Would You Rather: Christmas Edition

Just a mini post as I saw this on a few blogs and fancied doing it. I will try and do a proper post shortly...

Eat brussel sprouts or cauliflower cheese?

Both! Although if I had to choose it would be the sprouts honestly.

Have twinkling lights or still lights?

Still but we do have some that go over the window that do flash gently. I don't mind if they aren't too manic but even though they can the tree ones must not flash.

Eat gingerbread or Ferrero Rocher?

Neither but gingerbread if I was forced to choose.

Open your Christmas presents with only immediate family or with all your family members?

Immediate family, so me and mum.

Cook Christmas dinner for the whole family or don't eat Christmas dinner at all?

Toughie. I am a rubbish cook but if mum couldn't I wouldn't want to go without so as long as it was small-ish hopefully I could cope if she talked me through it...

Have a real Christmas tree or a Fake Christmas Tree?

Fake every time.

Use blue, yellow, white or multi-coloured lights?

Mixture. We have multi-coloured and white on the tree, blue and white in the kitchen, pink and yellow with white in the window and yellow and multi-coloured on the display units.

Eat mince pies or Christmas cake?

Mince pies! Yum!

Wake up at 6am or 10am?

6am because I can never sleep late on Christmas morning no matter how tired.

Drink champagne or hot chocolate?

Got to be hot chocolate. I love it enough that I have it almost every day even in summer whereas I've never even tried Champagne.

Eat Heroes or Roses?

Heroes! The best tied with Celebrations.

Get a puppy for Christmas or a kitten for Christmas?

No pets for Christmas. My puppy is a lot of work even now he's 8 months, to bring that with all the mess of toilet training home in winter would have been a nightmare whereas bringing him home in the summer by now we have good routines set (his behaviour is still very questionable in a lot of ways though). Kittens are easier to cope with over the holidays but I would be wary of any person or place that let a pet go home at Christmas knowing how many get dumped after the holidays.

Watch Elf or Home Alone?

Home Alone is a classic. I've watched Elf but I wasn't a fan. Just too silly from what I remember.

Only be able to listen to Christmas songs all year round or never hear a Christmas song again?

Never hear a Christmas song again. When you hear them on repeat in your crappy retail job you kind of want to pull your eardrums out after a while. I always enjoy them at home up until the point they start at work and then that starts to ruin things.

Wake up bright and early and get all of the best boxing day sale goodies or stay warm and cosy in bed wearing your new Christmas pyjamas?

Apart from the fact that I had to work boxing day this year (and Christmas Eve) stay warm and cosy inside wearing pyjamas all day.

Christmas and Life Lately

This is going to be a long post so bear with me...

So things lately have been pretty busy. At the beginning of December I got a Christmas job at my local 99p Store, I'm still there so hopefully it's becoming permanent so I can drop the school cleaning. The hours are better, therefore equaling more money. The main downside is my boss. I just don't like him. He's been having a tough time lately in his personal life but that's no excuse for being a patronising git. Today for example I was expected to do about 7 jobs at once: put out 3 boxes of umbrellas, rearrange the batteries (didn't finish), put out filter tips (didn't even start), put up a stand for EE sim cards, move the anti-freeze, restock the deicer on the tills and serve customers in between. Phew. At least it wasn't as manic as it has been. December 22nd, 23rd and 24th I work 8am to 5pm (5:30pm for the close on the 24th) and it was so busy, especially Christmas Eve! I was absolutely knackered every day, starting to fall asleep on the sofa at 9pm. Insane. I have never done days that long in my life. The only thing that may come close is college on a late finish day when I've missed the bus but even then, over an hour each side is the bus journey which is just relaxing and reading, maybe having a light doze.

Mum's not been doing great. She's being made redundant in February when the Co-op where she works is closing down. They've been bought by Aldi but for anyone thinking she can just get a job there, wrong. They aren't planning on opening until November. Apparently if they re-open within 6 months then they have to take on the previous staff. The manager hasn't told the staff but a lot of customers are saying that they're taking over the Costcutter at the top of the hill, but then again the customers knew the shop was closing months before they told the staff. Yeah, slightly crap.

