The Geordie Fish Van

Every week, a load of Geordie blokes fill a van full of fresh fish from Tynemouth quayside and drive down to Ealing first thing in the morning, sell it and drive all the way back again in a day. Finally, after years of them telling me, "I can't believe ye've not gorra freeza!" I got one, a free one from my friend Mark. So I bought a freezer pack of fish from the lads, enough to last three months at two meals a week.

We got to talking about growing veg as Alan stacked the shelves for me. I told him that I wanted the rest of the space for freezing raspberries from the garden to last me through winter. He could see the size of my garden (small) and he couldn't believe why I'd bother when I could get down the Asda and buy frozen ones.
"A lot of people in London grow their own vegetables, don't they!" said Alan the fish man incredulously. His question was, "Why make work when you don't have to?"

So I thought about it. It's the theory that time saving devices make your life better. Paving over your garden makes it easier to maintain. Driving to the shops is faster than walking. Using a food processor to mix your cupcakes makes it simpler. Buying cupcakes makes it even better. It's why Aunt Bessie's frozen mashed potato sells by the tonne from the freezer cabinets of British supermarkets. Why bother to grow your own potatoes, dig them up, wash them, boil them and mash them?

It's all very well for me, with no kids to feed, clothe, wash and supervise. There are probably millions of people who must bless Aunt Bessie, whoever she is or which ever corporation invented her brand identity, for charging several thousand percent on top of the price of a potato, in exchange for taking half an hour off the preparation time.

What's with the Londoners, some of the busiest people on the planet, the ones who've been measued walking 10% faster than anywhere else in the UK, trying to give themselves more work by cultivating vegetables in our own tiny plots? Well, it's a question of what we're saving the time and the labour for. So we can sit on the sofa and watch more television? So we can spend more time working? It's the myth that digging gardens, mowing lawns, peeling potatoes and making our own cupcakes is unfulfilling work. When really it's a lovely way to pass the time, and it keeps us a little bit fitter than we would otherwise be.

A raspeberry from my garden will always taste better than a frozen one from Asda, a plot of moss filled, clumpy grass will always look better than a paved back yard, and mashing your own home grown potatoes is better exercise than lifting weights at an overpriced, sweaty gym. Efficiency is not the way to a happy life.

This week, resist the ready meal. If you haven't grown your own, buy potatoes that still have mud on them (they are loads cheaper too), give them a scrub, boil them and mash them. (I like some salt, pepper, skimmed milk and benecol spread squashed into mine.) See how much better they taste. They go brilliantly with haddock driven all the way down from Tynemouth.

Finally: it's time to mention yoga

I've resisted this long, but it's time to share. For the last 14 years I've been practising yoga and I qualified to teach BKS Iyengar's method in 2003. It's not all soft and fluffy; passing the assessments was probably the hardest work I've done. Four years of practise before you're allowed on the training course, and at least two years to get through. The Iyengar approach is rigorous, and uses equipment to help all students do the extensions correctly, but all yoga is yoga. If you are going to do downward facing dog, it's the same in every class you do; it's just that some methods hold the postures for less time and aren't so fussy about whether or not you try your hardest to get it absolutely right. Some go straight from posture to another in a more flowing style. In Iyengar's method, teachers are expected to help students to correct mistakes. Once they're good, then they can flow.

Around the globe some yoga teachers do something a little bit different and name it after themselves, trademark it and see if they can earn a stack of cash. That's not particularly yogic, not according to Patanjali who wrote down the rules over 2000 years ago. (BKS Iyengar says he does Patanjali's hatha yoga, it's just that it's simpler to call it Iyengar so students know what to expect.)

What's yoga anyway? Bouncing about in lycra showing how bendy you are? The definition I like best is that yoga is the quietening of the mind to achieve stillness. Showing your muscles and standing on your head in public isn't yoga, it's just showing off. But if you do go to a class with a decent teacher, concentrate hard on doing your best and what each part of your body is up to (ignoring the others in the room) you'll come out feeling brilliant, with a calm head and a spring in your step.

That's why I'm recommending that you give it a try. It'll help you to think clearly, put things in perspective and keep your body parts functioning smoothly. Since I've practised yoga I've been able to concentrate better while I'm working and I've got rid of the lower back pain I always had from sitting at a desk. (Except the time Nick dreamed he was playing football and kneed me in the lumbar spine.) I've a long way to go before I quieten my mind enough to achieve stillness, but it happens more often than it used to, which was never.

Go here to find yourself a local class: www.iyengar.org.uk. If you're in Ealing, get in touch.

