fudge it

i'm thinking of setting up a little shop on etsy, selling phone charms and possibly scoubidous (message to the i/o, expect a consignment very soon!).

what do you think?

(in the meantime, you can always play on the colour picker thingy.)

bushra | permalink | |

of course. all this talk about the clover ad reminds me of the noise we had with those three adverts with the pandas.

bushra | permalink | |

C: look. they're coming for you bushra.

i turn to see security walking past and almost jump out of my seat.

C: god, it's so obvious you're from birmingham!

bushra | permalink | |

A: G has suggested a secret santa.
D2: pfft.
A: C said she'd do it so long as she didn't have to buy bushra a present.
me: what?!
C: look bushra, it's not that i don't like you, it's just that i'm more likely to get you something from BhS, as opposed to Armani, or something.
me: Armani?! what?
D: failing that she would have bought you a packet of Benson and Hedges and then asked for them back...
C: the trouble is bushra you're just too bling for us.
me: me? bling?!
C: not in a beyonce kind of way but a black mobiles everywhere kind of way.
A: i'll suggest to G that we're all very keen on this secret santa idea if she buys all the presents.

my last secret santa present was a contact lens case thing with a small bottle for solution. which is now lost. but paperchase have got a really cool stripy version, you know, just in case. i like paperchase. sometimes i just go in there to look at the cool stuff. i saw these pet shop toy stickers for labmonkie, and grow your own snow for scooterdeb. niece #2 and i have to go into leeds tomorrow, and we're going to go crazy.

me: and just so you know, BhS are doing some cool lighting that i was going to pick up later. so there.
C: they do actually.
me: and all that Kelly Hoppen stuff.
C: really?
me: oh yes.

not that i've had a look at any of it, but don't tell C that.

bushra | permalink | |

me: do you know, why is it that everyone else who wears a long woolly scarf looks cool, but i look like i've got a neck brace on?
D2: ah, that's because you do.
me: that's great. just great.

bushra | permalink | |

and we all. love. clover. all over this laaaaaaaaaand.

now then. have you seen the advert? the clover advert? the one with the people crying? go look it up on you tube or something.

J: You might have thought the medical profession might have considered the before/after count of surgical instruments before people started accidentally going home with a saw in their lung, innit. Listen, Bushra. I've been meaning to ask you about this. Why are all those people so upset in the Clover advertisement on TV?
me: I don't know! Why? I was hoping you might know the answer. There's something about the black guy crying over his corn on the cob that says 'stereotype'.
J: You know what? I'm going to contact Clover and ask them why their advertisement depicts their consumers as such terribly unhappy people.
J: I'll tell you what makes me laugh. Those Iceland advertisements with Kerry Katona, the talking potato. You know the bits where they show all these tables laid out with this Iceland food. It looks exactly like when that withered geriatric stick insect scatology fetishist Gillian McKeith introduces those great big fat people to a week's worth of their normal diet all in one go. ie: it's not exactly appetising.

later:

J: Well, I consulted Dairy Crest about the Clover advertisement. Mrs Nock has provided me with this answer. Now I feel more confused than ever.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: 22-Nov-2006 11:51
Subject: Reference: Clover Advert (084042)

Good morning,

Thank you for contacting us about our Clover advert.

The people on the advert are not crying out of sadness but are crying out of happiness as they all love eating Clover.

We do appreciate you taking the trouble to contact us. I hope this resolves any confusion between why the people are crying and Clover spread.


Kind regards

Sue Nock (Mrs)
Consumer Care Advisor

bushra | permalink | |

office IM.

A sits all the way on the other side of the office. well, not all the way over there, he's just over there.

blue = IM conversation.

A: I've booked my holiday
me: er, whatever!
A: I am going to south africa for 3 weeks
me: stop it!
A: in march
A: booked my ticket already
me: hey, i've got A bragging about his holiday to south africa in march next year. why is he telling me this?
D2: say, that's funny, you're going on holiday to south africa in march next year as well.
me: wait. i know:
me: it's funny. D2 said he's off to south africa in march next year as well. also for three weeks!
D2: hey!
A: really
A: where about
A: I am going to Jo'burg and then cape town then durban then back to jo'burg
me: let me check with D2
me: he says he's doing jo'burg, durban, then jo'burg. he didn't fancy cape town.
me: he says he's bagging the window seat on the plane
A: I am flying business class
me: that's nice. D2 says he's going first class. but i think he's making that up.
me: he also says he's getting me my iPod from duty free. what are you gonna get for me?

