My Mum passed away on February 2nd. She was 66. She was hilarious, brave, complex, kind, resilient, gorgeous, and, in her own words, “a bit of a character!”.

I called her The Mothership. It started in 2000 on this blog as a joke about how she would descend onto our flat at short notice to point out potential fire hazards and things we needed to clean. Think: “The Mothership is landing soon! Get the vacuum out!”.

But for me, the true meaning of The Mothership was the place, the person, that I could return to. No matter where we were in the world or what was going on. Through all the very tough stuff we navigated over the years. She was always there with unwavering love and bottomless belief when I couldn’t find it for myself. I hope she felt that mirrored in return.

I still can’t wrap my head around a world without her. Thank you, Mothership. I love you.

…

As a tribute to her many contributions to this blog, please enjoy this compilation of her greatest hits on this post: The Mothership at 60.

You won’t believe it, but for once in my life, I had this Annual Review ready to rock for the end of the year. But then along came covid, followed by The Mothership passing away. So I’m hitting publish in the middle of March 2023, well past the point anyone is interested in hearing about 2022! Och well, I don’t know what to do with myself right now, so why not crack on with this?

…

Happy new year, everyone! Here's the fourteenth Annual Review. It's a set of end-of-year questions that first did the rounds back in the olden days of blogging. All previous episodes are here.

1. What did you do in 2022 that you’d never done before?
Drawing a blank here. Next!

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
I didn’t make any for 2022. For 2023 I have resolved, not for the first time, to read some of the gazillion unread books on my bookshelf.

3. What countries did you visit?
Australia, Denmark and Ireland.

4. Did anyone close to you give birth?
No.

5. Did anyone close to you pass away?
My paternal grandfather passed away at 92. 💗

6. What would you like to have in 2023 that you lacked in 2022?
Gardening! I planted my tulip bulbs about three months too late, resulting in sad, weird tulips with one-inch stalks. It felt like a metaphor at the time, and I did not adjust my stinky attitude to grow anything else for the season.

7. What days from this year will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
I can’t choose between them, but my favourite moments were all conversations with friends. Whether it was an everyday catchup or a big reunion, there would be a point after we’d updated each other on the daily minutiae that we’d get into the deep stuff, with honking laughter and teary bits.

I always love the parallel experience of listening to a friend’s story while marvelling at their three-dimensional awesomeness after so much time connecting only through screens. I love the rush of love, gratitude and admiration for the smart, hilarious, resilient human sitting before me, navigating the inevitable crap that life throws.

That is a cheesy paragraph, but that’s the point of life I have reached; I’m a massive sap.

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8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Finally installing a blind on my office window, so we didn’t go into an 8th winter with the neighbours being able to see me all lit up and grumbling at the computer when the sun goes down.

9. What was your biggest challenge?
The “snakes on the doormat” of 2021 were still around and at times it was challenging to choose healthy outlets for pesky emotions. But I’m still here and still celebrating all the good bits, so that’s a win I reckon.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?

• A mortifying tumble on black ice near York railway station in December. Somehow both my right knee and left arse cheek fared the worst.

• As I write this on December 31st, Gareth has just tested positive for Covid. I’m waiting to see if I’ll be struck down or somehow spared. Update January 10th: Noooooo, I was not spared! But we're both better now. 🦠

11. What was the best thing you bought?

• Mecca Cosmetica To Save Face SPF50+, a lightweight facial sunscreen. It goes on smooth and cool, then vanishes with no greasy shenanigans. My fellow SPF-obsessive pal Elizabeth wrote an excellent review that properly explains its goodness and why it’s her most beloved too.

• 7 in 1 Paw-Style Cat Toy - Ziggy had always been wholly uninterested in cat toys, but now in her middle age, she demands around two hours per evening of Laser Paw.
  
  If you don’t pick up this bloody toy at the designated time, she will fix her steely stare on you until you crack. Then one must shine the light around the room in a particular sequence of movements. She pounces from the living room to the hallway, hurls herself at the door, hides behind the shoes, and then does an ambush, all with a speed and nimbleness we never knew she was capable of.
  
  She prefers the toy to be in Star or Smiley Face mode - Butterfly or Mouse modes are considered inferior. We have created a monster and bought a backup paw, so she never has to wait 15 minutes for it to recharge.

The Laser Paw has definitely lived up to the promises of the product description:

12. Where did most of your money go?
Home repairs. Bor-ing! They knocked the elderly Renault Clio from the top of the expenditure list. Speaking of which, the little red engine now has 200,000 miles (320,000km) on the clock. Stay tuned to see if we make it to 250,000! 🚗

13. What did you get really, really, really excited about?

• Getting our filthy driveway power washed. When I say filthy, I didn’t think it was particularly filthy until it was done. I curse not taking a before photo because the after was spectacular; even the cat did a double take.

• The 2022 Tour de France was also an absolute belter, especially the beautiful chaos of the Jumbo-Visma bike swap incident.

14. What song will always remind you of this year?
When Olivia Newton-John passed away I had Magic from 1980 on repeat. Her voice is an angelic purr but the haircut! The whole look! I loved this era. The song was #1 in the US for four weeks, only to be kicked off by Christopher Cross’ Sailing. What a time to be alive!

Then in late November when Christine McVie sadly passed away I couldn’t stop playing Hold Me. I love so many of her songs but again the early 80s always get me. The video is a classic, shot in the scorching Mojave Desert when band relations were particularly frazzled. From Wikipedia:

"Four of them, I can't recall which four, couldn't be together in the same room for very long. They didn't want to be there," says [video director Steve] Barron. "Christine McVie was about ten hours out of the makeup trailer. By which time it was getting dark." According to Fields, "John McVie was drunk and tried to punch me. Stevie Nicks didn't want to walk on the sand with her platforms. Christine McVie was fed up with all of them."

Also, this classic moment…

In honour of Christine McVie, here is the perfect Fleetwood Mac joke from Flight of the Conchords. pic.twitter.com/j2FUvv4k32

— Mike Beauvais (@MikeBeauvais) November 30, 2022

The other song that lodged in the brain was We Love Sweets by Hanabie, thanks to Gareth playing it at least 575 times as his deep dive into Japanese metal began (see #18). It is a wild ride that leaves you feeling like you may have been run over by a truck, but you immediately want to be run over again!

15. What do you wish you’d done more of?
Cooked some new dinner recipes instead of just endlessly saving links to my Apple Notes. I definitely want to liven up the menu in 2023!

16. What do you wish you’d done less of?
Watching hairdresser Instagram reels*. The sound of snipping and the dramatic before and afters are bloody addictive. But really, I needed to go to bed.

* My current favourite is Assort Hair, though I wished they’d linger longer on the result!

17. How did you spend Christmas?
With the in-laws. We went full vegetarian this year, and it was delicious, except the scent of faux pigs in blankets lingered for two days. It was like living inside a bag of Frazzles.

18. Did you fall in love this year?

• Audiobooks! A great soundtrack for endless games of Laser Paw.

• In the summer, Gareth ended up in a YouTube vortex of Japanese rock and metal bands, and I was happily swept up too. LOVEBITES, an all-female metal band, are my favourite. It was a swift journey from “what is going on here?” to deep obsession and emotional investment in their search for a new bass player. In my next life, I hope to be a bass player in an all-female metal band.

19. What was your favourite TV programme?

• Gareth calls all my Scandinavian crime dramas Death In The Snow. It’s true, the moody detectives, excellent interiors and frosty landscapes start to blur together, but it’s still my favourite comfort telly. This year’s faves were The Truth Will Out 🇸🇪, Entrapped 🇮🇸 and the new season of Deadwind 🇫🇮.

• Favourite non-Scandi crime fest: Chyłka 🇵🇱

• Favourite escape: The Split. This kept popping up on iPlayer for years, but I only jumped in after reading Abi Morgan’s incredible memoir because she wrote the show. I gobbled up all three seasons in July. it was the perfect mix of family drama, secrets, shouting, tears, office glamour, nice houses and good hair.

• Also enjoyed: The Bear, Andor, Girls at the Back, and The Tourist.

20. What was the best book you read?

I’m still a sucker for anything with “loneliness, longing, sadness, regret, second chances and/or healing”, and even better if takes place in a small town where not much happens.

Here are some 2022 faves:

• Olive Kitteridge and Olive, Again - Elizabeth Strout

• Again, Rachel - Marian Keyes

• Love Marriage - Monica Ali

• Standard Deviation - Katherine Heiny (the withering line “Do you even fold?” from the origami club has entered our household lexicon.)

• You Made a Fool of Death with Your Beauty - Akwaeke Emezi

• This Is Not A Pity Memoir - Abi Morgan

21. What was your favourite film?
Top Gun: Maverick, because it was such boofheaded fun, and it sparked joy for Gareth in a way I'd never before witnessed.

In the 19.5 years I've known him, he’s only delivered positive feedback with one of three phrases: alright, not bad, or pretty good. But in this instance, he bounced out of the Dunfermline Odeon into the sunshine and declared, “That was the greatest film of all time!”.

He actually forked out more of his British pounds to see it again a week later. This display of unbridled enthusiasm was one of my favourite things about 2022.

22. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I was 45! There was a day off, a swim, lovely pal chats and my friend Allison’s famous chocolate cake. Perfecto!

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23. What kept you sane?
Books, friends and memes.

24. What were the best things you ate?

• On November 27th I made an unusually good batch of roast potatoes, perfectly fluffy inside with an excellent level of crunch on the outside.

• After reporting that 2021 lacked ice cream, I corrected in 2022 with a superb passionfruit gelato from Joelato and a wee tub of orange sherbet from Dunfermline’s own Fancy A Scoop.

• This French toast from Singl-End in Glasgow joyfully gobbled the morning after seeing Thundercat at the Barrowlands. There were plums, bananas and cinnamon crème fraîche involved, I think!?

Thank you for reading! Wishing you all good things for 2023.

Nearly every morning this year has started with Wordle, sometimes even before I take my thimble-sized bladder to the loo. I cross my legs and guess quickly. 

The next step in the routine is to text Gareth the result, whether he’s away at work or sitting beside me. That’s three subjects we text about now: 1) dinner 2) cat 3) Wordle.

We’re very competitive about it, but have completely different approaches.

If it's going badly after two guesses, I tend to say “Ahh, F*CK IT!” and start hurling random nouns, because I struggle to tolerate a morsel of discomfort and want it to be over immediately. 

Gareth takes a slow and methodical approach, pondering for ages and ages and bloody ages. He’s perfectly happy to walk away from it, sometimes for ten hours, before making his next move!

File under: “How you do one thing is how you do everything”. 

(We recently discovered that his parents solve the Wordle together. Honestly, that just feels like a missed opportunity. Where’s the spice?!)

The next phase of the morning routine is:

• Worldle - guess the country from its silhouette. This is pure joy for my inner geography nerd, last seen in 1985 playing Where In The World Is Carmen Sandiego? on an Apple II school computer.

• Heardle - guess the song from a second-long snippet. I’ve been training all my life for that one!

• Byrdle - for the days I really want to prolong the return to reality. It’s like Wordle, but choral music terms only. Minutes of fun to be had!

After that, I put the coffee on.

Are you into Wordle or any of its many variants? I would love to hear about your routine!

This was first published in Shauna Reid Writes A Newsletter, my twice-monthly email. You can subscribe here if you fancy!

1. What did you do in 2021 that you’d never done before?
Wrote over 50,000 words for my clients. It was exciting to remember I do have the ability to slap words down on a page. There is hope!

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for this year?
No and no. We're taking it one day at a time, baby!

3. What countries did you visit?
Does England count? In October, my pal Julia Jones came over for the London Marathon so I nipped down over the border on the train for a happy reunion.

4. Did anyone close to you give birth?
No.

5. Did anyone close to you pass away?
No.

6. What would you like to have in 2022 that you lacked in 2021?
Gelato.

7. What dates from this year will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
I don't know about you, but specific dates are fuzzy from the blobby megayear that was 2020-21! But here are some gems:

• A peaceful late arvo swim in November. Orangey soft Autumn light, a rainbow, and a sweet chat with my swim buds.

• A particularly deep yet hilarious conversation with The Mothership.

• A superb surprise care package from an absolute legend of a friend.

• An excellently-timed joke in a Burger King parking lot that made a dear friend speechless and wheezy with laughter, then I couldn't stop laughing too, practically gargling a mouthful of fries. I can't remember the joke, but I remember the wave of purest happiness.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Finally solving my clothing storage issue! I have a built-in wardrobe that is an awkward, sloping shape and has no shelving. When we moved in 6+ years ago I put a dilapidated chest of drawers inside it to host my clothes. The drawer fronts kept falling off, and it was super dark so I could never find anything without a torch.

Every six months I'd have a meltdown and vow to sort it out Once And For All. I'd draw plans to build shelves, approach a handyperson to do it, or look for ready-made solutions. But I'd lose steam and go back to throwing things into the void and closing the door in a hurry. YES, this could very well be a metaphor!

In December 2021 I decided I could not let this drag into yet another new year. I found some mesh drawer units from IKEA that fit perfectly. G added a motion-sensor light, and my well-being has improved by approximately 675%!

9. What was your biggest challenge?
Remember a few years ago I wrote about the time I left the house for school and nearly stepped right onto a snake on the doormat?

"That's what the start of a New Year feels like - that mild anxiety as you open the door and stretch your foot out into another set of 365, wondering if there'll be the proverbial snake on the doormat."

There were multiple snakes in 2021, each with their unique bitey challenges. But it's already half past January bloody April and I don't want to dwell. It was a difficult year, but it was also chock full of hilarity and love. So I will toddle on into the glittering future, make some new memories, and write about them instead!

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
No.

11. What was the best thing you bought?
Pre-cut baking parchment sheets. No more wrestling with the stupid roll of paper that never tears off neatly and doesn't quite fit in the kitchen drawer. No more paper that never quite sits flat on the baking tray. No more petty raging at inanimate objects!

12. Where did most of your money go?
As with 2020, repairs on our elderly Renault Clio. It is held together purely with sticky tape and stubbornness at this point.

13. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
The day when there was a woodpecker in the back garden.

Also, the new season of Succession. It took a wee while to get going then, pow!

14. What song will always remind you of this year?
In March, I had That Was Yesterday by Foreigner stuck in my head for three weeks straight. I'd wake up every morning and it would pop back up in my brain in all its epic 80s goodness. Then in December, it was this Stevie Wonder cover of We Can Work It Out. It is very catchy, I am just warning you now!

15. What do you wish you’d done more of?
Taken more walks and more photos.

16. What do you wish you’d done less of?
Checking email.

17. How did you spend Christmas?
I cooked Christmas lunch - I told Gareth I would take full responsibility for the cooking if he assembled my aforementioned IKEA drawers. I really do hate assembling IKEA. After his folks went home we watched North By Northwest and ate cheese. Top day!

18. Did you fall in love this year? 
Extra grateful for Gareth... after 18 years he still cracks me up every day. Many times in 2021 I'd say "Can I get a hug?" and he'd reply, "£10."

19. What was your favourite TV programme?

• The Killing popped up on BBC iPlayer, ten years after it first aired in the UK. Long enough for us to forget it was twenty one-hour episodes, and for Gareth to forget who the killer was! It was fun going back to where the Scandi crime drama obsession began, marvelling at Sarah Lund's jumpers and her eating dinner out of a saucepan, plus all the ye olde mobile phones. And thinking all over again that Troels Hartmann would be an excellent name for a cat.

• Not wanting to leave Denmark, next I watched Ride Upon The Storm. I didn't think a show about a family of priests would grab me but it stars Troels Hartmann (Lars Mikkelsen) and Nanna Birk Larsen's mum (Ann Eleonora Jørgensen) who are always compelling. Family drama and shenanigans + much soul-searching and meaning-of-life pondering + frilly Danish priest collars = very entertaining.

• Also enjoyed: the final series of Call My Agent 🇫🇷 , Bump 🇦🇺, Mare of Easttown 🇺🇸 and When The Dust Settles 🇩🇰.

20. What was the best book you read?
I really admire my Goodreads friends who write smart, insightful book reviews because when I like a book all I struggle to articulate why I liked it beyond, "It gave me feelings!".

• Sorrow and Bliss by Meg Mason got me in the guts.

• Seven Days in June by Tia Williams was my favourite romance.

• Huma Qureshi's memoir How We Met was so quietly elegant (plus wonderful cover illo by Parul Arora)

• I also read Cathy Rentzenbrink's A Manual for Heartache after Christmas and it was the most reassuring hug of a book ever.

Basically, sign me up for any book containing: loneliness, longing, sadness, regret, second chances and/or healing.

21. What was your favourite film?
I keep thinking about Mads Mikkelsen (Troels Hartmann's brother) in Another Round. He can just sit there and let his cheekbones communicate complex emotions!

22. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I turned 44 and had a very quiet Monday with G. We went for a walk on the beach and I rued leaving my swimming gear at home. Then we went to the garden centre to buy a bird feeder, my requested gift. It's placed so I can see the wood pigeons, blackbirds, blue tits, robins, spuggies etc. dropping by from my office window.

23. What kept you sane?
Friends. How good are friends?! Seamlessly passing the "Shitty Day stick" back and forth, sharing and listening, laughing and crying; being real and being there for each other. Whether it's in person or in the DM's, occasional contact or a daily flurry of messages, it's all precious stuff and hell yes I am grateful.

24. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
During the Euro 2020 tournament both Gareth and I were utterly obsessed with Italy’s dapper assistant coach Alberico Evani. We were far from alone.

25. Who did you miss?
Everyone during the lockdown times! But especially the folks in Oz.

26. What were the best things you ate?

• This pumpkin bread with maple glaze from Yossy Arefi's Snacking Cakes (the book I raved about last year). I baked it just to use a can of pumpkin puree that had been haunting the back of the cupboard for years, but the cake was so tasty it's an autumn regular now.

• The veggie breakfast below at Contini in Edinburgh - who knew a grilled zucchini could rock one's world? All the better coz it was also a reunion with my dear pal Ravideep. It's good to have witnesses for these tasty moments.

• This festive spiced shortbread with sour cherries and pistachio from Bre Graham's newsletter. I added clementine zest for extra fest.

Sending you all excellent humans good wishes for the not-at-all-new year!

Very belated new year greetings, comrades! Here’s the 12th Annual Review. It’s a set of end-of-year questions that first did the rounds back in the olden days of blogging. I’ve retired some questions and added in new ones over the years! All previous episodes are here.