Tye Die For

Is it a brain scan? Is it an aura? No, it's my first go at tie dying a t-shirt since I was about seven years old (when I didn't tie the knots tight enough so the result was all a bit disappointing).
Yes, in answer to Alastair Creamer*'s queston on Wednesday evening, I am single handedly trying to bring back tie-dying as a fashion statement. My pink and lilac hoodie is a wonder to behold, in my eyes anyway.

So far, in my quest to do something different on a Tuesday, this one's been up there with the most satisfying, along with picking 14lb of plums and making fruit leathers (see earlier).
All it takes is two packets of Dylon washing machine dye (but choose your colours carefully my friends), 500g of salt dying session (29p for 750g at Tesco Metro is the cheapest I've found yet), a t-shirt, some string and a washing machine.

For t-shirts, I'm using Anvil 100% organic cotton from PAG. I bought the huge reel of hemp string from Newbury Street in Boston in 2002. I knew it could come in handy one day.

*www.creamerandlloyd.com/about

The wrong name

I picked up a brilliant little book this week, but I nearly walked right past it. It was only when I spotted in very small red letters "Mandy Wheeler", fellow 26 member and someone I knew years back when we made a radio programme for LBC, that I got a little bit interested.
And here's the problem. It's called "Tell an Outrageous Lie". I don't like to do that, so I couldn't see any need for a book that encouraged me.
Open it up, clarity follows.

This is a book full of ideas, to inspire you in your writing and thinking. It's to help you to explore situations you might not have thought of for yourself. In September I'm going to be running two creative writing workshops, just little ones, in a beautiful place called the Garden Studio. It's in Ealing, the Queen of the Suburbs. I'll be taking my copy of Tell an Outrageous Lie with me, and I'll recommend it to everyone who turns up.

You really have to see it to appreciate it, because it's a visual little beauty. Each phrase is matched with an illustration or a photograph to set its mood. But here's an example. If you're stuck for inspiration, half way through a story or a poem or a script or just a letter to your gran, open the book at a random page and you might find, "an abandoned handbag" or "when the dust settles".

It's so simple it seems obvious, like so many ace ideas. It's the kind of thing we think could all have written - but we didn't, did we, dammit? Have it handy for when your natural creative tank runs dry. It's like inspirational Opal Fruits. And you don't have to tell a lie if you don't want to.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Tell-Outrageous-Lie-Mandy-Wheeler/dp/1905736460/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1274220249&sr=8-1

Normal Service Resumes

Two things happened this week. We got the planes back over Ealing and the yoga email scam did another round. (Just so you know, I do teach yoga, qualified in 2003 in the Iyengar method, so that's how they find me). I'm posting this one from a man who claims to be called Paul Martin and claims to be Australian. See if you can spot where he goes wrong...
Scammers are doing their best to target people they think are going to be trusting and honest (but neglecting to recall that yoga teachers are working towards point 4) in his list...) Read on and please feel free to be slightly outraged at the audacity of these people.



Greetings,

I hope this email meets you in good health and spirits. I'm coming with My wife to the UK for a 2 weeks and 4 days holiday with 4 of my Bulgarian Friends.I m actually from Australia. As part of our Vacation Arrangement, we would need classes in yoga retreat. We are looking for a Yoga teacher/instructor who will assist us with some few excises steps as well as give us a fun choreography which both i and My friends will enjoy. Please let me have the types of Yoga you teach.

Date of Arrival: 26th OF June 2010
Date for Lessons:28th of June 2010 to 13th of July 2010.

We would need 2 to 3 hours of lessons ( 4 days a week) for 2 weeks.
Time of lessons:The morning class will be at 8am (tbc) and the evening class at
5.30pm (tbc).

I will send to you my credit card details for a deposit for you to hold the date for us. I hope you have a credit card facility? So confirm this and provide me with your

Your Full Name:..........
Contact address:.................
Phone/mobile number(s) :.............. .
Cost/deposit required...................

Please kindly confirm the reservation for the above dates so that we can process with the total cost of 2 weeks.

This goal is achieved by maintaining our natural condition of:
1) A body of optimum health and strength
2) Senses under total control
3) A mind well disciplined, clear and calm
4) An intellect as sharp as a razor
5) A will as strong and pliable as steel
6) A heart full of unconditional love & compassion
7) An ego as pure as crystal
8) A life filled with Supreme Peace and Joy.

Best Regards


Paul.

Beautiful Things

In 2007 I signed up for Cash in the Attic, even though I lived in a ground floor flat. It was on BBC1 again today, and will be repeated for ever and ever, I expect. I hadn't really thought it through at the time; it just seemed like a good idea to ring them up. Alastair commented that he thought I had more stuff than any other home he'd visited. (And that was after I'd done several days of tidying up.)

