Election indifference

Surely I am not the only person who feels a cool wave of indifference flow over me when I think of the forthcoming elections?


I feel as if I’m admitting to some sort of shameful secret. I’ve always been a huge advocate of our democratic system - a keen believer in civil rights and the duty we (especially us women) owe our forebearers to make the effort and get out and vote on election day.

I have, in the past, castigated friends and family for not using their vote imploring them to at least go along and spoil the darn thing rather than let it sit unused. I have quoted the life and times of Emily Pankhurst. I have referenced our very own civil rights movements. I have proudly felt as if my wee tick on a box could make a difference.

But this time? Well I’m afraid to say I really don’t care. It’s not that I think we can’t still make a difference - just that I’m tired of the same old tribalism and infighting that so seems to characterise the modern political world.

On a regional and national scale we are mired in scandal, sleaze, ineptitude and political gesturing. Meanwhile on the ground cuts are being enforced across the board on some of our core services, people are losing their jobs left, right and centre and our indigenous industries are all but destroyed.

Services to the young and services to the old have slashed with the arrogance that only the middle to upper class middle-aged can get away with. Those cutting costs seem to have forgotten that they were once young and seem to live in blissful ignorance of the fact that they will someday get old.

God love them if they get old and sick - then they are, I’m afraid to say, in real trouble.

Perhaps as my mid 30s approach at a frightening pace I am developing a healthy dose of cynicism.

My six year old has everyone’s card well marked. He travels past the posters and asks a variety of questions about who is who and what do they do. He has nick-names for them all based on their appearance. Can you guess who he refers to as Chancellor Palpatine from Star Wars?

He has tonnes of questions about the government, who they are and how they have the power to make decisions.

It’s not the easiest thing in the world to try and explain to him that we are voting for a new government and Prime Minister but no, Chancellor Palpatine, Fancy Hair or Sue Sylvester don’t have a chance of winning the top seat.

It’s been tricky to explain to him that no, Barack Obama has no plans to run in the Foyle constituency and indeed that he can’t run himself just yet.

“Why not mammy?” he asked, “Sure, I’m smart.”

And he’s right. He is smart and he has some cracking ideas. Two day working weeks and five day weekends. Bigger spends on parks and leisure facilities. Oh, and he wants people to be nicer to each other and stop joining the army to go and fight in wars. The Afghanistan issue is simple for him - no people in the army, no one gets killed.

His plans don’t just stop at Stormont - oh no - he has plans on being the first Derry born President of the United States but when he comes home (after his two victorious terms in office) he has asked me to ask if you would kindly just call him Joseph and drop the Mr President title.

Perhaps if we put a rake of children in charge we would get better results. Sure the budgets might largely be squandered on DS games in the first instance but sure that’s not worse than squandering expenses on swimming pools, moats, designer clothes and the like.

I’d like to think a host of new blood would bring new ideas. I’d like to think that we could get back to the basics. Maybe it really is time for out with the old and in with the new.

I’ll probably still vote - there will be a wee voice in my head telling me it would wrong not to - but i’m yet to be convinced on who (if anyone) deserves a tick.

Who is going to make sure that maternity services are protected and that more money is poured into mental health services? I want someone who can stand up the banks and actually bring jobs (not just make empty promises) to our doorstep. I want someone there who pays more than lip service to reversing spending cuts in care services to the disabled and elderly.

If they can wangle in a two day working week and a five day weekend then it will be a cert.

Otherwise a spoiled vote might just be the way go to... I might scrawl “Joseph “Mr President” Allan for MP”.

A Weight Watchers Wobble

It has been a BAD week.
Yes, I lost a lb on the scales this week but I can feel it - and more - back on me now just three days later.
I seemed to have careered down a very dodgy path and the binge monster is winning.
I've had half a Dominos Pizza - a big one, with chicken and mushroom and sweetcorn and that wee garlic dippy thing on the side.
And a Mars Bar.
And a sausage sandwich.
And buns.