1. What did you do in 2020 that you’d never done before?

• The pandemic thing… let’s start with the obvious!

• Hung up a picture that had been leaning against a wall, on top of a radiator, for 4.5 years. Win!

• Baked (burned) hot cross buns

• Grew some dahlias

• Attended a Zoom wedding 😍 and many Zoom quizzes.

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions?
I chose a word: action. I must have been feeling feisty on 31 December, 2019. But I did hang up that picture!

3. What countries did you visit?
Italy. I met up with my dear pal Julia for a work weekend in Milan at the end of January 2020. A month later there were images of a deserted Piazza del Duomo on the news. The whole idea of a work weekend away feels so strange and decadent now!

4. What dates will remain etched upon your memory?
My dips in the sea only add up to handful of 2020’s hours, but they were chilly portals to joy, sprinkled throughout an often shapeless year. Here’s a few faves:

• January 1 – I went along to a local New Years Day dip with fellow newbie Melanie. I hadn’t been in the water since my first cold dip up north, six months earlier. That had been so magical and world-shifting, I worried it couldn’t possibly feel that good again. But it DID! (though I don’t think my arse defrosted until January 2nd.)

• May 30 – the first dip after 11 weeks of lockdown was a ridiculously warm morning, piping hot by Scottish standards. We dried off on the beach! In the sun! No shivering! Outstanding.

• September 6 – An early morning dip with a blazing sunrise. My swim buds Melanie, Debbie and I, plus one friendly stranger had the beach to ourselves. The water was like silk and afterwards we all sat on a log, with appropriate social distance and Melanie’s homemade banana cake, sipping our tea as the sun finished its rise.

Outdoor swimming became a real thing in the UK last year, with Dry Robes selling out and the inevitable Daily Mash article Cold water swimming latest health trend people need to shut up about. But I will not shut up! Because I tried and tried and tried for decades to find something to help calm the relentless brain chatter; to feel like my mind and body weren’t at war with each other. I finally figured out that nothing makes me feel so at home, so at peace, so present and accepting, than a chilly hug from the North Sea.

5. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
a) Learning the Cookie Scoot, a technique devised by Erin of Cloudy Kitchen. When your fresh baked cookies come out of the oven, place a round cookie cutter slightly larger than the cookie, over the cookie, then “scoot them into a perfectly round shape”.

You can see Erin demo it in this Instagram Story highlight. I didn’t have a cookie cutter so had to use a pint glass, which was a tight fit but still made these babies pretty round! So pleasing.

b) Learning the shortcut for bringing up the emoji keyboard on a Mac. Control + Command + Space bar!

c) The Moody Blue Office. After five years of indecision and dodgy paint samples (that baby poo brown colour in the Before pic below was meant to be GOLDEN, dang it), I now have the library-meets-cave atmosphere I always wanted.

d) Daily Duolingo habit. I struggled to be consistent with anything during 2020, so maintaining my Duolingo streak was a low stakes way of staying in touch with the idea of consistency. If that makes any sense at all.

I started out with German in the beforetimes for a planned trip, but when that was cancelled I switched to Finnish as I was currently engrossed in a Finnish crime drama called Bordertown.

I’m now on a 354 day streak. I’m not sure if I will ever get to visit Finland again, but now when I watch my murder shows I can understand thank you, sorry, ice cream and hello… if bugger all else!

6. What was your biggest challenge?
I often hear the phrase same storm, different boats used to describe the collective experience of 2020. My boat was pretty sturdy: I already worked from home, Gareth could safely work at work; I was used to not seeing my family. Meanwhile, I knew folks working on the medical frontlines, or juggling their work with homeschooling, or suffering with Covid, or losing loved ones to it, or dealing with terrible storms that had nothing to do with the pandemic. That puts things in perspective.

At the same time, it was (still is) Unprecedented Times™ and like everyone I talk to, it’s an ever-shifting tour through okayness, frustration, deep gratitude, loneliness, numbness, rage, quiet joys, tedium, gut-churning worry and uncertainty, 3am staring at the ceiling… etc etc etc etc etc.

(This one is bloody impossible to answer, I’ve been trying for six weeks now. I hope you get me!)

7. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Minor clumsy injuries only.

8. What was the best thing you bought?
Neoprene gloves and a fleece-lined beanie for making swims a wee bit toastier!

9. Where did most of your money go?
Repairs for our ageing car.

10. What did you get really, really, really excited about?

• The Mysterious Caramilk - my swim buddy Debbie discovered a large display of Caramilk, my favourite Aussie chocolate, in a bargain shop right here in Dunfermline. How and why this happened, we will never know. Did it fall off the back of a ship somewhere? A true Christmas miracle.

• Neil Finn's Fangradio broadcasts - for a good six weeks during Lockdown #1, Neil performed live from his LA home every freakin' day. He was often joined by his equally talented sons, wife, and charming 3-year-old grandson Buddy. His songs have been companions to my ears since early childhood, so it was pure comfort. I loved the nightly routine of heading up to bed with headphones, ready to tune in along with folks around the world. Special shoutout to Dana, lovely longtime blog buddy in Kentucky – we often messaged as we listened and her witty banter added lockdown sparkle! 💗

11. What song will always remind you of this year?
Running With The Devil by Van Halen. When Eddie passed away in October I could not get this out of my head. Also for my fellow nerds out there: Rick Beato did an excellent episode of What Makes This Song Great about it.

12. How did you spend Christmas?
I had a quick morning swim, then we said hello to Gareth's folks from their driveway, then came home and faffed around, then finally started cooking Christmas lunch. We ate at about 8 pm, on the couch, watching Close Encounters of the Third Kind for some reason.

13. Did you fall in love this year?
Yes! With Cats of Brutalism on Instagram. Eternally grateful to my pal Sue for introducing me to this match made in heaven.

14. What was your favourite TV programme?
This year was mostly about comfort telly. 2020 kicked off with a foreign crime drama phase, including Bordertown and Deadwind from Finland, Rebecka Martinsson from Sweden, Ultraviolet from Poland and Cardinal from Canada.

After I saw the brilliant documentary series Lenox Hill on Netflix, I switched to medical dramas. The Resident, New Amsterdam and Chicago Med. The faces vary, the doctors usually have excellent hair, and in most episodes, someone will have a miraculous recovery and someone else won't make it. That predictability was nice when the real world situation was unfathomable.

I also enjoy how these shows seem to nick each other's plots. I've seen multiple patients with cobalt poisoning, multiple patients who they initially dismiss as drunk but turn out to have auto-brewery syndrome, and more than one evil doctor fiddling with a clinical trial.

Also enjoyed: Unorthodox, I May Destroy You, Schitt's Creek.

15. What was the best book you read?
Such A Fun Age by Kiley Reid and Snacking Cakes by Yossy Arefi.

I've always liked the term "snacking cake", which I first heard in an American food magazine. It basically means a single layer, one-bowl, no stand mixer required, relatively casual cake to have with a cuppa, or for breakfast, or for no reason at all. My favourite kind of cake to bake and to eat.

This is one of those rare cookbooks where you want to make pretty much everything. It's a great blend of classic flavours and plot twists, and there's not a single recipe where you read it and think, "I cannot be arsed making that". The exact kind of book we needed in 2020.

16. What was your favourite film?
Newer: Parasite
Older: Hunt for the Wilderpeople

17. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I was 43! I had a Zoom afternoon tea with my local pals Alli and Nicole. We developed a nice 2020 ritual of having arvo tea for each other's birthdays since we couldn't meet up in person. The non-birthday duo would do the baking and doorstep delivery, then all meet with the birthday woman on Zoom for tea and chat. Good times, great cakes!

18. What kept you sane?

• Friend chats!

• Swimming, when permitted

• Pen McKinley-Rodgers' Qigong course

• Sitting under the silver birch tree in the back yard, listening to the leaves rustle. When we weren't allowed to swim, it almost sounded like waves.

• Ziggy's endless array of withering looks...

19. Who did you miss?
All the humans. And the library, if we can personify the library.

20. What were the best things you ate?

• Saag Feta - "The secret to my mom’s saag paneer is… that it contains no actual paneer," says the fabulous Priya Krishna, author of Indianish. I always say feta makes everything betta and this dish is no exception. We cooked this at least once a month.

• A tasty Biscoff variation of that old standard, Midnight brownies.

• Nicole's outstanding soda bread, and spelt and rye sourdough (pictured below)

• Right before Christmas, Allison dropped round the most amazing hunk of chocolate cake, still warm from the oven. It tasted like the memory of childhood chocolate cake... tender crumb, fudgy icing, no fuss. Still dreaming of it nearly two months later...

I appreciate this Review is 90% cake and swimming. There was lots of other stuff, but this is what was left in the sieve after I shuffled through all the thoughts, feelings and happenings.

If you made it this far, thank you for reading! I so appreciate you being here after all this time. 😍

The End.

Week 8

Ziggy had a socially distanced trip to the vet. Her left eye had gone all weepy and squinty and Dr. Google said not to ignore a weepy squinty eye. So I made an appointment and Gareth got her pink space capsule down from the loft.

The only time Ziggy makes a cliched cat noise is when travelling to/from the vet. It's a non-stop miaow miaow miaow miaow miaow miaow that sounds exactly like it's spelled. Not sure if she's saying I'm scared or This pink space capsule demeans us both.

