices, but I feel accepted and am pretty happy to belt out terrible vocals anyway. We consider ourselves quite pros now. We skip songs if they aren't going very well or if we feel we've had enough from a few verses and choruses as we know the time goes quickly. We have a set of standard songs but we also try out a few new ones each time. I consider it quite a two hour workout as we dance away and would consider it quite appalling to leave a gap between songs.  We do have certain numbers that certain combinations of us do as duets etc such as:

Elton John and Kiki Dee

Gangsta's Paradise

Fat Bottomed Girls

Wuthering Heights - quite a masterpiece!

I also love that we have songs that probably no one else would do - namely Cliff Richard's Saviour's Day - which we did last night 79 days before Christmas! 

Some new ones we enjoyed last night were:

Under the Sea

Truly Madly Deeply

Wannabe

Here is a list that was sent round before this session and clearly was compiled at some point in the past. I feel it's the sort of thing I would have written but as it isn't on the blog then I am confused!! 

Must do

Far bottomed girls

Wuthering heights

You can't stop the beat

Like a prayer

Grease

Islands in the stream

Eye of the tiger

Bat out of hell

Time warp

Backstreet boys

Holding out for a hero

Saviours day 

For the album

Ring of fire

Don't go breaking my heart

Just can't wait to be king 

Maybes

Call me maybe 

Hey ya

Moves like jagger

Tiny dancer 

Crocodile rock

Don't stop me now

Suspicious minds 

Total eclipse of the heart

One way or another 

Everything I do 

Love shack

Wake me up before you go go 

Hangman style 

 Today 

Barry White

Year 3000

Love story

Let it go

All about the bass

Uptown funk

Sweet Caroline

Sorry seems to be the hardest word

Rasputin

China in your hand 

Africa 

Boots walking

Don't you want me

Ice ice baby

Rocking all over the world

Teenage dirtbag 

Fame

Shaggy

Paloma faith 

Brown eyed girl 

Bed of roses 

That's what makes you beautiful

And here are a few extras that I remember doing last night:

Never Forget

I got a lovely combine harvester 

East 17

I'm not sure if it was during Like a Prayer or maybe Don't Stop Me Now that I looked round and thought how much I love having these friends that I can do such silly things with and know I've got them and they've got me. I also felt the words to Hmmbop were highly highly appropriate - very surprised to discover it actually had words, and meaningful words at that!! I had the odd thought that if I died I would want the three of them to go do karaoke at some point and now I think I'd like them to sing Hmmbop! 

On coming up to town

I started writing a post on blogger as I arrived in London yesterday but didn't save it properly and lost it. It wasn't a lot so I will try to re-write the gist of it here. 

I had a funny sensation as the train pulled in to Paddington yesterday evening for karaoke with the girls. I realised that I couldn't remember the last time I had been to London - other than Heathrow, Gatwick or edges of Kent and Middx. It could well have been when I met the girls for dinner in August 2015 before we headed away. 

It definitely felt more monumental then I was expecting as we came in to the station. My sense of occasion was added to by following a passenger off the train who had a traveller backpack. I started to see it through the traveller' eyes that I had worn last year. I also saw quite a lot of people taking photos on their phones in the station that made me smile somewhat. 

I definitely felt like I was 'coming up to London'. I'm not a local and I sort of feel saddened that I don't have that at home and in control feeling that I had as a commuter after I left school. I did enjoy the sensation of knowing the shortcuts and best places to stand on the platform to be at the right exit. I'm also rather disappointed that I don't have the romantic feeling of coming up to town from somewhere like St Mary Mead!! 

I continued to have mixed feelings about London as I was meandering around. I arrived in Oxford Circus 55 minutes before our karaoke session so I wandered. I was a bit thrilled to come up and see the Christmas lights up - they weren't switched on but I did enjoy seeing them. I do love the build up to Christmas. I must get on with writing my cards!! 

I wandered down Carnaby Street. I don't really like it sadly. The shops are not the sort of places where I would buy anything. It was all very shiny and glam and prosperous looking. Although I would much rather somewhere be prosperous than run down, I still didn't like it. I also walked through Liberty's which I don't know very well. I thought I could like out for somewhere to buy a first birthday present and then I realised I was close to Hamleys so I managed to have fun in there. A lot of noise and plastic but I did buy a fun Peter Rabbit book. 

The big thing I noticed about London was the crowds. I think in the past I have found the crowds part of the charm and mastery challenge of London - sort of like at Disney World. Mustn't London be great if all these people want to be here and won't we feel more virtuous and successful if we can overcome the crowds and enjoy it. This was the first time where I was beginning to feel the crowds were too much and hampering the experience. I'm not going off London and I won't stop coming, I guess it's just that I can see what people mean about it being too busy! 

Karaoke was a super time. After 3 or 4 songs we were away and wearing our wigs and rocking our socks off. Some new hits of last night were 'Truly, Madly, Deeply' and Wannabe. I've just tried looking through the blog and it seems shocking to me that I haven't done a karaoke post before. What?!? I've just started writing about it, but have now decided it needs its own post! So I will leave this London summary here. 

On a side note - I am currently waiting by Platform 8B at Readinf station and the lady next to me is clipping her toe nails and I am pretty disturbed and freaked out by it...!!! At least the train is here now! 

On being home

Hello blog! I've missed you. 

We have been back in the country a month now and we have been back at school 3 weeks. I want to record some of my thoughts of being here. 

The thing that has struck me currently is time. That's one thing I didn't truly appreciate about GYIL. Now I don't seem to have the time to be doing the little things I'd like to be doing. I haven't knitted as much as I wanted, baked as much, done as many things on my to do list, blogged, phoned friends, made photobooks, touched my diary. School I guess takes up a lot of time and is tiring. The evenings just seem to pass. It was a bit better in the week before school started. Maybe I need to wait till half term. But that seems sad. Maybe I just need to lower my expectations or plan in something each day to do. Maybe instead of reading blogs over breakfast I could have computer set up to photobook/video. I'd like to move the to do list to the kitchen counter. Have a plan of when to cook, rather than waiting till there is time. 

I'm going to make a list (hehe, as that seems to be what I like to do) of the things I have achieved so I feel a bit better and encouraged:

- I've knitted three segments of a ball

- I baked two cakes before school started, some disastrous muffins after school started (or August, not am), some nice rolls and on Thursday some short bread. Need to work out how to get it out the mould (just found some ideas on Lakeland while looking up whether mould has a u!). 

- have done photos in Australia photobook - still need to do labels

- have finished Leicester book and started HBP. 

- lots unpacked at house and bags gone to charity shop. Still need shelves up in spare room. 

- had two lots of friends round for a meal.

- three or four episodes of ER. 

- Scottish dancing twice

- thirsty meeples once

- Rose Hill Runners and Parkrun once each.  

I'm thinking I need to get out of bed and have a go at some photobook things. 

I'll just blog about one more aspect of being home. It's very easy to stop appreciating the nice things about home. I am having to keep reminding myself that these things are good. Instead of being disappointed that I didn't manage to get a load of washing in before bed, I should be happy that it's so easy to do tomorrow. Instead of feeling tired reading in bed at night, be glad that I'm still able to read and enjoy. I have been enjoying waitrose online shopping and meal planning and cooking - yay! 

Well, at least I can tick off blog and maybe get up and do something else productive now! 

Happy (random) photos since being back: