turps

If anyone ever wants to make podfic of any of my stories you have blanket permission to do so. The exception being any co-writes, in which case you'll have to ask the permission of the other writer.

All my stories are uploaded at A03.

If anyone ever wants to friend me, feel free. I always enjoy meeting/reading new people but at the same time, it doesn't bother me if people read and don't comment at all, or even comment very occasionally. All are welcome.

I read in lots of fandoms but the main ones right now are The Musketeers and MCU, though that's 99% winterhawk.

I also still love bandom and popslash and had a brief intense fling with Downton Abbey, so often dip into those fandoms when the urge hits.

I'm very much an OTC person, and my past and present loves include Tom Paris, Blair Sandburg, Brennan Mulwray, Chris Kirkpatrick, Mikey Way, Aramis, Clint Barton.

I have a long-lasting and deep love for h/c, but read pretty much anything.

I still write on occasion, nowhere near as prolific as in my bandom days, but sometimes I feel the need to scratch the writing itch.

Mostly I post about real-life things, my family, my cats, walks to the beach and the cinema. Along with my husband, I have an Odeon Unlimited card so we got to the cinema a lot.

I'm a carer for my husband who has AMC. He has a full-time job but I help him a lot in the house and do a load of surveys, product tests etc for extra money. They're all boring, tedious and often pay pennies, but I've found as long as you slog through a certain amount a day it all adds up.

I have one son who went away to uni and never came back. He still lives relatively close, though, so I still see and chat to him often.

I had a gastric bypass a few years ago and lost a load of weight. I don't really talk about it on here now, but it's something that changed my life and something I'll never regret.

I very rarely friends lock posts, usually only photos of people and mainly just keep plodding on through my life the best that I can.

There's no need to comment if you want to friend me, but if you want to, go for it.

The knife saga is over, sadly, not with help by Amazon. In the end, yesterday, we just drove to the outlet mall again and bought the equivalent quality knives from the kitchen shop there. It did cost a little more than the Amazon prices, but both knives also come guaranteed for 25 years and at least they're bought as it was getting a little close to Christmas for comfort.

We did our usual thing of going an hour early, planning to go for a Costa while waiting for the shops to open at 10. Only to find out the Sunday hours are different, and you couldn't even get to any of the shops, including the food ones, as the gates to the actual mall were all shut. But, you could go into the McDonalds at the end, so I had a McMuffin and coffee and watched the craft and food stalls set up.

There were so many tempting stalls, including one selling bath stuff. I'm a sucker for soap, whipped soaps etc, so after checking out the smells I gave James a big hint such stuff would be nice to receive, and he sent me on my way as he made a surprise purchase. Which he then left next to the Christmas tree at home in an open paper bag.

We may also have come home with some cakes, which were enjoyed last night, with more left for tea later.

Saturday it was the delivery day for the pieces James has been working on. Thankfully, the man who'd commissioned the pieces loved them. James had also created a freebie for him, a raccoon on a live piece of wood. I think that's the technical term anyway, it's wood which still has bark attached at the sides. The man sat stroking that piece -- the other two are a bit big to hold onto -- and it was obvious he was genuinely happy with everything, which was such a relief.

After delivering those, we drove up to Seahouses, taking the coastal route and stopping off in some small villages to have a mooch and hot coffees. It was so nice to do that, normally those places are packed in the summer, but in winter it was easy to look around and actually see stuff, including a red phone box that had been turned into a Christmas decorated tiny library.

In Seahouses itself, we got to pose with a giant plastic polar bear, and a lovely lady offered to take a photo of both of us together You can also see photos of the pieces James delivered if you're interested, just click the arrows to see all the photos. No photo of the raccoon piece, though, I had to take a screengrab from a video from that, so that's behind the cut. With bonus standing in front of our Christmas tree too, as I know turlough likes to laugh at it every year *g* ( behind here )

The knife saga continues. I tried to buy Corey's knives using my debit card, but again, couldn't check out due to age restrictions. So James tried, same for him. He called Amazon and talked to someone who said it was apparently an ongoing glitch in Amazon's system, that he could try again in a few days time, or otherwise, buy the products elsewhere and whatever decision he made, Amazon would issue £30 credit for the inconvenience.