When friends come to visit our place, they often go completely quiet; it's because there's so much to look at. We have too many things, most of which - I hereby confess - are mine.

On 15th and 16th May we're having our own flea market. I can't be bothered to get up at 4 to be at a car boot fair at 5 ready for the gates opening at 6 and the shoppers turning up at 7. Hell, complete total hell. And it might rain.
These two particular bottles won't be for sale. They will stay on the bookshelf, just being gorgeous. The ink came from Scotland, via eBay. I love it for the art deco hand drawn design. The copper sulphate powder came from Avignon. I love it for the DANGEREUX label on the bottom.

So even though I am aiming to berid myself of 50% of my possessions this year, the ink and the copper sulphate will be staying. If you feel the need to surround yourself with stuff, at the very least make it stuff that you love. Keep it because it appeals to you, not because everyone else has one. To be surrounded by beautiful things - whether it's a view of the hills, or your back garden, paintings, ornaments, plants or pure nothingness - is a luxury that makes life worth the bother. Remembering to stop and look at them is entirely up to us. Seeing the beauty in unusual things (not everyone admires my bottle of copper sulphate) is one of the extra added bonuses that life throws in for nowt, but that we're sometimes too busy to collect.

If you're looking for something new to do this week, something free and new, switch on your beauty detectors. Photograph your spottings and share them. If you want to come to my flea market, get in touch. Or join in here: http://www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/event.php?eid=105933532763277

Ethical Business: How to do it right

I'm renting out my mother's house to two very lovely people. I've got my gas and electricity safety certificates, and was chasing about trying to get an Energy Performance Certificate done. Lots of people who qualified to do the surveys gave it up when houses stopped selling; it had been a huge new market, then suddenly it wasn't. Everyone I called had given up. West Boldon is the kind of place where everyone knows what everyone else is up to, so out of the interconnected Boldon blue, a friend of a friend recommended a man. Yesterday I rang him up and arranged for him to go in and sort it out.
This morning I got an email from him, and here it is.

Hello Sarah,

After our telephone conversation yesterday evening I thought that it sparked a memory and so I checked my records. In August 2008 I supplied an EPC to Colin Lilley for a Home Information Pack for 7 Rectory Green. In theory that EPC is still valid as EPC’s currently are valid for 10 years. Obviously any changes that may have been made to the property and its heating / insulation since then would make it inaccurate. I’ve attached a copy of the 2008 EPC for your information.

Please let me know if you would still like me to go ahead with supplying a new EPC.

Cheers,

Michael

Is it just me, or does that restore your faith in the world? Michael Moffatt could have gone ahead and charged me for a second certificate, but he didn't.
If you do happen to need an EPC, and you're somewhere in the Geordie part of England, look up Michael Moffatt, and if you can't find him, get in touch with me and I'll pass him on. He's made my day.

This week I also read defra's new guidelines for writing green claims in advertising and marketing copy. They've had to tell organisations not to write things like "Does not contain lead" when neither their own products nor their competitors' products do now or ever did contain lead. They've had to explain that is it not right to claim a 50% increase in organically produced ingredients, when the contents have only gone up from 4% to 6%. Mathematically, yes, it's correct. But that doesn't make it right, not when it misleads people into thinking it's a lot when it's not.

It was a pleasure to write for Lush, knowing that they didn't have anything to hide and that no-one would ask me to greenwash any of the statements we made. Generally, Lush is years ahead of guidelines and laws when it comes to their ethics.


It's a shame that the marketing departments of huge organisations think it's acceptable to pull the wool over their customers' eyes with their environmental claims, to see if they can dupe us into believing and buying without checking. Wouldn't it be good if they would change their business practices rather than trying to find ways of disguising them. Wouldn't it be lovely if they adopted Michael Moffatt's standards of business ethics; telling the truth and doing what's best for his customers, even if it means losing some trade.

Duty, deadines, determination and discipline

Deadlines. We deal with them all the time. They approach steadily, never by themselves, and we have to hit them before they crash and get us into trouble. I like to imagine them as like the little green aliens in Space Invaders games. The longer you leave them they faster they approach and the more they proliferate. When you've got someone chasing you, or a meeting report with a date and your initial written beside it, you know what you're dealing with. They want it by Friday, you aim to get it there on Thursday night (or if it's me, more likely Saturday morning because unless I'm given strict guidelines, 4a.m. still counts as Friday night).

What about the projects that don't have set deadlines, the ones you can put off for almost ever? How do you make sure that they ever get finished? At the risk of beginning to sound like a Victorian moralist, last time I wrote about duty and now I'm thinking about discipline.

