If it's for someone I love, then I enjoy the process greatly. Be it finding it, making it, planning it, giving it. Whatever. It's those awkward pressents for people you don't really know that well that I find difficult.

According to the Met office and various other websites, we're not getting snow today.....

According to outside, it is pelting snow down.  It feels like I'm in an alternative universe. If so, can I have one where I can be blue and pretty please, rather than one where the weather reports and I don't match ?!

On a more serious note, it means we're unlikely to be able to visit my father on Christmas Eve. Actually I can't see it happening this year. We'll have to get together and do something when the weather clears.

On an even more serious note, I hope Pogona can get home tonight...

Okay, that recipe's a doer again. Decided to cook the chicken joints that came in the meat box. So I rubbed them with some oil and Roadkill Rub (is a mixed grill rub, and we're running low...must look into this), bunged them onto the wire rack above some cut up unpeeled potato wedges which I'd oiled, salted, peppered and paprika-ed, shoved it all into the oven at 220 degrees, and let it cook until done. The chicken was especially amazing - there's a huge difference between organic and non - and the skin was really crisp. 

I've now handed Pogona milk with chocolate melted into it, rose syrup, cinnamon and nutmeg, as the poor boy can't sleep.

Riverford have delivered! All very yummy looking. And healthy, bonus points there. The bananas aren't good, they suffered with cold, but otherwise...everything else looks great. Just....what to do with frost damaged bananas?

As I gazed out of the kitchen window this morning, waiting for the kettle to boil, I couldn't help smiling. The snow over our lawn reminded me of the white of a swan's back. The brilliance, the light, the pure whiteness, unsullied. The dawn of a new day, of a new day with the promise of a little more light.

It is beautiful out there. And it took my breath away for a moment, and made me feel a little like a child again, excited, and eager and full of the hope of things to come. And for a little, I forgot myself and was one with the moment and nothing more.

Rather than suffer the usual food shopping angst, we decided to order a meat box, a veg box and a fruit box from Riverford Organics for the FoE season. We've used Riverford before, and they've always been very, very good. And I have to say, nothing's changed there.

When I phoned the order through, I wasn't rushed, the lass took her time, confirmed all details, and set up an alternative account so we could have the order delivered to the house, rather than Pogona's workplace, as the Christmas week delivery would have been on Sunday. (They never delivered to our area before, so it was better that way a few years ago.) I had plenty of feedback, confirmation of payment was emailed as I was on the phone, and the lass dealing with the Cardiff area orders rang us as she was concerned there'd been a problem with our order. When I explained what the issue was, she was absolutely fine, and rang up the people who deal with our home area. Who rang us back, confirmed everything was fine. Absolutely wonderful customer service, considering they're probably dealing with a fair few folk at this time.

And then, with the snow this morning? They rang us again, to say they were unable to deliver today, but were arranging a four wheeled drive, and would attempt to deliver tomorrow. No us chasing them, no stupid on hold. But decent communication, letting us know what was happening all the way. In this day and age, you can't fault that.

And they do bloody awesome food products with it! Win all round! Now...let's just hope they can deliver without any more snow problems!

Milton wanted out. When a cat wants out, you gotta let them go....Even if you know there's several inches of snow outside. ESPECIALLY if you know there's several inches of snow outside. Because, let's face it, cats and snow is just SO unbelieveably amusing to watch.

So the door was opened. And they just sat there. Except Mystic, who'd obviously seen the snow from a window, as she sat at the inner kitchen door with a "Sod that." expression. And we laughed at their expressions. And then they came back in again.....

Cats. What can I say? They like cosy.

Yesterday was pure win. After some frantic thinking about what we could do for peeps and some very productive time spent in the kitchen,  yesterday we had a hamper full of pressies to give out to folk. It was almost magic. And it made me very happy that we had stuff. And we'd not needed to go "Arggghhhhhhh" around the shops or wrack our brains. I had ideas. I implemented ideas. Those ideas pleased.  And it slightly frightened me as to how much I enjoyed the whole process. It may have given me some directional ideas....maybe.

Anyway, we both thoroughly enjoyed our Yule veggie meal with friends, and the exchange of Yule pressies. It was so wonderful to catch up with them, to eat, drink, share laughter with them. The nutroast was awesome, and the table almost buckled under the weight of the food! There was plenty to drink, and a huge pile of loot shared ! (Chocolate karma = utter win!)

And then we had pudding, and more alcohol, and played silly games.

This morning we had home-rolled croissants with fillings of our choice. And then later we had a second breakfast fry up.And I'm not holding my breath over this, but  I think finally the Universe and I are once again on talking terms.....

Oh, and I now need a good (and maybe slightly naughty) name for a little Harris Tweed mouse that G. made for each of us who went to the Outer Hebrides earlier this year. Any suggestions?!

I am a bad and wicked bunny. I have done things with chocolate that really should not be done.....and it's worked!

