frustrating work life

I am really finding work hard this week. My employers are soooooooo unprofessional. I am used to working for companies who for example have a problem with their orders or equipment breaks and they usually dump the nasty job of explaining the problems to the irate customers onto me it seems. This company though do not do that. Nice not to be dumped on but they just dont tell their customers at all which means we are getting a very bad reputation for being unreliable and I have to say the company deserves it! thats besides the fact our products are second rate in quality anyway. Obviously this means if I answer the phone at all I get shouted at and I have to be honest I dont blame em! On top of this I was told in mid October we would be on holiday from 19th December. As of 4pm yesterday we are apparently now working next week. I wouldnt really mind but its very short notice and I have actually arranged to do stuff every day up till xmas! No idea if I have a leg to stand on if I query it since as I have previously mentioned I have no written contract! Might have to check this one out tho cos as of end of today have been working here for a whole year which does finally give me some rights. Friday 19th is payday so shtum till then! Bombshell brewing!

weekend

Well its monday again. We did another market at Wellingborough. Have decided we will continue there till Christmas Eve and then try some others. Made only £6 after fuel to get there and the hire of stall so not a good day and a complete waste of time really - stood out in the cold. A guy on an opposite stall was £1100 down on the same saturday last year so it must be bad. Not a good time for me to be considering going solo maybe. Difficult to decide what to do. The place was empty. Good for us to actually do that day tho cos we proved we can do high winds and rain. Not that anyone but us actually cares but really its good to find these things out. If we had not done it I would have wondered if we are just fine weather market traders but we are not. We can survive adverse weather. Stayed there till about 4pm and then spent £16 of takings on supplies at local Tesco. Going to enquire about doing Coventry after xmas. For now will continue where we are and maybe those few days before xmas will make it all worth while. We will see. Sunday parents came over with tons of stuff they have cleared from my Grannies house. Its goes up for sale 1st January. There are loads of big garden pots, a tumble drier ( could actually save us money cos right now we have to have a dehumidifier on constantly due to drying washing inside and its working out more expensive than using a tumble drier!) Loads of bath towels which we really need - dogs can now have old ones which will be good for them and us. Tho Grandma apparently didnt go in for big bath sheets which we prefer but then they are all free so we will manage and there is a whole suit case full. Also a washing machine which is great cos mine is dying and best of all a wooden bench which my paternal Grandfather bought for my Nanna in 1952 and then when she died she left it to my Grandma ( my mums mother). All slightly strange but now I have it. Its in great condition considering its loads older than me. Apparently I have to oil it every year so will have to remember that. I think once the summer comes we will put it next to the pond so we can sit and feed and watch the fishes. Lovely! Only problem now is we have limited time to get the house sorted and have 2 huge TVs in lounge and boxes everywhere. I am intending to try and freecycle the old one. It works perfectly. Is larger than the new one and is a Sony Trinitron so surely someone will want it. Seems criminal to go sending it to landfill and we have another almost as good in the garden shed. Maybe I should freecycle both infact! Only keeping new one cos in theory being several years younger it should ultimately go for longer. I hate taking risks with this sort of thing but we cant keep them both and there is no where we can store it so one of them has to go! Still no word from the local council about giving mediation between us and next door over this hedge. I just wish I could see her face when they tell her if she carries on shes going to get an ASBO - whether she works for a solicitor or not. AND whether she thinks we are scum or not. hey ho. I `d like to be a fly on the wall for that one. What we will do if she does continue wrecking our lovely garden after that tho I really do not know. Nearly Xmas. Break from boring work on friday but have markets saturday, and right up till xmas eve. Then if all is ok will have 2-3 weeks off and then start up again in different town. I do hope 2009 is a good year for us.

hood finished at last

Well I have finally finshed the hood on my new jumper. Very pixie-ish. Really have got to post a photo. Will have to get M to take it. More than likely will need to wear the thing too so you can see tho would have prefered to remain faceless. Still here we go........Just gotta do the sewing up / construction bit now and round the neck!

And I have one whole ball of lime green and two half balls of both lime and turquoise to find a use for. Legwarmers????? Scarf?? Dont really need any more scarves since have enough of one type of another to fill a large suitcase so maybe legwarmers or even socks or gloves. Dont usually go for matching stuff either tho seem to be getting lots that matches with this venture.

The yarn is actually DK tho I have been using double to give me chunky and it also means I get solid turqoise and lime and a marl version too with only needing the two colours so works a treat. I will have to have a think about this cos looks like I am getting a whole look for very little work really. I will pick up round the neck tonight.

Today is going to be a really long day cos was up at 5am to make bath bombs to stock up for markets. Dogs were happy tho cos they got to go our very early. Reggie actually kept jumping up and kissing me. Very cute so long as he doesnt break any teeth cos his head is very hard and he keeps jumping into my face and it wouldnt be the first time!!

I have started my 2nd 25kg bag of bicarb too so now wondering if I should buy more. It took so long to come last time that it might be best to get it in early rather than have no stock. I also need sweet almond oil and cannot get any. It used to be cheapest in Tesco but they have stopped selling it so now I will need to find a supplier fior that to and need to do asap since have only about 100ml left. Cant get over how quick I am getting thru supplies now I am actually trading. Still I am selling lots so should be very happy about that.

I want to experiment with Eco soya candles next. We will have to try em out so could be a good one to do over Xmas hols since we will get round to actually lighting them then! usually we seem to have candles lying around for ages till Xmas comes along. It would be nice to have some natural Eco candles rather than the usual parafin wax. We need another line for the stall too. Intending to make some new soap over xmas too. Will need the forum to give me feedback too since I will hopefully add it to the range if any good. Also got to think of a new bath bomb mix for spring / easter since cant have the Christmas ones too much longer. Its a shame cos they are selling like hot cakes - mind you probably thats cos they smell Christmassey. Mind you maybe I can do same perfumes for both soap and bath bombs. Christmas will be fun I reckon. Lots of experiments. Maybe a citrus mix for spring???? Hmm. Also I would like to make some soap with my own special mix of essential oils cos I have been trying several out for months now and finally I have come up with a really nice mix. I have already made moisturiser with it so going to try to do it as soap and bath bombs. A complete range maybe like a signature scent - or am I getting silly now?? After all I am just a market trader in the end!

councillor

The councillor came round yesterday. I was out but M was there. She has confirmed the neighbour cannot/ is not allowed to cut our hedge. They are going to put us in touch with someone to try and sort it out before its gets any worse. Thank goodness for that at least. All we want to do is live there and not have hassles. Hopefully the neighbour will decide to leave us in peace. I have a suspician she will not be happy tho. I think its some sort of mediation but if it enables us to all get along ( after all you dont have to LIKE your neighbours just be able to live along side of each other) then all will be fine. I am dreading her finding our we went to the local council tho. Councillor had a look at all of our garden and likes it even with it being messy and half finished so it cant be that bad whatever next door says. Thats a relief anyway cos you never do know what the council will say do you. Anyway hopefully this problem will get sorted. Also councillor has confirmed the neighbour has stolen one of our trees and part of our garden!! She planted this hedge the day after we moved in and I did think it was on our land but I am pretty easy going usually and didnt want the hassle but anyway she did steal our land. To be honest we cant be bothered with the hassle so long as she leaves our hedge alone but if she keeps up with this shes going to seriously find herself in it now. Anyway all we need to do is to wait a couple of years for her hedge to grow, remove our fence which keeps the dogs in and put up wirwe netting against the hedge she planted which is right on the boundary line and we get 99% of teh land back again. She can keep the tree. Its a leylandii and will be more hassle than its worth in a few years when folks make her get it cut down!

good weekend

Well markets went well. Saturday was pretty quiet but Sunday was so shockingly busy. Everyone else reckoned they did badly next to last year. We did very well. But then tis coming up to Xmas and we were not there last year so we dont know what we might have made had we been. I am encouraged anyway. On the other hand most of the stalls were selling things for £100 plus and we are pretty cheap at £3-4 for most expensive soap and £1.49 for a giant bath bomb. Maybe even in a recession we will be competitive enough that people will buy since they are comparable items to many that cost a lot more! Had to make bath bombs for 2 hours before work today and M is going to buy some ingredients to enable me to be able to make more tomorrow cos we sold so much stuff I need to try and replenish for next weekend! have so far found we sell tons of lavender, floral and geranium bombs. I should ofcourse find this wonderful but having to work makes it hassle to make bombs! I suppose when I am finally self employed I will get a routine and it will al get easier. Right now I am trying to juggle a regular and very boring job with my own companys needs and its not easy fitting it all in. I need an accountant I reckon but no idea if we will make enough to justify the expense! I am now so far behind with company books its getting scary! Anyway the best sellers so far are packs of 3 mini bombs for £1 and the floral and Christmas bombs. Not surprised about the Christmas ones it coming up to Xmas but I am very surprised no one is interested in the Orange or Lemon bombs cos I love them and so does M. Still if there are some left we will have luxurious baths at xmas. Tho to be honest if there are none left I shall make us some! I am considering doing a promotion this week to get pepes spending something like spend £8 and get a free - something tho not sure what yet! Will have to see what we have lots of thats near end date maybe. Or maybe promote either the Lemon or the Orange bombs cos I reckon if I could get people to try em they would come back for more! Then I could promote something different the week before xmas! As for work ......am still not going to lunch in cafe and have started to go out now. They do not like it. Surely tho you should have freedom to relax away from work during your lunch break! It really is just too much being stuck in a greasy spoon ( tho they call it a Bistro! but really its a bacon sarnie type greasy spoon!) I think perhaps I am just an antisocial git maybe! Ah well. Why should I be forced to spend my precious lunch time with folk who cannot be with me when I eat without insulting me for being a veggie. I have put up with it for a whole year in an effort to try and be normal if thats the right word. I hate the food - they have hummus or hummus for me! They have poisoned me 4 times and definitely given me "off" hummus more than once and I hate spending my time there. Its just not a break. Besides the fact you come out smelling like a chippy! The problem is we are expected to go cos the company pays for lunch! I prefer to bring my own sarnies and have been eating far more healthily since I have started to so do not want to go back to their greasy food. Also the weight has just fallen off me and I have not even cut down. If anything I am eating more! Its simply unreasonable to be forced to go every day. If it was just one day a week I wouldnt mind. In my previous job I used to go to the pub with work mates every friday and it was a team bonding type of effort. It was not every single day tho! Its not as if I like any of em. I dont hate em either just dont really care! Other than that I am finally on last few stiches of my hood - for the jumper I have been knitting. It now has a tail like a pixie hat developing and I am really looking forward to wearing it. Then just got to sew up and do the neck edging and will have matching jumper and hat for xmas - well if I get it finished in time anyway. I am aiming for that. Then will start on this recycled sari yarn for a spring top of some sort tho unsure what exactly to knit as yet! Infact I have some piccies of jumper so will try to attempt to post here later. Hey life can only get better!!!!!!!!