It was surreal driving into town after an eight-week absence. I'd missed the transition from bare branches to full-on spring. The streets were quiet but the trees were loud with blossoms and green.

The lockdown vet process was beautifully efficient:

1. Park up and place cat carrier behind vehicle.

2. Phone the vet.

3. Vet comes out to collect feline and take inside.

4. Vet does their thing then calls back with diagnosis.

5. Bill paid over phone.

6. Feline deposited back to rear of vehicle, with medication taped to the carrier.

The vet's plastic apron looked mighty shredded when she returned, so I hope Ziggy behaved herself.

The whole thing was done in 15 minutes and £52, then we miaowed our way back home to Fluffy Towers. A few eyedrops that evening and Zig's peeper was de-squinted.

Week 9

Gareth went back to work on Thursday after five weeks on furlough. Time to get that essential whisky back in production.

I felt a little sad and unsettled as he left our bubble, though relieved and grateful he still has a job and that he can do it safely, when so many are not so lucky.⁣

I said on Instagram that at first I was worried about being together all day. We've spent great gobs of time apart this past half-decade, with his long hours and my work travels. I half-joked that "separate lives" was the main reason we were still together.

So it's been a relief to find he's still the human I like to hang out with most. Not sure how he feels about it though!

I don't take for granted this unexpected pocket of togetherness, with the bleary-eyed morning coffees, the cat-and-eyedrops wrestling, the mechanic assisting in the garage; the crisps/tea/Schitt's Creek.

Week 10

Is anyone else's mind throwing up a montage of past mistakes and/or cringe-worthy moments late at night? Just as you're trying to get to sleep?

Maybe with the present being so repetitive/scary and the future but a fog, the brain is forced to look backward for entertainment.

It's bloody annoying.

Recently in Diversions

• I took up watercolour painting. "Taken up" = "slopping amorphous blobs onto a page". I'm not great at making something look like something that exists on this earth, so I tried some Morning Mood Mandalas like my friend Alli does. You draw a circle, look at the paints, see what colours sing to your mood, and just do whatever you feel like in that circle. It's strangely soothing and addictive! Gareth calls them my Beach Balls of Rage.

• I started tidying the chaotic pit that is my office, starting with the bookshelves that are visible in my Zoom background and slowly working forward.

• We've now done eight Friday night Zoom pub quizzes. I cannot believe Gareth did not know that the unicorn is Scotland's national animal. That is THE BEST factoid about Scotland!

A set of temporary traffic lights has appeared in our quiet street and it's very exciting.

Scottish Water are doing some pipe repairs; there are traffic cones everywhere.

At night, Gareth's new game is to peek behind the curtain and say, "Okay, guess what colour they are now."

"RED!"

"You're right again!"

By day, if I sit up straight on the couch, which happens now and then, I can see the lights from my spot. It's thrilling when I manage to look up the right time.

"GREEN! They're green! Quick, look!" and Gareth will lunge across to see.

Week 6

On Tuesday Gareth went on a cleaning spree. Not an unusual thing for a grown person, especially one who needs tidiness to function and must always have the remotes lined up and pointing north on the coffee table. But he was wrestling with a weird guilt for being on furlough, thus looking for a project to justify his existence. I, in turn, felt guilty for not helping, even though I'm still working. I put on my headphones to drown out his scrubbing.

When I emerged a couple of hours later the bathroom was gleaming, the carpet was vacuumed, the kitchen was perfection.

"Looks great, G!"

"Did you see the hob! It's shining!"

"It is!"

"And the floors!"

"Amazing!"

"And the cupboard doors! No fingerprints!"

"Excellent work! ... is this enough validation for your labour?"

"I think you could be more enthusiastic!"

"Ahh, you want more COMPLIMENTS! Like when you throw me a parade for stocking the fridge or cleaning the litter tray?"

"Yes! Give. Me. Compliments!"

I had forgotten about Compliments, this awesome video from 2011. We re-watched it five times and thought of simpler times. 

Why is my impressiveness written off like as it was ofcourseness...

Week 7 

I dunno about you but I feel like my mind hit the wall this week. I'm forgetting how to form proper sentences. I'm sure this article explains it but I've not got further than the headline: 

'Allostatic Load' is the Psychological Reason for Our Pandemic Brain Fog

I got so tired of looking at screens that I drafted this blog post on... paper. Have you heard about paper? It really works!

The screen fatigue did not extend to devouring Normal People across Friday night and Saturday. It was beautiful. It felt good to be immersed in another world.

This Week in Diversions

I hit Day 80 of German on Duolingo. Won't be visiting Germany anytime soon but keeping up the streak makes me feel like a person who might one day be capable of a streak in other areas of life.

So... how are you, comrades? Let's chat. Monosyllables and/or random mashing of keys are fine!

Week 3 and 4

Normally my Friday nights are sacred and silent. The shutter goes down for the weekend,  I'm done with people-ing, and it's time to watch whatever music documentary BBC Four has put on.

But recently Gareth's work colleagues were doing a Zoom pub quiz. I cannae resist a pub quiz! I met Gareth at one after all (go Team Big Merino!).

Each team had to contribute a round - we were assigned Geography. Gareth devised our questions, kicking off with In what country are the Bungle Bungles?

The world heritage listed Bungle Bungle Range, located within Purnululu National Park in the Kimberley region of Western Australia, is G's favourite Aussie place. He's wanted to go there ever since Helen Daniels took a painting trip there on Neighbours in the 80s.

Our opposition were not of a classic-era Neighbours demographic, but me being from Oz they assumed Oz was the answer. I wished we'd made our questions harder. Next time we will go for what is the capital of Moldova.

We finished the quiz middle of the pack, which was fiiiine. But I was annoyed that I hadn't trusted my gut feeling and written down "China" for Where was ice cream invented?. If I've ever had a specialist subject it is bloody ice cream.

Gareth had also been certain Brazil had won the World Cup six times (correct answer: five).

"That's very disappointing," I said.

"Well at least I didn't insist that a dog sweats out of its arse!"

(The correct answer to Where are a dog's sweat glands located: in their paws. Always be learning!)

Gareth is now on furlough from the distillery, so we are home together all the time. For the past six years I've been by myself during weekday daylight hours. I am adjusting to this new format, but he makes good tea and he makes it often.

He's currently dismantling a vintage motorcycle in the garage, so every hour or so he will come inside to my office and present a hunk of metal and explain why it's broken, or run through some repair ideas, or ask questions like, "If I paint these motorbike parts, do you mind if I cure them in the oven?"

Instead of baking motorcycle parts, I baked hot cross buns again. I tried a different recipe... why did I think inviting more uncertainty into the world was a good idea?!

How are you all doing today? Zapping loads of good thoughts to you, wherever you are. My mind is utter mush and I can't think of a tidy way to wrap this up.

Before I skdaddle, I wanted to share two things I read this week that I keep thinking about...

• "It is like I need to know the numbers because I don’t want to forget the scale of the human tragedy here, real people with their real stories of loss and grief..."- Ravideep Kaur, Hypernormalisation & Covid-19

• "Everyone had a fever. Everyone was out of breath, some unable to walk even ten steps without passing out; by the time she stabilized one person, two more were waiting." - Two Hours Daily to Sanitize, Two Hours to Cry - Lisa Miller's New York story about an ER doctor at Elmhurst Hospital in Queens.

Out for my allotted walk early Friday morning, I made a sharp dive left into the bushes to put plenty of space between me and an older lady and her whippet.

"Thank you for distancing!" she called out cheerily.

It was ace to get thanked for something that's previously been called a character flaw, ha ha ha.

So, comrades. How are you? I always mean that sincerely, but I mean it even more now. I hope you and your families are okay.

I've been at home since the 14th, and the UK has been on lockdown for a week now. On the surface it would appear not much has changed. Gareth's still been out, making whisky for the future. I've been working from home as usual.

But like everyone, it's a daily trot through an encyclopedia of emotions. An undercurrent of unease, hope, worry, gratitude.

It feels strange that for many of us our primary task right now is to stay home, when so many have to go out to work at great risk, to help those suffering and to keep the wheels turning for the rest of us. Not to mention those that don't have the luxury of somewhere to shelter, nor water to frequently wash their hands.

So my head is a mush of feelings and I appreciate the indulgence of these wafflings. But this old blog feels like a calmer place than social media. I spent an hour this morning catching up with the everyday lives of blog pals in my Feedly reader like it was 2005. The quietness of it felt good.

Notes from the last two weeks

Activities:

• Working, haphazardly at best

• Distractibaking: hot cross buns, malted chocolate chip cookies, bread rolls

• Zooming of friends, especially the extroverts

• Reading articles on How To Work From Home, despite having worked from home for the past six years

• Sternly instructing mother-in-law to stay inside ("Oh yeah, and happy Mother's Day too!")

• 2/3 of a Zoom yoga class (watched the rest from on the couch with a cuppa).

Soothing things:

1. Jacinda Ardern's clear communication

2. Sam Neill reading poems and bedtime stories

3. Neil Finn's daily mini concerts. Perfectly imperfect with the tunes you know and love.

(Whoa dude... three calming Kiwis!)

If anyone is out there... how are things in your corner of the world? Let me know how you are doing today. This hour, even, as things are subject to change!

