Our anniversary and Adolf Hitler's birthday.

Hear me out on this. Yesterday, 20th April was our 12th wedding anniversary. In celebration, we enjoyed a pleasant meal and several glasses of wine, plus I got a new watch from my husband as a gift. All good stuff. Our wedding day back in 2000 was a beautiful day, even though it rained all evening.
Some months prior to the big day, my bank account was overdrawn, cheques were bouncing left, right and centre, so it was time to throw myself at the mercy of the bank.
Appointment made, I attended the High Street, complete with my list of outgoings, always bigger than the incomings, ready to plead my case.
The account manager I spoke to was a very nice, fair haired, blue eyed man. "Have you any big expenses coming up?" he asked.
"Well, I'm getting married," I replied.
"Congratulations," he said. "When's the big day?"
"20th April," I said.
"Hitler's birthday," he said.
"Well actually, we picked it because it's Maundy Thursday and the castle we're getting married in is half price on a Thursday."
"That's also a good reason," he said.
I got married and changed banks.

My dog's nuts

The apostrophe in the title isn't indicating the omission of a letter, but possession. Bless my happy, little Labrador, he has an embarrassing problem at present. Being the pampered pooch he is, I took him straight to the vet's, along with my husband clutching his wallet. An injection, anti-inflammatory cream, a huge plastic collar and £76 later, we took the dog home.
Problem is, twice a day, we have to rub cream into the dog's bits. It's a bit distressing for all parties. My husband being of greater strength in holding the dog down, gets the restraining part, I get to apply the ointment. Lucky me. At least he gets a biscuit afterwards. He has after all, used a lot of energy holding on to the dog.
I was late for work this morning. When my line manager asked why I was late, my apology was accompanied with, "I was rubbing cream on the dog's testicles."

87,000 words and the Brighton Festival

Left alone with my own fevered imagination for the last six months, I have managed to come up with 87,000 words of a crime novel. On a whim, I sent the first 4990 words to Myriad publishing in Brighton back in February. Last week while on holiday, I was thrilled to find out that I've been shortlisted along with five other entrants for the Writer's Retreat competition.
The winner is to be announced at the Brighton Festival on 23rd May. I'm going along to hear whether I've been successful or not. If I have, then, of course, I'll be delighted but win or not, I'm keen to hear what it was that the five judges were looking for in the submissions. After all, isn't life one long learning experience and if you're really lucky you get feedback? Just hoping they're kind about it.

Don't open that cupboard whatever you do.

Begrudgingly, I admit, it was my idea.
"Let's stay somewhere cheap," I suggested on our trip through New England. "You know the kind of thing I mean, don't you? A budget motel and takeaway pizza."
After several hours of driving from North Conway, New Hampshire towards Boston, I spied what I thought was a pleasant appearing place to stay. What I'd actually directed my husband to drive into was an animal hospital. That looked very smart. The motel was next door, somewhere a little less salubrious.
Correcting our mistake, we made our way to the office where a very helpful man looked at us with incredulity on hearing our accents and request for somewhere to stay. In hindsight, he was probably running through his usual list of  'Do they look as though they're wanted in three states, are narcotic dependent or on the game?' or whatever the American colloquialism may be.
"You want to stay here?" he politely asked. "It's $49 plus tax."
Sounded like a steal to me.
"You may want to look at the room first," he added, sliding a key across the counter. This was our chance to plan our exit strategy but then came the moment when he unwittingly clinched the deal. "Do you want a king size bed or two queens?" he asked, keeping one hand on the key.
Well, naturally, being English, I was not used to choices like this. I felt that deep down, an establishment which offered me more than one option, could not have been that bad.
Off we went to the room, opened the door and apart from the smell, it looked fine. There was a television, a fridge, microwave and air conditioning.
"We'll take it," we said to the office man. He looked a bit shocked.
What followed was not the best night of my life. The telly had been dropped at some point, the fridge didn't cool but seemed to warm and the microwave set fire to the paper cups we tried to heat water in due to the absence of a coffee maker.
My husband came out of the bathroom and said, "Don't open that cupboard whatever you do. Some sort of animal or insect seems to have been living in there. It's OK, it's gone."
Yeah probably to the Vet's surgery next door if it had any sense.

New Hampshire to Maine but still missing my dog

Holidays spent in America are fantastic. Let's face it, holidays spent pretty much anywhere are usually great or else you wouldn't be visiting the destination in the first place. Americans may not appreciate their road and motorway system as much as foreigners but it's easy driving in the USA (especially for me as my husband does it all - I have the worst sense of direction). Prior to our arrival in Boston we'd only booked our first night's accommodation as finding a hotel or motel is easy. The only obstacle I face is ordering food. I break out into a cold sweat and momentary panic grips me as this is when the questions start - do you want a side with that? which of our choice of seven dressings do you want? what kind of bread? wheat? rye? soda? artisan? Please good people of America, listen to the accent. I'm English. More choice than white or brown and you blow my mind.
We've just spent three nights in North Conway, New Hampshire. What a fantastic place. We were here 13 or so years ago and don't want to leave it over a decade before we return again. Despite having a really pleasant and relaxing time, I can't wait to get home. I miss my dog.
We've left him at a very fine kennel. I have no doubt that he's being looked after very well but he likes company. In fact, he drives me crazy following me around all day, tripping me up, knocking books out of my hand when I'm reading, trying to get all 40 kilos of himself on my lap when I'm writing. Still, I can't wait to get home to him.
By the time I've unpacked and fallen over him a dozen times, I may have changed my mind.

Asking for water and being given cold tomato: language difficulties

This year, we travelled to New England to celebrate my birthday. We don't usually do anything so grand but on my 40th last year, things went very wrong with my husband ending up in hospital. We thought we'd make up for it this year and flew to Boston on Friday.
My birthday was very pleasant and spent in Connecticut. I would have had a better time if I hadn't tried to be so British. The first drink I ordered had a lipstick mark on the glass. I told the barmaid and she changed it immediately. I then ordered red wine. It was terrible. It was enough to strip the enamel from my teeth. Did I complain? No of course not. I struggled through as I didn't want to appear rude. What's that about?
When I just couldn't take any more, I asked her for water. She thought I asked for cold tomato. Being English, I was grateful for the vitamins.