Friday at last

I forgot to set alarm last night and didnt wake till 7:55 today. Lucky to get to work on time. Mind you feel better than have felt for weeks so probably good to sleep longer occassionally. Have been averaging about 5 and a half to 6 hours a night and I know I do best on 8-10 hours so no wonder have been feeling a bit knackered. 95 pepes get laid off at today at Unipart where M works. All temps but very worrying. I feel so sorry for em at xmas. They have little chance of another job right now I suspect. They are talking about redundancies in January too. M will more than likely be on the list since hes only been there for 3 and a half years. We are going to be stuffed unless our markets take off big time. Still I suppose it could really be a new beginning for us if we can just stay positive. The Govt breaks will more than likely not apply to us either cos it turns out altho we got our mortgage thru Alliance & leicester its actually with a company called SPML and they are part of Lehman Brothers group who went down in the US. No idea if we will be able to defer our interest for 2 years like every one else. Anyway other than that tis friday, tis a market day tomorrow and sunday and tis only 20 days till xmas. cant wait. We are not going to do any markets from 25th to 3rd or even possibly 10th Jan so we will actually get some time to look after our dogs properly ( they wont get a decent walk this weekend since we will leave and return in the dark poor lads) and have a rest. have a big xmas market on sunday so hopefully we will take lots of money and then we can realy start to plan and to believe in the business. Right now its hopeful but has yet to prove itself. I have so much to sort out tonight for it..........even taking a heater that I bought last year for the sheds. Strangely - cos its work- I am dead excited about it. Its our 2nd week and I just have this feeling we are going to do really well...........
Ive been considering my own options jobswise. Well who knows what the future will hold. I dont think I would be able to go back into a lab now..........altho apparently cos I am a manufacturer of soap etc I can apply to be a CChem which I may have to do. Well have to comply with GLP etc and theres quite a lot of routine chem in my chosen profession even if it is basic such as pH testing and H&S and COSHH and interpreting stuff like allergens for labelling etc. You know I do like that "my chosen profession " bit!!!! Its all an accident but it really really is my chosen profession isnt it! How weird is life. I left chem for ever to do office work only to find a way to do permanent real chem. Now that has encouraged me that has. Have to get round to doing company accounts soon tho.........hate this bit......cos have now over 6 weeks to sort and the hours are mounting up. There have been lots of transactions in and out too so its going to be hassle. A month of receipts usually takes me at least a day to sort out. Still I am off at xmas tho will have to do at least 1 days accounting. I need to find an accountant too now I think since this I feel is going to be big. Its just a shame I had to waste money doing the PGCE year really cos that is draining my current income. Tho if I had chosen a different pathway maybe I would not have found my way to where i am now.......Hmmm...... yes getting a bit mystical here. I dont really believe in fate as such but I do beleive you get to chose a pathway from several possible ones and the choice you make causes where you finaly end up.........if you see what i mean. Mind you I am no where near to the final end yet. This is just the begginning. Hey I am so happy today. I think the hard bit is deciding where you want to head for and once you take that desicion the going there is just easy. For months I have been wanting to give up the job and do markets etc but it was just a dream -now I am doing both ( job and markets that is!) and have already made the desision I needed. I just have to wait for the right time and carry the plan forward. Maybe its the risky nature of it all that makes it so exciting. I think I just dont want to live in a safe nice comfy world. I have to risk everything on a reasonably regular basis. Thats who I am. Either I will end up very rich or very broke but then I came from the bottom of the pile living in a homeless persons shelter and no qualifications etc so who knows so far so good. I just dont believe we are going to go under. There is a way of thinking that you make your own luck in life. I always believe stuff and it happens so maybe that is true. So in that case all I have to do is put in the hours, believe and make it happen and we will have our freedom ( as much as anyone in this world does) and be self employed and make lots of money or at least as much as we need cos I have no particular need to be a millionaire. Just to be free. Its friday tho and I am going to make it happen tomorrow onwards. Wait and see. Incidentally "Make it Happen" is a song by a band called A Look Inside. they didnt get very far, they are/were all very close mates of mine. ( My Ex housemate is best known and currently having a revival as Guitarist in the SECT) and this song inspired me to do just that. I went and got GCSE Maths and then my degree ( all because of a song and something quite psycadelic - I was young then tho and it was the 90s!)
But it still changed me and my life forever..............The POWER OF MUSIC!

blogging and eating cheaply

I am making a very early new years resolution. By Making it now it gives me time to get it right! Anyway I can get to proctice being good. I am going to try to blog at the very least every 3rd day. Every day if possible. Maybe I should invest in some sort of mobile internet so I can do it during my lunch hour. Cant really afford anything right now tho! And hopefullty soon I will have my own time back during my lunch hour ( or half an hour as it has turned out..........but then I have no contract) I am dying to blog whats happeneing at work but cant right now due to possibly dropping myself in it since this blog is live on the web. Theres lots afoot tho! Once it actually happens I will blog the whole story cos it wont matter anymore then. In meantime I have to be sensible and stay quiet. Tho i am BURSTING! Owls Wings again is inspiring me and also Lunaea Weatherstone`s blog. Never been there before. Great tattoos. I really need to get my own rubbish 1980s mess updated. I still have what has been described as a coughing corgi with wings on my shoulder - meant to be a bat with blood dripping from its fangs - from my goth days! Not that I have ever really stopped being a Goth/Punk just I am abit old for most of the clothing these days and really I think most of it is a rip off. Occassionally you see something and its lovely. I have a beautiful black velvet top with floaty sleeves from Dare Gothic in Cornwall thats just lovely ( and very goth too) and also very wearable. Anyway that aside I think you remain inside what you are as a teenager unless ofcourse it was really just a fashion. For me it way a way of life. And I have never really left it behind me. Tho nowadays I dont just wear black. Infact nowadays I think I mostly wear homemade or cheap and when I buy new tends to be fair trade etc so I dont afford much new! One thing thats good, Christmas wont cost too much this year since all relatives, male and female and kids, are getting soap and bath bombs etc. -has to be the way. My dogs are turning veggie as of today too. Not thru morals but cos its cheaper...........well when your whole house is the same its cheaper than buying and cooking 2 different types of meals. I dont suppose they will be veggie forever since it seems wrong but we are too poor to feed em expensive meat now and they are not eating the rubbish that is pet food especially now I have been told it actually contains dogs and cats! You know I hate the insert button, just wiped half of this post! I have no prooof it contains dogs and cats but I have been told it does and have no reason to doubt it. After all in the 1980s it was common knowledge that human biscuits containing so called " animal fats" contained dogs and cats so why not pet food now! Anyway my dogs absolutely love Redwood food lincolnshire sausages ( so do we) and currently you get huge packs of em for just £5 ( direct from redwoodfoods.co.uk and they have an offer on their roasts too!). Even if we get thru 2 packs ( dogs have a bit more than just one pack a week cos I am worried they will suffer and be underfed - hopefully they wont get fat but we have problems getting thru a whole pack so it will work out to be 2 packs a week approximately between us and the dogs) thats still less than food is costing right now. We are going to eat sausage everything. I made sausage casserole with em last night and was yummy. Bonus is they are ready to eat so if you fancy a quick sausage sarnie you dont have to cook em! Or cool em for dogs! Looked up vegetarian dogs on internet and most pepes give em dried food but i dont want to do that so we will see how they do on the same as we eat. They already have beans and veggies sausages occassionally ( in can). Its a good quickie for when things are running late and they love em! Other than that till now they eat meat and veg meals - human style but its costing too much. I feel they should really be veggie too or at least we should try them on it since we are both vegans and have been for years. And there will be no guilt at teh checkout when I have meat in the trolley which is a real hassle for me to cope with. Am a a wuss? Maybe! Other than that we are continuing our dried pulses extravaganza that we have been on for last couple of months. I seem to have usually 3 pans of different pulses soaking and cooking so we get a constant stream of chick peas, white kidney beans, pinto beans, aduki, lentils etc. Much cheaper than buying beans in cans and we get loads for our money. And other than that we will be eating whatever is cheap vegetable wise at tesco, aldi and sainsbury etc.

following blogs

Been so busy recently have had no time to read other blogs. In have just spent today catching up. Read a great article at Owls Wings about lighting candles each week till the winter solstice. Its basically a spell and half the planet or at least any followers of Owls Wings are getting involved. I have missed the first 2 sundays but I suppose that wont really matter. A world spell has to be much more powerful than a single persons spell. I didnt know either that November 30th was Hecates day. I will remember that for next year. I am learning so much by reading this particular blog. Its pagan and different. magical. Or Magikal! anyway worth a read if you have the time and happen to come accross what I am writing. I need to make a wreath I think. This time last year I was well into wreaths by now. This evening I will try to cut some evergreens. The main trouble will be that its pitch black when I get home. may have to cut them in the morning and then make the weath itself tomorrow night. One things certain too I need to clear all the clutter we have collected off the lounge table. Our Dining Table is the "lounge" table since our house is very small. Its an Ikea drop leaf jobby that breaks down very small. About 30cm wide and made I think of Birch so it is quite beautiful and small when collapsed which means we can just about fit it in. It only gets used for xmas or the odd sunday dinner due to the rooom it takes up when its put up. Sad really cos its lovely. The lounge is full of clutter right now cos of doing the markets and we have no where else to store the boxes. It is certainly not ideal. I have decided if we start to sell steadily I will have to pay for a storage unit to stick all this stuff into. At least then we will get our house back again.