This is no one bad day - this is a trainwreck of three days and mentally I have to say I'm struggling to get into the right frame of mind to get back on track.
I think I need to do several things. I need to remember why I'm doing this - how I felt the day Joseph asked me if I was sure I wasn't pregnant as I was so very, very fat. How I want to fit back into my wedding dress. How I want to feel attractive for the first time in my life. How I want to be fitter and healthier and not have to mentally check each room I enter to see if I'm the fattest person there...

And I think I need to find a new approach to what I eat. Maybe 10 weeks of eating the same old, same old has made the diet tired for me. Toast with Low Low in the morning, Special K bars, Thai Curry and Pasta and chicken for lunch, Potatoes and chicken or salad and chicken. Chicken features a lot as I'm a fussy meat eater and don't do fish. I have eaten my body weight in Muller Light yoghurts and if I see another packet of Velvet Crunch crisps I may actually barf.

So ideas please? For a person with exceptionally limited cooking skills?

And ideas for keeping positive when all you want to do is fall headfirst into a bucket of KFC?

Extract from book 5 - the work in progress

“I’m going to be a daddy?” Martin had looked at her through his dark eye-lashes, eyelashes she always said were wasted on a man,  and smiled.


She gestured towards the small white stick in her hand and steadied her voice as tears threatened to spill down her cheeks. “It looks like it!”

“Well, that’s brilliant,” he said with an enthusiasm she so had not expected. “Wow! A daddy! And you a mammy! This is great news, Ava. I promise you. This is brilliant stuff. We’re going to do this right, you and me. I’m going to take care of you and that wee baby. I promise.”

He had moved across the room in what felt like one giant impressive manly gesture and had pulled her into his arms while she sobbed. Okay, so it wasn’t in her lifeplan. Okay so she was still young and just getting into the swing of things in her teaching job. Sure, she still lived at home and only saw Martin a couple of nights a week but this didn’t have to be a disaster - not by any stretch of the imagination.

When he had put her down he ran out and bought a box of cigars. He stood in the back garden of her mother’s house and smoked one and when he came back in the smell almost made her vomit.

“This is one of the best days of my life,” he said, with a strength of emotion she had never seen him use before. “There’s only one thing which would or could make it better...”

She had watched as he had knelt on one knee. She felt him take her hand in his and she listened to him tell her loved her and ask her to marry him.

When Ava had looked in Martin’s eyes she had seen nothing but love, joy and honesty radiating back so she had said yes and had kissed him deeply - despite the fug of stale cigar smoke and told him yes.

Two days later Martin had spent his week’s wages on a simple but beautiful yellow gold band with one small but perfectly formed diamond. She had slipped it onto her finger and felt like a proper grown up. Okay, so none of this planned, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t going to be just perfect. Happiness comes when you least expect it.

He had teared up at their first scan. Ava had felt strangely emotional too but also more than a little freaked out. This baby – the white and black and grey little blob she could see on the screen with its very own little heartbeat- was inside her. It was growing in her stomach. It was attached to her, relying on her for everything. She felt overwhelmed with responsibility – she had to do this right. She had to make sure her baby was fine. She had to feed it all the right food and avoid all the wrong things. She had to wear flat shoes and wireless bras that made her boobs look saggy and she had to drink lots of milk but still partake in (mild) exercise. She panicked about the bottle of wine she shared with Martin before she knew she was up the stick. She panicked about the cigar scented kiss they had shared just after they knew. She panicked that she would have a miscarriage, or a premature delivery, or that the cord would be wrapped around the baby’s neck, or that she would need a c-section. Worse still she panicked that she wouldn’t need a c-section and she would actually have to push a baby out of her actual lady area. She panicked she would tear. She panicked she would make a show of herself. She panicked that she would be a rubbish mammy. She panicked that something would be wrong with the baby and she would struggle to cope. She panicked that Martin would leave her and she would be left a single parent.