P.S. If you need a smile: Aussie Astrophysicist gets magnets stuck up nose while inventing coronavirus device.

1. What did you do in 2019 that you’d never done before?
Tried my hand at pottery. Form an orderly queue at the Etsy store please...

Also:

• Made a quilt

• Went to a Fleetwood Mac concert

• And a Bjork concert

• Took a dip in the chilly North Sea!

• Went to Philadelphia

• Went to Birmingham

• And Wales! Just over the border, to see my pal Claire, but it's a start!

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for this year?
I didn't make any in 2019. This year I have chosen a word: ACTION!

It's not a stick to beat oneself up with, rather a wee thing to whisper when dithering, to encourage some imperfect effort on things that matter (more on that in #9).

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
My high school comrade Renee.

4. Did anyone close to you pass away?
Our lovely Uncle Pat.

5. What countries did you visit?
Austria, Italy and USA.

6. What would you like to have in 2020 that you lacked in 2019?
A consistent skin care routine.

7. What dates from this year will remain etched upon your memory, and why?

• May 26 - Lizzo concert in Manchester - never has a gig been so full of joy.

• June 22 - Aforementioned dip in the North Sea. Cold water = crazy magic!

• June 27 - Discovering our cat on Google Maps

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Finishing that bloody scarf from Christmas 2017 - it ended being three metres long! Well, I still haven't woven in the ends. I don't think I'm a knitter.

The other achievement was surviving my sixth year of freelancing. There were the usual buttock-clenching moments but overall it was lively and challenging in the good way!

There were interesting projects with long term clients, plus lovely new stuff. I helped the super smart and sparkling Ravideep Kaur launch her anti-racism course. My enthusiastic review of the Eule Planner led to Kerstin Martin hiring me for some content writing! Stationery fiend's dream.

I also randomly had some folks ask for mentoring, for book proposals and content marketing strategy. That turned out to be bloody amazing. I really loved that sense of collaborating over a period of time, helping bring their projects to life, so busting to do more of that in 2020.

Subtle plug: If you need help with your words, check out how we can work together!

9. What was your biggest challenge?
Some tedious personal stuff that I muddled through. Giddyup! Also, I often neglected my priorities, e.g. writing here. I ran around in self-censoring circles most of the time. So that's where the 2020 word of the year ACTION comes in. Sure, it's taken me two months to finish this bloody post but one has to warm up.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
In the scheme of things, with loved ones dealing with actual scary health stuff, I had a healthy year. Minor incidents:

• Injury - Despite a very large sign saying MIND THE STEP, I failed to mind a very deep step in a crowded cafe. I strode out into thin air then slammed my foot down, jarring my knee and ankle. I was mortified, so tried to turn a stagger into a casual stroll like nothing had happened. But I badly sprained the knee and ankle, and nine months on it's still not right.

• Illness - September brought the looooong dark night known as The Sicily Spewnami. The poor Mothership was the first victim. Then a couple of days later I looked in the mirror and thought, Wow I've got a nice glow, this must be what those Instagrammers talk about. Wrong! It's not natural highlights, it's the virus of doom!

11. What was the best thing you bought?

• Baby Pyrex jug - just £2 and the little Pyrex family was complete!

• Bedside tables - scored for a song on eBay, most triumphant. We're now on Year 5 of Operation Decorate That Bedroom, so maybe in 2020 I'll go wild and get a bedside lamp.

12. Where did most of your money go?
Concert tickets. Edit: Actually that's not true, it went on everyday household expenditure! Three cheers for groceries.

13. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
That first cold water swim. Brace yourself for an upcoming post of joy and shivering delirium!

14. What song will always remind you of this year?
Living On The Ceiling by Blancmange. This 80s classic contains the line I'm up the bloody tree. Gareth started singing "She's up the bloody tree" whenever Ziggy hopped into her ridiculous tower.

15. Compared to this time last year, are you:

a) happier or sadder?
A wee bit sparklier!

b) richer or poorer?About the same.

16. What do you wish you’d done more of?
Getting to bed earlier. I think I said that last year too, dagnabbit.

17. What do you wish you’d done less of?
Hesitating.

18. How did you spend Christmas?
The in-laws invited us over for a low key Christmas lunch. It was strange after a good few years of hosting to just rock up with a Sainsbury's Christmas pud and a tub of custard. But once I surrendered to the lack of menu control it was ace!

19. Did you fall in love this year?
Yes, with that sassy cat meme! Could not get enough for two months solid.

The other big love was ginger. After a lifetime of indifference, I fell hard. It started with a slice of a vegan ginger cake at Cafe Wynd in Dunfermline. KAPOW! Could not get enough spicy goodness after that. I started with edibles -  ginger jam, ginger tea, ginger and apple juice etc. Then branched out to ginger hand soap, ginger lip balm, ginger washing up liquid.

The greatest love of all: Borders Dark Chocolate Ginger biscuits.

If anyone has any favourite ginger things please tell me, I'm always looking for the next hit.

20. What was your favourite TV programme?

• Fleabag - an obvious choice but it felt good to have a proper obsession, after worrying post-Americans I'd never love again.

• Call My Agent! - lunch break show of the year. Addictive French comedy about a Paris talent agency, with lots of glamour and swearing and famous French actors guest starring as themselves.

• Succession - it took a couple of attempts to go from "why should I care about these mega rich bastards" to dreaming about it. It's savagely funny and impossible to pick a favourite cast member, though I do love seeing Matthew Macfadyen in a role that's a galaxy away from Mr Darcy. Also, one of the best telly theme tunes ever?

21. What was the best book you read?
The Mother In Law by Sally Hepworth - proper page turner! I also liked Big Sky by Kate Atkinson. Not my favourite Jackson Brodie mystery, but the audiobook read by Jason Isaacs was delicious for the ears.

22. What was your favourite film(s)?
Little Women and If Beale Street Could Talk. Older films: Blade Runner 2049 and First Man. #accidentalgoslingfest

23. What were your favourite podcasts? (new addition!)

• Billy Connolly on The Adam Buxton Podcast - this episode is hilarious and moving. Billy's story about Robin Williams made me blub.

• 13 Minutes To The Moon - this series from the BBC World Service tells the story of the Apollo 11 mission by those who made it happen, from the astronauts to engineers to the boffins behind the scenes. It's riveting and dramatic with moving music from Hans Zimmer. And good news for moon nerds everywhere: Season 2 on the Apollo 13 mission launches on March 9.

• Samin Nosrat and Phoebe-Waller Bridge were both ace on How To Fail

• I never skip Fortunately... with Fi and Jane and the Nigel Slater episode was particularly funny.

24. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I was 42! I had lunch with my pal Nicole, then G and I went for a walk in Perthshire the next day.

25. What kept you sane?
The Bon Appétit YouTube channel.

26. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
No new entries on the Fancy List that I can recall.

27. Who did you miss?
I'm going to retire this question! It's always the same answer... the folks back home in Oz <3

28. What were the best things you ate? (new question!)

• Aforementioned vegan ginger cake from Cafe Wynd.

• Soft serve ice cream with amarena cherries from Paesano Pizza, Glasgow. Thanks Sue for introducing us to that one!

• The full Scottish breakfast at Kelvingrove Cafe, Glasgow. Still dreaming of that sausage.

• A melon gelato in Ragusa, Sicily. The scent, the smoothness! And it was way before the Spewnami Day so the memory is unsullied.

FIN!

*If you're new around here, the Review Thingo is a set of end of year questions that first did the rounds back in the olden days of blogging. I found it via my pal Trish and kept on doing it, albeit delivering further and further from the actual end of the year as each one passes. This year shall be different, this is my vow! 

Ziggy now appears on Google Street View.

It's all because of this cat tree...

We'd noticed for a while that Ziggy liked to climb high, so we decided to get her a tree. Admittedly I didn't research for long. I ordered the Fluffy II because it was reasonably priced and 163cm tall. I guesstimated that since it was ten centimetres shorter than me, it would be high enough to interest the resident feline but wouldn't take up too much room.

What I failed to take into account was the Fluffy II's width. And its thick, thick covering of faux sheepskin. And the giant furry crow's nest on the top.

It was bloody massive. It hogged half the window and dominated our not-large living room.

“I think we'll need to return it,” I said to Gareth as he finished the assembly.

No way, said Ziggy, who immediately jumped to the top level.

She's been up that bloody tree for about 80% of her time ever since.

It's like she'd been phoning it in the last three years, hoping this moment would come. Now that she has Fluffy Towers, as Gareth named it, she no longer has to feign interest in engaging with us. She can simply reign from above, watching and judging, descending only briefly for food or litter tray or treats or a backyard stroll or a few stair runs. Then she's all, "BYEEEE!" and hops back up to the luxurious embrace of fake fleece.

She spends her days alternating blissful snoozes with surveying the neighbourhood.

At night, she observes what is happening in the kitchen from the safety of the penthouse.

Recently I went to Google Maps on my computer to plan a bus journey. When I typed in our address, the thumbnail image of our street caught my eye. It looked like the Google Street View car had been in the neighbourhood back in March, for the first time in a decade. Instead of a previous resident's caravan, our driveway was now empty.

I clicked and zoomed in. And lo, there was Fluffy Towers in the window, topped with two blurry triangles of snoozing cat ears!

That made my year, I tells ya.