Tuesday at work

Well work as usual is totally boring. Did a market on Saturday and it was ace. I reckon I have found what I am meant to do in life. Didnt make loads but did make a small profit. Ofcourse by the time fuel to get there and back is accounted for I probably still made a loss but we got a lot of interest so I think this is more than likely realy a viable option. It was our first week too. With me I have a look and if teh stall is there again I try it out and then if its good \i go back. Again and again! I have built a great website whilst on my evening course - last lesson was last night so either I post website now which cant do as yet since dont have a program that supports CSS. My dreamweaver program is MX and wont allow anything in CSS. When I decided I prefer to use CSS to the normal HTML templates I had no idea about that so now I really need to buy a newer copy of dreamweaver. Next part of the course begins on 20th January so its quite a few weeks away yet and that means my lovely website ( which actually works!) is stuck on a pen drive and I cant upload till I get it all sorted. Made bath bombs this morning and am packaging and labelling liquid soap tonight for this weekends markets. We are doing a big xmas market on Sunday in Towcester so hopefully that will go well ( it cost £60!!! so really hope we at least sell that much of stock!) and doing Wellingborough again on Saturday. We intend to do Wellingborough every Saturday now right thru to xmas and have actually signed up to do the week immediately before xmas too. Then we are taking the bit between new year and xmas off and then we will start again as regulars in Wellingborough i reckon on second week of Januray or maybe even on 3rd we will have to see. I dont want a Jnauary sale tho so not too sure about this really. Mind you my Mini bath bombs seem to be really popular which is great since I have a much bigger profit from them than from the large ones. maybe straight after xmas anyone who was given them will want some more and buy lots off us. Weird tho that people seem to prefer 3 small ones to one giant one. I personally go more for luxury rather than quantity. Tho I suppose 3 mini bombs for £1 is pretty good as a stocking filler. I will see how this week goes but really I think we may actually be on to a winner here. Work is boring me to death and starting to get eye problems with looking at a PC constantly. Never had such a PC oriented job. I mean I am literally chained to it it seems. They dont even like you to do the look away from the screen every so many hours which I have always been told to do in other jobs. I have been here a year on 18th December and never had a workstation assessment or an eye test and I am sure you are meant to have both of these by law! I have always had them in other jobs even when I was temping. I saw an optition anyway a couple of weeks ago now cos I am worried about this problem with my eye. I had an operation as a kid so I have to watch it cos dont want to have to have another. Anyway work is getting no better. Since I am bringing my own lunches now and no longer going to the cafe with everyone else they have got very weird with me. I really dont want to go tho. The food is the same every day and to be honest having eaten Hummous every day for a year I am sick to death of the stuff. I actually love hummous but variety really is the spice of life. I feel much better eating what I know is a healthy lunch tho rather than sarnies coated in marg!!! Also I know this cafe have poisoned me 3 times. I know when hummous is off ( I eat it lots and it goes sour after about 3 days). They have given me off food too many times. I reckon more than 3 day old food too! Once I would ignore cos it happens - tho no excuse really - but 3 times is just too much. Anyway I am once again self sufficient with lunches and it feels great. Eating daily in a cafe stops being a treat after awhile. It only takes 5 minutes to make a couple of nice healthy sarnies and I have different fillings every day now. Great! Sadly I simply do not belong here. Tho no it isnt sad at all. I dont want to belong here. I have alwasy got on with folk and usually been the person organising the Friday lunchtime pub visits in other jobs so no idea why I just do not fit in here. It must be them thats weird. I have never before worked anwhere where you have to socialise with the work team outside of work either. We have no contracts so theres nothjing to say i must go along but I am made to feel I have to. Not a nice feeling. They are all saddo apparently who have no life or even friends outside of work. well I do. Not hundreds of mates but I have them and they are nice people and I really do not want tyo spend every weekend and half my weekday evenings seeing people I see all day. Not that I hate em cos I dont but we are just work colleagues and really have nothing in common. Also they can never ever even of a minute it seems forgive or forget that I am veggie. What is their problem? veggies are the fastest growing food choice? Doesnt sound right but the numbers of vegans shot up to over a million last year and the numbers of veggies or meat avoiders are now huge. I am not unusual and I have no desire to try to convince any of em to change so why do they have to take exception to me all the time!

obnoxious neighbours

Well after we did the market yesterday we were pretty tired and just slobbed. It was a good day tho. Anyway this morning I went up the garden with my hounds trying to trip me up inbetween wrestling with each other - they are very active looney dogs believe me. Anyway I realised next door neighbour - the nosey one!!!- has yet again cut teh top off our hedge. Cheeky or what. So checked the time........well it is sunday..........and its 10:30 am so decided to go and tell her she has to stop this since shes ruining the look of our garden and it IS our hedge not hers. Anyway knocked on door and promise you I really did not shout but she did. Virtually strainght away. Apparently she works for a solicitor so I dont have a leg to stand on and she will cut my garden back when ever she feels like it. Then she shouts in my face Your garden is a MESS. the mess bit being shouted far to close to me. Very rude. Then I am told we are not good enough to be her neighbours. Who does she think she is. Honestly. So now we have to either accept her bullying us, cos bullying this certainly is, or see a solictor. Trouble is aside from the money aspects cos in the end its our garden and our land and we will afford it if we have to, but really if we go down this route I dont ever see us even getting along with this woman. Well personally I dont need to like my neighbour - tho in last house they were lovely really, but it would be good to just be able to live in peace with her if you see what I mean. And if we go and get solicitors involved I dont think even 10 years down the line we will be able to do that. She does have a point. The garden is a mess. Tho the hedge was fine till she touched in. Our efforts at demolishing the huge sheds have not helped the way the garden looks right now but it will get better and considering when we moved in it was full of rusty metal and rubbish everywhere which took us 2 skips to clear, I think shes beiong really nasty. It isnt that bad either. Its just she wants a wastleland with block paving and we want wildlife friendly hedging and arches made of trees - thats what we have. I will try to take some piccies to post cos really our garden is beautiful. Tho maybe not to block paving loving city types! She was scared of teh guy who used to own our house ( a big biker type) and we are just ordinary folk. She wont get away with this tho cos I wont be bullied!

Green peace

Just had to remove the link to greenpeace since i cant get it to work at all! Sorry if this causes anyone any inconvenience.

markets

Spent this weekend exploring possible markets and have decided to start with Wellingborough market( Northampton). Its busy but not too busy so I should be able to handle it. Also it is possible to become a perm reasonably quickly. There is no one selling my kind of products there either. I am also interested in Donnington market which is one of the biggest in the Midlands but to do that one I will need to buy a stall which is a minimum of £135 and really I also will need a van not a tiny Fiesta!. I cant wait now till next saturday so we can get going. Will be needing to buy some thermals tho by the looks of things. This really could be the beggining of my new life. my main problem discovered from my only other local village market is I cant add up! I really need to find or buy a new calculator. I have several but no idea if I will find them in time. Anyway got to sort this one by saturday to avoid the embarrassment. I am still waiting for my stock to be delivered too and have a backlog of orders for bath bombs which I cant fulfill. Luckilly the guy who placed the order will wait a little longer but its a right pain. I dont really want to change supplier after the last time when the ingredients were second rate and I ended up throwing loads of stock out cos that is just expensive. I have a real problem with this tho. If the order doesnt come by thursday we are going to be very short of my very popular mini bath bombs.
Tonight I have my last website lesson. I have to decide whether or not to do the second bit. I am very keen to do so but what if it runs on a market day. Assuming this gets seriously going by February ( as in I will be able to quit my boring hateful job!)I may end up not completing the second bit and that will be waste of money. On the other hand if I do complete it I will be in a much better position regarding building my own website from scratch which will save me hundreds or possibly even thousand of pounds which I dont have! I have actually managed to put a web page up. Its a bit rubbish really but has a link to my ooffoo advert. Atleast now if anyone goes there they will know where to go to buy my soaps!

