Gracie’s Life Experiment

Our friends Ian and Sally had their engagement party today.   It was held at Preston Grasshoppers RFC and they had a Ceilidgh (something like that spelling I believe!).  It was really cool to see loads of our friends we hadn’t seen from Uni.  It’s been about 2-3 years since they graduated.  I would say about 1/3 of the people there were archers. Not surprising considering that that is how they met (albeit for rival Uni clubs).  Which led to us wondering how many couples are archery archers.  At least three of the married couples there were student archers.  And there were plenty of other archer couples.  I think there were about 6 people who were archers who weren’t going out with other archers.  So there you have it, if you are single - go join an archery club if you want to find someone special

Summary of the day:  Got no sleep at the people in the room above at the hotel were partying till 5am!!  Went to Mum’s and helped babysit 2 toddlers (yikes, it’s hard work), Went to parteeeee!

Hubby had to go to his school open day today.  That left me on my tod again.  Rather than bum about in the house feeling lonely I decided to go out and about and keep busy.  So got up and dragged my (slightly hungover) ass to Victory Hall for archery.  I missed practise on Wednesday because I didn’t get back from Farnborough till late.  Practise started out great. Brilliant sighters (I should have known it was going to go downhill from there) and first dozen was 107.  Sadly my group then moved to the red/blue border and then everything went totally to pot.  I even hit the target to the left of mine!!  Managed to at least shoot a round, 496 Portsmouth. 

After archery I went food shopping all by myself (I don’t think I’ve done a full shop alone for about 5 years).  Kind of strange but also much more efficient (forgot the bacon though) and not as stressful as I’m not being asked “can we get this, I think we really need to buy X, Y, Z powertool or 47″ LCD TV”.  I went to Aldi this week (there’s no market this week in Loughborough as the annual fair is in town)- there’s not as much variety as the bigger supermarkets but it’s also not as busy and there’s always something a bit different.  I even managed to put away all the shopping myself (usually husband growls at me when I try).  Bit miffed to have to buy my own flowers though >

Summary of the day: Woke up alone and thought about going to work, Realised it is actually the weekend, Went to archery, Sucked, Went food shopping, Put away said shopping, Read first few chapters of A Room with a View (one of my favourite films, not sure what it is about it that appeals to me)

No, this post is not about seeing friends who are geriatric!!  Today I met up with a couple of friends, one who I hadn’t seen/talked to for about 5 years.  Was interesting to see that we’re pretty much the same as we were before and just picked up where we left off.   Sad to think I haven’t really done much in the last 5 years to talk about. 

Some student has given me flu AGAIN so spent the whole day with tissues attached to my face.  Unimpressed when I am trying to be social.  We had a couple of neighbours over as well in the afternoon and then had a Red Dwarf (series 1) watching evening (totally forgot Kryten wasn’t in the first episodes).  Dog kept trying to steal chicken nuggets and Guinness!  No sign of the 4,691 irradiated haggis though

Summary of the day: Went to archery only to find my string has frayed, Emergency trip to Merlin Archery to get a couple of new strings (and a new tab face while I’m at it), Twist new strings and put on bow only to find serving way too thin, Put second layer of serving on and start shooting 1 3/4 hrs after starting at archery, Met up for lunch with old friends, Retired back to house and had tea, Cooked nibbles and watched Red Dwarf, Dribbled a lot!

So it was the first archery club social tonight.  Started out at the SU and ended up at the SU.  The route to the final destination was a little strange as we ended up in the GB and Phantom in between!  I haven’t been out to the SU for about 3 years (tried to go a few weeks ago for the decanniversary but couldn’t get in).  It was packed at Stupid Tuesday.  Quite an odd sensation going out with a bunch of people 10 years younger than you - wasn’t too impressed when they decided that I must be 49 though, grr!!!  Ended up with writing all over my shirt, arms, chest, and a big green X on my forehead. 

Note to self: you don’t like drinking nasty, so why do you keep doing it?  Note 2 to self: you don’t like drinking VK, so why do you keep buying it because it is on offer?  Note 3 to self: Phantom cocktails are too drinkable.  Note 4 to self: switch off phone when going out drinking then you can’t “accidentally” send drunken txt msgs to people.

