Tuesday Ten

Ten recent pieces of wisdom

1. You could only comment on my blog if you had a Blogger account....until today. I'm sorry. I never purposefully set it like that. I have changed it now and hopefully commenting will become easier. But not so easy I get spammers.

2. Sparkly shoes are the remedy to an awkward moment when the deputy head is hanging out in your classroom killing time. Actually, sparkly shoes may be the remedy to everything, especially when they're this sparkly. They are my matron of honour shoes for Jen's wedding and they arrived today. When they fit I was so happy I nearly cried. But it's been a bit of a cry-y week. Month.

3. I have some pretty strong childhood memories attached to Paul Simon's Graceland album, which I just downloaded and am listening to for the first time in decades. "My travelling companion is 9 years old..."

4. If genetics are anything to go by, I'm going to be still all kinds of awesome at the age of 86. Granny Hand is still in full possession of all her faculties and very sharp about it too. She doesn't appreciate Robbie Savage's thrusting on Strictly Come Dancing, though.

5. Some wisdom from a year 11: "I had pumpkin soup once. It tasted like soup." Yes, Shannon, and now let's talk about that C you're supposed to achieve in History by the end of this school year...

6. If you fancy trying some of the Starbucks Christmas drinks but you don't like milk and soy milk in a latte is not your cup of...er....latte, try a soy misto. It's half coffee, half soy milk, and the Christmas syrups can be added without it becoming something diabetes-inducing. This tip brought to you via The Fit Writer who contributed it to the forum and is therefore a winner in my eyes (and a lot of other people's, since she's a champion bodybuilder)

7. When I laugh too much, I get a head rush like I'm going to pass out. This was proved last week when I hid in my cupboard before Yakob's lesson in my room. Then 5 minutes into the lesson, Paul came down, told Yakob he was there for a meeting, knocked on the cupboard door and got in the cupboard with me. Yakob evicted us both quickly with an incredulous shout of, "Get out, you bad people!" while his class gaped. "Was she in there the whole time?!" they whispered. Yes, children. I heard all about 'Kieran's tits'.

8. The post-WW1 democracy in Germany had a system where a party was allowed one candidate per 60,000 votes. ANY candidate. They didn't have to nominate certain people to certain areas. This doesn't strike me as especially sensible. But, since this was the system that elected Hitler, I don't suppose it was. I wonder if there are any PR systems out there today that work this way.

9. I don't like writing about controversial history. It took me two days to write the first 22 pages of content for my book. 10 days have passed, and I have managed only 3 of the remaining pages. I have finally realised that I'm not just struggling to stay fair: I'm struggling to do it justice. Everything I write sounds trite.

10. But really, sparkly shoes do make everything better. They really do. Just wearing them puts me in a better mood.