Now, credit like that would be good, that is if it happens, the guy said give up to 3 days for it to be applied to the account, which gives until tomorrow. James does have the email stating the offer, but no credit as yet. But man, all I wanted to do was buy some posh kitchen knives. Next step will be going to a kitchenware shop and buying them there.

Today we've been to our family friend's funeral. The guy's wife is a devout Catholic so it was the full service at church, followed by the crematorium, then onto the complex where the couple live. It's a semi-assisted facility for people over 50, and such a nice place, plus they put on a cracking buffet. Too delicious a buffet tbh as it's our Christmas meal with Pauline this evening and I could have done without two nice meals being on the same day.

I had to buy cat food earlier, and the shop I was in is right next door to a pretty big charity shop. So, James went in to look for wood stuff, and I was pulled towards the books. Now, I've banned myself from buying books as I have so many to read, but they had a section set up with all Christmas books, and I ask you, how is that fair? Many of you will know I love a cheesy Christmas themed book, so how could I walk out without buying four one?

Now, I'm going to have a quick catch up on here, then I need to change from my black outfit to my Christmas gear.

I actually started some Christmas shopping yesterday . Plan was to drive to a local outlet mall and get parked by 9am. The shops don't open until 10, so we'd have time to go have breakfast and a coffee, then be there for opening time, before it got mega busy. And amazingly, that's exactly what happened.

We hit Greggs for a breakfast sandwich, looked into some very overpriced homeware shops, got Corey's Christmas chocolate and James' birthday freebie from the Lindt shop, and I got my candle advent calendar from Yankee Candle. I do like an advent calendar but tend to get them when they're on sale. So this one was half price due to it being the 4th. As always they ripped the back cover, no doubt to stop reselling, but hey who cares? Half price!

Then on the afternoon the plan was to get the tree up, but yeah, that didn't happen. Instead I ended up visiting Kayleigh and Bodhi for a couple of hours while they put their decorations up. Kayleigh and Lucy are doing Elf on the Shelf, so Bodhi was telling me all about what the naughty elf had been getting up to, and then showed me another stuffed elf, saying the elf had brought it. I asked if that elf did naughty things, too. Only to be told very firmly that no, because that was a toy elf, and didn't I know toys couldn't move? So consider me told.

Monday was a day with a few minor frustrations. In class they did a move that I just couldn't master. It was the dead bug and while I could physically do the movement, my co ordination had apparently left the building, even after Rosie got on the floor twice to show me, and actually guided me a few other times.

Then later, after cashed in all my survey voucher earnings I was buying Corey's presents from Amazon. He's still upgrading his kitchen stuff and has two expensive knives on his wish list, which fine, that's what he wants, so I ordered them both along with other stuff. But then couldn't actually get through check out.

Cutting the story short, it seems you can't buy age restricted items with Amazon vouchers as they have no date of birth attached to them. Which I guess makes sense, but does mean I need to shuffle payment methods around so I can actually buy what he wants.

Today I've put up the tree and decorations at last. I've still got a load of baubles to put on the tree but have had to stop for now as I'm Bodhisitting soon. Just for a couple of hours, though. So I'll be back in my sparkly, light and sparkle deer filled house before six.

We went to see Wicked For Good on Saturday and I really enjoyed it. Both the film itself, and the buzz in the cinema, the charity cos players were there and Odeon had various displays up for photo ops while the staff were all wearing witches hats, add in the general air of excitement of people going in, and it was just a lovely atmosphere.

I'm sure James would have enjoyed it too if he'd been awake for more than 1% of it *g*

I will cut him some slack though as he came down with a nasty chest cold on Sunday, so much so he had to call in sick from work yesterday as he was really not well. He's a bit better today, and thankfully, had annual leave in for Thurs and Fri so with his regular day off will only have to claim two sick days. It also gives him time to rest up, as we've got a craft fair on Saturday, and then my MiL wants to take us out for Sunday dinner on Sunday.

I got a new to me type of comment at AO3 the other day. It was someone saying they thought the fic would make a good comic and said their insta name if I wanted to make that happen. Curious, I Googled the insta and it was from a fan who does comic strips, for a price I'm sure, so while their work was good, I won't be taking up the offer. The fic they picked was my Intoabar 911 Lonestar Voyager cross featuring TK and Nelix, which I guess could support a comic strip, but I'll never find out. And mainly, have come away from the comment with a grudging respect for someone putting their work out like that. Thanks for Cesy in comments for telling me what these comments are about. No respect at all now.


