Is something happening in Britain this summer?

You’d think something was happening over here soon… 😉

Going shopping these past weeks in Peterborough, I’ve been bombarded with the Union Jack flag everywhere and on everything.  It’s wonderful and I can’t help getting swept along with the excitement.

Biscuits, chocolate, bunting, plates, bread, toilet roll, rugs, headphones, you name it and I can probably find one with a british flag on!

Yes, I gave in.

For the Queens Diamond Jubilee I had to get a new cake stand decorated in red, white and blue bunting and, to show my support for the Olympics, I couldn’t resist 3 rubber ducks bedecked in the designs of a Team GB runner, swimmer and cyclist!  I love them!  (I know, I’ll never grow up)

What is your country celebrating this year?

What bizarre items have you bought which have been produced just for it?

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Love or Hate? #eurovision

I love it.  Always have, always will.  That thing called Eurovision.

Don’t know what I’m talking about?  It’s the Eurovision Song contest final this weekend.  I think it should be compulsory viewing for anyone who wants to know a bit more about Europe.  You either love or hate it.  Yes it’s that extreme!  To me it’s mad and hilarious and crazy and touching and I’ll laugh and cry and shout and sing and by the end I’ll be exhausted.  I’ve been watching it all my life it feels.  Maybe missed the odd year but not many.

It’s the first semi finals tonight.  I can’t wait, but only just realised I was going to buy a new tv for the finals on saturday.   I seem to have forgotten about the semis.  Oops!  Might have to rush out and get one before 8pm!

I do hope that you can catch it outside europe via internet.

(sorry I’ve not put a link in as it’s not working well and I don’t know the ‘rules’ yet of linking to official websites.. I’m sure you’ll let me know.  One you can find on eurovision.tv and the other is on bbc webpages under eurovision.)

do you?

love or hate eurovision?

I won’t apologise if I post more about eurovision in a few days..

Dawn chorus wake up call

Rarely, these days, do I wake before 6.  This morning I woke at 4am and had to open the window and listen to the amazing dawn chorus of the birds that populate this little space I call home.  There was 20 minutes of a wake up call from 4am and then it paused.

I’ve had another wake up call this week.  Yesterday, I found out that a friend died a few days ago.  Life took us apart from each other many years ago and by chance we’d got back in touch in recent years.  I saw his name in an email chain I received and checked to see if it was the same person.  It was.  We met for breakfast when I had a meeting in the town he lived in and it was as if we’d last seen each other the day before.  Isn’t it wonderful when that happens?  We planned to meet again, yet when he was free I wasn’t and vice versa so that was the last time our diaries were able to collide!

The birds have started singing again though with a different voice.

I cried a lot yesterday and today I’m planning to go visit some new places.

When friends die we need reflection and a renewed enthusiasm in life if it was a little lacking beforehand.  I called this blog lynnelives perhaps because for the last couple of years I’ve been slowing down, taking things a little easier.  It’s probably no surprise that this more hermit lifestyle of mine started when I first got a computer at home and started writing.  It’s a period of my life I’m enjoying but one which has kept me away from many of my friends and whilst I love the chatter of the dawn chorus I do like some chatter myself and must spend more time with friends and family taking in their ‘real-time’ chatter a bit more than the ‘virtual’ chatter of life.

I do want to edit my novels too and keep my blog going..  It’s going to take some will-power to drag me from my nice cosy hibernation out into the dawn chorus of life…

For now, I’ll sit here in my darkened house with the back door open to the gradual lightening of the day, listening to the dawn chorus and send loving thoughts to my friend’s family and to all of my friends and family xxxxxx

Focus woman focus

This morning I wrote a post which I liked and made me smile.  Why didn’t I publish?  I thought it was embarrassing.  I pondered and probed and sought advice then went for a wander into my garden.  You know, that place that I’ve been neglecting since I started blogging in January.  It’s still there.  Dreadfully overgrown since it didn’t get the pruning it wanted in February.  The greenhouse looked sparse since the seeds didn’t get sown in March.

It just so happened that yesterday I bought a few plants which are now in the greenhouse and I did a bit of sorting.

On the way back I noticed the white lilac flowers are nearly over and the pink lilac flowers smelt so wonderful.  The violets, grape hyacinths and snakes head fritillaries are no longer yet the bluebells are looking resplendent.

Sometimes when we focus on one part of our lives we may neglect another.  It’s all about balance.

This isn’t the post it nearly was a few hours ago.  That one may, one day, get published in a funny book about how a larger woman copes in her 50’s.. one day… in about 10 years time.

For now I’ll focus on my garden and getting fitter.  I have a yoga class today I am looking forward to and I need to find some other plants for my greenhouse.  Focus woman focus!

 What do you need to focus on this day, week, month or even year?

#AtoZchallenge reflections

April AtoZ blogging challenge 2012 reflections

April came and went in a blink of an eye

Blogging became my life, my world, my everything

Commenting, commenting commenting please please do, Ooh, I popped by and forgot to let you know, shame on me

Daily routine went out the window

Easiest task?  Some wrote themselves

Felt love and hate about April AtoZ 2012, more love than hate

Going to do it again?  Never. Not really, well, we’ll see, maybe.. hmm…

Highlights-seeing my writing prompts being used by others & hurdles-trying to comment, enough said…

I am a robot!

Jewels in the crown-those that kept going when they weren’t able to by roping in friends and family, well done you

Knowledge gained, I learnt lots about writing and flash fiction and all sorts of things, it was like flicking through an encyclopaedia

Lee, what would we do without Lee

Mornings spent hoping my blog had miraculously appeared at 00:01each day, it did!

N eventually.. wrote itself and was much loved

‘O idea what possessed me to sign up, never doing it again (hmm.. see g)

Posts that especially moved or impressed me – there were a number, I should have kept a list, those that managed a triple AtoZ were astonishing.  Drat, I should have done an A2Z of Olympics.. how did I miss that one? (britain’s gone Olympics mad)

Quasi is how I felt during the AtoZchallenge

Ruled my life for a month, that’s what April AtoZchallenge 2012 did

Scheduling was a lifesaver when I was ill and took a holiday (not together), I know, how did I have time?  Pre-scheduling was the key, a fantastic invention

Themes, I kept forgetting to say what my theme was, I did like the themes

Underestimating how long it takes to read and comment on blogs, I kept doing that

Verisimilitude, any excuse to repeat that word (very pleased I finished)

Wisdom to pass on, with all the wisdom out there? What can I offer? I’ll need to ponder that one

x-rated posts made me pink

You and me, we’re blogging friends now, yes?

Zany