Summary of the day: Went to work, Had a long long meeting about TLCM, Went out to socialise (eep)

One of my favourite hobbies/sports is archery.  I’m been doing it for about 10 years now.  I was a bit of a super novice in my first year, got my first bow of my own (a Marksman Meteor) shot pants for a year, and then started shooting well.  That bow and I were damn good for 3 years and I won a pile of medals (only student based comps - I’m not that good), then bought another new bow (marksman stopped manufacturing and with no other options for limbs that bow wouldn’t have been a good long term option).  So my next bow was a Samick Mizar (I went with a shorter riser this time to get a bit more power).  Struggled for 2 years to get used to the bow (and the magic arrows that went round corners), gave up and bought a Spigarelli Explorer (mainly because it was reduced).  That was last year.  Over the summer I shot loads and improved my PB.  What’s good with this bow is that I seem to actually have a vague semblance of control over the shots (rather than total randomness).  I’m too much of a fairweather archer to practise in the garden in autumn/winter and I can only really make one session a week at the club.  So my resolve this year at the club is to really enjoy the shooting and socialising (in the past couple of years I’ve tailed off due to pissed-offness with old bow).

Confuscius (I think) said “ln archery we have something resembling the Way of the virtuous. When the archer misses the centre of the target, he turns around and seeks for the cause of failure within himself’.”  I like that as it means that you have the power within you to hit the centre and also you must strive to self-evaluate to improve.  After a while it’s actually very psychological.

Summary of the day: Went to work, Planned the cabinet scenario, Went to lunchtime seminar (about network congestion - was lost after the 1st 5 mins!!), Had meeting in afternoon, Arrived late at archery, Flung a whole pile of arrows into targets, Came home to find hubby had cooked yummy dinner (he’s a gem), Felt knackered

The second series of Robin Hood started last week on Beeb1.  It’s all pretty silly, but being an archer I feel I should watch just to laugh at the bows and incredible shots!  Today’s episode was particularly ridiculous, some cross between Hustle and Indiana Jones.  Every time they go into a village with the lowly peasants I am reminded of the scene in Monty Python with the Sir Bedevere and the witch trial (a duck!).  Love the totally over the top Sheriff, and have noticed that some of the hammy evil-dudeness has rubbed off on Guy of Gisborne this season, especially the random snarling  (still think he sounds just like Sean Bean in Sharpe though).  Even though it’s all made up and isn’t meant to be authentic, I can’t help but laugh at some of the odd/out of place things.  Still it’s entertaining enough for a Saturday evening (and best of all it isn’t reality TV).

Summary of the day: Went for walk into market with the dog, Tidied the house, Gave a piano lesson, Played piano myself, Avoided watching football as everytime I watch they lose, Cooked shepherd’s pie, Watched telly, Read The Times (it’s so big on a Saturday it takes almost all day to get through)

This week I’m putting ten links that are in my Favourites:

1. http://graciek.wordpress.com (well, duh otherwise I wouldn’t get to my blog each day to write it)
2. http://news.bbc.co.uk (lunchtime fix of daily news)
3. http://www.facebook.com (it’s just so addictive)
4. http://www.sciencedirect.com (useful for finding journal papers)
5. http://www.google.com/calendar (gets to my online calendar)
6. http://www.lboroarchery.co.uk (archery club site - mainly to look on discussion boards)
7. http://www.google.co.uk (search engine, would have this as my homepage but where I work has fixed the work homepage as that)
8. http://britishexpats.com/forum (forum with lots of other people also trying to emigrate to Australia)
9. http://www.kelkoo.co.uk (price comparison site)
10. http://www.moneysupermarket.com (lots of interesting articles about how to save money)

Summary of the day: Woke up at 4.30 with dog barking, Tidied house, Went back to sleep at 7, Went to work at 9.30, Sent lots of emails to students, Had a meeting all afternoon, Gave a piano lesson, Ate 1/2 a garlic ciabatta (mmm)

Do you ever think that sometimes there is a soundtrack playing in the background to your life (like it does in the movies)?  Today I am Feeeeeling Good, da dum, da dum, da dum!!  For some reason I am inextricably feeling rather happy indeed.  Ear’s still a bit sore, but at least the tinitus has stopped.   The sun came out to play today.

Summary of the day: Went to work, ate lunch by the lake in the sunshine, got 3 things ticked off on my work to-do list, played piano, shot 546 (yes a new PB, 25 Golds - w00t), started reading a new book

Inspired by BBC News’ 10 Things lists, I thought I would try and make Thursdays my own variation of 10 things.  So the first one will be 10 things I like…

1. Family
2. Playing piano
3. Archery
4. Exploring
5. Moose (Taboo and Coke)
6. Lasagne
7. Having friends over
8. Playing scrabble
9. Wandering round museums
10. Painting

Summary of the day: Went to “work” (didn’t really get much done though), ate yesterday’s lunch, shot a 526 in the garden.