Transition Towns

Read some seriously interesting stuff on Transition towns today. Started at the usual stops, Owls wings then Ran Prieur - very enlightened if you ask me.- cant say he has actually changed my beliefs- he just seems to put the words in the right place and explain what I already believe. Good reading - anyway there was a lead to another site on Transition towns. Cant honestly say never heard of em before today but very interesting concept of how a local cut off after no fuel town will cope and what to do to get round to coping when the carbon as in oil runs out. Some dicrepenciess and flaws but good reading anyway and informative. worth checking out. I will post a link tomorrow when not inebriated. Also today read about rainbow warrior. Infcat had the chance to go round her but simply could not get there either day sadly so have not done that. Anyway attaching a link doobrie now.

damp patches

Have some new problems with the house which is growing mould. Its only in the corner of one room but pretty bad. I bleached it all off last thursday and its already growing again. I cant understand it. We also get black mould from condensation but this is different. Its actually fur like. Nasty. I need to bleach it all again and try to kill it. It grows in the corner of our front bedroom. Currently we are sleeping in the back since the intention when we moved in was to do up the front and move in but we havent afforded it yet. Maybe its time we just moved in. Its full of stuff now anyway. I am inheriting loads of furniture from my Gran now too. One item is a pink(!!!) woven 1930s chest which will be a great replacement for the rubbish chest of drawers I bought to keep the spare sheets etc in. The real problem in this house is we have no airing cupboard and I am used to having a huge one the size of a double wardrobe. I really need to sort out where to store everything instead of just leaving in a pile on top of this broken chest of drawers- from Ikea but the cheapest they did and not worth the money. Or maybe it would be for a guest room or somewhere where there wasnt so much stuff in the drawer the bottom keeps falling out! Anyway that was a bad buy. Might be worth freecycling if someone can be bothered to fix it. Its less than a year old. Anyway hopefully when I get the sheet storage sorted there will be space to redecorate and sort out the damp patch. Most of the house has air vents but that room doesnt so maybe we need to put one in. Course \I thne have to find the time to actually do the decorating. We have picture rails but there are bits missing so we either need to replace with new or remove. Above the picture rails is the most awfully done artex you ever saw. I have been considering trying this smoothtex stuff to cover this over. my dad used it successfully so maybe it would do the job. Then shove some textured wallpaper over and paint it. Dont particularly like textured wall paper but the alternative with teh uneven walls is to lining paper the whole house and having justy put 2 layers of lining paper and then wallpaper on top of just the chimney breast I dont think I can handle doing that with the entire house. After all we dont even spend much time in the bedroom. Decorating is such hassle.

all work and no play make me a very dull boring git

Well sick to death of going to work 9-5 ( anyone who has ever stumbled upon thios blog before propbably is already aware of this. I was meant to check out some local markets last weekend but never got round to it!! Did manage to finally find a home for my ancient but almost mint condition flower faires collection. (Given to me aged 21 so never really played with!). They have gone to a friends daughts and I hope she enjoys playing with them. They are lovely dolls and really should be played with. i will post a few piccies infact later. Anyway going off at tangents here, Friends came round and we had a great day on saturday. Got very drunk saturday afternoon and woke up fully dressed and hungover on sunday and spent rest of sunday in recovery. has to be done occassionally. So now still have not checked out any markets. Going this saturday to both Wellingborough and also to see Loughborough so we will be doing lots of travelling. The idea is to decide which and then go for it the following week and get started truly trading. Advatage of Wellingborough is not too far from home and also not too close and its possible to beome permanent after 3 weeks whereas most markets its about a year before you can beome a perm. I have to sort this out now tho having spent ages making products so now its time to just do it and stop talking about it. Anyway have also decided to branch into organic unfragranced liquid soaps and shampoos which I didnt want to sell since not environmentallly frinedly but people keep asking me for. have to buy a laser printer tonight since inkjets cannot make good labels apparently. I need a new printer anyway. My lexmark keeps taking in 20+ sheets of paper and wont feed so I have to hand feed every sheet if printing in black and white. Strangely it works ok in colour! My canon photo printer gives good quality but is also an ink jet and currently I cant get any refills for some reason since everywhere has sold out! So anyway have to buy a laser printer. Then need to label everything up and launch business on the markets. Hoping that over xmas will make a reasonable anmount of money back to be able to buy new stock. If all goes to plan I shall be giving in my notice on 9-5 job around 3rd week of january and going it alone for real. Interestingly market traders generally only do 3-4 days a week and still manage to make a living so I am getting very keen on this. I can see it being freezing this winter but wonderful in summer so I cant wait to get started now. I suppose you spend the other 3 days a week doing the books, making new stock and packing stuff for the next market.

bsoaps on ooffoo

I have just been learning to upload files from Dreamweaver ( and other programs of similar types) in my website class only to discover - with considerable shock and also jubilation! that I have a web presence. Wow!! Or at least my soaps do. cant quite get over it. My soaps show up in a list of different addresses if you search for them. Its amazing. trouble is I still at the moment have no real website. I am on ooffoo tho. Here comes the soaps. I have to really knuckle down and do this website designing now since the web address doesnt point to anywhere right now which is a real pain. I could have hundreds of people looking to buy my products and no way to do so. Will they find ooffoo? will they buy from me. I have come to the conclusion the soap business is never going anywhere until I take the risk, chuck in my day job ( which pays the mortgage and bills!!) and go for it full time. Now other half is being laid off for a whole month tho I do not see how I can really do that. He working in the car industry ( what little we have left of it) and the company is shutting from 5th December to 5th january with no pay! How rubbish. No idea what we will do now and its right on christmas too. Well good thing we have no kids cos that would be even worse. We hopefully will get thru this. If its only a month we should be ok but if this goes on for longer I think we may well lose our house so not a time for me to be quitting my boring job. Thats not very secure either. Cant feel doom and gloom tho despite this. Seeing a list of links to Bsoaps was just so wild. Cant describe the happiness I feel right now or the fear cos what if it really takes off? Will I have enough soap to fill demands?? I suppose then it will be time to really go for it and quit the boring day job.............Bring it on............

funeral

Well today it finally happened. I already seem to have a cold coming on thru all the familly kissing. havent seen many of em for 20+ years tho so WHAT EVER! Grandma was seen off in style. Found I was later watching the clock knowing the crem gets switched on at 6pm. Frying tonight! Yes I am a sick human being! I cried. Hate myself but I did. havent heard anything from the job interview and that most likely means I didnt get it. Still not qualified so no idea why they even gave me the interview. Xmas market looming - approx a month till the big one and not sure I have anywhere near enough stock to even consider doing a proper xmas market. Tho I suppose in the end we can always retreat tails between legs etc. Other than that lots of different liqueurs started off for xmas drinking and we even found some sloes on a hedge when walking the hounds. Havent read any blogs recently but will catch up in next few days. My new ( celtic) year resolution is to get up to date with blogging! Met my cousin KAREN after about 30 years and shes really nice. Met lost of other relatives too. What can I say? Sadly didnt meet all who were there but didnt know who they all were. Never mind. Sadly there could be more funerals coming. I know of 4 people of my own age who died in this october and 3 of them committed suicide. Weird!

Barak Abama

As the whole world is I am vaguely interested in the US presidential elections. I also follow several US based blogs. I came accross this link which is pretty wow with respect to the sort of person Barak Abama really is. Even if or maybe because thois happened 18 years ago the man is unusually wow. Nice guy and maybe really he will change the world if he gets elected.

http://leishacamden.blogspot.com/2008/10/not-that-it-matters.html

Grannie Dies

I know it has to happen to us all and I should be glad she was so very old but it really doesnt help at all. Grannie died last night at 6pm ish. I was at the website course. Was hoping to see her today. Apparently I wouldnt have got there in time anyway since they called my Mum to let her know Grandma had taken a turn for the worse but by the time my folks arrived my Grandma was gone. Probably for the best since at least now she is not suffering anymore and she certainly was. Now i am at work. Yes I know shouldnt be blogging but really do not at all want to be here and really right now I couldnt care less if they did sack me. Grandma was born 31st january 1916 so she was a very old lady. I keep remembering this day when we were paddling in the sea and Grannie had her skirt pulled right up showing off these huge long knickers! Strange the things you think of. I must have been about 6 at the time! It makes me smile to think of her showing off her undies tho since it was very unlike her. Probably no one else would understand at all. One of those silly familly memories. probably i should think myself very lucky to have known all four of my grand parents and even my great grandmother who lived to 101 years old. She lived in the Valleys in Wales and was very poor all her life so poverty doesnt necessarily mean you die young. Anyway probably time I got back to work!

Grandma

Went to see Grandma. very frail. When I first walked in I wasnt sure it was her but she seemed bright enough. Worried about my Mum. Shes not looking very good either. Shes been working herself to death looking after Grandma. Anyway duty is done for now but Grandma is not looking very good at all. I do hope she will get better.

Cornwall

Cornwall was brilliant tho we didnt spend long enough there and I definitely want to find a way to move there or somewhere similar. What can I say, sun, sand and sea and old friends we hardly ever get to see anymore. Dogs loved it and seemed very happy. They have great muscles after all the walking and the top of my arm hurts from holding onto Reggies lead. Birds even seemed happy and loved the journey there. When dawn came Billie was sitting watching it out of teh front window of teh car and screaming her head off. Didnt help driving and I was knackered on Saturday but it was worth the hassle of taking the birds with us to know they are happy and safe. they didnt even fight altho stuck in one cage together. We couldnt fit 2 cages into teh car as well as the rest of us so they had to share which normally would cause fights but they were really great. Downside is missing the website course but hopefully I will catch up ok with that. We were hoping to extend the holiday a few days but having had the bad news my Grandma is rushed into hospital I dont really feel like staying any onger so we have come back home. Still have a few more days off anyway before I have to go back to work so time to make some soap!

knitting again

I have knit a new jumper and when trying to make a hood for it actually made a wonderful hat. Well the hood didnt work so i altered it. Thats the trouble when you dont use pattens. I have also bought some yarn from helen at Yarntraders in New Zealand. It arrived dead quick and is beautiful. Its also Vegan. Found info on if at vegan knitting blog and wnet on to investigate. Its recycled rayon made in nepal , fair trade etc and is made from recylcled saris and I wuld recomment to everyone. Going to post both my latest new jumper and show you what this yarn is like and what it knits up like in due course ( have to sort out how to use this didgital camera first). Infact lack of digital camera knowledge currently inhibitting soap website. How can it be that I can build a website and not understand how to use a digital camera. sad am I!