As it turned out, he did. And no amount of panicking about it beforehand helped prepare her for the body blow of him walking out on her and her eight month pregnant belly.

It hadn’t been terribly dramatic. He had dropped his paint roller mid nursery transformation and grabbed his coat and said he couldn’t do this anymore. He didn’t love her. He wasn’t ready to be a daddy. She was an awful sour bag to live with these days. He was going to move away. He had a job in America. She could keep the ring – all £350 of it. £350 which would turn out to be the only money he would ever, ever pay towards his daughter’s upkeep.

Depression - again. The curse of the modern woman?

I read an article this morning by author Allison Pearson on her own experiences with depression. I recognised myself in a lot of what she said - the need to want to give the right answers, to appear perfect.


I also recognised the allure of bridges in the middle of the night and indeed the desire to just not “be” any more. No, I don’t want to cause my family the pain of losing me in gross circumstances (suicide is never pretty, don’t let anyone tell you it is) but it would nice to hit an off switch or a pause button.

Allison said depression is the curse of the middle-aged woman - well, I’m not middle-aged yet but I do recognise her Blues Sisters analogy and indeed her description of Sandwich Woman - trapped between the devil and the deep blue sea trying to keep everyone happy.

She says our theme song is ‘Rainy Days and Mondays’ - for obvious reasons that made me smile. (A bit bizarre I know...that it made me smile but it felt like a piece of a jigsaw slotting into place).

She said depression is now, some would say, fashionable. Sure Marian Keyes has it, so it’s cool. And Emma Thompson. And her.

I’m not sure it’s a fashion anyone would want to follow but I’m grateful at least that people are talking about it. I’ve been battling for people to talk about it for years (and indeed the likes of La Keyes have been heartbreakingly open about their own experiences for quite some time now).

It’s still a taboo, isn’t it? I still notice the strange flashes of confusion when I extol the wonders of Prozac or mention that I need my happy pills.

I still get called “very brave” for being open about my experiences - I prefer the term very honest. There is nothing brave about getting through another day feeling like this. It’s just doing what I need to do to be there for my family.

Until it isn’t seen as “remarkable” to talk about having a mental illness we’ve not really won the battle, have we? But let’s keep trying.

Talking about Weight Watching

I was having lunch with a former colleague last week when I mentioned that I was on WeightWatchers. We were caught on the hop and with ten minutes to get something down our necks before we had to be back at our desks, the choices in the cafe were limited.
I settled for a scone the size of the my hand but congratulated myself on choosing Low Low spread and not proper real butter.

As I was munching it, thinking of all the things I could eat in place of it for less Points, I muttered to my colleague that I was on following the WeightWatchers programme and being at the relatively early stages of my diet I didn’t want to be put off my game.

She confided that she was going to WeightWatchers and thus ensued a conversation about filling or free foods, the worries and strains of getting on the scales and the reasons why we both wanted to hit goal weight.

We also commented that wasn’t it fierce when women on a diet talk about it all the time - the irony of that not being lost on me.

The interaction confirmed my belief that you cannot put two women in a room together for any length of time before the topic of conversation inevitably turns to weight, appearance, slimming or cravings.

Deep down, the vast majority of have an inner diet bore just waiting to break free and regale anyone in the vicinity with her tales of will power versus temptation.

As the old saying goes, many of us can quiet that inner diet bore down with chocolate but when she breaks free there isn’t a topic of conversation that doesn’t somehow wind its way back to what we’ve eaten, what we plan to eat, how much exercise we’ve done and what size we’d ultimately like to be.

Now personally speaking the inner diet bore has been my closest companion for the last 20 years. Even when I’ve not been on a diet (which is a lot, as the scales will show) she is there niggling away. She wonders do I really, really need that bar of chocolate. She gives me bad looks when I visit the chippy. She tuts and shakes her head at my obsession with plain bread toasted and clattered in real butter.

