United State of our rooms

And so Autumn is upon us and this is turning out to be the first year i haven't needed to prompt Bear to clean his study.  He is currently in full force pulling all sorts of forgotton items into the fore.  The constant calls from the next room find me scuttling through to see what has been found.  So far a butterfly (a live one, strangely) has materialised out of nowhere.  I think Bear sneezed it out of his hooter during one of the numerous dust filled sneeze-outs he's been having.  It was given a second chance, carefully caught and released out the back door.  The other thing that has been found is a tape case containing some of my old tapes.  We have YAZZ's Wanted album (minus its own case), Now Dance '86 and la piece de la resistance: NOW 6!  I have to share what (well, the good bits only) is on the latter two:

NOW DANCE '86

Communards - Don't Leave Me This Way
Gwen Guthrie - Ain't Nothing Going On But The Rent
Grace Jones - Pull Up To My Bumper

The majority of that album turned out to be a bit shit.

NOW 6

Queen - One Vision
Eurythmics - There Must Be An Angel Playing With My Heart
Kate Bush - Running Up That Hill
Fine Young Cannibals - Blue
Midge Ure - If I Was
Siouxie And The Banshees - Cities In The Dust
Jan Hammer - Miami Vice Theme

The study is now looking smart and the sneezing seems to be giving it a rest.

I'm thinking of having a clear out.  I really have accumulated such a lot of crap and most of that is craft related.  I'm going to start by putting the contents of my two shops (http:catlovesbear.etsy.com and http://catlovesbear.folksy.com) into some sort of sale whilst trying not to undercut myself.  Then the CD's need a going through.  There are too many empty cases i've kept in the hope of CDs showing up, but i think after 6/7 and in one case 10 years, they aren't coming back.

I'm now thoroughly addicted to Muse's Resistance album.  I wanted to listen to it everyday on my MP3 player but that would interfere with the setup of songs i have on it for the gym, so I make do with playing the album on my laptop and I let it run from start to finish.  I actually love each song now and can't believe I complained that two of the songs were bland.  I still have a hell of a lot of their other stuff on the MP3 player.  On shuffle, nearly every other song is one of theirs.  In other music news, i've heard the new Flaming Lips single Slippery Silver Hands and it seems they are getting in on the Space themed music as well.  It is very good, but quite odd.  I ate my porridge to Prodigy's Breathe this morning.  Good old 6 Music.

Good and bad news at work.  Bad news was that last Wednesday I was nearly told that my job was being cut from 39 hours to 20 hours a week.  Our manager had gone to a meeting in Swindon with a packet of other managers from around the region to be told that all their stores were going to 'Realigned' ('Made Redendant' to you and me).  My manager spent all night ringing people out of their beds to plead our case that 5 students had left for uni in the last week so our hours/staff ration was better than everyone elses.  We got off the hook, while four other stores are now going through a full realignment.  I feel guilty that i get to keep my job when so many of my friends from other stores are now going through hell.  If that had been me, i'd have just left.  The good news is that my manager has finally conceeded that he was wrong about taking my Stock Controlling job from me and handing it to the Night Crew.  Night Crew can't cope with it as the company are not giving them enough hours to do their own work, let alone the logging in of excess products from the store and couldn't even start to think about pulling items out of the warehouse to see if they'll fit on the shopfloor yet.  So Hurray!  I get my old job back during weekday mornings, before an afternoon of paperwork and reports.  I feel mighty smug.

I would like to say that the gym is going well, and as a whole it is but i still loathe having to go and haven't lost the amount of weight that puts you into a state of Euphoria to motivate you to enjoy the sessions.  I have gone everyday for 2 weeks now and i get my 4th appointment with a gym instructor on Tues.  I have now been given two programmes to do on the treadmill, one on the bike, i get to use a strange contraption to strengthen my legs, i do lunges, floor excersises and i can play with one of those big blue balls.

I'm looking forward to getting paid tomorrow.  Its been a long month.

x

Oh Mummy, What's a Sex Pistol?

What a strange week.  Monday started by finding a fiver in a bush on my walk to work.  Tuesday i found out that all my Nectar points training at work has finally come to fruition and i have amassed some 13,000 points which works out at about 64 squid.  Wednesday i arrived home at the end of the day to find a Royal Mail 'So sorry we missed you' (no you're not) card when i have nothing ordered and nothing expected.  Thursday i went to collect my prize at the Post Office to find that some nutjob in Mumbai, India had sent me a postcard via Postcrossing but had decided to spend 40 Rupees on it to send it by Recorded Delivery 'Just to make sure I got it'.  Why would you take such a project so seriously?  There are kids in sweatshops in Mumbai (I am sure) paid about 2 rupees a day.  It all adds to the experience, i suppose.  We didn't win the quiz on Thursday but we did get every question right in the second round, and lots of chox from Bryony, Keith and Allan's team who won an anagram. 


