Tuesday, June 29, 2021

Wake Me Up Before You Go Go

...Was the cry as we spent the third or fourth solid 12 hour day packing and transporting our stuff to the new house we are renting. I was literally swaying back and forth, side to side. We had had about 4 hours sleep for goodness knows how many consecutive nights running. No time to eat. Being in the kitchen with boxes towering over me while my other half transported things from other parts of the house, was definitely overwhelming. I could not move to pack more even if I tried.  I escaped upstairs and, yep you guessed it, packed something else! We grabbed whatever snack we could. The previous week, I only sat to eat my tea. It was all work, work, work, pack pack pack, audition, pack etc. This week, even this so-called Duracell Bunny is dead on her feet! I would say, ‘if I didn’t see another box in my life it would be too soon’, but I can’t because we are still absolutely surrounded by stuff. Please let me fall into a ‘Midsummer Night’s Dream’ and someone wake me up when it’s done! Ha ha. In other news, I’m off to the theatre tonight. Yep, an actual IN PERSON LIVE play! It’s been so long since us thesps have been allowed ‘’home’’.

Till next time,

A Real Northern Hermia x

Monday, June 14, 2021

A Midsummer Letch!

 A few days back I thought that I would pop for a breather among the grass and trees. Just soak in a bit of peace among the chaos of moving house. I was looking forward to listening to the birds (the feathered kind by the way) in the sunshine. Could I do that? No. Enter Mr Letch. ‘’Hello darling. Hello? Hello? Are you here to see me?’’, Letchy repeated over and over. I nearly left the little park, but then I thought, no, why should I? I opened my mouth and asked him to leave me alone. I do get absolutely sick of letchy men! And before some of you say, ‘not every man’, of course not every man but in normal pre pandemic times, there hasn’t been a day when I haven’t endured, letchy harassment and my female identifying friends say the same. I cannot remember a time that I haven’t experienced anxiety while walking home after dark, wherever I was living at the time. We, as women, were and are preconditioned to almost accept that we are not safe walking around alone, from being young girls and teenagers. I don’t know a single woman who doesn’t hold their keys in their knuckles while walking home in the evening. Even at 4pm in winter! We are over half of the population, and yet this has and is allowed to continue.

I have been kerb crawled, followed, surrounded by groups of men while walking to my bus stop at 5pm, had my boobs grabbed by randoms who just think that it is their right. I have been sexually assaulted by someone in a position of power when I was 20. I have even been beaten up and left with a broken nose because I wasn’t interested in accepting a man’s advances. A man who I would find sitting on my bed in the shared house that I was living in at the time. A man who would just walk into my room, a man who would not stop trying to touch me wherever in the house we happened to be. The latter did go to court, and I found out from someone else that a colleague of his had ripped this man’s beard off because they were sick of his lecherous ways towards their female colleagues. I have to admit to being slightly pleased about that news. Violence isn’t right, but this man had been getting away with horrendous behaviour for too long. I was 22.  And this is just a short list of what I have experienced. Anyway, I digress. Why was this allowed to happen in the first place? Why are we as a society allowing this to continue?

So there you have it. A serious blog from me this time. Hope you won’t bee too disappointed that I haven’t written in my usual tongue in cheek style!  Right, I am off to get some quotes from removal companies, and yes, I am still surrounded by boxes. How is it that two women without children, have so much stuff?!

Until next time,

A Real Northern Hermia x

Monday, June 7, 2021

It's One Big Trip, Maaaaan!


I’m so physically exhausted with house sorting ready to move that you would have thought that my brain would be too exhausted to dream, but no!

Last night’s dream involved puppies (a sandy coloured female and two black and white, in case you are interested) and a round light which looked like my ring light, but wasn’t, flashing every time the house phone rang. Asda had taken over from EE and the Wi-Fi signal boosters were no longer going to be offered but customers still had to pay the same rate. Anyway, I digress.  I seemed to be living at my parent’s (family home) but not as I know it, and spent a lot of time in the bathroom cleaning the tiny puppies. Apparently I was working as some kind of dog sitter. My current partner was with me helping to clean them. Although she seemed to think that Timotei shampoo was appropriate?? Ha ha (in reality she is a huge dog lover by the way so would never do this). I seemed to be my adult self, but my adult brother had reverted to his teenage self and had a knack for walking into the bathroom without knocking. Apparently, Mum had gone out to a union meeting and now some aliens had invaded the picket line! I mean seriously, where does my brain go?!

Is it just me or have people become moanier lately? Or maybe I am being moany myself, moaning about them being moany?! Honestly, people trying to help those who may need it, and others outside of the equation, moaning. Well as one of my favourite roles, Lisa, in Up the Bunting, would say, ‘’let it go. Let it go’’!

As I type this, for some reason I have the song, ‘’Happy’’, spinning around my mind. I haven’t listened to it or heard it for a long time. Physically, you’ll still find me under packing boxes, but as for my brain, I couldn’t tell you!

Until next time!

Love,

A Real Northern Hermia. x

P.S. Just in case you were wondering, yes, I did make that gluten free fried chicken! :) 



Here is my gluten free fried chicken! :) 

How my dream seemed!






Tuesday, June 1, 2021

Halo by Name, Halo by Nature!


And if you believe that, you’ll believe anything!

I have got it into my head to make gluten free style Southern Fried Chicken. Mainly because my partner is obsessed with a certain high street takeaway and because I cannot eat it due to being (sadly) gluten free!

Let me explain. We have been watching a lot of Canadian series set on horse ranches and they always seem to be eating butter milk fried chicken. Then yesterday, we spent the day sorting their hoarding hoard as I call it, and in all of the clutter was an unused ‘Halo Health Fryer’.. Unsure whether it works, but I tested the electrics and its all go! So, guess what we will be eating tonight for tea? And yes, my readers, it is tea. I am The Real Northern Hermia so it is therefore: breakfast, dinner, tea, supper!

As I type this, we have thankfully said goodbye to Mayvember and hello to June! Finally we are able to socialise a little more and for the first time in 18 months, I saw my eldest niece a few days ago! It was brilliant. Surrounded by friends, she came with my sister and my younger niece and nephew to see me at a picnic! It was absolutely brilliant! Family time at last! They say that you learn something new every day, and as I paddled with my nine year old nephew, I learnt all the countries from the smallest to the largest across the world, the population sizes too!

Right, I must go to speak to the baby dinosaurs now!

Have a sunny week!

Love, a Real Northern Hermia! x

 

Oh, Marlene..

Marlene Dietrich said, 'I do not think we have a right to happiness. If happiness happens, say thanks'. As much as I love you, I tot...