on holiday hey hey

I am away this weekend and possibly next as well anyway in cornwall. Should be good tho. Many of my ex housemates have moved to cornwall. Weirdly ( as I see it anyway) they all chose to buy houses in Truro - the ONLY CITY in cornwall. Personally wouldnt move there to move to another city. Seems mad to me especially since houses in truro are loads more than in the countryside. They are all from Cov tho. Probably couldnt handle being really countrified. I remember telling a friend where I was moving and she was horrified cos I wouldnt be able to walk to work! She spent weeks, daily! trying to stop me moving with loads of good reasons to stay in a city. I dont think it mattered if it was Cov or somewhere else so long as it was a city, but she was just horrified by the thoughts of living outside of cities away from shops, buses etc. I have already started to pack up the car since have to get 2 cockatiels, 2 dogs and me and M into my tiny fiesta. Also in order to prevent lads from destroying caravan have to cover chairs etc in covers so have to take lots. Last time they kept jumping from one chair to the other and if we hadnt had covers it would have got filthy. I want me deposit back. I know I should stop them jumping around but its very difficult cos they get really excited when they go to the seaside. Safest just to cover it all over and keep it clean that way. I intend to use it as a way to clear out loads of old but useful stuff that I keep hoarding. Rather than bring it all back and wash it I am going to chuck it all at the end of the holiday. Hopefully that will stop me from my usual. I put things out to recycle and then get second thoughts and bring it all back in again and really the house is too small for the amount of bedding and rugs so its time to get rid of some. It will save me having to wash it all when we get back as well! I will be brave and throw it all. Really I WILL!

again too lazy to blog! Am considering taking second ( third?) job. cannot live at all right now and we dont have a 101% mortgage so I really do not know how other people are managing. Good this is the company stuff is finally coming together altho teh florists shop have only managed to so far sell 3 soaps but then that is much better than none. M keeps getting orders from work and the xmas markets seem pretty sorted. I have even considered becoming a private tutor ( well have done teacher training) but have so far not managed to find anyone who knows me from last time teaching in any of the schools I have contacted. Without references it just aint going to happen. cant blame the agency for that either really. The third attempt at a website is slowing coming along but I am again learning a new program and its taking longer. Also this time I need a bit of HTML which is slowing me up. having said that the website course ( monday evenings ) is really pepping me up and I am finding I am very happy on a tuesday which is most unusual since its mid week and usually I just hate work so much I spend the whole day wishing the day away! Work is just a boring waste of time and I just cant wait to finish the day which is sad and a complete waste of being awake! have started blagging people for discounts and managed to get a 20% discount on essential oils for teh xmas markets by simply being cheeky and ringing the owner up. Excellent. I am now doing next years March Brighton Vegan Fair which should be good and may even get us established who knows. Trouble is everything we do costs so much its just killing us. Maybe we should just sell the house and go rented. Might sound mad but I am seriously thinking we could buy a shop in cornwall with a flat over it and move down there and get a better life. Well something has to work eventually surely. According to Charlie who I spoke to te oter day the hill I am currently half way up is the hard bit. After that its a great life. I just cant help wondering how much further till I get to the top of the hill?

i have a yello belly!

Made ace bath bombs with natural colouring dye. Unfortunately I ended up with a yellow ring round my belly and round the bath and it wont come off the bath. It will wear off me! Other than the yellow bit ace bath bombs! best not to use turmeric by the looks of things.

INGREDIENTS:
500g bicarbonate of soda OR Sodium hydrogen carbonate.
250g of citric acid.
Water as needed!

Race is on till xmas to make this work and where then?

xmas markets and tons achieved

Well life is too short. Done lots on monday to wednesday when not at work but spent the last 2 days wishing my life away again. Trying to sign up for a Christmas market on Towcester but dont actually know how to pronounce Towcester. Toe cest er? Or Towster?? Who knows. It could be a bit embarrassing tho doing a market in a town you cant pronounce the name of. Still got a few months yet to sus out the pronunciation. Spent all of Monday at interview for dream job which didnt get. Looked round Camden market and didnt buy anything which was very difficult but being broke and in trouble and trying to pay off debts would be silly to spend what havent got. Then tuesday made soap and cleaned the house but in the opposite order. Wednesday decided no way will afford accountant next year so best get off 4rse and do the company books. Not a great surprise to find lots gone out an very little come in tho have actually now sold £39.95 in soap!!!! Not a great amount I know but very encouraging for me. This entrepreneurship stuff is dead hard maan! Starting to wonder how I will ever get this company off the ground and actually trading. Then delivered some soap to local florist who is selling for me and came home and had encouraging email froma site who sell stuff like mine saying someone would call me but they havent and not sure whether to be cheeky and just go for it or just forget the whole thing!. Then wednesday afternoon spent hours and hours till 7pm wrapping and labelling soap and individually pricing to sell when do get a stall somewhere. Seriously knackering is the word for it. I need to buy a bar stool for the kitchen so I can sit whilst doing all this hard work. Anyway having wrapped everything. Made 4 new bars of soaps ( curing ready to cut next week) and sorted out curing cupboard have now decided need more to actually do a stall than just bars of soap so going to make lots of bath bombs since over last few months of playing for us seem to have perfected and now dare I say it as good as Lush ones. Well I think so and so do several others who have tried them out. No longer using basic recipe off internet either have altered. Just need to decide which are best recipes and then get safety assessment and hopefully will have about 100 for the xmas market on 7th December. And need to buy some nice looking baskets to present them in on this stall. Then last 2 days back in dreary office doing boring work which just gives me nothing back and doesnt even pay very well. There has to be a better way to live really there does. Got to enquire about local University markets too since a very long time ago in the 80s I sold lots of stuff like hand made jewellery and screen printed Tshirts at one and could do that again one day a week or fortnight. I think this will come together eventually really I do but so far I have laid out nearly £4000 and got £39.95 back! Still they say you need to speculate to accumulate................we will see.........Luckily have very nice partner who is encouraging me all the way. Well he may not be rich but he has lots going for him in other ways or has now I have gone and invested all my savings and lots of money each month from wages in this slightly mad idea. Maybe it will eventually pay of who knows. In meantime have caught up with reading other blogs and am now intendingt o get round to properly subscribing to them. Oh and has lots of problems with 1&1 internet ecommerce site not working so emailed em and complained and they said they couldnt find anything wrong but when logged back in they have fixed it all so hopefully by monday might even have online business going! Reminds me of that song..............things can only get better.............cant remember for life of me who sang that ( probably very uncool band) but who cares. Today is friday and cant wait for weekend this week. Not that anything has changed there!

new connections

Well I seem to be getting worse and worse at blogging. My life has become very hectic. I have actually made two different soap sales and am meeting someone tomorrow who is a florist who is interested in stocking my soaps. The trouble is it has become obvious I am rubbish at the storage and logistics side. Spent the whole of wednesday and thursday nights reorganising my storage so i can find everything and know what type of soap most need to be made next. I havent had time to make any more yet but suspect i will do so tomorrow after the meeting. At least now we have got round to wrapping some of it we can start to cut some of the large bars which really should have been cut last week or even the previous week and then left to dry out further. When they are cut they take much more space up since have to be lain out to dry and I keep running out of space. It was all getting a bit much but then I decided why am I stressing out. This is meant to be fun and fullfilling .......the fact I still work fulltime means no time for the soap or for me but its going to change. I do not yet know how I shall make it happen but I intend to do my best to and i believe it will all work out so it must. Got ripped off by the labels guy who has charged me £500 more than he quoted!!!!! Well a lesson to be learned here- always get a written quote! So I am learning but this is the painful way. I wont get caught out like that again and not sure I shall be going back to him either. Depends on how it all goes I suppose cos we now have a great design and logo and infact my company has been born! The new ecommerce website is started but yet to go live and I have enrolled for the webdesign course. Also have a job interview for a new job which I am hoping may come off since it sounds much better than my current boredom boredom unfulfilling boredom that is my working life. Made friends with the local scrap man who came and removed loads of metal - well I would rather give away than let skip company have it when we are paying them for the skip itself - let them have the s5it we cannot get carried away since thats the point and they wont make much out of us! Well other than the extortionate hire of the skip itself of which we will probably need another 2-3 skips!

Except for the fact I completely enjoy blogging, I should probably give it up due to never doing it very often! Still perfection is something to be aimed at and never achieved.
I also read part of a new blog Owls Wings which I find very inspiring and interesting so will be going back there. Need to catch up with Tatty too since have been very slack reading blogs recently.

Godaddy website tonight!

Another whole week has gone and loads has happened. I found out whilst looking for a freeware shopping cart for my new business website which I built using GoDaddy`s website tonight package that it is possible to write to the admin file of the account. While I am no expert its obvious to me this must threfore be insecure so anyway I contact Godaddy who help me to secure my Linux site but cannot do anything with my Bsoaps site ( on website tonight) so I have closed it down and now waiting for an authorisation code to move elsewhere. Spent days checking out ecommerce packages and came to the conclusion I will sign up with 1&1 since not only are the "green" apparently but most of the ethical companies seem to use them and also they have a great package for small companies which is only about £6 a month which is very good so going to try them out next...........assuming ofcourse I am able to get away from GoDaddy! I have checked out some forums and it seems that might not be as easy as it should be but we will see. Even if they give me the codes to authorise moving the domain it could still take me 48 hours to get up and running. Anyway tonight I intend to set up the bsoaps.co.uk site on 1&1 and then just move the godaddy site as soon as I can. Unfortunately the soap labels ( finally recieved last saturday) have bsoaps.com on them which is a bit of a cock-up to say the least. If I can get both sites pointing at the 1&1 account tho it wont matter and will be much better really since it will mean anyone searching for me should find me. Boiler man is coming saturday and we still have a skip outside the house waiting to be filled and it will be in his way! Hoepfully he will still be able to put it in without moaning too much about lack of access. I will finally get my labelling gun saturday to add batch codes and BBEs to my soaps so I will actually be able to start trading one week later than originally intended but its not such a bad result in the end. I am quite excited about the whole affair tho need to quit my day job to concentrate on my own company and cannot afford to yet! Also have had several quotes for getting a professional website built - cheapest is £1000 + VAT so enrolling tomorrow/saturday depending how it goes for a course at local tech to learn to build them myself. Means by about this time next year I should be able to do my own website design rather than rely on packages and templates. Whole thing has become very exciting. Its so weird tho that my idea to make hand made natural soap has escalated to the extent I now have a company and am about to learn to build websites. Ofcourse if ok at it I will also be able to do other peoples and make a living from website design. Weird year this has been I have to say. And still 3-4 months left..........whatever will happen next? My mate (currently living in Salisbury ) is moving back to the midlands too so that is great cos we will get to see each other much more often - I feel the pub calling.............