I am looking forward to the proper start of Autumn when it feels icy cold and breath turns to vapour.  Where i can justify buying some lovely items from Etsy.com.  My top five Etsy items for this week are:

1. http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=24439321  Black fingerless gloves with black ribbons
2. http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=30848092  Limited Edition Magic Moss Bears Print
3. http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=27822186 Knitted scarflette in brown and turquoise
4. http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=30880940 Mummies and Vampires Halloween Chequers
5. http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=30917512 Winter tree leather journal

Oh and Wispa Gold has returned on a Limited edition basis - Whooooooo!
x

I quite like the Yeah Yeah Yeah's Heads Will Roll, The Very Best's Warm Heart of Africa and Muse's United States of Eurasia (Shah, Shah, Shah!).

Lazy Days and Muse

I had planned to do something today.  Anything, in fact, except spending all morning on my laptop.  Fail.  I excuse myself by noting that i will be going out after lunch and probably won't be going home again until the early hours of tomorrow morning.  I've got approx. five hours to find two uniforms for me and my boyfriend to wear on a mates birthday night out, with no clue of what to buy and trying to justify the cost, which i can't.  I've looked around our cupboards trying to find remnants of our old dressing up box, but its probably made its way into the loft by now.  Poo. 

I've just been really naughty and listened to a live stream of the new Muse album 'Resistance'.  I've waited so long for it to come out on Monday that i couldn't wait any more.  Two days, i know.  I always find first listens of albums difficult to sum up - they need more listening!  I'll write what i think about each song now and no doubt will update each with every new listen. 

UPRISING:  Beautiful tribute to Dr. Who theme.  Very beefy with the bass.  Currently my favourite.
RESISTANCE:  Starts off slow and wishy-washy, quickly picks up a catchy verse before the first chorus.    
                          Goes etheral for a bit.  Repetitive.  I like the catchy bit a lot.  It reminds me of something
                          from the 80's but i don't know what.
UNDISCLOSED DESIRES:  Starts off like some catchy R'N'B tune Destiny's Child would have cooked
                          up.  Very different sound.  Punchy lyrics.  Very distant strains of Depeche Mode.
UNITED STATES OF EURASIA:  Stunning tribute to Queen.  Full of twiddly bits and power chords. 
                          Video is very good, if not a bit sinister where the maps of the U.S.A., Europe and Asia are
                          merged together to a very creepy part at the end of the song.  Makes the hairs on the back
                         of my neck stand up at the end. My second favourite tune.
GUIDING LIGHT: Epic arena anthem reminiscent of 'Invincible' off their last album Black Holes and 
                              Revelations.  Reminds me why i love his voice.  The occasional Queen-esque twiddle. 
                              A pretty song.
UNNATURAL SELECTION:  Good beat, very slappy.  Queen moments.  Great lyrics.  Poetic.
MK ULTRA: Reminds me of the tune from Anneka Rice's Treasure Hunt right at the beginning.  I love the
                      voice mashing in the middle, spooky bit.  There is a song by the Manics called 'Paul Robeson'
                      that features the lyrics 'MK Ultra turned you paranoid.'  Just thought that i would get that one
                      in there.
I BELONG TO YOU/MON COEUR S'OUVRE A TA VOIX:  My second favourite song so far.  Very
                     different.  Reminds me again of the 80's for the use of the sound effects in it.  Love the 'Oooh-
                     ee-oooh-ee-oooh's.  Fat on the piano.  Includes Matt singing in French.
EXOGENESIS:SYMPHONY PART 1(OVERTURE):  Reminiscent of Holst's planets, Alien soundtrack,
                    various creepy space films.  Orchestra sounds amazing.  Matt howls unrecognisable words in 
                    harmony thoughout.  Fantastic.
EXOGENESIS: SYMPHONY PART 2 (CROSS POLLINATION):  I wish i could remember the names
                   of all the classical music i like.  This one is heavy on Piano and sounds like a famous classical
                    song at the very beginning.  The lyrics are very *The world is in your hands, so save us*.        
                    Orchestra and band playing at the same time.
EXOGENESIS: SYMPHONY PART 3 (REDEMPTION)  Sounds like its going to break in the funeral song i've learned to fear (can't remember the name of that now, either.)  Starts getting happier and fairytale like.

I need to go and do something else now.  Might make some jam tomorrow.