The Secret Life of Andrew

Christmas has been a pretty successful affair, although it's not quite over for me yet as I've not seen my family yet! My haul's been very good. James' presents had a broad muppet theme and I got:

The Mupper Show Season 3 on DVD
A cuddly Count and Janice
Angel 'Smile Time' graphic novel
Muppet Christmas Carol Soundtrack
A Swedish Chef mug
Nausicaa Of The Valley Of The Wind Graphic Novel
Cuddly Totoro
Monty Python Fluxx card game
A Muppets Christmas DVD
'Animal' belt
Sesame Street DVD 1969-1974
Sesame Street 40th anniversary
Various chocolate goods

I haven't looked through them all properly yet but the Sesame Street stuff, especially the book makes for fantastic reading. I'm quite into the Muppets (good job eh?) so seeing what work goes into the shows is really interesting. We watched the first Sesame Street episode the other day and James keeps singing the songs round the house. In 1969 the only characters to appear were Bert and Ernie, Big Bird, Kermit and the Cookie Monster (who doesn't even eat cookies!).


Ourliving room on Xmas day

My presents to James weren't themed at all:

Tetris Cube
Zac Efron calendar (so fucking hot)
Cow candles
Black Eyed Peas 'The E.N.D' album
Beyonce 'I Am...Sasha Fierce' album
The Argyle Sweater 2010 desk calendar
Top Trumps tournament
Cows In Action book
Mr Bump stress reliever
Mr Bump mints

Think that covers it all. Oh, and a cute toast cushion which I bought for both of us as I loved it! Haha. We played with the games and stuff a fair bit during the day. We've got various other bits from James' family too. Too many chocolates and biscuits, Ross Noble DVDs, a strange penguin thing, a digital photo frame (re-inventing the wheel? We're not convinced by it yet!).


James with toast cushion and other various gifts

On the day itself we played games and cooked the dinner. Very exciting as we'd never cooked a Xmas dinner before. It was a roaring success though. Should have taken a photo of it but we forgot! I was dead pleased with it though. Once that was eaten I'm ashamed to say that we watched a lot of TV. Top Of The Pops (I sung along to everything naturally and it was tonnes better than last year even though it still had Fearne 'The Programme Murderer' Cotton [who appropriately turns into Fearne Bottom when you type it into predictive text] and Reggie 'Please Punch Me In The Face' Yates), The Queen, The Gruffalo (beautifully animated), Doctor Who (OK. Got better. Too much confusion and contrived goings-on at the beginning), Strictly Come Dancing (vaguely), The Royle Family, Gavin And Stacey (Like week old sprouts. ie, off the boil) and Catherine Tate's Nan's Christmas Carol. Quite surprised by The Royle Family. I can take it or leave it usually. I find it a bit too depressing, like a lot of stuff about 'normal' families but it's miles better now they've left the house! A good day all told.


Me looking quite smug with my gifts

On Boxing Day we braved the shops just to leave the house. Town was busy and a lot was open. We did pretty well. We got the DK Prehistoric Life book from Smiths which we'd been after for a while. For dead cheap too. I bought the Ministry Of Sound 80s 3CD set, although I think I've over-dosed on electro 80s a bit now :s. I also got three pairs of trainers in the Schuh sale. I'm quite excited by this as I've never owned so many pairs of trainers!

Yesterday we went to visit James' family. The farm was nice, still all snowy, and we got fed lots and although we didn't do a lot it was nice enough. We played Scrabble today. I won the first one, James' Dad the second. He's worse to play board games with than James, haha. Julia and James' Dad don't get on all that well and Julia always blame me for his behaviour when we visit. Unfair! He'd show off with any visitor!


Caught in bed with another man

Back home now. Quite glad that we've got a break before we head off to my family for New Year. I want a rest! 

We've been in London for the weekend. We'd promised ourselves that this time would be a relaxing trip but as usual, it never works out that way does it? Actually, it wasn't too bad but we did do a lot of walking. Over the years we've done all the main things so it's nice to go off the beaten path a little bit isn't it? On Friday we had the day off from work so we got to London at about half 1. We checked in at the hotel and then headed straight out again. We went along Oxford Street and saw the Xmas lights. Christmas Carol has really got a big marketing budget right?! We then headed down Regents Street and to Hamley's. It's been a while since I've been in there. It was pretty packed but I love it so much, I didn't really care. We went right up to the top and had a drink in the cafe, then we had a look around. We ran into the new Lego boardgames which are just brilliant. I'd actually earmarked one to get to James for Xmas but it was blown wide open after we'd seen them because we fell in love with them! So we bought the Minotaurus one for ourselves. We totally failed at getting presents for anyone else but we succeeded in buying presents for us. We win.

Anyway, after that we went to Piccadilly and then to the venue of the musical for the evening (more on that in a minute). We needed to get some food so we crossed over to the south bank and had a look around the Xmas market there. We didn't buy much, although we did get some cute tree decorations. We then ate in Giraffe. It's tasty but I'd have an easier time ordering if they put some chillis on the menu so I could see how spicy the food was!

After food we went back to the Palace theatre to see Les Cages Aux Folles. Mistakenly we thought that John Barrowman was in it but when we opened the programme the slip told us that we off doing Children in Need! Gutted. They could have told us when we booked it, it did when we booked Blood Brothers. It turned out ok though as we managed to convince ourselves that John Barrowman (who is now known in our house as John Barrowman Booo) wouldn't have been all that great. I actually think he'd have been better cast in the role of George. Anyway, the replacement was debuting the night we saw him and he may have taken a little time to get warmed up but it was brilliant on the whole. Not camp at all, oh no....I really liked the way that front of stage/back stage switched. Song wise, they could do with a few more uptempos at the beginning but the second half completely nails as, of course, it has 'I Am What I Am' which when you see it live just amazing. So yeah, great stuff. So great that a fight broke out in the stalls during the interval. We couldn't see what was going but we heard something, very strange.

