Janey had an idea what Sid's present for her might be.

Yesterday I got two gifts. One was the correct link to my redbubble page http://www.redbubble.com/people/annemac curtesy of the techno savvy Marion Ryan (thanks Marion!) and the other was the gift of a colleague who rang to confirm she had just plucked up the courage to ask a prospective client for five months work. Her enthusiasm made me smile for the rest of the day, and with both gifts I didnt even leave the house.

However, like most people, these are few and far between and I still have without doubt, the ugliest candle holder in black metal that I got from a well meaning husband last year. I havent the heart to throw it out, I would'nt be bad enough to give it to someone and I know that as congruence and integrity are major components of a professional life coach, them I am doomed to the big hot oven if I dont do something.

So, in a damage limitation excercise I am trying to make sure it dosent happen this year. By writing a list of possibles, some costing money, some none (like the "clean mam's car" voucher I asked the ten year old for in November, its still manky), but all of which I will use of find useful.

Most important, I will do this without judgement.

My first present to my husband who was a fisherman out in all weathers at the time was......a glass bowl with floating candles in it. He stuck a few oranges in it and used the box for loose change.

My second was a silver candle stick.

My third was a suade coat that looked like something out of Only Fools and Horses. I wore it for a long time.

He started his own business several years ago as a builder. That year I bought him a DKNY watch.

This year for our anniversary also in November, I bought him a silver acorn shaped antique nutcracker. I am sure it can be used.

So when my list is done and I have handpicked all my possible presents its becoming obvious that I may not have the monopoly on crap presents.

This year I was thinking of getting him a "Build Your Own Boat" set....

Sid loved the comforting strains of the violin.

My brother in law plays the violin. It sounds like he's cleaning it.

Tommorow both the men in my life are travelling across the Irish Sea on board the Ulyesses (dont laugh!) then on to Old Trafford to watch Man Utd. play.

Yahoooooo! For two whole days there will be no massive amounts of detailed information about WWE from the younger, (I feel I know the Undertaker, John Cena, Batista and Eddie Gerrerro intimately) or the finer points of the long range weather forecast from the elder ("she's giving it windy for the next four days").

So myself and my teeange daughter can eat no meat, no potatoes and watch no documentaries about fishing for lobsters in the snow or grand slam sweaty men in tights fighting it out for a rubber belt.

And there will be no smoke. No sneaky "I just put it out before you came in" smoke, no "my pocket is about to go on fire" singey smoke, and no "I swear I didnt smoke in the bathroom" which has no bloody windows!!!!

I hope that when the much longed for son is gone, and the much romanced husband is far away, the reasons why these are the top men in my life will become blaringly obvious, and I will focus on other aspects of having a clean, tidy, quiet, peaceful house.

In the meantime I will try not to look at the tins of paint in the hall (promise of painting it before Christmas), the dustcoats under the stairs and the ladders inside the front door. It will be me, Sinead and a large bottle of Fabreze!

Writing was always prefarable to killing someone.

Over the last twenty years I have read every kind of self help book I could lay my hands on, some I loved (Women Who Run with the Wolves, Tuesdays with Morrie, All the Julia Cameron and Robin Norwood Women Who Love Too Much) and some I just dont get so have bought them and left them somewhere just out of reach and almost out of sight. (Power of Now...just cant get it). I had to read Ulysses when I was in college and lost several years of my hedonistic twenties in the process. Fair balls to James Joyce, he published in France so I presume they thought it was some kind of quaint folk oirish dialect and we all ate kidneys for breakfast and had very long soliloquys about bedposts.

So given that the last year of my life has been largely devoted to my twin passions of writing and painting, I have decided to read only stuff that A, I can follow, and B makes me want to read more. So I LOVE Brick Lane by Monica Ali, The Shipping News by Annie Proulx and The Kite Runner and A Thousand Spendid Suns by Khaled Hosseni.

So having written the novel and finding an agent that was a real person who then lost it and then couldnt find a home for it (dont ask, see earlier post!) I decided that I would continute to be professional and proactive about getting it published.

Dear Sweet Jesus was I naive??

I can either donate a lung and pay a self publishing house who will wreck my head with typeface and fonts, all the time reassuring me that any mistakes in the finished product are indeed my responsiblity, or put my ego in my arse pocket and print out many many copies of the first few chapters and post them to agents who will not read them but send me back a lovely little rejection slip.

