Elb n' Apples......

I am looked upon with something like suspicion by friends, relatives and work colleagues: for I am not like other women my age.

I am not a “girly” girl, which is probably just as well, working as I do in a male-dominated engineering environment. I like to think I am sometimes seen as an Honorary Bloke in that I can give as good as I get with regard to bawdy workshop banter, and I enjoy “Top Gear” - not a programme about haute couture, but cars. (Sshh! Don’t let on, but I watch it mainly to lust after the presenter known affectionately as “The Hamster”, Richard Hammond.) I do however, draw the line at football......

But what really floats my boat (aside from a certain Scottish actor) are gadgets and gizmos - the more gadgety and gizmo-ey the better! So imagine my delight when my daughter presented me not with the customary bunch of flowers or box of chocolates for Mothering Sunday, but an iPod Shuffle, Apple’s entry-level MP3 player which plays your choice of music, but just to be contrary, in a totally random order - hence the name “Shuffle”!

I have worshipped at the altar of Apple for many years now, having been introduced to them by my then boyfriend, a graphic designer. The unfaithful slimeball boyfriend is long gone, but my allegiance to everything Apple remains resolute. My house is like an AppleMac rest home, as I lovingly nurse each elderly computer into retirement, then store them in a back room that resembles a scrapyard more than the dining room it once was.... I cannot bear to take them to the local tip, as they each have personalities and quirks of their own, and each in their time, has served me well. I secretly delight in the superior speed and abilities of the newer model whilst suffering pangs of guilt that my fickle affections can be transposed so easily.

My latest acquisition is the oh-so-cute Mac Mini which masquerades as a sandwich box (I believe I may have enthused about it before?) but which has oodles more oomph than all my *coughsevencough* previous computers added together, yet is a fraction of the size. It also cost less new than my previous, secondhand iMac!

Which STILL sits on my desk alongside the young Mac interloper, valiantly putting up a fight to the bitter end, before it too is shuffled quietly into the Twilight Home for Terminals downstairs. And talking of which, it must be time for me to play with my new gadgetry and fill the wee Shuffly Thingy with “bangin’ choons” so I can once more play the auditory variant on Russian Roulette!

Badgers Lay Eggs.......

We have a cleaner at work who - bless her holey nylon leggings - has a heart of gold, but who (to put it kindly) won’t be knocking on MENSA’s door anytime soon.

To say that she likes a natter is an understatement: if her broom/hoover/floor polisher moved at the same rate as her mouth, the place would be gleaming in ten minutes flat, and she’d still have been able to wash the cups up and clean the windows....... However, unlike others of her sex, the lady seems unable to multi-task, and if the mouth is engaged, all other movement ceases, and even when confronted by the back of my head as I make studious efforts to get on with MY work, she blithely continues bombarding me with tales of her little grandson’s latest exploits in the nappy-department, or how much bleach she has needed to use on each of her clients’ toilets......

This rather rotund lady is an unwitting source of much hilarity for me and the guys in the engineering workshop. She has me in stitches (much to her bemusement) when she tells me that she has recently bought a “George Formby Health Grill” (does it play the ukelele as it cooks?) and that she must wear “toadstool” boots (steel toecapped footwear) when cleaning on building sites...... The lads take advantage of her naivete by telling her earnestly that , of course badgers lay eggs! (She hurries off to spread this little-known piece of news amongst her colleagues in the business....)

When she appears for work every other Wednesday, the lads have usually got something new to tease her with, and to give her credit, she puts up with the good-natured banter admirably. If she only knew that they told a senior member of staff that our cleaning lady does a sideline as a strippergram........

A small rant about plastic.......and snot

Okay. Fine. Whatever.

I am in a strop again, and do you know what is the cause of my stroppiness THIS time?

Packaging.

That clear plastic stuff that creates a hermetically sealed cocoon around whatever goodies we happen to buy, like batteries or printer cartridges, or in today’s instance, some silicone “skins” for my lovely little iPod Shuffle.

There is no easy way into this bloody moulded casing, and I have to attack it with a pair of scissors, thus destroying the packaging forever, so if there were a circumstance in which I have to return the goods, they probably wouldn’t accept it back because I have totally trashed the wrapper! ...........And cut my fingers to shreds on the sharp edges of plastic in the process, so there is now much of the red stuff over the new goodies, and I have to rinse them off before I can even TRY a new coat on my precious little Shuffly thing without getting copious amounts of gore on it...

Surely there must be a more environmentally-friendly way of encasing such goods? If not environmentally-friendly, then surely PEOPLE-friendly???? At the very least, it should carry a public health warning........

Egads!!!! Is there no end to my suffering??

