My new fridge magnet

Check, check, check and check

I've had a very successful weekend, both in terms of having had a wonderful time, and of ticking off items from the bucket list.

I went to Iceland (check!). Go. Seriously, go. It is such a beautiful country, and the people are incredibly friendly. Sure, it's pricey, but it felt worth the money. The landscape is bizarrely stark and beautiful at the same time. At first the flats almost look like the Yorkshire moors in winter, until you realise that what looks like dirt and scrub is actually laval rock and lichen. And then there are the mountains, rearing up from nowhere with their bold streaks of black mass and gleaming white snow, an improbably huge glacier (check!) bulldozing through infinitesimally slowly.

In addition being lucky enough to see the Aurora Borealis (check!) on our second night there, we also saw geysers, a frozen waterfall, stood on the brink of a tectonic plate and miraculously failed to acquire any ice based injuries. Pretty much the only negative is that the whole place has the lingering odour of rotten eggs; a side effect of the sulphurous thermal springs.

Oh, and I ate soft shell crab (check!). That stuff is good!

Northen lights

The Aurora Borealis is a thing of glory and wonder. How do I even find the words for this? A fine veil sleeting across the sky, rippling and dancing in this intense natural light show. I was so struck by how much beauty there is in the universe, I stood and laughed in pure joy. It's like a mist of phosphorescent water, a sheet of the finest spray from a waterfall, ebbing and flowing. It's beautiful beyond my ability to articulate. I can see why people used to believe they were glimpsing heaven.

Not again!

I was on a blog hiatus during the Great Passport Incident of last year. Basically I succeeded in losing said passport the day I was due to go and visit Spike in Copenhagen. She kindly refrained from killing me, either then or in the succeeding few weeks when I continually failed to get my arse in gear and apply for a new one. Eventually she went so far as to download the forms and email them to me, and the new passport arrived on the last post day before our next trip. The course of true Meg never did run smooth.

Fast forward to yesterday, and I'm packing for today's planned trip to Iceland. I go to the desk to get my passport and.....nothing. it's not there. Frantically I search every bag I own. Even those I haven't used in years. Every pocket of every coat, every shelf, every 'safe place' I can think of. Nothing. How can this be happening again?

Cue panicked facebook message, because a crisis just isn't a crisis without a bit of embarrassing public hysteria. Much use of exclamation marks and caps lock. Many suggestions from friends, in levels of helpfulness ranging from 'calm down' to 'somebody needs to go over there and slap her'. Somebody probably did.

Furious with myself, and barely holding back tears at having let my friend down yet again, I eventually gave up, texted my manager to say I would be in work after all, and went to bed in the kind of shivery, nauseated state of anxiety I haven't felt since I finished my last uni essay.

I left my bed this morning, and commenced my morning ablutions with a heavy heart. Then, suddenly, a beam of light shone from above, angels seemed to sing, my subconscious awoke, grudgingly raised its head and said "Passport? Didn't you show that for your DBS check for that Christmas volunteering? Isn't there an envelope with that stuff under that pile of books by the wardrobe?".

I leapt out of the shower and ran dripping to the pile of books. YES YED YES! Throw things in bag, throw clothes on body, throw text messages at Spike and my manager, throw self in direction of airport.

I'm writing this on the plane. I think I might have a nap now. I'm bloody knackered.

Molly

My cat died yesterday. She escaped when I was taking out the rubbish and, after a prolonged search, I found her in a puddle in the gutter a street over. The short walk home, sobbing, clutching a wet, furry body to my chest, felt like it took about an hour. 

Molly was possibly the most irritating cat in the history of the world. Her appearance in my house as a tiny bedraggled kitten, flea-ridden and emaciated, pretty much set the tone for her existence. There was the summer when she brought in a seemingly never-ending series of huge wood pigeons in varying degrees of disembowelment, the night she gave birth to five kittens under the kitchen sink as a mental patient broke into the house, the time she stuck her nose into a tub of hair dye and dyed her face purple, and the many death defying leaps from first floor windows so that I had to knock on assorted neighbours’ doors and beg to retrieve her from their gardens. 

All this, and yet, dammit I loved that stupid cat. Ok, so maybe she was wantonly destructive, and attacked half the people who tried to pet her, and maybe she was so thick that she’d happily stand in the litter tray and poo over the side, but how could I fail to love a cat who crawled into my dress to sleep, because that millimetre of fabric was just too far away from me. Who licked the tears from my cheeks when I was sad. Who always wanted to be the big spoon when we snuggled, however uncomfortable it made us both.

RIP Molly. No hunting cherubs, even if they do have wings.

Get it?

Child on train: Mummy, my friend Saffron has two mummies, because they have less beans.

Jam and Jerusalem

Tonight, E and I went to our first WI meeting. Somehow (I'm not quite sure how), we got talking to people about the penis cake I made for a friend's birthday. And somehow (I'm not quite sure how), I got talked into recreating said cake for the upcoming bring and buy sale.

Frankly, if they're not already referring to me as 'that awful penis cake girl', it's a miracle.

I wish it could be Christmas every day

Not really, but I would like more tinselly glittery decor. I have finally taken down my Christmas decorations - yes, yes, I know - and now everything looks bald and drab. Is there any real reason why tinsel isn't an acceptable year-round home accessory?