A Catch Up

Here it is almost the end of November and my current total of words for NaNoWriMo stands at zero – yep I’ve not written a single word. At least I haven’t written a word of my novel. I have of course written blog posts for my other blog, written a bit of fan fiction, made lists of stuff, done some writing for work, but the novel has remained elusively out of sight. And so, for this year, I officially give up.

And now it’s almost Christmas again. It seems to me like it was only a few weeks ago that I was writing about it being Christmas last year, time flies so fast these days. I have seen the billboards with the Coke lorry, M&S have released a dreadful Christmas advert and John Lewis have split the country with their offering which is either tedious and mawkish or unbelievably cute and tear-jerking depending on which side of the line you fall. I have to admit to quite liking the advert, although it didn’t reduce me to tears – but then maybe that’s because I was picturing something nasty in the present he’s so eager to give.

I’m actually feeling ahead of the game for probably the first time ever in my life as almost all my presents are bought and are ready to be wrapped (I can’t actually wrap them until my Christmas tree goes up and that doesn’t happen until 1 December, obviously, although it may be delayed as I still have to knit my angel Snape for the top of the tree). The only person who I haven’t yet got a present for is my God-daughter Leanne, but she’s easy to buy for and so I’ll get her sorted in the next few days. As long as there’s no problem with the post I should be all done and dusted by next weekend, which leaves me a few weeks to get cards sorted out, as I haven’t yet got started on those, although I’ve meant to a few times.

One of the nice things about Christmas is the countdown and advent calendars. Whilst I do have the traditional Thornton’s chocolate one (bought by my friend Richard as he has done every year for the last ten years or so) I’m trying to lose a bit more weight and am wrestling over whether to eat it or not. But I also have (and have sent to friends and family) the Jacquie Lawson advent calendar. I got last year’s and it was a delight, having a little animated scene to play out every day, and I understand that Freddie and Aiden enjoyed it almost as much as I did.

I’ve added a few photos from Halloween and the Labyrinth Masked Ball that Mrs H3 and I attended, along with a few other friends (that’s Foxhunter in the Hannibal Lecter outfit). Unfortunately there aren’t many of Mrs H3 as they didn’t come out too well apparently. As you can see we had lots of fun – and no, of course we didn’t get looked at all, travelling across London by tube dressed like that!