At the moment she is in full voice - checking nutritional value labels with her Points Tracker always, always at hand. And I apologise because I seem to have no control over her - she hunts out people who might be in a similar boat and she tells them everything - from what I’ve ate, to what size my clothes are and she has no shame about it all.

I’m not sure what it is about being on a diet that prompts us all to talk about it so much. Maybe because we want people to acknowledge the effort we are going to. Maybe we want to revel in the moments when people tell you they notice a change to the shape of your hips, the girth of your belly or the number of chins you have. Maybe we want people to know that, yes, as much as we may be on the hefty side now, we are doing something about it honest and don’t intend to be gulpens the rest of our days.

Maybe, it is just damn hard work and we feel the need to make other people suffer as much as we do. (But of course, I’m not suffering... not at all, nothing tastes as good as being slim feels - apart from a big feck off Cadbury’s Whole Nut or the aforementioned toast clattered in butter).

In seriousness I do feel better for shedding a few pounds. I do know I have a long way to go (a really, really long way) but I have a increased sense of self confidence, the desire to make more of an effort generally and a renewed interest in such frivolous things as painting my nails and applying some make up. I’ve even dyed my hair blonde and invested in new glasses.

I realised the heavier I became the more of a frumpy mammy I became. I felt frumpy so I became frumpier. I suppose if I talk about it all a lot now is that I want people to know that Mrs Frump is on her way out and that a new and improved me is on the way back in again.

Okay so it is clear I’ll have to work on the new me’s conversational skills - there is only so much court anyone will hold with tales of chocolate bars resisted and salads eaten. My husband just rolls his eyes when I bring out my wee green folder and start rambling about saturated fats - happy and all as he is to see less of from week to week.

But at least my inner diet bore knows that if all else fails she will have the chance to have her say when I’m in the company of other females. After all, we are all a little obsessed, aren’t we?

Random conversations with the boy

So, it's election time.
Joseph is trying to get his whole head around the issue of democracy, voting, republics and the like.
He is particularly interested in America and Barack Obama - can't say I blame him. I'm partial to a bit of Obama myself.

Joseph, unaware that he will never actually be President of the USA, was intrigued to find out that all former Presidents are entitled to be called Mr President for the rest of their days.

Joseph does not like this.

This morning in the car he turns to me, a slight tinge of panic in his voice and says: "Mammy, when I come back to Ireland after being President can you please not call me Mr President. I just want everyone to call me Joseph."

The quest to fit into the dress rumbles on...

... as does my stomach.
I lost half a pound this week. A little part of me was disappointed. A bigger part of me was relieved. You see I had a dodgy Easter which hadn't shown on the scales. I knew it was following me around and was going to show itself at some stage - and there it was, last night with a small loss.
Which was better than a small gain (and definitely better than a big gain).

I now have 4.5 stone to lose, on the nose, to get to goal. This will actually have me thinner than I was on my wedding day - wouldn't that be a joy to slip the dress on and have it be too big? Although with two babies since then and a tummy which resembles the wrinkly skin that forms on the top of cooling custard, it is unlikely.

I have my own personal goals - smaller ones. It will be a big deal for me to lose another 9lbs, which will bring me into a new stone bracket.

It will then be my mission to get under the next stone bracket after that -I will really feel as if I'm making progress by then.

My BMI has already dropped 2.5 points. Unfortunately I will need to lose another 30lbs to no longer be classed as obese. Isn't it a little sad that I'm looking forward to the day when I can dance around the house shouting "I'm overweight! I'm overweight! Look at me, I'm over weight!"?

It has shocked me to work that out. That, in essence, I was 47lbs (more than three stone!) into the obese category. I knew I was heavy but that heavy???

Ah well, we march on... eating healthy and shedding weight. I'll get there eventually.

And we have a bidder!

For 100 of your English pounds.
Come on folks - you can help children under five with brain tumours. You can help Camille.
This is who you are helping... this precious, beautiful little girl who deserves all our love.