Now I'm cutting myself loose from my biggest client to do my duty, I'm going to have to set my own goals, impose my own some deadlines then make sure that I want to hit them. We can use time management techniques to sort out which ones to do first, or to delegate or ditch entirely. We can get ourselves into good habits. We all have some of those: I wouldn't dream of going out without brushing my teeth or locking the door; I always recycle everything the council take; I even bring my plastic back from my holidays.

But to make things happen, you really have to want to make them happen. Without the determination, it all fades away. Finishing off books, for example, everything that you have on your "wouldn't it be nice..." list. How do we set and stick to our own deadlines when no-one is chasing us, or won't pay us if it doesn't get finished? Now that all my big projects are going to be like that for a year at least, can I be relied on to chase myself up? What's my incentive to keep shooting down the aliens?

It's not so much about the small stuff with me; I procrastinate on a grand scale. I take on to much big stuff, then stretch myself beyond any reasonable limit, filling my screen up with thumping aliens and buzzing about like a bluebottle trying to knock them all out before they invade. (And if you don't know what it's like to play Space Invaders, go here www.freespaceinvaders.org. Or even if you do.) In the early 1980s, I did get quite good at Space Invaders, up to 14 screens. You do it by keeping a cool head and a sense of perspective and by wasting loads of time getting good at it. Probably a bad example of discipline.

It's a question of deciding what's important. Then getting on with it. I've got my list (see earlier topics) and I'll make myself a future mood board. (Of which more soon.) From May to July I've got to spend time clearing out old projects that I really will never finish, so that they don't weigh me down with guilt.

Talking of which, if you're anywhere near W13, put 15th May in your diary. I'm having a car boot sale, except in my own front room and just for nice people. I'll be making coffee.

Discipline. Yes. Let's impose a little and bring myself back to the point. From May 2010 to April 2011, the year I've given myself to get things done, I need to get things done. There's definitely going to be some room for slacking about faffing and fiddling, because it's in the faffing and fiddling times that you have your best ideas, as long as you've been taking the time to observe, contemplate, consider and plan. And talking of plans, I've got one, but I'll keep it flexible, because all the best plans should adapt to fit the circumstances.

As stated in many other places on paper and in the ether, I plan to have a building where I can run writing workshops and yoga classes and where people can come for a good creative think, and a decent coffee. So let's see how we get along, shall we?

Duty: time for rehabilitation

Duty is underrated. It was pretty popular in the 19th Century, then it went out of favour while we were busy achieving our potential, pursuing our goals and getting in touch with our inner selfishness. As I find myself in a position where I have a bit of duty to do, I've decided that I might as well apreciate the opportunity rather than resent it. That's all very well but one problem with doing your duty is that it can turn out tobe a bit of a drain on your resources. Last year was bonkers. I spent half my life on the train to Sunderland, visiting my mother in hospital (after a series of falls) and rehabilitation homes (where she passed all her tests to show she could look after herself at home - but couldn't), then working with my sister to get her a place in a marvellous care home in York, organising the house move and working out what to do with the contents of an eight-roomed family house. The other half was spent on trains to Poole, down to Lush, the people to whom I've dedicated most of my work life since 1996. With no time in between to do anything but sleep, our house looks like it's been burgled by a gang of monkeys who failed to find the bananas despite looking everywhere.

So here I am, doing my best to be a hard-working creative sort, writing for a living and filling my spare time with suitably mind-expanding projects, then I discover that I've got an old person's life to take care of. No choice really. There's a pile of paperwork to do, the family home to tidy up and rent out, and a never ending list of apparently insignificant items to buy from mail order companies and have delivered to York, because if I don't, I get reminded at least once a week and several other people call me to explain that my mother has told them I've forgotten to buy her important items from mail order. (To be fair, I share this chore with my sister, who also gets the day to day duties.)

So now I've now got two lives to administer (when I'm already somewhat behind with the running of my own), I also discover that I can't fit in a job that regularly takes over evenings and weekends.

Children, start saving up now. When I was 23 I embarked upon a savings scheme; this means that in a couple of weeks time I can reclaim a small pile of cash that will buy me a year off (as long as I only spend money on food and bills). Yes, I ought to save it for when I'm 80 and I retire, but I might not last until then, and besides, I need it now. If you're 23, the moment where you'll have to step in and look after your parents might seem like a long way off, but believe me, your life is over in a flash. So start saving. You'll be able to take a year off work too. I've no idea how I'll get on without a job; I've been working hard to impress people since the age of four.

Tracking back a bit, one of the most difficult parts will be the bit that involves not buying anything. I haven't done that since I was four either.