I pick up a magazine to flick through, but have to detach a CD from the cover first, lest its weight rip the page off, and find myself entangled in the hideous snot-like substance that is used to affix various 'freebies' to the cover of the aforementioned publication. I am a sucker for anything free - (yes, I KNOW that nothing in this life is free....) and am a marketing dream when it comes to extras tacked onto the glossies that I buy. I feel I am getting my money's worth if "Ferret-Twirling Monthly" has the added bonus of a dodgy plastic comb stuck to the cover with the horrendous bogey-glue..... But on the other hand, is it REALLY worth the effort of removing the sticky residue if it is going to send my already frazzled brain into melt-down?

Don't answer that..................

Honey, I shrunk the appliances....

I remember at the end of the 60’s, my dad brought home one of the first so-called ‘pocket’ calculators; a chunk of beige plastic the size of a housebrick. (Were pockets bigger in those days?) To us kids as we were then, it was magic - the stuff of science-fiction, seeing the glowing green numbers on the screen change with each push of our sweaty digits. Previously we’d enjoyed the luxury of doing sums on the old adding machine we had at home. (Yes, we had finally progressed from the abacus.) We had only just replaced our huge cumbersome black and white telly with a spiffy new colour set and sat watching “Lassie” in colour, and in awe. Mum’s ancient washing machine, complete with mangle, had recently been superceded by a wonder-tub that did all the hard work for you. We didn't even KNOW what computers were, but apparently, they took up a whole room because they were so vast.

Now, as technology advances, things are getting ever smaller. Ok, so washing machines have stayed more or less the same size despite our smalls shrinking too, (Who in Hades invented thongs???) but you can now hang your TV on the wall like an ever-changing picture, the calculator I use at work could be mistaken for a credit card, and with the advent of modern computers, you no longer need a whole room to house the thing; my latest, a microscopic Mac Mini, is just a tad bigger than a pile of 6 CDs, and is often obscured by the cat, who wraps herself around it! Early ‘portable’ phones were huge black chunky monsters connected via a curly cable to a separate battery which one carried around in a wheelbarrow it was so heavy. Now the world, his wife and their in-laws have mobiles which are so small, I often lose mine in the depths of my handbag, which seems to expand disproportionately in relation to the size of my phone.

However, the kitchen is one area where appliances tend to remain the same size. After all, how would you fit a Christmas turkey in a shrunken oven? We'd be reduced (no pun intended) to eating dehydrated food such as astronauts have to suffer whilst in space. Mind you, supermarkets are now selling 'baby' vegetables, such as baby corn, carrots and cauliflower, so if you bought a poussin, you could have a whole miniaturised dinner! I'd hazard a guess that things are going to start shrinking soon, but for the moment, while your oven and freezer may outwardly stay the same, the wizardry inside them has changed beyond recognition. The latest domestic appliances now have on-board computers; when you use the last of the marge, your fridge adds it to the shopping list, then orders the weekly shop over the internet. How far will computers go in taking over our everyday chores? When you open the fridges of the future, will they be stacked out with porn DVDs that your dodgy appliance ordered when your back was turned? Will we be unable to cheat on our nearest and dearest because we’re using videophones, and they can see that we’re NOT ‘working late at the office’? Will our white goods throw a wobbly when we’re late home and complain we never take them out? Indeed, will we be able to find our household equipment if it has all been so reduced in size? Where will it all end?

WARNING! ELB AT WARPSPEED...........

I HAVE BROADBAND!!!!!! YAY!!!!!!! ........ FINALLY!

I am just SOOOOOO excited it’s positively unhealthy...and from being a laid-back, ever-so-easy-Elb, I am suddenly hyperactive and desperate to get home and online, where my true calling lies.... However, I have to suffer a day in the Real World first and do something to earn a crust, but at work, I am counting the minutes - nay - SECONDS till I can go home.

Freshly connected to the internet via broadband as from last night, a wider world of webbiness has opened up to me. I am in download heaven.......

Previously on dial-up, everything was SOOOOO slow to load - I was getting left behind in online conversations, and pictures were a definite no-no. Image-hungry message boards were the bane of my life, and I ended up missing so much. Last night, on the forums for the first time on broadband, I was so hyper I was answering questions almost before they'd been asked! I was posting so much, they nicknamed me Superfast Elb! *Cheesy grin* I'm so boingy with excitement, I feel like a kid the night before Christmas! I spend six hours straight online, hurtling wildly at warpspeed around the ever-expanding vastness of cyberspace on the Starship AppleMac, in search of juicy downloads, whilst holding multiple conversations on different message boards at the same time! Talk about multi-tasking! I am so involved, I forget dinner, and it is only when my stomach sends out distress calls that I take note, and throw a sad-git supper down my neck whilst still online......... Before, when a page was loading, I had time to go downstairs, make coffee, knit a sweater.... and when I came back, it was STILL loading...... Now, I am afraid to leave the computer in case I miss something! *Makes note to install kettle and fridge next to computer*

I start making lists of all the things I want to download and wonder briefly how soon it will be before I exceed my allotted 6GB limit...... I am tempted in by iTunes and Podcasts and all the bandwidth-hungry stuff I couldn't watch before like film trailers (Oooh - Pirates of the Caribbean 2!!!!) and videos..... My thoughts are all over the place, and for the umpteenth time at work, I wish I wasn't there. Why can't I be a Lady Wot Lunches?