bank holiday

Well bank holiday came and went far too quickly. We managed to achieve loads and have a skip that is half full of rubble and glass from our numerous sheds and greenhouses that we do not want. The garden is being retrieved. I seem to have managed to get covered in cuts and bruises tho which is not good. How I got half of them I really do not know. I have also put down an impromptu path made of bark chipping. Shame really cos it isnt done right so will eventually need to be redone. It was really an emergency since it was too muddy and slippy to be carrying glass panels from one end of the garden to the skip. Bearing in mind the garden is 83m long its a long walk with each pane of glass! Anyway was too dangerous so went and bought 6 bags of bark chipping and have to say it looks ace. We are going to add some edges and keep the path like this since it looks really good with the sort of rustic garden we have. We are also intending to rebuild one of the sheds on the boundary line since that way we can define our boundary and hopefully stop next door neighbour from stealing any more of our garden or chucking any more of our roses. The roses are on our land but are on her side of the fence since we put it up infront of the leylandii ( which are also ours) when we moved in since was winter, very rainy and we needed to secure the garden for the dogs. Anyway they are My roses and I intend to keep as many as I can. We have removed nearly all the leylandii now and have only about 10 left to cut down. WE are also considering cutting the apple tree down since if left where it is it will eventually destroy the fish pond with its roots. Oh and we have loads of gold coloured goldfish now since lots of teh babies are changing. The pond is now looking really good. The whole garden could be brilliant if we ever get to sort it out. Everything takes so much longer. I wish I could just wave a magic wand or wriggle my nose like Genie and just make it all happen. M found it very funny when next door neighbour is trimming the leylandii one minute then he comes along and cuts same tree down. yes not nice to laugh but shes nasty and a garden theif and also very nosey. Apparently shes one of these strange people who like leylandii and hate deciduous trees. Well they are our trees and they are being replaced with nice indigenous hedging come november time. Also we get all this free wood to burn on the woodburner. Alright has to be weathered or whatever its called first but in the end its all free wood! We are building a store for the wood too which we really need since have a pile that is about 10m long and 3m wide so far and more to come home.

friday at last

Well its Friday. Weekend is nearly here. Loads has happened in the last week. I am very happy. They are going to give me Vegan Society certification for my soaps which will open doors for me I think. That also means when I have the meeting next week to finalise my lablels I will be able to include the sunflower logo. Not really sure it will sell my products better but its worth a try and at least I may get listed on the ethical sites now! hey I am happy and its nearly the weekend since the weather is looking good and we are intending to cut down about 15 trees and reclaim our garden. We have a problem with nosey old bag next door in that we put our fence up on the outside of our trees ( to keep dogs in etc) and she is now gradually nicking our garden so we have to act now and get it back before she plants more of her stuff in it. The original fence is actually still there so we are going to cut the trees to the ground and put our fence up immediately next to hers! Any plants she has put in will either be bent over or she had better move them. In some parts we are currently looking to lose 2ft of garden so we really need to get round to this. There is one bit she nicked the day we moved in and while I am willing to let her get away with that rather than take her to the civil courts ( makes it much harder to sell your house tho she has nicked about 18 inches of our garden and its about 10 ft in length in the dog leg bit) she has planted (non-indigenous) hedging tho so not all bad. But she aint getting any more! She has also which has really infuriated me removed loads of hedging roses which were really ours but are currently behind our hedge. They were still on our land tho. Anyway going to move the fence and plant blackthorn ( sloes in future) hawthorn, hazel, dog roses etc and they are good for wildlife, make a great hedge, we can coppice to keep in check and burn the wood(bonus) and she absolutely hates all those plants so I will get real satisfaction planting them!!!!!!

Trouble is I bet I will be knackered come monday with all the gardening we have to get done. Its one step closer though. I havent looked at weather forcast but its hot today and a few showers wont stop us anyway. WE will just have lots of tea breaks! hopefully we will not have to kill any deciduous trees. There is one that may need to be pruned but I think we can get away with not cutting it down completely. I hate leylandii and they are not only allowing next door to nick our garden they block out most of the sunlight. They will probably stay in the middle garden cos its nice and secluded and shady and where we sit and have BBQs and sometimes if on holiday we have breakfast there, but I think they will all go at the bottom end.

WE are going to get rid of both sheds and put some new ones up so they will mean we can access the sides of the larger shed to take it down. The neighbour who is nicking our garden likes them( leylandii that is) and wants us to keep them but the rest of the street ( who have lived there all their lives!) all hate em and agree with us so it will only annoy the nosey theif woman. She is too...........nosey. We cant even walk up the garden without her coming up to see what we are doing. She has also broken a whole side of the greenhouse where it was one of the few bits that was perfect. Possibly by accident but more than likely to see what we are growing in it ( tomatoes but I have a suspician she thought it was something more subversive! silly woman!).

The glass was all moved inside the green house and stacked against the bit of glass next to the hole - theres no way it was just the wind or something natural! havent accused her cos whats the point. WE are intending to buy a new polycarbonate one next year anyway. It did irritate me tho. We are intending infact to put some natural willow type screens against the fence once we have moved it. I bought 3 large ones last year in winter reduced in Wilkos but decided not to use yet cos the fence was definitely not in final position and we never trusted this neighbour. Did not actually expect her to do what she has done tho. On August 30th assuming all goes to plan and I have a strange feeling it will I will make my/my soaps debut then at this Creative Arts Fayre in Spon End. I will also begin my tax hammering but that is inevitable until i can give up my day job I think. I cannot afford to give up my day job yet so will just have to put up with paying extra tax until I start to have a real turnover with respect to the soap. I have hardly made any this week ( only 3 bars) since ran out of just about everything but its all been re-ordered and is on its way. Getting 80L of olive oil this time next friday since I am on holiday ( to work for myself!!!) over bank holiday but I am so happy. It seems if you follow your dreams they really can come true. Still waiting to find out more about this hotel that is interested in my soap but its all happening for me at last. Only 2 hours left at work.............there I am wishing my life away again! Gotta get out of this rat race and start to really live again. I suspect its bad for the face this self employment but what the hell...........we all have to get old and wrinkled and I rather be happy and over worked than bored and doing what someone else wants me to do. I have to go to a company dinner after work next week. Dont really want to go but really need to make the effort after I upset everyone when I refused to go horse racing. This time its a chinese which I dont particularly enjoy but has to be done. At least it might mean my job still exists for a while longer or at least till I tell em where to stick it and go self employed.

a great day at work

I had a brilliant day today. Was at work but did very little. Spent the day sorting stuff out. Got this email when I arrived from a business development agency I am registered with about a creative arts fair on 30th August. No idea if I will be ready to Trade but its only £5 a stall so decided to go for it. Rang the organisor who is a woman and explained the situation and she was very encouraging and helpful and even told me who to contact to try and get a grant. How good is that. Also apparently a local hotel is after some soap that is different and may be interested in mine and she knows of a potter who sells all sorts of other peoples crafts and may be interested in my soap. How wild is this. Then after got back to desk after long phone call to sort all this out had another email from Vegan Society about certification so rang both my suppliers. Have to get em to fill a form in for me to state no animals or animal tests in my products. No problem with one who supplies most of my stuff but the olive oil supplier is being a bit awkward. Hopefully they will make the statement else I will have to find a new supplier which is a shame cos it makes lovely quality soap. I do not believe the olive oil has any animal content either its just the hassle of having to fill in a form they do not want to bother with. Ah well if I have to change supplier so be it. I will get certification in the end one way or another. Finished the allergens declaration for the last 3 soaps too so emailed them to printer and its all looking like its coming together amazingly. Also due to 2 requests I made coconut soap last night. It smells and looks lovely but it is not natural since you cannot get coconut essential oil. I will see what its like and get some feedback but not sure if I will want to sell this one really. Just made it cos 2 different mates have asked me to.

time to stop dreaming and get real

The more I consider it the better is seems the right thing to do. I could rent a shop in Devon or Cornwall .............just for a season, make and sell soap, and keep the house on at home. So long as I make enough to pay the rent and mortgage and to eat it would be the perfect summer. Alright its going to be hard work but I really think it may be the answer to the things I truly want in life. Move to the seaside and make soap. Then if it worked well could sell the current house and actually move. The we wouldnt be risking much since we would only buy a company at the seaside if it worked out well. I am off to Cornwall in October for Ms birthday so intending to go and talk to some estate agents and see what a shop would cost me to rent. then will see if its a really viable idea or not. Till I know more it will just remain a dream. Sending off to get vegan society certification tonight and once i have that I will get the labels printed. My graphic designer is on holiday this week so cant move forward anyway till he gets back so I need to get this all sorted for next week. its meant to take about 4 days to get a yeay or ney on the Vegan Certs so should know by Tuesday next week if they are going to give it me for my products. I have to try and focus now on actually getting round to selling cause all I am currently doing is supplying my mates with free soap and dreaming!!