Today has been a good day. It started off with lack of promise, I had a nightmare which involved my being the only one who knew my mother had been taken over by some evil force, and turned everyone against me. It was really Dr Who-ish, and I was woken up by the doorbell,  as I was screaming at my father "You HAVE to believe me!".

Things got better then. Answered the door to receive an intriguing package. Opened the big cardboard box, much to Milton's interest, and deliberately left it for him. Next time I looked, he was sat in it, proudly, with a "This is MY catship" expression. 

Today, as well as being lazy, I made chocolate shells for some intriguing chocolate fillings, I ordered our meat and veg for Christmas, I fed him pizza when he got in, and myself samosas and bajhis. I also listened to Azam Ali's Portals To Grace (beautiful) on Spotify, and have been playing through some Emilie Autumn.....I have a tendancy towards the less weird stuff, but I'm particularly appreciative of By The Sword....although I am currently being lured by her rendition of Veracini's Sonata in D Minor for violin and continuo. I don't think I've come across music quite this diverse before. And these are on the same CD as a cover version of Always Look on the Bright Side?!

But the best thing? The best thing today was someone coming home and bringing me a bunch of roses! It's been a long time, and it nearly made me cry. They're beautiful. Creamy white, with some slight pale peachiness, and a touch of very pale green in places, and best of all....they smell!  Believe me, these roses mean so very much to me for a number of reasons. And they made me smile, and that made Pogona smile, which made me smile more. Did I mention I love roses?!

I saw this Christmas ornament today and thought it was pretty....then I saw this one and drooled also.

Seems I'm not the only one attracted by something shiny. My mobile was perched on a high shelf, closed (it's a flip open cheap job) and charging when I left it last. Pogona found it, detatched from the charger, in a different room and open.

CATS?!! WHICH ONE OF YOU DID THAT?!!!

The memories of the morning of the 15th of December about six years ago. Of sitting up until the early hours in a hospital room. The walls, in my memories, were an orange colour. An owl hooted in the distance. A tiny pool of perspiration gathering in the hollow of her neck. Watching the gradual, inevitable decline of her breathing. I lived in a hollow world that Christmas. The joviality, the bright and cheerful glitter, the bouncy music, and everyone wishing me well, and there I was, stood at a checkout queue with tears pouring down my face, grieving for the loss of my mother.

Her funeral was that Christmas Eve. Each Christmas Eve I visit her grave, leave some flowers there. I enjoy the peace of the graveyard, the wildness around. One year we saw a woodpecker there, bright and beautiful in the trees. She would have approved of that.

It's taken the artificial sheen off the season, brutally scoured it away. Those memories serve to remind me of what is truly important. Those around us who love us. All the arguing about who gets the remote and the best sofa space, or Auntie Gertrude being drunk and throwing up over the dog is nothing in the grand scheme of things. These days I don't look forward to huge presents, or a massive Christmas dinner. I look forward that little extra closeness to family and friends at this time of year and of celebrating what we have.

Memo 1 to self: write Gaimanesque style story about a polar bear in the freezer. You know, one of those manky old freezers with no self defrost function.

Memo 2 to self: it doesn't have to make sense. It's a story.

Memo 3 to self: yes, it can be environmentally conscious, just don't make it preachy, remember, first and foremost, it's a story.

Gah. It's 8.32am. I've not slept properly since 6.30am, due to painful sore throat, feeling ack, and someone next to me twitching in their sleep and snoring. I think we also had a strange conversation (I'm certain he was asleep), where I asked him if he was okay, and he said yes, he was watching a film with pirates, and other exciting things, plus four copies of his WoW character. A little later he asked me who that actor was, not Patrick Swayze but the other one.....Kevin Bacon, I said, tentatively. No.....the one from the Matrix....Oh. Keanu Reeves, I replied. Yes, he said, and then went back to quietly twitching and loudly snoring.

I'm doomed sleepwise. Last night I went to sleep cuddling Dante, with Mystic sat on the pillow, purring, and woke up (I'd been sleeping on my back) with a Milton lying on my chest, paws tucked under him, quite comfortable......

So now I'm sat here with tissues, cold hot lemon drink and a blanket wrapped around me. Oh, and the slipper boots of sheer comfort. I've also found the nukeable teddy, which is unbelieveably comforting. However, what I really want, what I really, really want, is sleep. At least for a little longer.

Some may say the internet was made for porn. I, however, have been exposed to another, crueller aspect of it. Now I can indulge one of my non-calorific vices, that of shoes, and drool/ raise eyebrows at this website of shoe beauty and bizarreness. I may even have several shoegasms.....

I picked up my pencils this evening. I'd forgotten what it was like to draw. I'd forgotten how easily one can lose oneself in the space between the paper and the idea. How the image is never the same as the idea. How, when you relax and become one with the pencil, brush, image etc, much easier it becomes.....

The strangest feeling at the moment is that of all this sudden inspiration, yet....I find myself lazy and not feeling like doing anything much. Perhaps a side effect of things? It's like one of the symptoms has gone away, and given me back (if not with excess) some amazingly creative ideas, but the actual action is so difficult.