Jingle jangle (Just call me Jimmy Saville)

Hurrah - today we won a new contract at work. This is great for a number of big reasons but also for some small thrills -namely I get to buy a new charm for my bracelet.

Celebrating new contracts like this might seem slightly odd but it's something I've done ever since my parents spent their holiday in Montepellier four years ago trying to figure out what the French for 'charm bracelet' was.

My first charm was a web (for an internet client), followed by a mobile phone (guess what they did) and so on. The bracelet acts as my 'mental checklist' so I can figure out if every one is okay. Though it does mean that I tend not to wear it when I'm away from work as I find myself worrying about a 'charm' that I may not have spoken to recently, so to speak. Saying that it's always in my handbag.

Seeing as I work with tech companies finding a charm to associate with a certain client can be tricky but I have a strange mix that at first may not be associated with the IT world inclouding a penguin, the elephant god (GSE if you ever need to buy one I can point you in the direction), a stegosaurus, an ice cream cone, a gun, a key, the see/speak/hear no evil monkeys (the basis of a client's advertising campaign), a gun and a sea bird. This will be my sixteenth charm. Am about to go and have a look at evercharming and eBay to see what I can find to represent something to do with colour and Japan.

There is a flip side to this and if I see a bizarre charm I want to find a client contract that will match it. Such as the turnip above. Any ideas?

Why do we laugh at misfortune?

Discuss. In as much detail as possible/ you can be bothered. Please.

Looking for ideas for PF's degree project. Brain frazzled*

*Due to early start this morning and lack of sleep on Thursday night...

Tra la la

Okay, I met up with the gorgeous wine dealer. He flies back to the other side of the planet later today. Fabulous and fun.

Patroclus: Up for a bit of boot shopping this weekend?

New boots?

New considering new boots. Although there are some sales on they are still a considerable investment.

Currently a tie between 1 and 6 at the moment, though don't think you can get frog wellies in size 7.

What is wrong with this picture?

I have refused an evening with a drop dead gorgeous wine dealer from New Zealand - who is rarely over in this hemisphere - in order to work.

There's something very wrong here. I really like New Zealand wine - and last time he was over he left me a crate of wine.

I must be coming down with something.

It has to change...

...I am turning into something out of 'James and the Giant Peach'* (or something else that involves a round-ish object that grows out of proportion).

So, I've made a gym pact with C - who has also been moaning about the fact that we are both members of a swanky gym but we use our Blockbuster cards 100 times more often (no kidding).

We're gym buddies now and one day we'll look like, er, not sure who. Perhaps just fitter, thinner versions of ourselves. That would be a good start. We're dusting off our legwarmers and starting tonight.

Target: To be able to run three miles without passing out (at the moment three metres is pushing it) / to lose two stone.

* No comments please from anyone who knows me.

Danger: Accident-prone girl on the loose

So far today I have:

- Smashed a pint glass* and cut my foot while getting ready for work;
- Walked into a door in my flat (that wouldn't open properly as there is so much cardboard from the IKEA wardrobe in my hallway);
- Lost my debit card and my credit card;
- spilt coffee in my lap.

And it's only 8.15am. It's going to be one of those days...

* I know. I knew it was going to happen - one of those thoughts you have to yourself ("I had better move that glass that's balancing on that edge there or I'll knock it over" - but you don't and you do.)

My weekend: Tango, Argentinians and dinosaurs

It's amazing how long a weekend can feel when you do lots of things.

Friday I took my high-heels / a swishy skirt /inability to walk backwards on said heels and did the tango with an elephant (is it me or is that a line from the um-bongo ad?) Great fun though I need to practice and vamp up enough so I can stay 'after hours' for the tango-fest that is an old-fashioned room decked out with pink lights and fairylights. Must also practice holding rose between teeth.

Saturday was an early start as promised friend a lift to Gatwick (snowing loads there) then a day out computer shopping with Gordon Gekko. A great deal more fun (and sober) than it would have been without him. Spent the evening at a goodbye dinner for R - a friend who has decided that she wants to use her skills for good and work for a charity in Sri Lanka. Am worried for her as it's not the most stable of places to go, but she's a sharp and energetic type. Very fun evening. Something about playing pictionary with loud Argentinians that is very entertaining.

