I'm going to be in London for 1 day only

on the afternoon of Wed August 5. My train gets in to Pad at 12:25 (theoretically), and I don't have any commitments until 7:30 in the evening when I have to be in Fulham.

If anyone fancies meeting up in that time, drop me a line (medievalsteph AT gmail DOT com). I'd love to meet you, whoever you are.

It's not that I don't love you anymore

I do, really and truly. And I think about you guys and wonder what you're up to. (One could argue that if I want to know what you're up to then I should log in and find out. But that would be logical.)

It's just that when i lived in Bristol I was a maiden trapped in a small room in the 7th floor of an ivory tower block, and my computer was my main connection to the outside world. Now the outside world is, well, just outside. I walk through my door and rather than finding a stinky, loud, smelly city full of torn bin bags, skantily clad drunk students, and crapping seagulls, I find a lovely garden full of sunflowers and sweatpeas and zinnias and corn and tomatoes. And if I go a little further than that there are other houses, with actual people in them. Meat people. And some of them are really nice. And we play board games and walk to the shops and keep each other company.

And there's the house itself, always with things to do, meals to cook, and laundry to fold. (Always with the fucking laundry. Jesus-H.-Christ-on-a-pogo-stick that man generates a lot of laundry.) And I find I just can't bring myself to sit in front of a computer for one milisecond than is longer than absolutely necessary. And not even that long. I've become abslutely crap at checking my email. It's driving my mother up the wall, but I figure that's fair revenge for being driven up the wall by her before the wedding.

So I'm still around, and I still love you all, I'm just unplugging for a while. I'll still be here intermittenly, so feel free to stop by. I like hearing from you. I just won't be a daily poster any more. Maybe at some point in the future I'll return to being a more regular writer, but in the meantime I think I'll stick to Big News. (I'm hoping that before next Christmas I'll have some Big News to share with you.)

There. That seems a good place to leave off. Always best to leave the readers hanging.

Brown Belt Humiliation

Last week I defeated a brown belt. I'm still a white belt. (Which in jujitsu isn't the bottom of the pecking order. It's one up from red, which is the lowest.)

I've been taking jujitsu lessons since November. In May I was awarded my white belt. Last week I was sparring for the very first time against someone other than my sensei. My opponent was a brown belt, one step below black, and also a guy. I beat him. Really and truly. He didn't let me win (though he may have underestimated me a bit.)

w00t.

Pet Names

Pirate and I finally came up with good pet names for each other. The usual "honey" and "darling" just wasn't working for us. We drew upon the native American tradition for inspiration (and utterly insulted it in the process). We are:

Bear Who Waits For Blowjob

and

Little Cooking Flower

My Mother-in-Law the Pudding Rapist

Wow. I knew it had been a while since I blogged, but I genuinely hadn't realized it had been over 2 months. Sorry about that. I didn't mean to take such a long break, but once I stepped back from the screen to take a breather I found it really difficult to return. Rather than write a big long whingy apology though, how about I just jump right back into it? Right. Here goes.

My mother-in-law is a Pudding Rapist. (This is pudding in the English sense, meaning all things desserty, not just the stuff Bill Cosby sells.)

Pirate and I were up at the in-laws for 2 weeks over Easter, during which time my MIL fed us pudding every day at lunch AND dinner. Argh! After 4 days I thought I would explode. The problem is I know she only does it because I'm there. If it was just Pirate visiting his parents she would make a pud the first night and leave it at that. But because I'm there she makes one every night. And since she's doing it for me I feel obligated out of a sense of hospitality to accept, and then she says "See, I knew you really did want it" and makes another one the next night. And then pourse double cream all over everything! GROOOOOOSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!

So, yes, the Pudding Rapist. Becuase in her mind "no" means "yes" and no matter how much you scream and kick and protest that you don't want any more, she knows you secretly do, and gives it to you.

The Results Are In!

And the winner is...


Pai Mei!


I'm awfully glad you guys voted for that name, because that's the one Pirate and I chose anyway, so now you won't feel like I fobbed you off.

Pai has settled in well to his new home. His favorite activities include tripping us as we walk down the stairs, making biscuits in my lap, and hiding in the wardrobe. (He spends so much time in the wardrobe he almost got named "Aslan.") Generally we call him Kitten-Pai or Cutie-Pai, or when he's hiding in the wardrobe Chicken-Pai.

Currently he's sitting on my mousepad licking his ass. All is well with the universe.

I can has family?

Here he is! Isn't he handsome?

(If a bit scary.)

Hello, small predator!

Aww, look at his widdle white socks!

Now the question is what to name him. The options are:

1. Fred. This is the name the shelter gave him and, though not terribly original, I was thinking of him as "Fred" in my mind for the whole week before we actually brought him home, so we're already kind of used to it. Also, it's pleasant and domestic and kind of suits him. (He's a cuddle slut.)

2. Pai Mei. This dude. He's the bad-ass martial arts guru from Kill Bill. The Furball is not a badass, but he kind of looks it with his narrow eyes and white goatee. We'd probably call him "Pie" on a day-to-day basis, and that has pleasant pudding conotations. Also it kind of ties in with "Pirate." He'd be the Pai-cat. A Pi-rat and a Pai-cat! Brilliant! (I may have just talked myself into this one.)

3. Clawdius. You can't really see it in these photos, but he has white toes with brown outlines that form these little Roman arches across his feet. Like little aquaducts. So we thought a Roman name might be appropriate. Pirate thought of the pun with the spelling.

4. Toast. He looks like badly burnt toast. 'Nuff said.

5. Thornton. Because he's chocolate brown and Hershey and Nestle are totally unorigina. Ditto Cadbury. And Lindt is just too posh.


Go vote. We won't pay the slightest bit of attention to the results, mind. Your opinions are purely for my amusement.