Would you like to be in a bestseller?

I've been wracking my brains trying to think of someway to raise some support for the very worthwhile charity CAMILLE'S APPEAL.
On top of a few other things I've decided to give one lucky reader the chance to make a cameo appearance in my new book 'It's Got to Be Perfect' for a donation to the appeal.
This is how it is going to work.

The highest bidder by the end of this month will win the prize.

They can feature in the book themselves, or nominate a family member or friend to appear in the book.

Their name will appear in the book which will be published by Poolbeg Press at the end of September 2010.

The winner will receive a mention in the acknowledgements of the book along with a plug for Camille's Appeal. They will also received a signed copy of the book for them and/or their chosen special guest star.

This is a very worthwhile cause - and this is a great present for people who perhaps struggle to find that perfect present for the person who has everything.

To enter: Please contact me at claire.allan@gmail.com

PLEASE NOTE: It's Got to be Perfect is a romatic comedy novel for adults - and does contain some strong language and scenes of a sexual nature - please bear this is mind when you are thinking of who you would like to nominate - as perhaps your great Auntie Mable wouldn't be so keen!

So now you can read it!

The opening gambit from my forthcoming book

It's Got to be Perfect

Little old wine drinker me...

Two glasses down.
It has been a bastard of a day.
First there was a coffee morning in work and being on WeightWatchers I could but smell the lovely sausage baps and fancy buns as they wafted past. I had a measly (but delicious) slice of carrot cake and a cry in the ladies...
Then, well, I had a difficult story to write up which made me want to cry, keep my children close to me and never drive a car again.
Emails were sent and received, stresses were created. I talked a lot of shite on Facebook.
Sky sent the wrong kind of man (he didn't have a big pole) to fit our dish.
There was a *thing* in work about half a pink fancy which actually made me laugh out loud.
I went up the town with the express purpose of buying new shoes for work but did they have my coveted pair in my size? NO! *cry*
Did they have the dress I coveted in my size? NO. (Although I'm kind of between sizes right now). *cry*
Did the scales in Boots reveal a half a pound gain? Yes.
Did the summer uniform dress I bought for my niece fit? No.
Did she get all 8 year old stroppy on my arse? Yes.
Did the M&S low fat moussaka I bought for my tea taste nice? No - it tasted like someone boked on a plate.

So tea-less and with spare points to consume I made an executive decision to finish the bottle of wine in my possession. And it feels rather lovely, thank you.

The wedding dress

Next year I will have been married for 10 years. (If we don't kill each other between times).
It will also have been 10 years since I fitted into the gorgeous Ivory Duchesse Satin Ronald Joyce gown which I glided up the aisle in.
With a boned bodice, off the shoulder detail and a sweeping full skirt it was *the dress of dreams*.
I loved it. I felt gorgeous in it. Looking back on the pictures I looked gorgeous in it - of course at the time I thought I was a big fatso bride.
By the time I came back from honeymoon (having put on the honeymoon half a stone) it was snug. By the time we reached anniversary number one it didn't fit. It has never fit again.
I dream (literally) of sliding it on and pulling the zip up effortlessly. I dream of feeling like a princess again.
But I'm a long way from princess-ness. I'm (gasp) almost 4 stone heavier than when I glided up that aisle and two dresses larger. My body is also irrevocably changed due to two pregnancies and the passing of ten years in which life has often been stressful.
It dawned on me last night, as I lay down to sleep, that I want to wear that dress again. And it's a goal I've not set myself as part of my ongoing Big Fat Weightloss Challenge. I hope, please God, that by May 26 of 2011 I'll be able to fit in my frock again. That gives me 13 months to lose just under four stone...at 1lb a week that is doable.
I promise if I do I will post a picture here for you all to laugh at see.