at this point A arrives at my desk.

our office person A: did you fall for it?
me: look at your face!
A: i, er, didn't, well no.
me: you so did! they did try and stop me, but didn't try hard enough!
A: so anyway, yes, i've booked my holiday...

bushra | permalink | |

nephew #1.

i don't know where to start. last week the nephews whined that i had neglected them, so i offered to take them off sister #2's hands. last sunday they came around for lunch and got to watch the little mermaid. nephew #3 had a bit of an, er accident so i walked him home with nephew #2, who had given up (the next day he asked me if they had kissed at the end of the film, though). on my return nephew #1 whined how he wanted to go home, and i kept saying he couldn't. and then he'd whine some more and when i gave in and said 'go!' he stopped and said 'i don't want to go'. yup. he's that kind of kid.

so anyway. he was a bit touchy again yesterday. sister #2 told me he'd said that he wished that i was dead. at the mention of that he threatened to turn me and sister #2 into garlic bread. sister #2 and i went to leeds today and she repeated a story his teacher told her at the parent's evening on thursday:

'sometimes, they split the classes up, and half the class will go into another classroom, and the other half of that class will come into the other classroom. well, when the time came for the other class to go, nephew #1 got up and went back with them. when the teachers realised he was missing they found him sitting in the reading corner on the carpet. he just kept looking around him and repeating 'my class has disappeared'. the teachers tried to get through to him but he was like, 'my class has disappeared'.

there's also the time he went missing in the supermarket for a couple of hours, and the time sister #2 found him holding the hand of a dummy in m and s and asking 'what's your name?' and there's also the time i spied him all the way over from sister #1's attic window, scooping puddle water into a bottle. so i shouted at him across the killing ground to drop it. which he did, he also jumped back a few metres because he couldn't understand where my voice was coming from. and when i told him to drop the bottle he dropped it and ran. the teachers have arranged for him to have a hearing test, because he sometimes he won't respond to them, but sister #2 and i both know it's because he's a bit of a daydreamer.

bushra | permalink | |

oh my gawd, another phone!

i dropped my KRZR. it has a huge crack in it. it's getting fixed. in the meantime i'm using yet another phone i've just taken ownership of:



more info here.

bushra | permalink | |

something about friday.

me: can you smell toast?
C: what? no.
me: i can smell toast.
C: brain tumour.
me: what?!
C: yeah. smelling things that aren't there. sign of a brain tumour.
me: really? it's funny, the other day i could smell cigarette smoke in my room, but there was no-one smoking around the house.
C: mmm-hmm.

a few minutes later, A arrives back at her desk.

me: can you smell toast?
A: i can smell food?
me: yeah, but can you smell toast?
A: it might be toast.
me: that's all right then.
C: right, tea anyone?
me: yes please. although i'm such a lightweight i haven't finished the last one.

C puts all the mugs down on her desk and puts her hands on her hips.

me: oh my god, it is a brain tumour isn't it?
C: now bushra, calm down.
me: go on then, how long have i got?
C: really. i just remembered i wanted to ask for some advice about watches.
me: oh.

bushra | permalink | |

my most recent office find:

bushra | permalink | |

i was down in birmingham for the day on saturday. an hour or so before i left niece #1 and i escaped for one of our little trips out to the supermarket. it was very sweet. she had a budget of £1 and was torn between a little box of chocolates for herself, or a trolley coin for the mother. i got her the chocolates as a present.

me: this feels weird, doesn't it? we've had a good day haven't we, and we're doing something we used to all the time, so it feels like i've never been away. but then tomorrow, you'll feel like all this was a dream, and you'll think was bushra really here, and did we really go to the shops and stuff?

she didn't respond, but the next day she called me:

'you know that feeling you were talking about? you were right!'

bushra | permalink | |

as i already broke the first rule of nablo pomo by not posting every single day, i'm going to do it again (probably) by posting someone else's words. another email from J. i know, i know, but J has been away for like a long time now, so it's only fair you heard from him. i'm sure everyone wants to know what's on his mind these days:

'So this morning I was lying in the bath listening to Classic FM and the news came on and the headline story was that the outcome of Saddam Hussein's trial is that he has been sentenced to death by hanging (he looked shaken, apparently, well you would wouldn't you) and at the EXACT SAME MOMENT that this was announced I realised who the singer from Razorlight reminds me of; he reminds me of the journalist ROD LIDDELL (sp?), and it occurred to me that although I can't stand Razorlight because their music is so rubbish perhaps the reason I dislike the singer in particular is that he reminds me of Rod Liddell (sp?), who in turn I loathe because he's such a flabby, unattractive slob who looks as if he smells like cheese and onion crisps, a smell which is fine if you are a packet of cheese and onion crisps (mm) but which isn't so good if you're a person, and when I look at Girls Aloud I think that they look as if they'd smell like cheese and onion crisps too. This in turn caused me to think about whether you're fasting at the moment, you know, for that religious thing, and I reckon you are, so if in the daytime you find your mind wandering to thoughts of cheese and onion flavoured crisps and it's making you hungry, just think of Rod Liddell (sp?) and those grubby looking Girls Aloud creatures and I reckon you won't feel hungry anymore.'

bushra | permalink | |

hanging out with S and N at sister #1's.

me: oh my god. you've got vogue?!
N: er, yeah?
me: didn't know you were into your fashion mags!
N: bushra. it's not a fashion mag, it's a style bible.
me: well, excuse me!

and we spent the next couple of hours going mad about shoes and handbags. we came up with an idea. a lot of pakistani families do this 'committee' thing, where for example you get twenty people and for twenty weeks they chip in fifty quid or something. each week a person gets that kitty. or something like that. i've never really paid much attention. anyway. what if you did like a fashion committee! i don't think we know enough people, though.

bushra | permalink | |

office hum.

A: did anyone see those pictures of kirstie alley in the paper this morning?
C: no, why?
me: i did. it looked like a cameraphone picture to me.
A: well. what's happened is she put on all this weight and was almost obese but now she's lost it all.
C: blimey how did she manage that?
me: oh, they've got these slimming drugs over there, haven't they? what was it called again.... crystal meth?
C: now bushra, they might have that in bradford...
me: no seriously! it's all the rage over there!

later.

D1 and A are debating the exact office location of neighbouring office person X.

A: bushra, what colour hair does X have?
me: er, is that a trick question?
A: no really!
me: ok, it's grey.
A: see!
D1: all right all right.
me: why?
A: i'm trying to point out her desk to D1. so if you stood up now, and looked towards the colour printer, she's there, isn't she?
me: (looks) nope.
A: what? (looks) that woman there, with the short grey hair!
me: that's not X. she sits all the way at the other end of the office. and her hair is longer.
A: ...
D1: ...
me: seriously. you two need to up your game if you want to survive in this jungle.

bushra | permalink | |

one of the blogs of note, adopt a microbe, caught my eye yesterday. so i sent the link to an office person i just knew would love it:

D2: Wicked! This is one of those websites that make you sick just by looking at it. One of my old friends from my days on the Gastro unit was helicobacter-pylori!
me: an old friend is one way of putting it.
D2: Well they say that the majority of Endoscopy staff will have picked it up from the patients. So I'm likely to have it or have made antibodies to it!
me: thank god i only worked in a library most of the time.
D2: you've probably got book worms then!
me: ouch.

bushra | permalink | |

sister in law A: you know all those people that hate the Lord of The Rings films? they just haven't given it a chance.

well all right. i finally watched the fellowship on the rings on the tv last night. things that kept putting me off watching prior to yesterday included:

- each film is three hours long! that's nine hours altogether!
- elijah wood
- dozens of people telling me that i should watch it
- the same dozens being the proud owners of lord of the rings pin up calendars
- three hours a film!

it were all right, actually. thank god for the advert breaks, though.

bushra | permalink | |

so i had this idea in my head to get back into posting more frequently by becoming a napblo pomo, where you post every single day in november. whoops. i brought a brummie cold up to bradford.

bushra | permalink | |

and it's hello from J:

I've been meaning to ask you whether you're familiar with Lidget Green Cemetery in Bradford. If so, you might want to check out plot 781, the grave of James Berry, the Victorian hangman who executed 131 people between 1884-91.

uh-huh. sure i am.

bushra | permalink | |

bluetoothing a file from the xda to my nokia. some of the more undesirable devices that were detected included:

It man
Twinkle
Playgirl !
Dave Technique Man

why? why would you call your phone that?

bushra | permalink | |

i was on my way to sister #1's when a bunch of witches crossed my path.

them: trick or treat!
me: i haven't got anything on me, sorry.
them: where do you live?

i point over to sister #2's house: 'over there'.

bushra | permalink | |