I enjoyed Strictly at the weekend, the Steps mashup was great, but really what I was really looking forward to was Nikita dancing with Layton again, and I was not disappointed. Well, I would have loved their part of the routine to be longer, but the behind the scenes stuff that various people shared helped make up for it.

I was sad for La Voix having to pull out though, she wasn't the best dancer, but made the show so much fun.

Class wasn't on yesterday, as someone had booked the hall for a wake. Now, the hall we use isn't a typical gym studio, it's actually part of the old Miner's Welfare building that's joined to the modern gym by a series of maze like hallways, and does actually have a bar at one end. But, I was still surprised that anyone would want to use it for something like that, as it's not the most picturesque place, and also kind of smells of sweat. But, people like what they like, I guess.

I bought a tunnel thing that's designed to circle the bottom of the Christmas tree, the idea being, the cats will go through the tunnel and leave the actual tree alone. They've both enjoyed going through it, but I suspect what it'll be is a handy step to help Kevin climb the branches. Anyway, here's Murphy enjoying the middle.

turlough is the best and my latest sparkle deer arrived from her the other day, isn't it adorable!?



I do love this tradition, she's sent me multiple sparkle deer now, and I can't wait for this new one to meet the herd.

We did a craft fair in aid of Consett Cats on Saturday. It was held at a golf club which meant no passing footfall, add on the fact it was raining and well, we didn't do that well. At least we made enough to give a donation to the rescue and got to meet up with some of the fellow adopters we know, so all wasn't lost. And hey, we ended up with a £5 profit after the donation, so silver lining and all that.

Good news, someone has taken on running the monthly makers market in our town, and we've got our pre-Christmas spot back. So as of now, we've two more fairs to go before the end of the year, plus maybe one possibility at my nephew's school. Also, James is continuing on TikTok and getting a few orders that way, which is great but also, still surprising.

During the week we saw Now You See It, Now You Don't at the cinema and I enjoyed it so much. It was flashy, fun and had a twist I didn't see coming, which is always a plus.

Yesterday we went to the Odeon to see Christmas Karma at the early 11am showing. It was my first cinema Christmas film of the year, and I bought a Christmas Costa drink and intended to wallow in festive feelings. Sadly, that didn't fully happen, I was really enjoying the film until about halfway through when my MiL started to alternatively call James' then my phone. Obviously, they were on silent, but they were impossible to ignore and eventually James went out to see what was up, and it turns out a family friend of his family had died.

He was a really good friend of my MiL and FiL for a very long time, and James grew up with the guy's son, so the families have known each other forever. I always enjoyed talking to T when we met, so he'll be a miss.

Some Murphy news. Last week I finally managed to get a pee sample from him, got it to the vets, and on testing it had some glucose in it, so they were worried he could be diabetic and wanted a blood test doing. He had that done on Thursday, and the results were expected today. The head vet has just phoned, and his blood results were fine, so she was confused about what had happened, asking if I'd cleaned the tray with something new or anything like that. But as that was a no, said to bring in another sample between a fortnight and a month, and otherwise, just to keep an eye on things. Of course, now I'm worrying that Kevin had contaminated the sample, and he's diabetic despite him looking perfectly healthy. Cats, there's always something to worry about.

I got offline early yesterday as I didn't want to see the Celeb Traitors spoilers. The finale was mistakenly shown a day early in Canada, so it would have been all too easy to unwillingly see the outcome. As it was, I was glad I did go in unspoiled. ( cut for spoilers )

I've really enjoyed watching the show, and while it was frustrating waiting a week between some episodes, doing so kept people talking, and I liked that.

Today I've been for a walk to one pharmacist to pick up Kayleigh's script, and then to another to get James'. While there's no bright sunshine, it's still mild so it was nice to walk through the falling leaves and get some fresh air.

I also talked to Pauline, who phoned asking if we wanted to meet up next Wednesday for a lunch out to celebrate James' birthday. Now, that's not until the 1st, so yet again she's arranging stuff really early. But hey, he's off that day and I guess there's no reason not to celebrate that early.

Tomorrow, for the first time in a few weekends, we don't have any craft fairs so we're off to the cinema. I don't even know what to see yet, but something. I may even buy myself my first Christmas Costa of the season. I quite fancy a gingerbread latte with a tiny gingerbread man balanced on top.

