Welcome to the world of tomorrow!

Yesterday we decided on a day trip to Balloch/Loch Lomond and here are the piccies. Unfortunately most of the journey was on a bus as they were doing works on the train line.

We met a lovely family who we ended up spening most of the day with getting very very drunk sitting outside in the sun. Overall a very good day, and I can't wait til the weather really picks up and we can do stuff like this more often.

Well we woke up on Saturday and thought we'd give Amelie a treat by taking her cone off for a while, while we looked after her (she was neutered on Monday and has to wear a cone to stop her licking her wound).

Turns out, we're not so good at looking after her :( She bolted under the bed and by the time we got her out, she had ripped/licked out ALL her stiches!

So we took her to the vet on Sat morning and luckily she said that she didn't need stitched again (which would have meant putting her under anaesthetic again and would have cost us about another £100) but she simply used some sugerglu on the wound and gave us some anit-biotics to give her.

So in the end it only cost us £14, which rocks. Luckily we have enough of her painkiller left to give so we know she's not in any pain, and her wound is looking very good.

The one (very loose) stitch she has left is due out on Thursday, so hopefully all will be clear then.

She has however got very clingy since the op, and she has slept with us in the bed every night since she tore her stitches out, usually in the crook of my arm, which is very cute.

I just hope she's okay, come Thursday.

Photos from our trip to Gorgie Farm yesterday. Owen also held a rat and stroked a chicken but I didn't manage to get photos of them. He was very taken with the guinea pigs.

I want a lamb, they were soooo cute!

I have uploaded pics from yesterdays rugby. It was a fabulous day, but the second half of the game was a bit dull. Well done to the Irish though.

photos are here

Today we bought a new dyson! :) Our old one, which was a wedding present from mun and dad and was awesome has just completely lost it's suction and has a very bad smell coming from it. We've cleaned it from head to toe but I think it's just old and decrepit. Of course, it has a 5 year guarantee and ot's almost exactly 5 and a half years old!

Our new one is basically the more recent model of our old one. The 'animal' which is especially good at sucking up cat hair. I used it in the lounge and just going over it quickly once, without going into the corners or anything, and it was full! I'd forgotten how amazing Dyson's are!

Also, we got it for a fantastic pice. We went to currys and it was there for £300, we almost bought it, but we thought we'd go to comet and compare prices. We got there and it was only £200!! So a complete bargain, we got it on the credit card, and we'll have it paid off in March payday.

And SCOTLAND WON THE RUGBY!!!! It was an awesome game apart from the first 10 minutes which were quite dull, but nothing compared to the Ireland-England game which was an incredibly boring game, especially the first half. And the English team are a bunch of thugs and were lucky to get away with only 2 yellow cards! It was just a shame that we didn't get another 2 tries, which we should have, and our try that was disallowed, on video replay, I'm pretty sure was a try.

C'mon Danielli!!!

I really love the idea of doing 'come dine with me' but have absolutely no interest in being on tv. I wonder if there is some way of starting a Glasgow 'come dine with me' without the tv cameras?.....

We just booked our holiday!

We will be visiting mum and dad with Chris and Cheryl from Aug 26 - Sep 5.

:D

Here is the inside of Seonaid's birthday cake and here are 3 photos of the mini meringues that I made tonight (and some soup as well, apologies for the state of the cooker)!

I bought a funky cake storage box today! It is this one from Lakeland.

I am currently making Seonaid's birthday cake and will use my funky new box to transport it to Edinburgh in about 30 mins.

If I remember I will get photos of the cake, it is the same one I've done a few times before, chocolate and raspberry, but it is sooooo good!

I was looking at a cake decorating evening class, but it was over £300!! I'll just get a book....

Well, I am feling pretty smug. I bought an electric hand whisk yesterday and my first ever meringues are now cooling in the oven :) They look fantastic, and I have some dark chocolate to melt over them and strawberries! I just hope they taste as good as they look.

I also found a simple recipe for creme brulee that I want to try at some point. I really wish I had a decent kitchen :( I hardly have any space to store baking stuff, and there's so much stuff that I'd love to get! I definitely can't get a proper food processor, but between the electric hand whisk and the fact that I am more than used to hand mixing stuff, I think I'll manage.

Going to make Seonaid my speciality raspberry chocolate cake on Saturday, and maybe some meringues if they turn out well...I just want to bake all day every day!

Waiting to hear back about a job I've applied for as an animal care assistant at the vet school which would be fantastic, but the closing date was only on Friday so I'm not expecting to hear anything yet.

Cats are all good, mini-cat is getting big, and they are all getting along very well now.

Mmmm...meringue

I am currently watching the CSIs remove the 'cannabis factory' from across the road :)
The house is literally across the road and about 2 down from us, exciting!

We were wondering what was going on last night as the fire engines and police were there for about 3 hours (with no obvious signs of a fire), then police stayed outside all night, and when I got off the train just now, I can see the CSIs bringing lots and lots of bags outside to a van.

And this morning we had to wait for an ambulance to be called before the train could depart becasue someone had collapsed/had a fit. Not so exciting as it involves someones health, but still, a good day for nee-naws!

Sci has told me that Dropbox should be easier for me to upload and organise photos online for people to see, so I am trying it out.

You should be able to see my photos here.

It does look easier to store photos as you can create unlimited 'sets' or albums, whereas yo9u can't on flickr (not on a free account anyway). The only downside I have found so far is people can't comment on your photos, but I can live without that.