lazy at blogging

Well I feel that I have been very lazy. Should have got round to blogging. Its been nearly 3 weeks!!!!! Lifes been a bit hectic. Been making loads of soap. I have been doing a full day at work then going home and working making soap for 3-4 hours a night so that I will have lots of stock to sell once I can start trading. Have also had to sort out commercial insurance which is not too expensive ( £300 ish) so better that I expected. On top of all this spending ages talking to graphic designers and still making new soaps for next years collection so its all very hard right now. I havent had any time to blog or even to email most of the people I normally keep in touch with! I really really need to spend less time doing my mindless job. Its so frustrating now that I am stuck doing something that seems completely pointless and I hate. I think the real problem is I do not feel at all Stretched at work and you do need some sort of stimulation. My old job working for a local council was at least stimulating and made me feel I was achieving something even tho I hated most of what I was expected to do. I worked in enforcement of environmental crime then and most of what I enforced was just petty and I simply didnt believe in my work at all. Still it may have paid less but was much better than my current work from the point of veiw I was less bored. I suppose at some point you always get bored at work but where I am now its just constant boredom with little interest at all. I suppose it pays the bills. Other than that its simply not worth the effort of getting out of bed! And I spend the majority of my life feeling this way. Its such a waste of a lifetime. I am sure the majority of workers feel this way. There just has to be something better. Now tho I have to face the possibility my own company will just not take off. Its all quite scary really but if I do not go for it what else will come my way to improve my life. I envy these people who have the courage to just up sticks and run off to live at the seaside not even knowing how they are going to eat when they get there. If I didnt own a house it would all be much easier to do but I do own a house and its currently not in a fit state to sell even if they were selling at the moment which they are not due to financial climate in this country. I can plan ahead and think of the future and maybe in 2 years move to cornwall or devon but right now it all seems really frustrating and pointless. It all a bit sad really cos you go to work and spend the day wishing it will end so you can go home .........wishing your life away. Sad to say but sometimes I truly wish I never went to Uni and had stayed unemployed and unemployable without qualifications and on a low income cos at least then I was free!

Bored

I am so bored at work. It all seems so pointless. Thought I couldnt get on work email today ( no internet) but after having closed PC down several times its working. No idea what I shall do if it goes down. Since end of June had to access my emails from external site cos program went wrong on PC. They fixed it last thursday but since then have had no database access. Cannot do my job without it. Very very bored. Will need to cover reception tomorrow anyway cos 2 pepes are off and to be honest cant wait! At least I will have something to do. Boss still doing my head in over horse racing. Rest of staff as bad too. Mind you I couldnt resist telling my boss my union have asked me to strike. His face was a picture when he realised I am in a union. Ha! Totally pointless tho since no unions where I work. I just stayed in it since I feel safer. They cant stop me after all and if they are going to get rid of me I doubt it will make any difference either way. Just means they know they have to have a good reason. I dont actually want to wind em up and I suppose if they had got rid of me unfairly I would have had an ace to take action with legal support. I still have that tho and really i would prefer they just dont get rid of me cos sadly I need the money. I started a new blog the other day to stick my poetry on. Normally I just write on the walls but once the house is done up I have to use a note book. Well I think M would object to graffitti on teh walls once its all nice inside. Right now it doesnt matter. Have decided whats the point of writing into a note book. I will never get round to real publishing but can do so anyway by blogging it and at least then the odd random person will actually find it and read it. Rarely write anyway so there will not be loads. Usually only when something happens like the race course/work corporate do incident. Frustrated with having to work in a boring under paid job when could be sorting out my own company. I have so little time it seems to do anything for me. There has to be a better way to live than this me thinks. Had a meeting with the guy who will probably be printing soap labels on saturday morning. Normally would avoid doing anything work related at the weekend but its so different when its for your own company. Didnt mind at all. Was also quite an eye opener when M said he would like to run a shop. Maybe that will be the away forward for us. In theory as well we would then both be self employed. I am abit worried about just how much soap people will buy tho. I mean at £1:50 to £3:50 ish a bar (thats another thing - must actually get round to working out realistic prices!) thats alot of soap I need to make to be giving up full time work!

help with our boiler disaster

This really nice guy came to visit from Advance Heating. Decided to plug the name since have never had a salesman before who didnt try to sell us anything but actually helped us to move forward. And we havent spent anything yet! All he did was advise us. He says first we need to insulate all outside walls with Trisol 13 and need 2 layers. Lower our ceilings in the bedrooms slightly so we no longer have "caravan" curves since these cause more heat loss. Also insulate under floorboards in lounge. Then invest in stainless steel hot water tank - can add solar panels at later date if we ever afford to. He reckons if we do this soon we will cut our heat loss by around 50% and probably find it much easier to heat the house using current woodburner. That sorts us out for hot water and warmer home for very little and we only need help installing hot water tank. He said we can do most of what is needed ourselves. He is also making us calculate the BTU for every room. He said he could do it for us but charges £240 and we should use that as our incentive to get round to doing it. There are programs you can use online. I have done it for the upstairs so far and just need to do the downstairs now. He reckons we need to replace all radiators but can do this ourselves. I agree they are very old and probably inefficient. Also all are the same so not right sizes for rooms. Nice guy tho. Most people would have tried to blag us for them to do it for us. He gave us lots of leaflets on wood burning stoves and stuff with costs even tho he knows we wont have the cash for this till next january at earliest so he is not really getting anything out of this. He spent 2 hours with us and I feel dead guilty since forgot to offer him a cup of tea even. Very rude of me and he was a really nice guy. Well thats who we will be going with when we do save the money for a new boiler!

labels for soaps

Finally found a company who will probably be the ones I am going to get to do my labels. The guy who owns it seems very nice. Minimum order is only £50. Much better than the 1000 labels minimum order with the larger companies I have been talking to. They all cost loads. This sounds more affordable, the company is up the road so I will be able to actually pick up my labels or get them to deliver reasonably cheaply, and they are also a small company so more like me. They seems nicer to deal with and really shouldnt I be supporting local companies rather than giving my business to large corporate entities? There are too many large companies and not enough smaller entreprenours out there. Napoleon called us a nation of shop keepers. In recent years the likes of Tesco, Adsa etc have put most of the local corner shops out of business. Likewise the local soap makers ( Unilever, P&G, Boots) and the local printers are probably exactly the same. I think it is time to actively aim to buy locally. Then we support each other, our communities and we all work together to improve our different lives. Much better idea.

Grandma

I went to visit my Grandma. She has refused to see me for months since she says she doesnt want me to see her like this. Mad tho cos if I dont go she is going to die and I will not have seen her since Easter. Anyway just turned up on her doorstep. She is in a very bad way. Has mercury bandages on her legs which are very swollen and also has what could be the start of plurisy. I am sad to think it may really be the end. I know the stuff people say..................shes lived to a good age etc ............she is 93. But it wont help at all. She is still my grandma. I sent my brother (in france) an email and a text .............its Bastile Day today tho so he will probably be on holiday and wont read them. I may have been a bit too honest and brutal too so am wishing had been more thoughtful in how I worded it. Still he has also not been allowed to visit Grandma so he needs to know what is happening. One thing tho she is still not at all senile so that bodes quite well for me and my brothers really. If she didnt have carers tho she would have to go into a home or starve to death. Its that simple. She cant go out without someone to take her and considering she used to go all the way from Coventry to Walsall ( at least 25-30 miles) on her bus pass just because the lamb chops were better value there she has been a very active person till quite recently. She used to be out someowhere every day infact. Then again that is probably why she has lasted so long. I am finding this all very sad. Anyway most of my life is really quite unimportant and most of what I get up to is pretty mundane but Grandma is very important to me so I am blogging about her here for the world to know.

website

Finally got one of the website programs to work and have a "live" website at last. Still needs to have lots done to it yet but its on the way now. Having lots of problems with E-business insurance. Business advisor has said DO NOT SELL SOAP WITHOUT PRODUCT LIABILITY INSUANCE! Actually not easy to get for anything you sell over the internet. Asked advice from one of the soap suppliers and they said try the BERR website/ service so will have to do that this week. Problem with weekends is all government departments are closed and when trying to get business up and running as well as full time working its really hard to do stuff in the week.I suppose (hopefully anyway) I will look back on this as just a minor problem at some point in the future. Right now its a real hurdle. The nature of the company I work for is that because they give us lunch ( obviously a good bonus) but you have to have a sociable lunch and cannot go off and do your own thing. I actually have decided I would prefer a "normal" company where you bring your own sarnies etc and can get away from the people you work with. If you dont get on with everyone where I work you are in a slight mess! It also means I do not have 30-60 minutes a day at lunchtime where I can do stuff for my own company. They seem to have forgiven me for not wanting to go horse racing anyway and thats a relief. I cant wait to get up and running and hopefully to be able to work from home. It would be great to spend my life at home with my dogs. And to see them more. Dogs do not live long. Mine are already 4 years old and I only really get to spend 2 days a week with them and part of that usually inviolves them being alone whilst I go food shopping. Also I could give up my car since we would only need one and that is a lot less money going out on fuel, tax, insurance etc. Have to start trading to get the soap company to grow and the home based business to get off the ground. If we could make enough we might even manage to afford for us both to get homebased businesses. M`s homebrew is improving loads and he is now investigating buying small scale industrial equipment to make his own wort. Wort is the gooey stuff you buy in a beer kit and has already been processed. If he did it himself he could possibly start selling to shops or pubs and go into business doing it. Well its probably as likely to work as making soap so why not! Weirder things have happened anyway.

the holiday end

the end of our holiday is in sight. Tomorrow back to work. Makes me more sure than ever that there must be an alternative. A better way thru life. We have done so much but not gone away. Why go on holiday to spain, greece etc when you live somewhere beautiful. I dont think we missed out here. Next year could be a different thing. Right now staying in Kilsby for a whole week is a wonderful adventure. WE have met loads of new people, tried out a new pub, had BBQs and fixed lots of stuff around the house. We even have a lovely new front door that very "GOTH"!. Brilliant. Havent made any soap but have started the certification process so will soon be able to trade. Havent done the hard bit tho and sorted out the website tho am intending to try out several 30 day free trials with free domains so will not move my domains just yet!.Will have to learn with JoBloggs.com etc. and then remake it later in my own. I am still trying to learn HTML. Found a great site with directions of how to build a website which I will post here for everyone to read. It sounds easy but is not as easy as it seems probably due to me being totally not a computor geek. In one year I intend to become a computor geek cos evefryone can do it and you are what ever you want to be. Also time for a moto on the blog. Just have to work out how to add it!