The first time Mother-In-Law Mary saw Fluffy Towers, she froze halfway up the drive and burst out laughing. She slapped her hands to her thighs and laughed and laughed and laughed. Before that moment I'd thought, maybe it isn't so ridiculous, we can get away with it! But such a reaction from lovely mild-mannered Mary confirmed it was bloody ridiculous.

We are now at peace with the big woolly wedding cake (as father-in-law Dave calls it) and its sun-blocking properties. There are occasional double takes from passers-by. And as I took a parcel the other day the postman remarked, "I see the Queen is in her castle today!"

But every time I arrive home to this surly face, it's a small price to pay for a happy cat.

So there we were a few weeks shy of year's end, and she tells me she's just had an idea to create a paper planner for digital entrepreneurs. She'd tried all kinds of diaries and dabbled in bullet journalling, but couldn't find the system that did everything. She wanted to make her own.

I was all ears. I freaking love all things stationery and organising. I start thinking about the next year's planner in July. Plus, Kerstin was one of the most precise, thoughtful and logical people I've ever known. If she made a planner it was bound to be a goodun.

It was already December 2018, so I thought, Awesome. I will look forward to her planner in 2020.

But no. This is Kerstin Martin we are talking about. She is a woman of ACTION.

Kerstin was not waiting around for 2020. Before I'd even tucked into Christmas dinner she had designed her planner, hunted down a printer that could print it with paper as good as our mutually beloved Leuchtturm products, and ordered her protoype. Then not long into new year, this beauty was released into the world:

At first I resisted because I'd already settled on a Hobonichi Weeks planner for 2019. But already the Hobo wasn't feeling right. Its compact pages had worked great in 2018 when I worked on site for a client a couple of days a week and needed the portability. But in 2019 I was working at home most days and generally felt more... chatty! Expansive! I wanted more room to write and doodle. So I repurposed the Hobonichi and ordered Kerstin's planner.

I've now been using the Eule Planner solidly for 7 months so I wanted to share my review. I paid for this planner, and there are no affiliate links - it's just a planner nerd sharing a good find. Kerstin is my friend but these are my honest thoughts. She wouldn't want it any other way!

So... the Eule Planner is an A5 size. It has a hard cover but it is a little padded, so it's soft to the touch. Can you say a planner is cuddly? It feels lovely in the hands. It's easy to wipe clean if you had to use it as an emergency coaster one time. It has a nice teal blue ribbon so you can bookmark a page.

The planner innards are high quality 50# Domtar paper. The pages feel thick but not bulky. Fountain pens don't leak through.

The start of the planner is packed with useful tracking charts and tables to keep track of all sorts of business and planning bits and bobs, including:

• Annual and Monthly Goals

• Weekly and Monthly To Do’s

• Year/Month/Week At A Glance

• Daily Schedule

• Track Your Statistics (e.g. Social or Money)

• Monthly Blog Post Planning

• Newsletter Planning and Stats

• Mingling: Guest Hosting and Appearances

• Detailed Project or Daily Task Tracking

You can see what those pages look like on Kerstin's website.

I've found these pages help me to pause and think about my business overall, instead of just lurching from one weekly to do list to another. I've made a monthly ritual of updating the stats, and it's satisfying to quantify ones efforts. Or in the case of the Blog Post tracker, see the lack thereof. Le sigh.Now to the guts of the planner - the weekly spreads. There are echoes of the Leuchtturm weekly planner layout here, with the dates on the left page and note space on the right. But Kerstin goes beyond Leuchtturm's lined page, and breaks the right page into two useful columns of To Do's with checkboxes, plus note space underneath.I've generally settled on using the pages like this:

• Left - Appointments in Column 1, Meal planning in Column 2. Or if it's a mega busy week I'll put that day's work priorities in Column 2

• Right - Work items in Column 1, personal in Column 2. Hmmm but in this photo above I don't do that at all! Och well, it's a very flexible format.

I prefer using highlighters to check off completed items as I like being able to still read the words underneath and also effort = colour!

Another awesome feature of the planner that I've not seen in any other is that you also get two full note pages each week. And they're dotted, which is the greatest of page markings if you ask me!

At first I wasn't sure how useful two weekly note pages would be, but it always ends up being the right amount to jot notes on a call or two, or to scrawl down some random thoughts that will make no sense to your future self. Having the week's notes next to the week's planning makes it easy to find things later down the line.

Overall, this planner is a beauty. It's thoughtfully designed and logical. I look forward to planning out my week. It's the first business-focused planner I've bought where I actually use all the supplementary pages. It really does have the online biz owner in mind.

It makes me feel a wee bit more like a business person and not a rank amateur.

Great job, Kerstin "Action" Martin. I will back for 2020.

If you'd like to take a closer look at the Eule Planner head over to Kerstin's website.

1. What did you do in 2018 that you’d never done before?

• made two new friends who live in the next village. Walking distance pals: the holy grail!

• took a beginner's sewing class (swore a lot)

• consistently attended both Pilates and yoga classes... after years in the exercise wilderness I've found some love again!

• had a brilliant trip to Green Mountain in Vermont as a guest blogger to work on my binge eating stuff.

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for this year?
I chose a word for the year, Outside: "I literally want to get more fresh air, but also looking to get outside of my head and outside of my comfort zone".

This turned out to be a handy anchor and it was an adventurous (for me!) 12 months.

I haven't felt drawn to any words or particular plans for 2019 thus far. I'm happy to just rattle along for now and make sure I keep the twinkle lights twinkling.

3. Did anyone close to you die?
No.

4. What countries did you visit?
USA and Australia.

5. What would you like to have in 2019 that you lacked in 2018?
A stronger lower back and more blogging.

6. What dates from this year will remain etched upon your memory, and why?

• February 8 - Snowshoeing in the dark at Green Mountain with all senses singing and an overwhelming feeling of being in the right place.

• April 28 - Gomez concert. Closure for my 2002 self who accidentally chucked out Sydney tickets! #dumpsterdivingfail

• May 3 - Day of the Missing Ziggy. My heart sinks to my shoes just thinking of that horrible long, empty night she went AWOL, both G and I worried what we'd talk about without that furry grump in our lives. Lucky for us she was only trapped in a garage, four doors down.

7. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
On paper, it would have to be my positive progress on the disordered eating recovery stuff. - I'm chuffed with how much has changed for the better. But sewing that bloody zipper bag really felt like a triumph ;)

I'd set a goal to make six crafty projects in 2018 - an attempt to try something new that had nothing to do with work or "self-improvement". At the time I mentioned on Insta my stages of learning:

• wild enthusiasm

• overwhelm

• panic

• thinking up excuses to run away (cat emergency? credible?)

• small moments of success

• mistakes

• swearing that you think is only in your head but actually out loud

• un-fecking-picking

• grim determination

• starting over.

Despite all that, by December 30 I had six small objects that didn't exist before, that look alright from a distance!

I'm still working on a scarf that I started knitting over Christmas 2017. Once I'd used all the yarn up it didn't feel long enough, then it took a few months to track down more. Now it's too long, but I feel compelled to get through this extra ball so I'm just carrying on! I reckon Lenny Kravitz might like it when it's done.

8. What was your biggest failure challenge?
Righto, questionnaire whose origins I can't remember, I've changed that word above because language is important ;) The biggest challenge by far was #9 below.

9. Did you suffer illness or injury?
A month after returning from Vermont, buzzing with rediscovered exercise joy, I injured my lower back on a hike that was in retrospect too lengthy for my fitness level. For the next six months, I couldn't walk, sit, or stand for longer than five minutes at a time without unleashing a world of teary agony. So I rotated between the three like the world's most BLOODY BORING triathlon.

I'll spare you the details but it made things, especially work, quite difficult at times and my mental health got very wobbly. But after much trial, error and super strong painkillers, I got in with an awesome NHS physiotherapist and we're now on a good plan for healing!

It's been an exercise in patience and acceptance and prioritising, I tell ya. I'm in the midst of Project Strengthen Back, Butt and Hips - and unlike with my dodgy knee ten years ago, I'm actually doing the physio exercises religiously! I'm now back up to walking a good 20 minutes without pain and feeling much more chirpy.

10. What was the best thing you bought?

• Cabin Zero carry-on backpack - I got this in 2017 and after a year of regular use, I still love it. On short trips, I find a small wheelie suitcase can be more trouble than it's worth. The best example, when in London, it's easier to squish this bag onto my lap on a busy bus than wrestling a suitcase. It fits heaps inside it, has a laptop bit, is comfortable on your back when walking around, and tucks easily into the overhead locker on the plane.

• Fleece leggings - my Canadian pal Jilanna got me onto these - like trackydacks/sweatpants, but leggings so it's like getting the warmest, cosiest hug for your pins on a super cold day.

• Leuchtturm B5 dotted notebook - bigger than a pocket notebook but smaller than A5, this is a brilliant size notebook for random lists. The soft cover makes it light to tote around (every gram counts with a dodgy back, mwahaha.)

• Lisa Eldridge Velvet Morning lipstick - my favourite orange-red since Lady Danger

• 3 metre USB cable - so I could charge the phone and use it at the same time without acrobatics. Genius!

11. Where did most of your money go?
Airfares.

12. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
The Americans final season. What a masterclass in TENSION! The brilliant series finale was so stressful my teeth were actually chattering. As handsome as Mr Bodyguard was, I think Matthew Rhys was ripped off for the Golden Globe for Best Actor the other day!

