sizes

ladies, ladies
Originally uploaded by Ms. Moll.

It’s a step in the right direction, but still only a drop in the retail ocean, and not far enough in my opinion.

John Lewis have announced that they will be using a ‘limited number’ of size 14 mannequins in their Peterborough store to test ‘how customers respond, and how they work in the visual landscape’.

If it goes down well they will be ‘rolled out’ to the 26 other stores. To be honest I can’t believe that many people will notice! The average size in the UK is 16, so size 14 is still a lot smaller than the majority of customers (except perhaps in Cheshire where the footballers wives live on a diet of vitamin pills and champagne).

Despite the fact that eighty percent of John Lewis’s sales of swimwear are size 12 and above, they still use size 10 mannequins!! It seems crazy that they think that people can get a fair idea of what clothes really look like when they are displayed on the equivalent of a 12 year old girls body.

It’s a move in the right direction, and certainly one that the British Fashion Council should take note of – they refused to ban size 4 (size 0 in the US) models from British catwalks for London Fashion week.

OED entries

The Guardian this week reported on the latest revision of the Oxford English Dictionary, and the new words it has included. The headline was the inclusion of the ‘Jaffa cake’, they say it has become iconic and is used as a nickname (?), but surely the bottom line is that it’s a brand name devised by McVities.

So, what other words have the included, and do you have any idea what they might mean? Comment if you know (no cheating if you read the article in the paper!), or want to guess!

Addy

Cattle class – okay, so that one is easy

Garburator

Get your ya-yas out

Heaviosity

Semifreddo

Wairua – for those of you who speak Maori

Obviously Microsoft haven’t got wind of the fact that these are words as they were flagged by spell checker.

It offered these alternatives –

Addy – Add, Eddy, Daddy, Paddy, Adds

Garburator – Carburettor, Graduator, Arbitrator, Granulator

Ya-yas – yo-yos

Heaviosity – Heaviest, Heavyset

Semifreddo – Semiarid, Semidried

Wairua – Walrus, Warier, Waurika, Ware, Wire

But then when I was a student Word spell checker didn’t include ‘matriarchal’, but did have ‘patriarchal’!!

British Rugby

I’m really pleased for the English rugby team – they won!! It was a great game, close at points, and although I didn’t watch it closely I saw enough to see Jonny Wilkinson miss two kicks (although I’m aware that he also scored).

But along with being pleased for the team, I also feel really sorry for them. The ‘headline’ on the ITV news, and watching the report you’d think that the team only consisted of Jonny. They showed the scoring kicks and how he lined it up for someone else to score a try, but neglected to show the kicks he missed, or anything that any of the other players did (unless it was connected to what Jonny Wilkinson did).

Come on British media – the team contains 15 players – not just one, let’s have some more balanced reporting.

Full circle – backwards.

As many of you will know, I’m not a big fan of the ‘googlebox’ and don’t often make an effort to watch (I’ve even lost track of Heroes, which I was actually really enjoying), I much prefer the radio.

So it’s interesting that the excellent programme I watched last night is a sort of ‘full circle’ for me.

I first heard bits of ‘Stuart: a life backwards’, a true story by Alexander Masters as a book of the week on Radio Four; I didn’t hear the whole thing so decided to read the book. It was sad, funny, fascinating and well written; I enjoyed it very much.

Last night on BBC2 (terrible scheduling as it was up against Michael Palin on BBC1 – why did they do that?), the story was shown as a dramatisation.

The actors who played Alexander and Stuart were brilliant, I already knew the story but this didn’t detract from the programme, and in a way made me want to watch more.

The difficult life of Stuart Shorter is an important one, a story that needs to be heard – there are people like him all around us – how many of us notice them? He may have been a thief, a drug addict, an alcoholic, violent and difficult; but he was also a person; a scared, hurt, confused and abused person – I like to think that Alexander Masters’ story means that we can learn from the mistakes that were made in Stuart’s life (by him and those around him).

More information can be found at the author’s website.

If you want to read the book, and you should, I recommend getting it from here where it is only £3.75 and you get to help grow trees with The Woodland Trust.

Keeping in touch

For those who read my blog you might have noticed a slight change in style – the font has got bigger and lighter – hopefully making it easier to read?

It’s been many months and over 300 entries but no-one has ever told me that the text was hard to read, but today I viewed my blog on my step-mother’s pc – and it was almost unreadable. Did anyone else have this problem – I have no idea – because I know that friends, family and strangers read this blog, but only a few bother to comment!

