seven things

I have been tagged by Sally to write seven things about myself. I would estimate that this blog already contains around seven thousand things about myself, but who am I to stand in the way of seven more?

1. I have spent this entire weekend writing my essay about Virginia Woolf. I haven't even been outside. I have certainly not done anything that could really be classed as 'social' or 'fun'. My 'reward' for this hard labour is that tomorrow is Monday and I get to go... to work! Party poppers all round. (The lesson here is: don't try and do an MA at the same time as having a full time job, because how ever much you like both of these things, it is not good).

2. On the plus side though, I'm having beef and ale stew with mashed potato for my dinner. The stew is currently in the oven cooking and it smells amazing.

3. The only other thing of significance I have done this weekend is knitting. I really enjoy knitting. It's a bit like meditation, except at the end of it you (hopefully) have something you have created, like a hat, or a scarf, or even some gloves, or if you're more talented than me, perhaps some socks in a fancy pattern. I really like watching something concrete and new appear from nothing (well, from a few balls of wool anyway) - a bit like baking, which appeals for similar reasons. My current project is a rather nice navy blue blanket for my friends' new baby (though the baby is not really so 'new' anymore - in fact, at the rate I'm going, this blanket's going to be about ready for when he goes to university).

4. I'm writing this sitting under my new red blanket (a Christmas present from my Dad, who knows how I like blankets) which I need because I'm extremely cold. I think I feel the cold a lot more than most people. This is unfortunate, but will be helpful for any pastry-making I need to undertake as I hear cold hands are good for that. All last week I wore a lot of clothes - two pairs of socks to counteract cold toes, and fingerless gloves which are handy for keeping your hands warm whilst typing, though though one of my colleagues did tell me I looked "like Bob Cratchitt". However, style must be sacrificed in the face of numb fingers and toes.

5. It's my birthday in one week's time. I am going to be 26, which sounds quite proper and grown up. It also means that I will no longer count as a "young person" (at least in terms of railcards and suchlike) which seems a bit of a shame. I'm not sure how I'm going to celebrate my birthday yet, but it will definitely involve eating nice food, drinking nice drinks, seeing friends, not thinking at all about essays and wearing my new dress. The dress has a very interesting black and white pattern all over it, which reminds me of illustrations in old books, perhaps woodcuts. My boyfriend says it makes him think of illustrations from "Wuthering Heights" though I don't know how he'd know, as I'm pretty sure he's never actually read "Wuthering Heights". Update - I found what it reminded me of - check it out here.

6. The book I am currently reading is Alexandre Dumas's "The Three Musketeers" - the rather fabulous new Penguin edition shown above with cover illustrations by Tom Gauld - which my boyfriend gave to me for Christmas. I am really enjoying it, but the only problem is that owing to a childhood love of the cartoon "Dogtanian", I'm having big trouble imagining the characters as anything other than cartoon dogs. I don't really mind though: after all, "Dogtanian" was brilliant. Just watch this and remember...



7. My i-pod is on shuffle. While I've been writing this it has played Stevie Wonder's "Signed, Sealed, Delivered", "Great DJ" by the Ting Tings and Laverne Baker's "Bumble Bee."

A lot of people seem to have been tagged with this one already, so I'm going to be renegade and break the rules and not tag 7 other people. Perhaps instead I'll tag everyone who reads this. If you read this and then feel like going to write 7 things about yourself on your blog, leave me a comment so I can go and read them, as I like reading other people's blogs, and also I'm just naturally a bit nosy.