When I Grow Up - Page 33

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In defence of Pixie Lott and freedom of expression

January 21, 2015

I’m a bit nervous about this one, so excuse me while a get a little political: Je suis Charlie. Everyone at the moment is defending freedom of speech – we are allowed to say what we want whether or not it offends people. The point is, we have the right to do so. So what about freedom of expression in other ways? The freedom to wear what we want for example? Glastonbury Festival has decided this year to ban the selling of native American style headdresses and costume while 2 days ago Pixie Lott received negative media attention and a flurry of criticism on Twitter for dressing up as TigerLily from Peter Pan and a similar thing happened to Ellie Goulding at Halloween. Surely the context in these situations is relevant? Festivals, fancy dress birthday parties and Halloween are occasions where it is quite commonplace to dress up. (I personally tend to find more excuses than that.) ….

Into the Woods film review

January 14, 2015

The problem about having an engaging trailer and a really good cast is you go to see a film with high expectations. I enjoy musicals and I love fairytales, so as you might expect, I was thoroughly looking forward to Into The Woods. This is how I imagine the conversation in film-making offices went….

The Hobbit – Battle of the Five Armies

January 3, 2015

Last night we drove to Yeovil to watch the final in the Hobbit Trilogy. Proof really, that it really should have only been two films. The second was my favourite – we indulged in the luxury of watching it at our nearest imax theatre in Cardiff and it was an amazing experience. I’m glad we didn’t bother with this one though….

Rayburn 345w advice

The practicalities of wood-fired heating & owning a Rayburn

December 15, 2014

My posts about the Rayburn 345W are still some of my most popular as there is so little information about them. Now we’ve had ours for four years, I thought I’d put together a list of practicalities that should be considered if you’re thinking about heating your house with wood….

nanowrimo advice

What is 50,000 divided by 30?

December 4, 2014

The answer is 1667. If you’ve just completed National November Writing Month, otherwise known as NaNoWriMo, then you’ll know what I’m talking about. For those of you who don’t, the idea is that you write a 50,000 word novel in just the 30 days which make up the month of November. Many people around the world get involved and local events are organised where people get together and just write. Well anyway, I decided to have a go this year and this is what happened….

Zombie costumes

October 28, 2014

I am lucky enough to live near the very diverse and mystical town of Glastonbury. This weekend we had been warned that there was going to be an invasion of Zombies in the High Street. I got caught there last year and managed to take a couple of photos before they attacked. If anyone wants to join them, however, I found a couple of fun costumes so you’d fit right in…

Guy Fawkes Night attire

October 22, 2014

I’m not sure my American readers will know who Guy Fawkes was, so just in case, here’s a little history lesson: Some guy called Guy Fawkes wanted a Catholic king, so on November 5th 1605 he attempted to blow up the House of Lords. He was caught, tortured and died for his trouble, and for some unknown reason, we celebrate this failed attempt at rebellion. We Brits love a tryer I suppose. So every year we have bonfires and fireworks displays and pretend it’s warm enough for a barbecue in the dark – usually run by the local Scout group…

Behind the Scenes at Hollow Crown filming

October 22, 2014

On Monday I luckily heard through Facebook that Benedict Cumberbatch, along with other amazing actors such as Michael Gambon and Judi Dench were filming the next series of The Hollow Crown nearby! By chance, my daughter had an orthodontist appointment after school there, so of course we stopped by to have a good old nose.

funny poem

There’s a hole in our kayak

October 17, 2014

This is a genuine post on our local Freecycle forum: “We have a very old kayak to get rid of. I don’t know anything about it except that it has a hole in it but still floats and that it is too small for my 6’3″ son to get into. It appears to be made of plastic. There is no paddle.” It inspired us at Writers’ Group to write a poem! Here’s mine…

Snow White Costumes

October 14, 2014

On the last day of winter term at Junior school everyone else loved our Christmas treat : We watched a film in the hall and were given an ice cream wafer sandwich. The problem is I don’t like ice cream (I know, I know) and I was brought up to accept what you’re given graciously. One year I told the dinner lady that I don’t like ice cream and she told me not be so ungrateful and gave it to me anyway (why were dinner ladies so horrible?). I’d try to eat the ice cream, I really would, but every year I’d sit there in misery with sticky melted ice cream all over my hands. So I don’t have particularly fond memories of those films – one of which was Snow White….

Frozen Costumes

October 9, 2014

Halloween is fast approaching and over here, the night before, a few of us might be wondering which black clothes we have that would pass off as a witch costume. If they are lucky, we may buy a cheap costume for the kids from the supermarket….

Farm Festival review, Bruton, Somerset

October 2, 2014

Oh my goodness – apologies for not posting in absolutely ages! One of the first things I was busy with was Farm Festival which took place 1st – 2nd August. This review is from a trader’s point of view. We arrived about lunch time the day before the festival opened, and set to work putting together our stall. I don’t know how it took so long to do this, but it managed to take several hours! Although we were ready by nightfall, we quickly realised that the festival wasn’t anywhere near ready….