Getting there

You see I'm not so much of a diet bore any more but believe me the diet is still happening. Easter was, it has to be said, a bit of a train wreck. I thought that I would be able to resist the lure of the chocolate eggs but I couldn't. I inhaled two... or maybe three. I kind of lost count because the truth was after the first few bites I wasn't even really tasting it any more.

I was bingeing... and it was not pleasant. My whole mood changed. I felt out of control, lethargic and not at all happy but as much as I tried to get back on track over the last week it really didn't happen too much - because the comfort eating monster came back to haunt me. The kids were sick. It was my *whispers* time of the month */whispers* and I was writing a very emotional scene or two in the new about eating disorders (ironic really).

But I must have done something good. I got my first stone on Monday. For the unitiated some WW leaders have a habit of giving their clients a stone - yes, an actual pebble - to mark that weight loss. By the time I'm done, I imagine (or hope) to have 5 of those bad boys staring at me. (Yes, 5. Yes, I am THAT fat...yes, I know...)

But I did it, in eight weeks and in addition I have lost an extra 2.5lbs making my total loss so far 16.5lbs which isn't bad really but I'll try not to be smug lest it finds its way back to my arse by next week.

I thought I had escaped the wonders of In The Night Garden

It came along just after Joseph outgrew the pre-school telly age so I thought "ha" I'll never have to watch that nonsense.

I did not bargain on the girl - she loves it. I don't know why. It is a load of nonsense. Characters with silly names falling down, washing each other and lifting their skirts.

And yet, it is strangely addictive. I have spent an inordinate amount of time this week (as the boy has been sick and we have been housebound) watching the goings on in the garden and have pondered such great things as whether or not Makka Pakka has OCD, if the people who name the Tittifers really thought that one through, whether the Haa-Hoos are obese or just big boned, what would happen if the Tombliboos wore the wrong trousers and which part of the Ninky Nonk I would sit in give the chance. (The middle bit, for the record... with the nice blue curtains - favoured by Iggle Piggle and Upsy Daisy).

Yes, I am 33 and yes I have just used the words Makka Pakka, Haa Hoos, Tittifers, Tombliboos, Ninky Nonk, Iggle Piggle and Upsy Daisy in a blog post.

I apologise for that.

An award.... how very special! *sniff*

Yes, I'm practising my gracious "didn't win" face as we speak but it seems this blog has been nominated by someone unknown to me (lovely, lovely person who I love even though I don't know you) for MAD Blog of the Year award in the Funniest Blog category.
I never win anything. Well in fairness I once won a basket of fruit in a raffle in school but someone had loaned me the 10p for the ticket so I had to give them the grapes (aka the best bit).
I don't think I'll win this either as the competition is very stiff - not least from Slightly South of Sanity which makes me roll on the floor howling with a mixture of laughter and jealousy.
But, if the notion takes you please pop along to the MAD website http://the-mads.com/nominate.htm (alternatively you can click on the link on the right sidebar) and cast a wee vote.

And if you think this blog sucks then vote for Slightly South of Sanity as it really doesn't.

The boy lies sleeping..

.. on the sofa. I can't remember the last time he slept during the day - not since he was a tot.
He has a vomiting bug (and the other) and I have literally spent my day rubbing his back and telling him it will okay while running yet another bath and loading the washing machine yet another time.
I feel for him - especially as vomiting is something I'm so experienced in thanks to the pregnancy from hell with the baby.
I did though - perhaps cruelly - have half a notion to say to him, as he threw up for the jillionth time "Joseph, this would be cool if it wasn't so uncool!"
Yes the words of  "comfort" he used when I was so sick with his baby sister were sitting right at the tip of my tongue but I imagine that would have been very unmammy-like indeed.
Instead I got him flat coke, made a bed on the sofa and didn't complain when his sick got in my hair.
Oh motherhood, how I love thee.