"The ultimate aim is to go thru life causing the least suffering possible." Or maybe it should be "make it happen" as several of my friends would say.....................

birthday

Its been a whole week since last blogging and I feel really lazy having realised that. I have started to try to learn HTML. I want to build a website and will probably have to use a website ecommerce package which will cost. Anyway intending to learn properly too since it will eventually save me money. Also the website builder I am trying to use is really so difficult to use I may aswell just learn how to do it myself. Anyway went totally off on a tangent here. I have been too busy to blog. Ms latest hobby - home brew beer might also have had quite alot to do with it. Being on holiday with a large stock of varying maturities of home brew beer and it also being my birthday means great excuse for alcoholism to strike. Tidied the garden yesterday and had long chat with neighbour who is considering storage heaters. I have had them before and they worked and they are cheaper than biomass. Hopefully we will still get a environmentally ok option for heating. Also electric expensive and getting more so all the time. M talked to T who installed wood burner in lounge for us. It was meant as just decorative fire originally. Apparently can be easily upgraded to give central heating but we will have to install different type of radiators and replace all pipes. No option is cheap. But we could do with a boiler to heat radiators for winter and winter not realy very far away!

Loads is suddenly happening

Life at work is still quite frosty to say the least. I am now trying to build a website. Well really 2 websites. One - the urgent one is being built with a web builder package that will inevitably cost me a fortune but will be much quicker to do. The other one I am using to learn how to use HTML and several other things. i think one was CSS but I am not sure. Right now its all very frustrating and difficult. I was so excited yesterday to actually get some text onto a site. Today tho decided it will take forever for me to do it that way and I have a free trial for a month to use this website building software so decided to have a go - even though that meant wiping my little bit of text I finally managed to publish off. Amazing the difference. I am sticking with the web builder for the important site. At least for now. I think if I carry on with HTML it will be so basic no one will want to visit it. Well I will carry on learning cos its really quite interesting. I had a short go at programming years ago with a language called Modula 2. At that time I was more bothered about passing my Uni course so gave up and concentrated on core modules. Now tho its possible I may at some point have some time to play. Exactly when that will be I really do not know. I seem to be so busy with this business stuff. Still havent finished the business plan either. Tho really it seems to me its just an action plan and you really need it to find a loan or finance. Since I do not expect to need huge amounts of money or to grow that big that quickly i will not need to visit the bank just yet.

House is still in falling down state but who knows maybe a miracle will happen. Had some quotes for air source heat pumps and for biomass boilers. At best we have about half of what we need and that leaves us with no cashsavings and between 3 and 6 k in debt! Not do-able at all. The kitchen is almost finished now. We even have plinths so best to look on the bright side if there is one. At least its summer. For now anyway.

I have decided now I live in the middle of no where it really doesnt matter to much what I wear so going to try very hard not to buy any new clothes. Well I have loads and its money I could do with saving right now.

Read the most amazing thing today. Some internet site that I should have book marked and didnt.

It asked if its really worth the cost to go to work.

Thats the cost of fuel, time and energy, being away from familly and friends. I have to say I really do not think it is worth the cost. I just havent yet found a way to make enough money not to go. Not that I spend much really. Its just you have to have some money just to live.

animal rights vs career!

Today I was asked to attend on corporate dinner and go horse racin! Boss not happy with me. Had to telll em all I dont want to go for moral reasons. To be real needed to go to animal aid and look up death of racers figures. No one asked me tho! I am now an outsider! Will they sack me! Its quite scary cos cannot afford to lose my job. Even more so cos boiler (oil fired) was condemned last saturday

I think they will find a reason to get rid of or not need me. I do not fit in!I know most likely no-one is even reading this but either way its scary!

I want my own business. I want going to take a risk on it. May have to. Why do I need to be victimised when there are millions like me all over the planet. I am not alone.

WE are strong. We are vegetarian. We do not eat animals!

Very worrying!But it waS A CHOICE am i A HYpochrite or am I real.? M Told me to fake it, to go along and get involved. I am real tho. Me! true even tho many pepes do not agree with my beliefs.

Oh and M tells me |I am anully retentive!!!!!!! to ask for a questionaire to be complete for feedback from soap! DEvry one who has kindly done that all you need to do now is tell me!

dead boiler

Finally we got the boiler engineer out bto service our boiler which is oil fired. Infact we have been trying to get the thing serviced since October but they can never fit us in. Anyway he said it would take about an hour. In the end it took 3 hours. Apparently we have a water leak. M did all the dealings with the boiler man and I went shopping which was certainly a bonus tho Tesco and Asda on a saturday are horrible, Anyway we need a new boiler. He says its about £1100 plus fitting. I have found some on the internet which are £800 plus VAT also not including fitting. Not good for the savings this. It didnt surprise me to find this out because everything else in the house has needed replacing or repairing ( most still ongoing) but at least its summer so we can probably get thru for a few weeks with just checking and adjusting the water pressure on the one we have. We had a very productive day today. Cut down half of the leylandii that blcok the light and the garden is looking huge. Cant cut down the rest because firstly we are both completely knacked and second its going to take us at least 3 trips to the local tip to get rid of the branches. M tried shredding them with this shredder my dad gave us but its just useless and doesnt seem to reduce the waste so I cant see why any one bothers with them. Just glad we didnt waste any money buying it! I also strimmed three quarters of the garden but then the strimmer cable ran out so part of the garden will have to remain a jungle till next week now. Havent done anything at all with soap or the business this weekend.

usless at blogin!

Well do not seem to be very good at this blogging/ diary stuff really. Not very good at workin either. Making soap/ the business is always on my mind and finding it very difficult to actually do my job properly! Normally would start looking for a new job but this time think I need to concentrate on my business. The trouble is will my employer sack me for not getting round go being ace at my job. Normally either I would become ace or leave. Have never (yet) been sacked! Bit worried cos cant concentrate. This time round I can do with keeping the job to pay bills etc and also doing my own thing. Am a bit worried tho cos now M wants a logistics business instead. Him to operate tho. Could be good for me getting cheaper rates at a future date I suppose! My employer is just annoying me right now. Cant seem to do anything right. Apparently zero% payrise this year too which has annoyed me especially since the country has currently got a serious inflation problem.

making soap

Well had my 2 days off. Got the olive oil fine, started making soap, made 5 kilos or 5 different soaps and realised I had forgotten something vital! Preservative! Wonderful planning eh! Its not like you can just pop to the local tesco and buy grapefruit seed oil either so that was that. In about an hour I am back at work. Boo Hoo! Still its friday I suppose. gotta look on the bright side havent you!

Days off work, hooray!

I am off work today so easy to find the time to blog. Had a good holiday. We ripped kitchen appart, wallpapered ceiling, painted it and nearly got kitchen back together again. Also had to take up floorboards upstairs to put new light fittings into kitchen so whole house in chaos. Got to try and sort out the house in the next couple of days too. Well make the most of 2 days holiday etc. Bedrooms are terrible state since we had to take up floorboards in both back bedrooms to do lighting so house is all chaos again! There is piles of stuff everywhere and dogs lying all over it making clean clothes and sheets etc stinky!

Intending to have mega soap making over next couple of days and then with luck will finally launch business. need to start to find outlets now. Considering some companies I know locally since a good customer so maybe they will try us out. Other than that have to rely on vegan society etc. Gotta sort out lab testing and also officially register the company cos so far have not yet done that. Its all such fun!

A friend went to visit a mine which is now open to the public so not actualy a mine anymore. Sounds horrible that mine! I didnt know they still use canaries. I did know pit ponies were treated badly. The worst conditions now are the brick kiln ponies in India ( and similar areas). The problem is often the pony has badly fitting saddle and harness which makes wounds and they get infected. Thats besides the heavy loads they have to carry. They rely on charities like the Brook Hospital who care for them and provide better harnesses etc. When I first heard about it it actually made me cry - anyway these ponies are often owned by kids of only about 14 who have to make enough money to care for several generations of familly. You can see why the animals come second once you realise the conditions the people have to suffer. Brook helps both owners ( by re-educating them) and the horses and ponies by treating wounds and giving better harness etc. Its still a terrible life they have to lead. Sounds an interesting place to visit tho. My Grandfather went down the mines in Wales. He was not very old when he worked there. On his first day there was a bad fall and his best friend died next to him. His older brother got him a job as a page boy in Brighton ( so he must have been quite young I think). Anyway years later he died from lung cancer which they reckon was directly related to the pit he spent only 2 days working in! That was about 1920s/30s I think.

Will be making much more soap this week. Didnt make any over weekend since chaos everywhere. Intending to remake cinnamon with more fragrance also several others which have ideas for. Have 40L of olive oil which is main ingredient so intending to go for it and then assuming all goes well to get certified and start up selling. I feel its time now. Also I can now get trade prices for all sorts of fair trade stuff so am considering a second company. Its terrible you know cos I keep going off at tangents. Having spent years trying to come up with an idea to go self employed I am finding them round every corner. Have decided to forget coconut oil for now since can buy cheaper from chester! maybe in the future tho when I need more or larger quantities. Also now have a sustainable source of Palm oil from columbia so no problems with guilt over orangutan habitats! had to do that since greenpeace keep emailing me about the indonesian rain forest being murdered for soap! Mine is sustainable tho!