Fave Friday + Weekword

I'm shaking up Fave Friday a bit. During my clear out I came across a couple of bits that are no good and don't really deserve house room, but that I am hanging on to for sentimental reasons. So for a few weeks I am going to be taking pictures of them, and blogging them, as my fave items. Then I will have a record of them long after they've been recycled.

But this week - something different again! My Lushie friend Sally mentioned this idea on the forum, that somebody suggests a word each week on a Monday and, if you want to join in, you comment; and then on Friday, you write about the word. The original poster tags someone new to pick the next week's word. I am all about this, except that (naturally) I forgot to comment.

(I find I do this regularly. Like, I read your email/post/text and responded in my mind - did you not get that telepathically?)

Anyway. Sally's word was key, and this ties in a bit with my new idea for Fave Friday.



These are my old keys. They live in a secret place somewhere downstairs and they are only used for opening the back door. As I've got older, I've preferred a minimalist key ring consisting solely of my front door and car keys, but most of these keys are sentimental, and thus are given house room.

That brown fuzzy thing is a fluffy bunny key ring. Mr Z gave me this a long time ago, in honour of my website name.

The bottle opener was added to my key ring some time when I was a silver service waitress. I believe it came home with me from a function room. It was useful for all those nights when Jen and I used to get the tube/bus to evening events and have a Bacardi Breezer on the journey, back when you could still drink on the tube.

The gold key on the left was the key to Father Hand's apartment on Pennsylvania Street NE, Albuquerque, NM. I lived there for 3 months the summer I turned 19, after a messy break up. That was the first time I had stayed with Father Hand for a long period of time since he left. It was one of my favourite summers ever. I slept on the couch and he didn't have a TV, but there was a communal grill right outside the door where he used to make steaks for dinner and then he'd read the news off his computer, and bits from the Straight Dope (I will always remember Schroedinger's Cat in rhyme) and the Onion. His friend Lisa, who was a bit more than that though I naively believed him when he said she was not, would hang out with me all the time and taught me some good frugal habits I still have. Sib came to stay at some point too, though for the life of me I cannot remember where he slept.
(I have just spent nearly an hour rifling through my filing cabinet drawer of diaries and old letters looking for a picture from when the intersection nearby flooded in heavy rain, and Sib pushed a car out of the water. Didn't find it.)
I also remember, about him coming to stay, that we went for an evening walk along the nearby arroyo and we were sat on the edge, Sib, Father Z, Lisa and me, and I lay on back to look at the stars, and then Sib told me a big cockroach had run into my hair and I screamed and Lisa made me stand with my head tipped over and flicked it around repeatedly.

I have a lot of memories attached to that key! Loads more than I realised, or have time to blog.

The fob that says 3-22 on it is from my Halls of Residence, Commonwealth Hall in Bloomsbury. The year after I left they made the 3rd floor boys only so I get some weird looks from later residents, if I ever come across any and tell them that was my room. It was at the end of a corridor. Arran lived across and Karin lived next door. At the end was Luscious Lucy who annoyed us, so one night we spread loads of crisps in front of her door and she came and shouted at us at breakfast.
I was a geek, even then.
I kept this fob. The halls charged me out of my deposit for it, so I don't feel guilty.

I think the big silver one is from Mother Hand's inside front door. I got that when I lived with her after coming back from the States.

The last little one is the front room door key for my third year residence. That was the year I started blogging, so my altercations with the landlady are documented. The front room was a treasure trove of crap leftover from the old lady she'd bought the house from, and we were not supposed to have a key, which is why I kept this one even when we moved out. I might still have a couple of picture hooks too, and a tin of old buttons, but since we didn't agree an inventory while I was living there I think she got away quite lightly.

This has been quite the trip down memory lane! I have been reminiscing for the next part of 90 minutes now. I like a good reminisce of a Friday night. Now I'm going to go and make a Google Map of all the places in the world I have lived, and let the reminiscing continue.

Thanks for the idea, Sally! Can't wait to see what next week's word is.