I present you with this:

Americans Getting Quizzed On World Affairs.

Go take a look, and if you don’t like it you can blame hubby dearest!

AxXx

Last night I was busy mocking my roots (as you do) and today I am once more a root free blonde bombshell with a spanky new cut.

Pics may well follow if I can get it all organised.

That is all.

AxXx

Life has a funny way of catching you by surprise. You can quite happily be getting on with everything when suddenly BAM! Life itself pulls the rug out from under your feet. And boy does the ground hurt when you land on your arse. But the people that pull you up again are the same people that watched you fall in the first place - Old faces in new places. Well not quiet new places. The place in question was the annual real ale festival that we have over here but I’ve only been once before. So it’s a bit like finding a £10 note in a pair of jeans you haven’t worn for a while - you welcome it with open arms and joy but only too soon it’s all gone again, and the jeans get put back in to the wardrobe and forgotten about once more.

How is it that things can change and yet stay exactly the same at the same time? Not just things but people and circumstances. On Friday night I came face to face with people that I haven’t seen at all for the last 4 years - and it was as if we were all still in school. That has to be the weirdest feeling in the world. I spent my formative school years with these people and then we went our separate ways. That was it. Or so I thought. Meeting them again made me realise just how much my life has changed. They really did act like they hadn’t left school. The same group of friends, the same stupid jokes. But despite all that part of me relished the idea that none of them could take their eyes off me.

I’ve changed a lot since I left school. University had a big part to play but more importantly my confidence has increased to such and extent that it shines through, and I don’t recognise the person I once was. And that person? She was a bit of a mouse to say the least.

Admittedly, all of these people were a little bit drunk (it was a beer festival after all!) so everything was taken with a large pinch of salt, and maybe pepper, and even a little bit of chilli, who knows? But even so. My vain side - and yes I do have a little one even if she doesn’t come out to play very often - loves the effect I have on people who haven’t seen me for a while. Where my arse hit the floor is closely followed by their jaws, and I can’t help but grin. But they don’t know me. And they try to treat me in the same way that they did when last we met, and that’s not a good thing. They may still be the same people, living the same lives, but I’ve come too far to go back to that. So as I walked away at the end of the night, I was finally walking away from an old life. And it felt good.

The knowledge of how far I’ve come, and how much I’ve changed, makes me smile far more than any compliment could. I’m happy, I’m settled (for now) and I have the love of a guy who knows me for who I truly am, faults and all. There’s not many people who can lay claim to that. And you know what? That’s worth more than anything else I could ever wish for.

I live my life for now and the future, whatever it may hold. The people and places of my past can stay where they belong - ensconced on the dusty shelves of history.

AxXx

My new drugs have many possible side effects:

feeling sick
vomiting
constipation
tiredness
drowsiness
sleepiness
dizziness
headache
confusion
hallucinations
dependence
agitation
anxiety
nervousness
sleeplessness
hyperactivity
tremor
sweating
appearance of ‘nettle rash’ on the skin
itching
difficulty in breathing
wheezing
worsening of existing asthma
difficulty in passing urine
urinary retention
blurred vision
nightmares
paraesthesia (tingling/pins and needles, mostly on hands and feet)
tremor (more tremor)
diarrhoea
stomach bloated
muscle weakness
oedema (swelling dues to water retention)
euphoria
loss of consciousness
blood disorders (e.g. unexplained bruising)
physical dependence

So that’s pretty much all the bases covered then. I can be drowsy, sleepless, confused and euphoric! Woo!

As it turns out, the only real side effect I have is a kind of euphoric giggling. I may still be in pain, but I really don’t care!

Ah Tramadol, how I love thee.

AxXx

Sometimes I really hate being female.

Bring on the new painkillers.

I’m off to bed with my sheep hot water bottle, in the middle of September. Gotta love it.

*sigh*

AxXx

So the question that got posed at dinner tonight is this:

What is the ideal sauce to accompany chips?
And does it vary depending on what style of chip you are eating?

Let’s say, for the sake of argument, that you are having a bowl of chips, with nothing else. What is your ideal sauce/topping?

Answers in the comments please!

AxXx