We've been having a bit of a nightmare with the Christmas decorations this year. It's always a nightmare thanks to Artex ceilings but this year more than usual. We've tried double-sided carpet tape, blu-tack (in white), the normal double sided sticky pads (must have been a bad patch), pins and wire holding tacks.

These things.

Nothing has worked and they keep falling down. There wasn't time this year but we're going to try and find some white duct tape for next year. I was going to take pictures of everything but none stayed up long enough so here's some photos from Christmas 2012:

The living room ceiling. Pretty much the same this year.

The TV in the living room, has changed for this year.

The cupboard by my desk - just visible cat treats - has changed slightly this year.

The hallway, pretty much the same this year. Excuse my reflection in my ratty old nightie.

The door phone with my owl picture. Pretty similar I think.

The cat picture, also pretty similar I think.

Our Merry Christmas sign, again pretty similar.

The reason I'm saying things are similar is because those cards stuck round things aren't necessarily in the same place each year.

Our Christmas tree this year :)

My presents this year, not shown are a bar of chocolate and some money from my aunt. The money we used for Polar Bear King, Transformers: Age of Extinction and Divergent. Polar Bear King we started watching, realised it was cheesy crap - the transformation sequence was a guy in a very bad costume - and returned it the next day. The bottom three and the book: The Shining, Two Bits and Pepper (horse film) and Gnomeo and Juliet were all from a charity shop. Harry Potter I already have but I think my copy is knackered since it didn't play properly on two different DVD players and was starting to go funny on the third when it finished. The owl hook is a set of three, two that colour, two with the foot colour as the main one. That, the two eyeliners and two of the nail varnishes were from Avon. The third one was a Glamour magazine freebie that mum decided to wrap up after accidentally duplicating the magazine.

My snowman cake that mum bought at the Co-op :D it was supposed to be for both of us but mum found the icing a bit sickly whereas I love icing! 

Scottie dog tin of shortbread from Sainsbury's! It says Scottie but I say it looks more like a Westie to me. The tin says the shortbread are Scottie shaped too but we haven't opened them yet.

Blogtober Day 30 - What Is On Your Christmas List?

Books as always. My Amazon fiction wishlist: http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/registry/wishlist/1X21OFANT5ETE/ref=topnav_lists_1

A new phone. Ideally I'd like an iPhone 6 or a Samsung Galaxy S5 or something along those lines but I'm not in a financial position to have a contract at the moment (providing I get accepted at all) and they're too expensive to buy outright so I'm thinking the Motorola Moto G:

It would suit my needs for now and is better than my old phone (HTC Salsa) which is the main thing.

A Tesco Hudl 2 in Purple. I'd like a tablet for browsing in the evening and watching the odd video but I don't want anything too expensive and I like the look of the Hudl 2. The screen size is good too. 8.3 inches so bigger than the normal 7 but not so big as the clumsy looking 10's.

An iPod Classic. Sadly due to production being ceased it's looking highly likely that I'll have to buy used. I just wish I'd had the money to buy one sooner.

A Kindle so I can save what's remaining of my bookcase space for books by authors I already own. I also want a chance to read the classics but their charity condition is often not too favourable so to own them all for free on the Kindle is a big draw.

Lastly a Windows 7 Laptop. No image because it's not something that's brand specific, just needs to be 15.6 inch screen, at least 500GB hard drive and running Windows 7. I did debate being less picky and opting for Windows 8 but I've used 7 and am familiar with it, also I've heard from friends problems with updates trying to wreck the hard drive which means constant back-ups are necessary.

Speaking of back-ups a 1TB (minimum) external hard drive would be nice for said back-ups. Also at the moment where my PC's hard drive is tiny I have files spread over a couple of memory sticks which isn't very practical. A hard drive is easier to grab in the event of a house fire.