I will admit

I am a wuss.
My parents, who I still call Mammy and Daddy, are away on their holliers this week. They have gone to Rome to see the Pope. (I have asked them to give him a bad look and shake their heads disapprovingly - I don't think they will).
Now the thing is my parents deserve a break. And they love Rome. And for my mammy is particular this is an important trip as she is accompanying her mammy, and assorted other family members, to Mass on Easter Sunday in the Vatican and while my mother isn't a touch religious, her mammy is very much so.
Daddy - a keen photographer with a love of history ("Grandad wants all the knowledge in the world to himself" according to Joseph) just loves the ambiance of Italy.
So, fair play to them. I hope they have a lovely time.
But I miss them. And I get a little anxious when they go away. (When I say a  *little* there was this one time when I had a complete mental breakdown when my mammy went to Bundoran for the weekend but the circumstances were exceptional).
They are back on Wednesday and I'm already counting down the days.
It gives me hope that my children will always kind of need me and I won't be a discarded mammy once they reach adulthood and frig off to make their own lives.

Denial isn't just a river in Egypt (Part 2)

Just got an email from a certain parenting club to which I have subscribed.
"Your baby is 13 months old" it said.
No, said I. She isn't. You dumbasses. She only just had her first birthday.

Realised that was four weeks ago.
Realised that they are right.

May have just lost a month of my life somewhere.

A lazy posting Meme

Never in my life have I been: to me.
Oh I've been to Georgia and California
And anywhere I could run
Took the hand of a preacher man
And we made love in the sun
But I ran out of places
And friendly faces
Because I had to be free
I've been to paradise
But I've never been to me
(Actually I have been to me... and none of the other places... but those lyrics make me laugh)

The one person who can drive me nuts is: Joseph - love him to pieces but at the moment he is a little challenging. This is combination of being six, related to me and being half deaf.

High school: was a time when I had several bad perms, some very dodgy glasses, a slight obsession with Twin Peak, Bros and Martin Luther King and a desire to become a journalist.

When I'm nervous: I gotta pee a lot.

The last song I listened to was: Endless Love from the Glee Soundtrack. Yes, I did sing the Rachel bits and pretend that Mr. Schu was right there in the car with me. Yes, that does make me sad. No, I don't care.

If I were to get married right now my maid of honour would be: Victory V, without a shadow of a doubt.

My hair is: shoulder length, a wee bit highlighted and largely very unruly.

When I was 5: I had my tonsils out and got a Bionic Woman doll for my troubles. I also got a packet of jaffa cakes all to my self which I distinctly remember sharing with my brother and sister. I was wile good like that.

Last Christmas: I got slightly sozzled and was beaten at Wii bowling by the boy.

I should be: an international bestseller. No one loves me though.

The happiest recent event was: La Boo's first birthday... my babba, my wee heart, my dressing dolly.

By this time next year: I will be closer to goal weight on WeightWatchers.

There's this girl I know that: can do the Cha Cha Slide with her eyes closed and under the influence of alcohol. I have video evidence.
The world could do without: fish. Seriously, is there a need? No. They are just wee slippery feckers. No need at all.

Most recent thing I've bought myself: was a M&S Thai Chicken Curry for just 6 of your WeightWatchers points.
Most recent thing someone else bought me: Teddy bears, flowers and a No. 1 mum magnet from my babelinas.
My middle name is: Anne

The animals I would like to see flying besides birds are: pigs because maybe then all my wishes would come true.

Once, at a bar: I drank some alcohol, shared a lighter with a very hairy backed man and ended up in bed with him. It all ended pretty horrible when my current partner phoned and heard chewbacca in the background. Needless to say, he wasn't impressed. Then again - that might just be the opening plot of my new book and I may have no embarrassing bar stories.

Last night I was: cursing the TV for losing the signal half way through One Born Every Minute.
There's this guy I know who: works down the chipshop, swears he Elvis.

Tomorrow I am: working! and possible going to Belfast for a Northern Girls shindig.

Tonight I am: going home to write. Don't be jealous!

My birthday is: in June. I like flowers and wine and jewellery.