Homecoming!

I've just come back from a wonderfully hot, family-soaked holiday in Spain. Not many people know that because I am so very internet paranoid.

I'm not quite sure what I think is going to happen: the local villain will turn to cyber research, picking a name out of a hat which happens to be Jackie Buxton, travel through the 33 'Jackie Buxton's on Facebook – there are this many, I checked – to find the one who lives somewhere around here (obviously I'm far too scared of my cyber shadow to divulge exactly where in the north of England that might be) and, after cracking the 'friends only' block, will smile gleefully at noticing that I happen to be out of the country (and indeed, that my tightly packed neighbours have also chosen this time for an excursion) exactly when he/she has a bit of time on their hands. Next, we hope that this local, cyber researching burglar with time on his/her hands isn't good at busting down doors and foiling alarm codes.

Of course, this could happen. And you can guarantee – because this is exactly how my mind works – that this will happen the day I let down my guard to post on Facebook and Twitter that I am beyond excitement about my pending holiday and if I spend another moment in front of my desk I will fossilise. Thus, I tie myself up in knots not mentioning it. Talk about, Don't mention the war! Every second word is suitcase and Sangria.

But, like my Dad who couldn't close the door on our bedrooms at night without first checking that switching off the light hadn't caused a spark behind the switch and a fire in the wall behind, and my friend whose family sit in the car and count how many times she returns to the door to check it's locked - We all do that, I say. Not seventeen times, the husband replies – pre-holiday internet muteness is how it is for me.

Meanwhile, I'm happy to report that the holiday was all I hoped for - and some - and although I love where I live and am very happy in my village somewhere in the north of England, no I wasn't ready to come home from the sun, pool, beach, Sangria, reading, cycling, family paella nights, synchronised swimming (sorry, 'synchronised' swimming) family cards, Exploding Kittens, more reading, lack of washing, and did I mention the reading…? and generally being just a whole lot more manana-ish.

Still, at least my return meant I could use my loyalty card at my local hospital to get my broken toe sorted. Yep, a different one this time. And a story for another day. Suffice it to say, please pray this sun continues because the flip flops will be hanging around for another three weeks.

Weekly Timetables? You thought I was joking!

Now that I'm back, I've thrown myself into my usual pre-September de-clutter. I've talked before about September being my New Year here and this year is no different: the idea of filing and rejecting mounds of paperwork and teaching resources, sourcing and recycling new storage solutions so that I can lay my hands on the surviving papers more quickly, finely tuning my weekly timetables because this year I will make tea before 8pm and I will find time for more coffees with friends and filling out my new Passion Planner (thanks for the tip, Erica!) with an achievable list of to-do's… are almost as exciting to me as the first sip of a Spanish lager outside a sun-licked taverna. 

Almost as exciting.

But I also have LOTS of newness to look forward to. Glass Houses and I are going on tour and I am ridiculously excited about it. Please, please do come and say hello if you possibly can when I'm at a place near you. I promise we will have cakes or chocolate or even both. And books, lots of books:  both Glass Houses and Tea & Chemo.

The tour so far – all welcome!

September
Monday 5 September from 8pm @ The Bakewell Book & Gift Shop, Matlock Street, Bakewell, Derbyshire DE45 1EE. View their website here
- for a brief talk, Q&A, book signing and a bit of a chat – with coffee and cake (of course).

Saturday 17 September from 2pm @ Blackwell's Bookshop, 21 Blenheim Terrace, Woodhouse Lane, Leeds LS2 9HJ.
- pop in any time between 2 and 5.30pm for book signing and chat. You'll find me in the Costa café (they insisted) on the first floor. We also plan to host a Q & A session during the afternoon. More on this to follow.

October
Saturday 15 October from 11am @ Octavo's Book Café and Wine Bar, West Bute Street, Cardiff CF10 5LJ
- Writer in Residence for the day. More details to follow but meanwhile, checkout these cakes!

Also
Date TBC for a Saturday book signing in the gorgeous, The Little Ripon Bookshop

Date TBC for a Saturday book signing @ Harrogate Waterstones, very recently refurbished and now with its own café over-looking the high street. I'm hoping I might be based in there…

Do let me know if you're interested in attending any of the events so I can get excited! 

Meanwhile, a very happy new year to you all :) 

Plant pots and holiday nightmares

After an altercation with a plant pot and a flight of, alas unrecorded, epic distance before landing crack on my knee on our paved drive, I appear to have inadvertently fractured my knee cap.  Unable to drive anywhere for six weeks, the family and I will be tucked away over the summer holidays in an unkempt hovel, without a bean in the cupboard, nor a clean item of clothing in the wardrobe. And worse, I’ve had to cancel the holiday. Truly repentant,  (this is not the first time my long-suffering family have been flawed by one of my carelessly broken limbs) I’ve been doing battle with the gods of form filling and Google searching and may have found us an alternative holiday when my knee should be back to its knobbly self.

Meanwhile, my mind wanders back to one of our holidays-to-remember.

It was in France. We’d excitedly booked ourselves into one of those tents which did all but the catering. This was in the pre-glamping summer of 2000 but we were, nonetheless, suitably impressed. The added bonus for our then 21 month old was that she’d quickly learnt how to undo the main zip in the canvas; the gateway to the great outside. She would proceed to play her new game of ‘unzip and run’ at difficult times such as when Dad was on the croissant hunt and I was changing our babe in arm’s nappy, my back turned. Thankfully her squeals of delight generally alerted us to her unauthorised departure.

After a few games of this, our nerves seriously frayed, a new strategy came into play, where eldest was summarily dragged off with either adult on exiting the tent. Thus we spent many a minute in the park en route to everywhere, the source of much joyous laughter until one day it ended in hysterical tears. Hours later when her screams were now keeping the whole campsite awake, for which I’d still like to apologise, the local doctor tried, unsuccessfully, to convince us that she was having a nightmare. Frankly, I think the only soul on the site not to be having a nightmare was our daughter, starting to cry as she had, way before her bedtime. It was only when we realised that the little girl who always had her right thumb in her mouth was refusing to suck, that we wondered about a broken arm. In fact, she’d dislocated her elbow which was duly re-aligned by a sympathetic French nurse who did her best to assure us that children dislocated limbs every second minute, it would seem, without their parents noticing and that there was absolutely no need to feel guilty about not knowing how she did it. Hmmm.

The next day was my birthday and while our children performed a mid-day sleep of epic proportions, hubbie and I drank bubbly in the sun, hiding behind our sunglasses as bleary-eyed fellow campers walked past, pretending that we weren’t the reason why they were booking a hotel next year.  When a fellow holiday maker asked my husband if we were the couple practicing controlled crying last night, and I sank a little further behind my book, I remember telling myself that we’d laugh about this one day.

In the words of the great Peter Kay, are you going anywhere nice? And if so, enjoy yourselves and be careful out there ...