I love character-driven shows where people grow and change over a stretch of years - the kind of shows that invite deep obsession. I love the routine of watching each episode, poring over online recaps and discussions and podcasts afterwards, dreaming about the characters, and of course, worrying about them years after the show has ended, as though they were real. This show gave me six years of quality obsession and it'll be hard to ever find that kind of love again. ;)

13. What song will always remind you of this year?
Fitness by Lizzo. She would have been my most-played artist on Spotify in 2018, if not for Gareth's prog and 80s metal cluttering up the mix. We have started the new year with separate accounts, as painful as that was for his thrifty sensibilities!

14. Compared to this time last year, are you:

a) happier or sadder?
Happier.

b) richer or poorer?
About the same.

15. What do you wish you’d done more of?
Fiction reading.

16. What do you wish you’d done less of?
Staying up too late on a school night.

17. How did you spend Christmas?
Quietly, in London with the nearest and dearests. Festive dining while watching Home Alone and Jaws on the telly. We did venture out for a walk at one point, then came back for trifle and Home Alone 2!

18. Did you fall in love this year?
Oh aye... with these Ottolenghi oven chips with Greek oregano and feta! 

I first saw these on Nigella's Instagram a few years ago (they hark from Australian chef George Calombaris) but it wasn't until I borrowed Simple from the library that I made them. SO GOOD. Crispy in a way I'd never known oven chips to be before.

19. What was your favourite TV programme?

• Halt and Catch Fire - I watched the first season a couple of years ago after Jason Kottke wrote about his love for it and how he got to be an extra. The first season didn't grab me so much, but then I saw a few articles that urged one to stick with it, for it gets goooood. And it did! It zoomed right into deep obsession and my top 5 series of all time. You may start watching HAFC and think, this is just about two geeky dudes building a computer. But it blossoms into soooo much more. If you grew up alongside the internet it's cool to watch a show that covers that evolution, but really it's the characters that got me laughing and crying and utterly hooked.

• The Americans - as per joyous ramblings above.

• Salt Acid Fat Heat - Unbridled enthusiasm is by far my favourite quality in a person and I could watch the luminous Samin Nosrat talk about food all day. I really hope she makes more programmes soon. If she made one episode per every good thing to eat in the world, I'd tune in. We could start with Cake Laksa Chocolate Bagels!

• Mortimer & Whitehouse: Gone Fishing - this was such a funny wee series in which comedian Bob Mortimer (who I crush madly on) is introduced to fishing by comedian Paul Whitehouse. Both of them had recently experienced heart conditions. Each episode has them go for a fishing lesson where they muse on both life's big questions and minutiae. It's addictive and touching. My favourite moment was when they cooked dinner for a cardiologist and asked him, "Which one of us do you think is going to die first?"

• Billy Connolly: Made In Scotland - in this brilliant two-part documentary Billy talks about his early life in Glasgow, his career, growing older, and his Parkinson's. It's hilarious and poignant without ever being sentimental.

• Also enjoyed: Sharp Objects, Spiral, Press, Killing Eve, Queer Eye, Feud and Mozart in the Jungle. The latter is one of those shows that I forget about between seasons but always enjoy when it pops up. Classical music, New York City, and Gael García Bernal - you cannae go wrong!

20. What was the best book you read?
The Life to Come by Michelle de Kretser. It follows the lives of five Australians, their lives entwining or briefly brushing past over time. I cackled and/or squirmed at the savage observations about writers and expat Australians. Cheers Kim of Reading Matters for the rec!

21. What was your favourite film?
I watched Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri on a plane and loved it. I probably should watch it again though as I've found when I rewatch films I saw on planes they're often not as good on the ground, because I'm always a bucket of feelings on a plane. Does anyone else get like that!?

Catching up on older films: I enjoyed Arrival and Grand Budapest Hotel.

22. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I turned 41 and it was a quiet and unremarkable day. But the following weekend I went out for tapas with two dear pals and that was spectacular.

23. What kept you sane?
Ziggy pats and funny friends.

24. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?

• Lee Pace in Halt And Catch Fire. Even in the 1995 episodes with his terrible hair and glasses that reminded me so much of dot com folks from back in the day.

25. Who did you miss?
In June I had an all-too-brief trip to Australia. It had been over five years since the last one, and that was too long! I want to prioritise getting back more often because it's so bittersweet seeing people after such a long gap and realising so much has happened since the last catch-up.

Elaine is one of those people so brimming with spark, brains and wit that you feel your own mojo rising just by being in her glorious presence. During her 17 year career Elaine has worked for some of Scotland’s biggest and best creative agencies, as well as for clients such as Domino’s Pizza, One Spa at The Sheraton, Whyte & Mackay, Buchanan Galleries, Scottish Rugby and even Susan Boyle.

Elaine set up independent agency Ginger in 2009. She's now based in beautiful Angus where she rocks the world of her clients all along the east coast and beyond.

I've been lucky to call Elaine a pal since 2006 when we first met in person over tea and scones at the swanky Balmoral hotel in Edinburgh (start as you mean to go on, right?). I'm chuffed that she was up for letting us peek behind the Ginger PR curtain and share how she gets things done with her trademark style and kickassery. She also shares her top tips for making great Instagram stories, as well what she sees as the barearse minimum we can do to promote our work online, without going bonkers.

1. When did you first become self-employed? Can you you recall the moment you realised you wanted to paddle your own canoe?

I can indeed. It was 2009 and I was spending around three hours a day in total commuting from Edinburgh to Glasgow. I really enjoyed my job but I longed for more control. It really stuck in my craw having to carry out work just to appease a middle manager (on the client side). I wanted to do work that actually made a difference and had integrity.

The credit crunch was biting down hard and I could sense redundancy was in the air (the company I was working for at the time had just closed the Edinburgh office I headed up) and it seemed like things were all falling into place for me to take that jump.

2. Pick three adjectives to describe your work.

Varied, creative, evolving.

3. How do you make your money?

Explaining PR has never been easy and the profession has changed so much in recent years that it’s even harder now. I help companies/brands/people raise and manage their profile, and in turn their revenue stream.

That comes in various guises. I might devise a social media strategy; creating a content plan for different platforms. I might place stories in newspapers and magazines. I might write the copy for a website. I might arrange an influencer event to launch a new product. I might provide essential marketing - such as signage/website creation/logo development. Anything that falls into these areas… I’m on it.

4. What does a typical working day look like? Do you like structure or are you more a by-the-seat-of-the-pantser?

I love structure but as in most jobs, things come up that need immediate attention so it’s the pants that are held aloft at this point. I’ve got two small children and don’t work full time as I want to be around for them. I like to joke that I’m living a full time life in a part time world, but it’s not very funny on the days I’ve got 283 things to do before I can go to bed.

On the days the kids go to nursery or granny, it’s head down GO GO GO. If there are any meetings or business development opportunities I need to try and schedule them on those days. The actual work can get done in evenings and weekends but the time spent with real life actual human beings who are my clients cannot!

5. I love how you share the everyday realities of running your business. You've posted a many an Insta story of you fitting in a bit of work in the car while your two young kiddos are napping. How do you find those pockets of time for work?

I love that phrase, pocket of time. When the girls are around (they have just turned 3 and 1) it’s impossible to get any real work done as I can’t concentrate – one eye is on the baby who loves to use her mouth as pocket to store all manner of choke-able items, and the other is on the 3 year old who needs a drink/ a fly removed/ a toy from a top shelf/ me to watch how high she can jump.

So if they are busy for a moment it’s a case of checking emails and firing off quick responses. Occasionally when they are in the double buggy and we’re walking somewhere I can make a quick call (with my headphones in) but that always runs the risk of background crying/mummy requests, or noisy traffic! Not so profesh so I try to keep that to a minimum.

6. You seem to dive into a day and get shit done with minimal faff. Were you born this way or has it gone up a level since you started your own business?

Ha! I feel like I faff WAY too much. Instagram has a lot to answer for! I am definitely more focused since I had children as there isn’t always another day to get the work done; I have to get it done when they are at nursery, or after they have gone to bed. Aside from that time pressure, I do hate being unproductive. The thought of a day wasted is very upsetting to me! The more I get done the happier I am.

7. You're a natural at Instagram Stories. I never ever skip past yours! What makes a good IG Story? Any advice to encourage those who feel a bit IG-story-phobic?

I LOVE Instastories. It is very self-indulgent to film yourself and your life and I suppose it gives me that taste of being the TV presenter that I would have loved to be. It can be really cringe talking to your phone, knowing people are then going to watch it and probably judge you. But if I don’t like someone’s story, I just swipe past. So if people want to watch or not – it’s up to them.

My top tip is talk to the camera. Film yourself. People want to see people. 17 stories in a row that are all pictures… boring. Get talking and show your face. I never plan what I’m going to say. I know the point I am going to make, so it’s good to have that in mind but otherwise I suggest pretending you’ve called up your best friend/mum and talk – and smile! Oh, and try not to be monotone. Be excited, angry, passionate, sneaky… anything that’s just a bit more.

8. What’s your least favourite work task?

I cannot be doing with the money admin. Invoicing and expense spreadsheets are dull dull DULL and I take no joy from them whatsoever. I have an accountant who makes me very happy but I still manage to leave ALL my expenses to the end of the year. Oops.