I have uploaded some more photos of Amelie, who is much bigger now! Plus there's what few photos I took while Sean, Chrissy and the girls were visiting. And I think 1 that I took at Christmas on my phone, David had gone to sleep, and Amy and Maisie both climbed onto him and curled up to sleep as well, very cute!

Here be photos

Work was very quiet today, only about 10 people were in the office, and it'll be the same tomorrow, but we'l get away early tomorrow. We have no plans for New Year, but I'm not all that fussed. We don't normally do anything for New Year, we'll probably just stay in and watch more West Wing :)

The trains are an absolute nightmare at the moment. They are having some problem with the signals (I think they have new ones, but are having teething problems) so me and Nicky were sitting on our train for 40 mins this morning! (It's normally a ten min journey) But once I got to work I realised we had got off lightly as my boss, who is normally on the train for 6-7 mins, was stuck on it for 2 hours 15 mins!!! The Scotrail site says that the signals are not working at all, so they are having to manually direct all the trains in and out of Central. By the time I was leaving to go home, all the trains on the Paisley line (that I get home) had been cancelled until further notice, so hopefully they'll fix it overnight. I can get a bus to work, but don't know what they'll be like on New Years Eve! Plus its further to walk, and just a general pain in the bum, Glasgow buses are horrible.

Off to watch some more West Wing just now.

Here is one of my gingerbread men I made a few days ago. I have a photo of them all together in the tub, but can't get it off my phone...

I used butter icing to stick on their choc chip 'buttons' and also for their eyeballs. Their pupils and smiles are from some coloured icing pens that I bought ages ago and had forgotten I had. I love their googly eyes!

Our first Christmas tree!

Our freezer has died :(

We came home from work on Thurs to find a lot of soggy fruit, defrosted meat and a very wet kitchen floor. Luckily we didn't actually have too much in it. The annoying bit is that both our fridge and freezer are squished into a small space under the worktop, and the freezer is exactly 50cm wide. I have so far only been able to find 2 freezers this wide, most seem to be either 54cm or 60cm. Thee was one that was 48cm but it was ridiculously tiny, I don't understand how 2cm can make such a difference, but ti really does! And the only 50cm one was out of stock :( So I am going to have a look online methinks.

So until I find one, we are freezerless, although I guess we could always just put things outside....

I never realised how often we use ice-cubes!

Mini-cat is doing well. She is eating properly now, the only problem is she keeps trying to eat us. We think she may be either possessed or pschotic :) She has a patented 'spider-jump' which she uses to reach the most juicy delicate parts of your face. And she will NOT give up trying to steal food from your plate! Sounds cute, but gets annoying really quickly. DOg and Electron are accepting her pretty well. Dog still won't touch her but Electron is quick happy batting her when she annoys him, or even just putting a paw on her and holding her down :)

Job is going well, it will be better once the girl I'm replaces leaves next Friday so I actually have a desk/PC/phone etc.

Off for a bath, then to the vets, then slobbing about all weekend I think.

So now I have a real job. As of Monday I am officially a HR Assistant for SDS, which is where I've been temping for the last 6/7 months anyway.

So, we took kitty to the vet last night and yup, she is girl so she is now officially Amelie. She did have fleas but she's been treated for them and I am spending the day washing all the bedding and fumigating every room one at a time with a super duper kill everything spray I got from the vet.

She only weighs 430 grams! She is tiny!!

Electron is very close to fully accepting her I think. He keeps sniffing her and he doesn't run away anymore, he seems quite relaxed around her, but no actual physical contact yet. Dog is gonna take a bit longer, she doesn't hiss at her anymore, but still runs away from her. I'm glad they are both slowly getting used to her, I don't want them to be miserable.

She has also started eating some food. Catherine (the vet) gave us some weaning food and suggested heating the catmilk in the microwave and putting the dry weaning food in it and letting it go all mushy. This seems to be working, but she still licks all the milk off and then eats the mushy biscuits. Its a start, and at least she's not starving! We just need to gradually decrease the amount of milk we use, so she learns how to chew properly. I swear, it's like having a baby! She was up 3 times to eat last night, which means one of us feeing her and then putting her in her cat litter. She's been pretty good at using her litter, only one small accident so far.

She's soooo cute!

go to my flickr page to see photos of the new kitten or go to you tube for a video of her being cute.

A woman phoned the vets today to ask if we'd put up a notice saying she had kittens looking for homes. She had taken in a couple of strays a few weeks ago and it turned out they were both pregnant! So she had 11 kittens to find homes for and is struggling with the last 6.

So we went and got one this afternoon! She (so we've been told) is gorgeous, mostly grey with various white bits and a fantastic thin white streak down her back which looks like someone has flicked white paint over her :)It was a struggle to only take one, they were all so gorgeous and tiny! So if anyone in Glasgow is looking for a kitten, let me know. They are all shorthaired, and a mixture of black and white (almost fresian looking), with one pure black one.

I will post piccies later, once Noodle is back in with her camera. I've been wanting to take some time off work for ages so I will go in on Monday and see if I can take the rest of the week off which means I can supervise as we introduce Dog and Electron to the kitten. They've seen her and Electron is terrified and Dog hisses, so I think Electron will be fine once he's over his fear, and hopefully Dog will calm down as well.

We haven't settled on a name yet, any suggestions are welcome. Actually If it's a boy I have a few names but working on the theory that it is a girl, they're not much use.

Oh,and Sci bought a PS3 :)