So that was 2011

Quite an eventful year:

20 February - my first half marathon in Brighton.  Chip time 2 hours 40 mins and 10 seconds.  13 miles is a long way to run and takes a few days to recover from but overall a positive experience and one I plan to repeat on 19 February next year.

Lawrence started his placement with Clifford French. Hopefully heralding a successful career in PR.

Svidrigailov joined our family as a skinny little kitten in May and now look at him.

St Dunstan's Llandudno went from concept to fully staffed centre.  Culminating for me in an invitation to the xmas party on 17 December.

5 March - first World Book Night.  Great concept with pretty rubbish admin.  Some of the people I gave Margaret Atwoods Blind Assassin to read it, others didn't.   

During April Adrian's longest running potential redundancy on record from Aviance at Heathrow finally happened.  A few weeks later he was offered a job back at Gatwick with Swissport.  Hopefully this one will last until he retires.

28 May - 5 June we went to the Hay Festival for the first time.  Another one to be repeated.

September - spent a week at Aarti's flat in Estepona relaxing and reading.  

30 October - Great South Run, Portsmouth.  Chip time 2 hours 4 mins.

2-5 December North Lees Hall to celebrate Phil's 50th with Melinda and Chris and Helen.  Pretty awful weather but lovely company and venue for a relaxing weekend.  I missed out on the cutlery museum and the lead mine on this trip so might go back again one of these days.

9 Hillside was the site of two successful parties during 2011, on 2 April to celebrate my great achievement in reaching the age of 50 and another on 9 December as the last ever St Dunstan's HR department xmas bash.

Here's to 2012 - an Olympic year.  I hope it's a good one!

Good old Endo

Work can sometimes be very, very frustrating and then you have a day off.  How aggravating then for Hotmail to block my account because they cant remember my new password.  I wouldn't have had to change my password in the first place if someone hadn't been able to hack my account and offer all my contacts products that those who don't know me very well might find a bit suspicious.

Anyway after a frustrating round of no email, laundry, shopping and more laundry I was feeling a bit fraught so I three caution to the wind and lycra to the legs and took off for a 5km run.  Thanks for joining me Endo, I really needed you today.

Bobotie recipe

As you can see from the dirt on the picture I've used this recipe lots of times since I acquired book in 1984.

I usually use more curry powder than listed and substitute dried apricot pieces for half of the raisins.

Come on Barbie Lets Go Party

The last ever St Dunstan's HR Dept Xmas Party is now only a collection of hangovers mostly in Sussex (East and West) but some scattered as far as London and North Wales.

At one point in the evening Barbie was chased by a gang of zombies.  Fortunately they were subdued by alcohol and various confectionary items so disaster was averted.

Afterwards by Rosamund Lupton

 

I preferred her previous book 'Sister' to this one.  I found the point of view - the story is told like a conversation with her husband and I had to keep reminding myself who the 'you' was that she was referring to.  Apart from that it was readable.

Nutwood Cattery

Not wanting to leave the window open as an invitation to burglars for the weekend I looked around for somewhere for Svidrigailov to spend the weekend while we were at North Lees Hall.  Its his first time away from home and he was a little bewildered but seemed calm enough and took to the cat flap idea when some Dreamies were thrown through the hole.  When I collected him on Monday afternoon he was quite vocal about our reunion but had spend a very comfortable and warm few days in his little chalet.  I would thoroughly recommend Nutwood as a caring and safe environment for a cat requiring an inn.

North Lees hall

A late Elizabethan tower house built for WillIam Jessop in the early 1590s.  Charlotte Bronte visited in mid 1845 during a stay with a friend nearby.  She found the name Eyre comes here and her description of Mr Rochester’s Thornfield Hall is a rather accurate description of North Lees Hall complete with a mad woman who perished in a fire.

Fortunately the Hall now has central heating, electricity and running hot water although it retains the treacherous mode of elevation, a modern (but not very) replacement of an uneven wooden spiral staircase.  Derbyshire in December is a very cold place, it must have been very unpleasant here before these mod cons were available.

The trip here was uneventful apart from the usual Friday afternoon M25/M1 stop start traffic.  The aroma of a lovely monogrammed meat pie greeted us on arrival (see below) and a few glasses of wine got the party started.

The trip home however was a little more fraught as there was 4cm of snow on the car and thick ice on the road.  The first 5 miles of the journey were a nail biting slithering along narrow winding roads.  Fortunately Derbyshire's dry stone walls (and our car) survived.

Happy Birthday Phil.

I missed out on the Cutlery Museum and the underwater lead mine and spent Saturday stoking the fire and reading my book instead.  I braved the cold on Sunday to visit Buxton which would no doubt be lovely in the summer, or even in the winter on a sunny day but it is not at its best in the snow when you’ve lost your travelling companions and dont know how to read the map.  Fortunately good humour was restored by hot chocolate with cream and marshmallows.  Back to Hathersage via Bakewell where the difference between a Bakewell Tart and a Bakewell Pudding was revealed by the charming proprietor of the Bakewell Pudding Shop.  Back to North Lees Hall for a bit of a rest before the birthday dinner.