So anyway, back to duty and where it fits into 4160Tuesdays.

While I've been saving up, I've also been collecting stuff, way too much of it. I've got stuff to paint pictures, to make clothes, to listen to, to watch, to make jewellery, to write with, to write books in, to write letters on, to read, to practise yoga with, to wear, to scent myself with, to decorate myself, to burn, to plant and just to look at and admire. I've got about twice as much of all of this stuff as I've got space for. So as well as getting rid of it - by eBay, freecycle, charity shops and generally using it up and wearing it out - I'll be pulling my socks up and doing things I've been meaning to do for ages. (And lots more yoga or I'll go bananas.)

My plan is to report here regularly.. Until 30th April I'm still working for Lush. (The boss has kindly said that once I feel that my duty is done I can call him and go back there, which makes the leap less frightening. Say what you like about safely nets; I think that they make you more adventurous.) After that, when I've handed over editorship of my precious Lush Times to the admirable Harry Blamire, it's six months tying up loose ands and six months unravelling a few beginnings.

For the 52 Tuesdays from May '10 to April '11 I'll see if I can create a new system, set up a way to earn a living at the same time as doing my duty as a daughter. There are lots of us in this boat; how do we earn a living while we run around after our parents? A generation ago, when one half of most partnerships didn't work, it wasn't such a problem. Your mum looked after your gran (or both grans). Now we both have to earn a living, what's supposed to happen? I'm starting to find out.

Just as working mothers hire nannies to look after the kids, working children hire carers to deal with their parents. These are new problems, and employers haven't got the rules in place to deal with them yet. You can't take a morning off to take your mother to the hospital. My sister and I are both self-employed with working partners. How else would we be able to do this?

Duty. It's got to be done. But the mortgage has to be paid. Not everyone can take time off to sort these things out and I thank my dear departed dad for bossing me into saving at an early age. He knew a thing or two about duty. If he hadn't saved up from the age of 23, my mother wouldn't have been able to live in the beautiful place she does now. I'll be letting you know how it works out.

(By the way, if you're looking for a place to live when you're old, get your name down on the list for Lamel Beeches, the Joseph Rowntree Housing Trust home in York. Joanne and the team are the world's best. Bar none.)

How My Dad Invented Snowboarding in 1941

Back up north, I've been exploring the house my family has lived in since 1971. It's a generously sized1960s box, not particularly beautiful, not historically significant and, as it's a good 25 minute walk from the Metro station, not on any estate agent's list of desirable residences. But it's full of my past, boxes of 35mm slides, mountains of theatre programmes, exam certificates, sheet music, vinyl, paintings, a record of our trips out, summer holidays and school years. But my favourite thing is a book my dad wrote about his early years, when he in the country during the war. He was a very safe, cautious, over-protective man when I knew him. When I read his recollections, I was surprised he survived past 16, considering the stuff he got up to. It's fascinating to see him in a different light; it's hard to imagine how the adventurous 13 year old Alan grew up to be a building society manager. Anyway, in the spirit of exploring our recent history, and with the Winter Olympics playing in the background, I give you Teesdale winter sports 1941.

After one night back, George and I and an older boy from our school took a borrowed sledge, there being a lot of snow in 1941, to the hill near the log cabin. At the foot of the hill was a line of small trees and bushes about fifty yards below us. George would have first ‘go’. We tried to get him to lie head first so that he could steer with his feet but he would sit upright, feet first. What happened next was over in a flash. The sledge was so sleek and well made, its steel runners so smooth, there was a ‘swoosh’ and we saw this dark blur below us shoot out from the bottom of the hill straight into a tree. A loud cry went up to find George in agony with his leg, the sledge smashed in at the front. I never got a ride on that sledge.

We pulled George back to the farm. The local doctor had the leg rubbed with liniment, George’s mother took him home a few days later and his leg was found to be fractured. He was off the rest of that term and although he returned for the summer term he never came back to the farm and I spent the rest of the time there on my own, including the two winter terms.

After the episode with the sledge I did no more sledging but I obtained a piece of wood from the side of an old barrel about six or seven feet high. I used this as a kind of snowboard. On the gentler slopes I would stand on it with my right leg and push myself along with the left. After a while I was able to balance on it with both feet and to travel long distances. The bottom of the wood got smoother and smoother until it ran away by merely putting it on ground with the slightest gradient. I developed a game in which the snowboard and I gathered speed and then went over a prepared mound where we rose into the air until it fell away, and I presumably fell into the snow.

And the rest is history. This week's recommendation is this. Write your recollections now, because in 70 years' time, your kids won't believe what you were allowed to get up to, before Health & Safety stepped in and stopped it.