Sunday I met some uni friends and my god daughters at the Natural History Museum. I don't like what they've done to the dinosaur exhibit: as a girl who always dreamt of becoming a drinking buddy with Robert Bakker (my hero when I was working on my dissertation which was about dinosaur physiology and whether or not they were endothermic) and planning a future of hanging around on the Badlands, I think the animatronic T Rex makes visitors forget how amazing the fossils and footprints themselves are: that something roaming around a few hundred million years left those prints. Mindblowing in itself.

Spent Sunday evening wrestling with an IKEA wardrobe. When they say 'self-assembly' they're having a larf, aint they?

A night with the undead

Following a conversation last weekend about why girls might/might not relate to zombies I wanted to do a bit of research.

Not knowing any undead,* I decided to watch my first ever zombie film. Besides, I was informed that a zombie film could provide "good dark, gallows humour"** - ideal for a Wednesday night.

First, a few things I thought I knew about zombies from my TV education and life-experience-to-date:

- Zombies are the least scary and threatening of horror monsters. After all they are the 'walking dead'

- In fact, they don't even walk, they shuffle (and - Michael Jackson take note - they certainly don't dance). How scary can they get?

- They come out of the ground: so don't buy that lovely house next to the cemetery

- They tend to make a low groaning noise. And have their arms outstretched (I think the latter is species distinction - it's the one thing that shows they are really zombies and not just someone who had a really heavy night last night with tell-tale bloodshot eyes, bags under their eyes and minimal brain activity)

- You need to cut their heads off to make them, er, even more undead

- They're not big into formming social groups, zombie clubs or generally getting together down the zombie disco

- They avoid eye contact (possibly due to the lack of working eyes - hang on: how can they see where they're going???) and so don't tend to flirt with each other (they certainly don't bat their eyelids)

- They're far from vegetarian

In the last 104 minutes, I have found out that:

- They don't meander around gormlessly with their arms outstretched: that pose is *so* dated

- They can run pretty damn fast

- They don't make that low moaning sounds after all, though they can give off a vampire-like screech when they want you to know they're interested

- They seem to gravitate to shopping malls (question: if you were a zombie which shop would you head to?)

- Finally, they can be the basis of a very entertaining (far-from the B-movie) film. I have to admit it was a brilliant film, cracking (as my dad would say).

Zombie film score:
Outrageous mindless gore: 7/10
Suspense: 8/10
Fun: 9/10
Pace: 9/10
Soundtrack: 9/10

Lights may stay on way beyond bedtime tonight - but not because I'm scared but because I'm going to plan which film I should watch next (I seem to be out of my John Hughes/80s phase, though someone did send me a text earlier to let me know that 'Footloose' was on which reflects what people think of my film taste..).

* Am tempted to put some names in here as possibilities but will resist.
** To quote someone with an x and a y chromosome***
** Okay, much though it pains me to say it, they were right

Happy New Year!! *

(Tried to find photo of Swansea Bay - this is not it, as anyone familiar with Swansea City Council's firework budget will testify.)

Happy New Year! 2005 has been a fun and interesting year but I have a feeling that 2006 is going to be more so.

Day started with flat champagne; lunch was schnapps (begged off a neighbour) and fridge remnants (pub at the end of the road was closed). Had planned a day of fun (e.g. getting high and going joyriding) but instead ended up watching more episodes of The OC than a human being (or two) should be able to process in one day ('eeeeuuw!' as Summer would say).

Have made 41 New Year Resolutions (yeah, I know it's ridiculous - I always make a load and write them in a book). Have already done something about five of them and broken two. Not a bad start.

Festive Commitment Count: Two friends have announced their engagements (one even proposed to his girlfriend in front of his entire family on Christmas day - now, that's foolhardy), and one friend declared pregnancy.

* Or Blwyddwyn Newydd Dda [Learn/use more Welsh: Resolution #12]