We've done two craft fairs this weekend. They went well, and thankfully, were at the same venue so we could leave our stall set up overnight. But even so, it was a lot of being on, socialising and chatting, plus of course, the setting up and breaking down each end. Saying that I enjoyed both days, the venue was lovely, a small community centre, and the coffee only 50p so I was well caffeinated.

Yesterday James was chatting to a man about why he called his business PyroRex, and hearing it was because James always refers to himself as a t-Rex due to his arm positioning, said he had a t-Rex costume that James could have if he wanted it-- and of course he did. The man went home, brought back the costume, and then ( this happened this morning )

On Friday the emergency vet phoned to say they'd finally had the results back from Murphy's urine cultures, and they thought the antibiotics that they'd given him may be ineffective against the UTI strain he had. But, because he's okay in himself they said to take a sample in to our own vets, they'd check it and give different antibiotics if needed.

Because this was Friday afternoon, our own vet was closing in hours and there was no way to get the sample in and tested before they shut for the weekend. So, James called in to get the sample collecting sand kit, on his way home from work and they said to get the sample and take it in Monday.

I was expecting that to be a nightmare, but amazingly, almost as soon as I put the sand in a clean litter box Murphy used it, and the sample is in the fridge ready to be dropped off tomorrow. Which is a huge relief, now, fingers crossed the sample comes back infection free and I can start to relax about more stones. And I don't have to write sample ever again!

mini_wrimo is going on again. I'm not taking part but sign ups will be on for a few days yet if you want to take part in a very low pressure write every day challenge.

I was thrilled to see Layton had turned up to watch Nikita dance on Strictly last night. And to watch the others too I'm sure, but you know, I'm still holding onto my Lakita love. It's been forever since I shared dances I love from the show, but man, I enjoyed Katya and Lewis' couple's choice so much.

James did another craft fair yesterday, and it was such a success, one of the best we've done. He sold a nice amount, and the location was lovely. It was inside a church attached to a community centre, so was full of people chatting for all the time we were there.

As stall holders we could have refillable coffees, and they gave us leftover Halloween cupcakes when the cafe closed, so in all, it was just a nice time.

Which was good as we were waiting for news about Murphy, which wasn't nice. He ended up at the vet hospital again on Thursday, and they quickly realised he had another blockage. ( cut for details )

Now he's got his special dry food, the special wet food is coming and he has a new water fountain which will hopefully encourage him to drink. So, fingers crossed he doesn't have to go in again, because I seem to have spent the last few weeks worrying about him.

It was quite a day yesterday.

It started well, I went with James to get our flu jabs, and got those done fast, in and out of the pharmacy before our official appointment times.

Then off to the doctor, who after a few attempts managed to draw enough blood from James to send off for the routine tests he needs. Though, I do wish people would listen when James tells them it's easier to draw from the back of his hand. I get it probably feels wrong for the medical people to start there, but his veins are so buried in the crook of his arms that it's almost impossible to find them.

Left there and came home as the tumble drier repair man was due. That actually went better than I expected, turns out the baring had gone causing the belt to snap. But the guy said it was such a good machine it was worth repairing, though due to the space needed for the repair, he'd have to take it to his workshop to do so. But, it should be fixed and back by Monday afternoon, and for cheaper than I was expecting, which is good.

After he left we did some organising for the craft fair we've done today. Got everything sorted, and then got ready to take Murphy to a vet appointment as it looked like his UTI was back again. But, turns out it was much more serious and he had a bladder blockage.

As I couldn't get him an appointment until 5:30, that meant the vet who could do the op to unblock had gone so we were sent off to the out of hours emergency vet hospital. This is where he ended up a month ago, so I knew they were nice there, but man, I really didn't expect to be heading there again.

( cut for vet stuff )

Drove home and because it was so late ended up at the fishshop for a cheese patty, chips and curry sauce tea. Ate that then ended up just waiting for the vet to phone with news, which she did close to ten.

Then to top it all I had the most horrendous night sweats that woke me up. ( cut for detail )

So that was yesterday, and I did not want to get up at 6am to get ready for the craft fair today. But I did, and the fair itself went okay.

Now we're home, and I intend to have a lobster bath, wait for the nurse to phone about Murphy, or phone them myself if I can't wait, then watch Strictly. Though tbh, I'd say the odds on me staying awake for the whole thing are pretty low right now.