And that leads me on to my next point – if you are reading this, and you like to keep up with what I am up to – that’s great. BUT it would be nice if you would contact me sometimes and let me know what is happening in your life and what you are up to, or maybe even what you think of some of the things I write?

A number of people have commented (on the phone or by post) that I haven’t blogged for a while, mainly as I haven’t had internet access at home, and that they missed it.

My lack of blogging was also partly as I was beginning to get the feeling that many people felt that they could read my blog, know what I was doing and then not really feel the need to contact me.

So, if you do read this that’s great, after all that’s what it’s here for. But please, I like to hear from friends and family – comment on posts, give me a call or even come and see me?

A few months ago Richard said to me on the phone when I asked why he hadn’t rang for a while, “I don’t need to call you, I read your blog so I know what you are doing”. Now I know he said it partly in jest, but actually it’s true – and I know he’s not the only one.

Over the otherside of the hills

Perhaps I should leave childhood memories where they belong – in the past! As I sit typing this I’m in a little B&B on one of the many roads off the sea front at Blackpool. I’ve never stayed in Blackpool before (except the work conference in a big hotel on the front which doesn’t count!), as when we were children and came to visit we always came for the day from Preston where Gran lived.

Arlecdon Church
Originally uploaded by Ms. Moll.

Today I had a day of meetings in Cumbria, well actually it was only two meetings (two churches that we are going to pay for some repairs to) but the distances and time it takes to travel the windy roads of the Lake District meant that it took all day. The weather was typical, raining one minute and then glorious sunshine the next.

The day was certainly interesting as my companion for the day, a work colleague who is a practicing Christian, very active in the church and a very strong believer – none of which I knew when we first set off. Oh no I can almost hear you thinking, well those of you who know my feelings towards the Christian church anyway!

Actually I really enjoyed our discussions about what happens when you die, who wrote the bible, whether god created everything or if it was just an accident – and, the fact that I’m going to hell when I die (not something that bothers me since I no more believe in hell than I do in heaven – both being constructs of the Christian church to try and keep people in line).

He was impressed that I don’t celebrate Christmas, given that it would be hypocritical as a ‘non-believer’, but he also thought that I’d be really interested in an Alpha Course!

Anyway, why am I in Blackpool?

Since tomorrow I will be going down to Gloucestershire to see Dad for a few days I didn’t see the point in returning to Sheffield for the night – and anyway, the Blackpool illuminations are on!

Illuminations
Originally uploaded by Ms. Moll.

Arriving in the town I was greeted by the weather I have come to associate with this resort – very wet drizzle and winds that can knock you sideways.

So after dumping my bags in the B&B I set off along the front towards town, along the front. I have to admit to being very disappointed by the illuminations – where they always so unimpressive? I don’t think they were, I’m sure that more of the trams were lit up, only two that I saw were. The promenade in the 70s was always bumper to bumper with cars, kids hanging out of the windows watching the lights and the trams. Dad tells me that he’s sure that we travelled on a lit up tram on one occasion but I don’t remember.

By the time I got to the tower the rain had penetrated through my coat and my trousers to my underwear, and down the back of my legs – miserable! The only places open to eat were the hotels, in which I would have been the youngest by about 60 years (they really did look from the outside like old people’s homes), or fish and chip shops (or of course McDonalds – sponsors of some of the lights).

Corporate sell out
Originally uploaded by Ms. Moll.

After a not particularly good fish, chips and mushy peas it had actually stopped raining, so I walked back along the front (against the wind this time), past the B&B and on to the pleasure beach – a lot more neon than before.

The B&B is supposed to have broadband, but I can’t seem to log in, so I’ll probably not post this until tomorrow evening when I get down to Dad’s house. Tomorrow I intend to spend talking photos, if the rain stops for long enough!

(Broadband was working in the morning, so I managed to post this before breakfast!)

Confused…..

If anyone out there knows anything about email address, websites, domains, POP3 and ‘pushing’ I’d love to hear from them – if they can contact me!!

I’ve got myself into a right mess with my email addresses and accounts – mainly as I don’t have a ‘provider’ – so my main email address just hangs in the ether and I have to access it via mail2web. The really scary thing is that I’ve got all my accounts for everything set up on it – so if it disappears I’d be stuffed!

anyway, hopefully I’ll have email at home soon and get myself sorted out. Help gratefully received.

Blogging will resume when I have easy access to the internet.

A year without Mum

Medicine of my smile
Originally uploaded by tearoom.

A flower blooms and fades away but the memory of it’s beauty lingers on the air to cause a smile as it touches your mind.

The above was sent to me by Buzz in a text message, not long after Mum died.