Slobbish Behaviour

Image: Banalities

While I was on holiday, the north side of Edinburgh was hit by such severe flooding that the gas supplies were knocked out for the Canonmills and Stockbridge areas. While shaking my head at another poor example of Edinburgh diverting money from necessary infrastructure maintenance into needless travel programmes, the problem hit me personally since it meant my usual bus journey through Edinburgh to work had to be altered.

It has resulted in a lot more roads being dug up to fix the problem, road diversions, traffic chaos—the usual for Edinburgh. However, fate smiled on me over the weekend when I caught a bus on George Street on Saturday morning and found a copy of The Leither magazine lying on a seat. I picked it up, and after switching on my iPod, began to read and enjoy it as I normally do.

Somewhere along Leith Walk I turned the page and was shocked to find a full page (no.23) dedicated to ME! There I was, totally caught off guard and blushing like mad as I stared at myself from the glossy page, complete with media kit interview and book cover. I closed the magazine and kept it for later, too embarrassed to read it in front of strangers that might recognise me.

It was then that I remembered the query email I sent the magazine in June had resulted in one of the editors asking for my media pack, but I heard nothing more about it. I’d been trying to get into The Leither for four years so to finally do it is great, but the way I found out about it totally caught me off guard and made it all rather weird. I felt strangely conspicuous for the rest of the journey home. The interview is also online, which you can read for a short time here.

The rest of Saturday was all about my wee niece, Charlotte. It was her first birthday on Tuesday and today saw her first official birthday party attended by us, the rest of my family, and of course, the Owens.

We had a great day for it, and so lovely was the weather up in Perth we moved the whole thing outside. We gave Charlotte our gifts—a garden slide from us—and then spent the day just having some fun in the garden. Here are some pics:

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Yesterday was a much more subdued day. With Gail and Laura doing their own thing I had the house to myself so while I tried to be as productive as possible, it was hard getting back into the swing of things. I spent the morning dozing in front of the television and moved out to the garden in the afternoon to start clearing up after its recent two week neglect.

My office got a bit of a clear-up too, as did the bunny house, but that was about it. I watched a couple of films and ordered a pizza at night, happy to just like a total slob in front of the television as it grew darker outside until the whole house was in pitch black. I felt like something familiar, perhaps like some character from a film that is struggling with a split personality, or more likely, from my older self.

This week I need to get back on the rails, shed the holiday blues and hammer into the second half of the year like there is no tomorrow. Thankfully, the Book Festival is just round the corner to feed my energy and enthusiasm once more.

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