Unless, that is, I have murdered someone and boiled their liver to be fed to Pigeons in Regents Park, lived a double life as a high class hooker and a mother of two speicalizing in making bread and imposing pain whilst simultaneously singing Danny Boy, or fess up to the fact that I was, in fact, the feet in Michael Flatley's Riverdance, with his body superimposed on top of mine.

So I was thinking, what if I made up some amazing background and name, sent the same chapters out to several publishers and see what would happen? How ethical would it be? Or would it be good fun to see the response?

Of course, I would probably have to invest in some cooking pots , a leather pinny ( size large) or a pair of good stout Irish dancing shoes (can still do a passable hornpipe if pushed).

So watch this space for the first novel by Shiela O'Breatheheavy, "My life as a pair of sweaty loafers!"

Oliver Plunkett is alive and well!

When I was a child, we were brought to visit the head of Saint Oliver Plunkett in a church in Drogheda, encased in a glass case, burned black and looking remarkably like my uncle Sean. This was after Irish dancing, long before Riverdance and usually before a visit to a smelling damp antique shop with a granny long on detail and very short on patience.

A famous saying of our mothers was, I kid you not, "I'll hang, draw and qaurter yez!" a direct reference to the martyrs down fall in Tyburn in England in the year, 1681, July 1st. Bless her she could be obtuse at times.

A part of the display was also the door of the prison in which he was held, with a small opening at the bottom where food was delivered, and if you knelt down on ten year old freezing knees you could never see inside no matter what angle your eyes chose.

I know now that there is a touch of Oliver Plunkett in us all. None more than at this minute as I type this waiting for the cat to come in and it is 2.45am in the morning here in Ireland. Its not that I dont trust who she is out with, nor do I care if she is taking drugs in a laneway with some skanger cats. Its that there are four kittens in a box in the sitting room, four weeks old and shortly going to look for feeding.

I never realised that the comforts of double glazing would be far out weighed by the lack of a cat flap! The dog has that look that says "dont ask!"

Rejection

A few months ago, I sent my fantastic second novel to an agent for review. She sounded happy and enthusiastic on the phone. "Great Stuff" I thought, and printed and posted my precious chapters off in the post in the rain with a song in my heart.

Some weeks passed.

No word.

Sent an email.

"Sorry for the delay, will get back to you over weekend" said the agent.

Great stuff.

More weeks passed. My 45th birthday came and went.

No word.

Sent an email with a cheery tone, asking if I was about to break into the big time or should I take a christmas job in Tescos.

"Sorry for the delay, found envelope, but cant find the chapters, would you mind emailing them?" asked the agent.

"No worries, chapters attached"

No word.

"Cant open the attachment, can you send them in the body of an email?"

"No worries, here you go".

All landed safely and I spent the last weekend knowing at least my words got through.

Guess what??????

She found it, she read it, she couldnt find a home for it.

"Great writing, not sure where it would find a home, best of luck with your career"

Ho Hum.

Taking comfort in the fact that only writers get rejections and she didnt puncture my granny's wheelchair I did the only decent thing and started a new one....

When I am a hugely successful published authour I will look back on these days and smile.
Not just now, but soon............

Where did they all go?

This is not the first time I have set up and posted a blog. I have set up several cleverly titled, smartly written witty ditties, then saved and lost them in spectacular fashion!

They are in cyberspace somewhere with several chapters of my current novel (saved under a date, in a file, god knows where) several memberships of fabulous sites gaurenteed to make me a fabulous income writing, all from the comfort of my own home and the first branches of a very scraggy family tree. Not to mention a great e-book called "dressing up for sex" !

I start them all, sign up for everything and save stuff in places only I would know where it is. That is usually the last I see of them!

My last blog had a nifty little post called Walking Women, based on a true observation of women powerwalking past my window, whilst I was reading the paper and drinking tea.

I was reminded of it yesterday when fifty women powered past on a charity walk to raise money for breast cancer, some demanding cups of tea, others hard cash and one even demanded a group a photograph, (this is a local village in Ireland after all).

They raised a ball of cash, the photo is a bit shaky but the blog I was reminded of is gone forever.

So here it is. My new one, my latest and the one I promise to keep going, mainly because my german friend Doris Stahl has told me she will bully me every day until I do. So I am/will.
Trusting that in the process some of my precious ramblings will find their cyberwings and come back to me.
in hope...
anne