On Saturday we took the tube to Notting Hill and went to Portobello market. It's years since I went there but I forgot how long they go on for! We didn't managed to buy anything but it was nice just for a look around really. We then went to Kensington Roof Gardens which is a pain to find. They don't advertise it. It was worth it though as it was very quiet up there. It's a garden on the roof of a department store and it was lovely exotic ducks and more excitingly, flamingoes! Strange but it's lovely to get away from the city up there. We then walked to Kensington Park, sat on a bench and had dinner and got rather cold. Then we had a wander round Kensington Gardens where I got stalked by a squirrel. It saw the carrier bag and was convinced I had food. It climb up a pole at one point and I was convinced it was going to jump at me! So I ran away and it stalked me from the bushes for a bit!

We then went back to the hotel and played Minotaurus (so good) as we were wet and cold. Then we came back out a little later on and found a lovely Thai restaurant called Patara, in Soho. I had crab salad followed by pear in coconut cream for dessert which was just lovely. I think Thai might be my favourite cuisine, it's all just so tasty. After that we went to Phoenix theatre to see Blood Brothers. I'd sort of been dragged along by James as Mel C was in it and he's a big fan. I'm so gald I went though because it's a great play. It packs so much social commentary in about class and modern history too with it been set in the 60s, 70s and 80s. And yet the move from year to year is seamless. I did wonder if the songs were necessary at all but it's because of the songs that the time moves so easily. The actors in it were great, with them having to play children through to twenty-somethings and I was quite surprised that Mel C was actually brilliant. I knew she'd be good but she was perfect for the role. We stalked her afterwards (ie, waited with about 15 others outside the stage door round the back) and met her! She signed our programme, had her picture taken with us and chatted to us all. I think people were a little star struck but she was lovely. I asked her if she was finding it hard work. She said 'yes' without hesitation, she'd done two shows that day. She was tiny as well. I'm not used to meeting celebrites, it was very strange. Good though. James was ecstatic anyway!

On Sunday we went to the Wellcome Collection on Euston Road. Unfortunately there were on the change over for exhibitions so we missed out on that. However, we saw the permanent rooms, of which there are two. One has lots of interactive stuff so we had fun playing with the touch screens, and the other if full fo Mr Wellcome's 'stuff', historical bits he'd collected from other countries over the years. So things like Japanese sex aids, models made out of teeth. y'know, the usual. It was fascinating. And I felt pretty good as I went to a medical museum and didn't faint, I faced my fear head on. Now I just hope that my head gets back to normal now. We had dinner in the lovely cafe downstairs and then wandered down to Foyles bookshop and Fopp. I got the new Phoenix album (thanks Steph!) and we finally found the new DK book, the prehistory one - the stuff of dreams. It will be mine when I can find it cheap. We have all the others. then we got a train back home and collapsed. A great weekend though. Pictures on Facebook. I would put them on here but it's such a faff that there's really no point. Boo LJ!

Christ. I can't be doing with many more days like this. I got to work today thinking, oh good, things have calmed down. All my potentially redundant have jobs again and I just have to worry about my part-time offer business. Well, no. You could tell things were going to be bad when the Principle wanted to see my boss this morning, plus his recall of the email that said congrats to the people with new positions. So the unsettling atmosphere came back and come dinnertime my boss was being sent home on indefinite leave! I mean, blimey! I won't bore you with the details as to why but it's a complete farce as to the reason she's being sent home and smacks of a desperation to get rid of her somehow or other. None of us can believe it. The mood was not lightened by the fact that we had a meeting about the re-structure this afternoon. Now I don't know who to talk about my part-time plan with and I'm not even sure I want to work here part-time anymore! 

Anyway, on to better things. I had a good, if not unintentionally busy weekend. We watched 'The Bourne Identity' on Firday night which I really liked. It featured not only the wonderful Franca Potente but also had the most realistic car chase scene even in it. In fact the whole thing felt nicely plausible and just didn't feel as cintrived as some other 'weird' action films do. So yeah, very good.

On Saturday, James' Mum took us to Harrogate. We had a fruitful charity shop where I picked up some CD singles and a newer version of Trivia Persuit for £2.50. Bargain! I got some PS2 games too. So yes, a good day, especially since we had dinner in Pizza Hut. Yum yum. They always say that Harrogate is posh but I always notice the amount of posh cars that are being driven around there. It's madness. It's a nice place to live though, well, going off the town centre anyway which is lovely, well, apaprt from the loonie religious woman shouting in high street. Why do we put up with this from religious loons? If it was an actual mental doing that then people would never allow it.

Saturday night involved Trivia Persuit (which I eventually won) and Dance Sex, sorry, DanceX, which wasn't as good as we thought it might be.

On Sunday James took his car out for a spin, with me and his Mum to go for lunch in Colne, and then to Matalan. I managed to pick up a pair of trainers, a T-shirt and a shirt so I was quite please. I have vowed to go back to Matalan soon when I have a little more money to spend. The PS2 buying has crippled me this month!

So yes, a good weekend depsite me not getting much 'me' time but it wasn't bad. I'm slowly getting James hooked on the Playstation 2 (which is good for multi-player playage). We've been mostly playing the fun Kuri Kuri Mix and Lego Stars Wars. While I played a bit of the X-Files game (which is slightly terrifying!) and Final Fantasy. Woo!