I have always had a butterfly mind (and memory of a goldfish...) but it appears that my butterfly has metamorphosed overnight into a squash ball pinging around at great speed in the cavernous space between my ears. It's as if speeding up my internet access has had the same effect on my poor beleaguered brain, and ideas are bouncing around in there without restraint, bashing against each other and spawning ever more random thoughts. I can't marshall any of them into anything remotely resembling sanity, so I decide to just go with the flow for now.... Writing this is therapy for me, although it must be torture for anyone who reads it. Nobody can keep up with the way my mind is working, least of all me!

Work at last done for the day, I drive at speed to get home, managing to avoid speed traps, road blocks and pedestrians alike, race upstairs and launch myself into hyperdrive online, fuelled by caffeine by the bucket-load. Probably not wise - (I can hear Scotty now......."The engines canna take it Cap'n - the Dilithium crystals are overheating!!!!! She's gonna blow..........") By the time I've written this, my download tally is rising towards 400megs and this is only Day 2!!! More are scheduled to slip down the ether tonight I suspect.....

And once again, time has run away with me, and the familiar gnawing in my stomach is becoming to much to bear..... I'll find sustenance as soon as I've got another vid downloading, honest.......

A 600 mile jaunt to the pictures....

I went to the cinema last week.

Just me and a couple of mates.

Nothing earth-shattering in that, you may think ...........however, it involved a hasty 600 mile-ish round trip to Northern Ireland and back, in a 737 rather than a quick drive to the local Cineplex.

The film we went to see was “Beowulf & Grendel”, Sturla Gunnarsson’s epic tale of yore (when exactly WAS Yore?) being shown at the 6th Belfast Film Festival. Or should I say “fillum” festival, as it is pronounced in Ireland....... As a fully paid-up, flag-waving, certifiable member of the Gerard Butler Swooning Society, I was keen (to say the least!) to see the film on the big screen, ostensibly to fully appreciate the stunning Icelandic scenery, but more honestly to gawp at His Butlership big-time.

A flippant discussion on the England thread of the GB.net forum one night led to a mad impulse whereby several of us decided that it would be rude NOT to take advantage of the screening of B&G in Belfast, as it may be the only chance we get to see the film on the big screen, as it does not yet have a UK distributor. Before you could say “Trolls”, we were booked on a flight with film tickets reserved at the box office......

That’s been pretty much the way of things since I registered with GerardButler.net back in November of last year. Mad impulses, leading to fabbo fun times and lots of laughter, with a substantial portion of drooling thrown in. Being a Libran, I am supposed to be indecisive, but can’t make up my mind whether I am or not............ Nope - I will squeeze out of the astrological pigeonhole I have been put into, and make a decision here. I have been inspired by the people I have come into contact with through the site, and have not only started this blog with the intention of being more creative, but I am getting Out and About more, and embracing new opportunities whenever I can. I have DECIDED that I will grab any chance I can to have a LAUGH, because that’s what it’s all about, innit?

But anyhow, I digress - back to “Beowulfast” as the venture has been named. The final number attending dwindles to three, but undaunted, we meet up at Bristol Airport and jet off to Belfast as representatives of Gerry’s British Tarts, now affectionately known as the BritTarts.

Murphy’s Law kicks in as soon as we land, and discover there is a bus strike on. An arm and a leg later, a taxi disgorges us onto the grey streets of the city where we track down the theatre, cunningly disguised as a row of houses. After much waiting, the allotted hour arrives, and we settle down in comfy seats to watch and drool...............

The film is stupendous, magnificent and well worth the forty quid apiece we have paid for flight and film ticket. Like I said, it was rude NOT to go, really.... We have aah’d at the amazing bleak landscapes, cringed at the gore, drooled over the sublime Mr B and all in all had a jolly good time.

The next bit turns out NOT to have been one of our brightest moves - we hotfoot it back to the airport, another arm and leg poorer, and plan to sleep over in the terminal before catching our flight home very early the next morning. That is the plan. A plan which never comes to fruition, as the airport at night is cold, noisy and pretty spooky, and we manage about an hour’s sleep between the three of us. Relieved when dawn cracks, breaks, whatever - we hop back on the plane, then drive for an hour before reaching home. Which I promptly leave again to go to work, out of some misguided sense of loyalty to my company, who fail to appreciate the utterly useless zombie wandering around the premises.

There are two things which were made apparent to me after the Big Adventure. One is that “Beowulf & Grendel” is worth every penny you pay to go and see it, whether by bicycle or jet. Please, please, PLEASE let it get a UK distributor soon, as I want to see it again!

The second is that I am FAR too ancient to go dossing about in airports as if I was a teenager. Next time, it’s a hotel for me!