I am now at

www.musclesthebabyandme.blogspot.com

see you all there?

This blog has moved

For details of the new address please email me or leave a comment in the comment section

On writing

I am not one of these people, most of us apparently, who think I have a book in me. I think I have fourteen. But, given that I am 33 and still smoking, I am aware I had better get on with it.

The girl who I will be working for in Edinburgh said that for as long as she can remember, (which means aged 13, at school), all I ever wanted to be was a writer.

That changed. The fabulous thing about the civil service for me was that it showed me that actually, there were loads of things I wanted to do.

But underneath the writing niggled. It doesn't matter what else I am doing, I feel like I should be writing. Yet, whenever I am writing I can't get away from the million other things I should be doing.

Not any more baby. Now the writing comes first. Sure, I'll work around it. But everything else is a means to writing not a means to not writing.

Watch out, the gypsy is getting naked and intending to revel in the dirt of life. I have rather a Persil view of dirt by the way, and think that's a brilliant advertising campaign. Dirt is good.

What to tell

Writing the blog has become a veritable mindfield lately. The awareness of the diversity of my audience, the chaotic nature of my existence (which seems to generate much material even when I am trying to keep it slim), the promise I would write well coupled with the desire to achieve blog-stardom; means that actually I need more than one blog. I need different blogs.

Someone also used my blog against me recently. I spend so much time wondering if anyone will be offended by anything I write that actually I may just as well write two.

I also intend to date a bit for a while, and would want my dates to be able to read something, but not necessarily everything. I have decided that from here on in I will be Julie, 'International woman of mystery', and the blog as it currently is would blow that faster than I could say, 'seeya then'.

I still want everyone to read please. This is not an inner outer sanctum blog thing. You dear long term audience will have the choice of which blog(s) you see. There will be a stripped bare version and happily rolling along edited highlights. If you chose the former (which naturally I would expect most you to go for) you will however be asked to sign a concorde de non-judgementalism. Unless I know you well enough not to need one.

Please email me or write in the comments section if you want to still see my blog in which case I will direct you to the appropriate link.

Hope this makes sense!
Julie xxxx

Note to Self

Next time little sister suggests watching 'Love Actually', unless your love life is flying higher than a helium balloon, freed from the clammy grasp of a small child by a wind unswervingly bound for the next ether, abstain.

I am now heading to Edinburgh with eyes that make me look like a serious pot head. The first time I saw it I cried, but only at the end. This time, every romance sodden pathos dredging scene had me reaching for the two ply.

Better head to bed and not compound the damage.

J x

Wish me luck

I have a job interview on Wednesday. The pay's crap and the job is sales which as many of you know I can do brilliantly but find less riveting than a Mills and Boon trilogy. However it's working on a magazine being set up by a mate of mine, looks really funky (the first front cover is an eye socket with lashings of glittery green shadow and thick black false lashes so naturally I'm hooked and have decided green is the new black), and there will be room for me to get involved on the editorial side potentially. Given the company currently consists of two people, I would be 3, it's a good time to get in and at the very least will get my hand out of the biscuit barrel and my adventuress revelling in a new town. I have said yes to six weeks, and assuming the one not my mate likes me (the mate naturally knows me enough to waver) will start a week on Monday.

It's in Edinburgh, a city I know a bit and like so far, bar the climate which makes East Sussex feel like the Med.

I have finally produced an article I am very proud of (as opposed to one that I can just put my name to), (on mobile phones, developing the stuff that started here) the novel is up running round my head again after a period of startling silence. Plus Mr make me want sausage has turned up on my doorstep with an engagement ring hidden in a giant bunch of red roses, attached to a hot air ballon which we rode in, attached to a jet writing 'Julie I love you, bugger what ma and pa think' in blue ink in the sky.

Only the last sentence isn't true.
Which is probably just as well as I always thought I would prefer a spontaneous mid snog on the heath / sexy bridge proposal than a sky writing one. Presumably as you only hope for one, it would be better to get something close to what you fancy don't you think?

I did however see the increasingly glamourous Ms West today. She had blossomed without me which is a tad on the irritating side but I decided holding it against her would be petty. It was good to see her, I wouldn't say it was a breeze, but it went far better that most first reunions with a former lover. There was no fighting, no re-dipping and a decent attempt at mutual empathy. We drank coffee and wine, played air hockey with my nephew, went to see our solicitor to tie up stuff with the house, ate cake, looked at photos of our trip and hugged hello and goodbye with the comfort of an entrenched friendship. Can't ask for more than that.

Julie x

Oh Bold Tigress

I am so impressed. The Tasmanian Tigress (http://tasmaniantigress.blogspot.com/) has ditched her mobile phone. Naturally she's right, we don't need them, we are infinitively contactable via a plethora of other phone lines in most instances. Only a decade ago, not only were mobiles novel but emails, blogs and all the technological wap based bits and bobs not to mention fancy ringing fridges and post box TV's never even existed and we had time to pick fresh fruit and play on haystacks (I know, getting carried away with my childhood and off the point).

Even so, ditching the mobile, I shiver.

My rational brain says 'shiver? You fool. There you are with a phone you only brought so the Indonesian boy to whom email was too formidable a prospect could send you SMS's in bursts of barely comprehensible English, and what happened?' Well, what happened was that his partner network was apparently not compatible with my partner network and the 2 (I know, just two - and you should see my phone bill, but let's move on) sms's he did send therefore ended up going to my sister's phone. Not only that but the phone I choose on the basis it had the cheapest tarif on offer at Tescos's turned out to have been advertised in a way that should but predictably hasn't yet, send me scuttling to the Advertising / Trading Standards Boards.

10p a minute it promised. No asterisks, no mention that this only kicked in after three months with twenty quid a months worth of calls. Plus the easy top up service promised fails for some reason no one at customer services (who you pay 25p to talk to every time their system fails) could fathom, imposes an arbitrary limit on my credit card. I therefore spent a large part of Sunday touring one of England's prettiest Cathedral cities in search of a newsagents that stocked the top up cards. Apparently, most don't cos 'they have this great easy text top up service love' .Quite.

I still have to look up my own number anytime anyone asks me for it, the games are crap on the phone (I loved snake but no nokia with one tel in Tescos), the phone barely rings as I have been useless at giving out the number I haven't learnt, and yet

Not have one?
Tiger Tiger Burning Bright
Will you share your courage tonight?

Actually I didn't have one in Bali. But Bali was Bali and back home, the thought seems more than alien

Just think
There would be no getting drunk and sending inappropriate texts to people I was trying to play it cool with (I am currently avoiding drink in order to stop myself falling in this pithole)
There would be no watching the unringing phone for calls from men who have recently left me bereft
There would be one less thing to worry about paying for

But I would have to impose on the already generous hospitality of those who have and will be putting me up during my stint at home, use their phones, and I plan to be moving round a bit, paying the plethora of bills would entail my friends and family asking me for money and everyone hates doing that.
Which is lucky. As I was on the verge of flushing the problematic bugger down the bog, until my brain at the last leapt on an excuse which not only makes sense, but would make me look like a selfish scrounger not to heed.

Still Tigress, I think you're amazing and when I have a base, will seriously reconsider emulating your action.