I don’t mind this but I mind the time it takes – a lot. Learning and training. Things are changing all the time and trying to keep up, and keep up to a level where you are advising your clients correctly is exhausting. I can spend hours looking into new platforms and understanding something technical, and it will still take hours to actually get my head around it. That’s one of the things I miss about working in an agency; the experts and training available.

9. You’ve been working in PR a long time, before social media was a thing. Is PR tougher work these days? What do you see as the biggest changes?

I wouldn’t say it’s tougher, I would just say it’s different. The biggest change is the adaption of ‘traditional PR’. While the concept remains the same (essentially selling a story into print media) the media has changed - it’s online and it’s social too OBVS. This means you also need to work on the way in which it’s delivered and get creative. The written word is always important, as well as events and collaboration, but images and the video need to take centre stage.

Fifteen years ago, courting journalists and developing relationships was THE THING. Now, that’s still essential but add into the mix, influencers and bloggers… that’s a huge additional audience to keep on top of.

There is also the challenge of succumbing to a scattergun approach as there are SO many things to suggest and recommend. A bit of social media, a bit of blog posting, some media coverage, a website refresh, a social influencer event… and are all of these tied up together?! A focused approach with measurable results is essential. Can you see if what you are doing is effective? How are you measuring this? Very important.

10. For the entrepreneurs or self-employed folks reading - what's the barearse minimum folks can be doing online to promote their work? Any common clangers you see where people don’t quite get it right?

So many! The main thing I would say is don’t feel like you have to do it it all. Pick the things that are central to your business and do them well. Website – is it up to date? Are the images clear? All the pages working and actually have words on them that are written well? Is there a phone number? Have you set up a Twitter account and last tweeted 4 months ago? Delete it.

The online and public perception of your business reflects directly on your brand. For example, if you run a self-catering venue and your website is dated? That’s what people will think about your accommodation. If you're an engineer and your social media is sloppy, people will expect that of your work too.

11. What’s the nicest thing a client has ever told you about your work?

It’s probably that I’m dynamic and the publicity I’ve driven for their brand has resulted in direct sales/increase in new customers. It’s not very exciting feedback as a lot of what I do is hard to ‘show’. Yes, a lovely big spread in the newspaper looks wonderful but it’s the impact that counts – which can be hard to measure. And there is so much work that is relationship building – which is very much behind the scenes work.

12. What are your favourite ways to procrastinate?

Instagram is most def up there. I am so bad at getting sucked into Stories for quite some time.Working from home always has the ‘tidy the house’ factor. You know, you’ll tidy and clean things that wouldn’t normally get a look in, rather than tackle the to do list. When I get back from dropping the girls off at nursery, I allow myself 15 minutes to clear up breakfast/empty the dishwasher/ put the washing machine on before sitting at my desk for the day – otherwise before you know it, it’s time for lunch!

I can also while away far too much time looking at recipes! I want to make something different for dinner tonight but I know I need to limit my online recipe trawling to 15 mins or I would be there for an hour.

13. Fast forward five years from now… what do you imagine Ginger PR will look like?

I’ve not been great at making future projections and plans for my business as I always knew I wanted to have a family and I knew if I was lucky enough, it would impact my business greatly. I’ve been working part time for over three years and on maternity leave twice in that time. But things are beginning to build back up and I’m at a stage now where things are growing steadily and I’m choosing to bring in people to work with me so the Ginger PR roster can increase. I also don’t like to plan too much as you just don’t know what’s going to happen. Something totally different could be around the corner that you had no idea was coming.

Update 2022: Elaine’s business has indeed grown since this interview and is more fabulous than ever! Ginger is now part of Altar Group.

14. What is your workday beverage of choice?

I love a coffee. A huge mug of coffee. I smashed my favourite mug some time ago and bought this purple delight as a replacement. It’s humungous and the pattern reminds me of my Granny Couper who died two years ago, and also loved a coffee.

15. Working for yourself can be a lonely business! Do you have any sources of support?

I don’t mind it too much. It’s a chance for me to enjoy listening to music and drinking coffee without anyone asking me 1393 questions, haha! I do miss the team chat and camaraderie at times though. I know a number of freelancers in the same boat so they are always on hand for a chat and I’ve also established a local monthly creatives meet up where we like to share gripes and have blether about the industry.

16. When it comes to getting organised, are you a digital or analogue person?

I am old school. I have a notebook for client work and a notebook for my weekly/ daily do to list. I love to write it all down, segmented by client/life topic. It really helps me to see where I need to prioritise my time. And yeah, ticking it off feels so good! The only other must have is my calendar on my phone. Ideally that would also be an old school paper one but I have a shared calendar with my husband, and ain’t nobody got room to cart another item around with them.

17. Is there anything about the world of social media that that you’re not a fan of/feel is a bit bullsh*t?

Yes. Insta is really where you’ll find me these days and I find it to be mostly a very supportive community. However, sometimes it’s a bit preachy. Lots of women telling other people they don’t need to feel X/put up with Y/ be afraid of doing Z. Ugh. A bit pious to offer advice when it’s not asked for.

18. What do you see out the window of your workspace right now?

Rain! The heatwave is over! Beyond the rain, some houses and some hills. I’m based in Angus, a beautiful part of Scotland with towns surrounded with glen, and fields and beaches.

Thank you Elaine! Check out her work at Ginger and be sure to follow her fabulous adventures on Instagram.

Background:

When we got her from the shelter in January 2016, Ziggy had always been an indoor cat. After much research, we decided it was safest to continue since we're not far from a main road.

A few months later, she expressed curiosity about the outside world, so we took her into our backyard. First on a little harness, then eventually without it. Ever since she's liked an outside jaunt most days. We'd hang out with her as she lounged around the garden, watched the birds, sniffed a flower or two, and then sauntered back inside after twenty minutes. Occasionally a neighbourhood cat would wander into the yard, and she'd whoosh over to scare it off her turf. But she'd always stop at the border, then get right back to the critical business of lazing around.

These excursions continued without incident for over two years... until two Thursday afternoons ago!

Here's how it all went down...

3.30PM - Ziggy is flopped out on the grass as per, when a little black cat appears at the edge of our garden. Ziggy springs to action and rushes at it. But instead of stopping like usual, she leaps over the fence into the neighbour's yard and then disappears in hot pursuit.

Shit. I race outside and head down the street to look for her... but she's nowhere to be found.

4PM - I return home and try to remain calm. I post a message to the village Facebook group. It felt like the best first port of call, as it has swiftly located many missing cats in the past. (And also provided critical updates on the availability of fresh bread rolls in the village shop during the #BeastFromTheEast!)

4.30PM - Gareth arrives home from his shift to find me anxiously pacing the streets.

5PM - Someone on the Facebook group says they'd spotted Ziggy and the black cat a while earlier, "having an altercation," but then they'd run off in opposite directions.

Ziggy is a street fighter now!?

The Worst Evening Of Our Lives - That may sound overly dramatic, but dudes... we were stricken. Between shifts of village patrol, we sat silently on the couch, trying to decide how worried to be.

On the one hand, it had only been a few hours, and my cat-owning friends reassured me that cats pull this shit all the time and then waltz back in. On the other hand, Ziggy had never been outside our yard before, so how the heck would she know how to get home!? It was hard not to imagine a tabby pancake in the middle of the highway.

It is ridiculous how deeply, deeply attached you become to a creature that is, for the most part, completely indifferent to your undying affection. 78% of our daily conversations revolve around her exploits. The house seemed cavernous without her stripey bod sashaying in and out of the room, or scratching her claws on the bottom step like she knows she's not meant to, or making a deposit to the litter tray juuuust as we sit down to enjoy a cup of tea.

“I don't know what I'll do without that jerk,” Gareth finally says, “She's my wee pal.”

He is so sad and sincere. I just want to vom from the guilt, since she'd nicked off on my watch.

“What did we ever talk about before her?”

“I can't remember.”

“I guess we'll have to get divorced if she doesn't come home.”

We laugh halfheartedly.

It rains all night. Neither of us sleeps. I get up every hour or so to see if she's outside or to shuffle up and down our street.

(I should mention at this point that I'd injured my lower back a few weeks earlier, with any walks over ten minutes sending excruciating pain radiating across my lower back and down my legs. Your timing sucks, cat! ;) )

Friday 5AM - G has to leave for work. I begin yet another shuffling lap of the village, calling her name as I shake a little bag of dry food and noticing the inner conflict between missing moggie angst versus feeling like a twit for making such a racket. I mean, people will be trying to sleep.

I see two tabbies that are not Ziggy, plus the black cat from the altercation. All are wearing smug I ain't seen nufin faces.

6AM - My back is cooked. I take a nap on the couch.

7.30AM - Wake up and submit cat to every Lost Pets forum in the land. After advice from dear friends who've previously had AWOL moggies as well as the reading Cats Protection What to do if your cat goes missing list, decide it is time to make some flyers.

7.35 AM - Scour the Google for a Lost Cat Microsoft Word template.

7.36 AM - Download template.

7.37 AM - Move template to Trash due to its use of SHITTY WORD ART. One has standards.

7.38 AM - Start making own flyer.

8.15 AM - Text Gareth and ask him to please sneakily print as many copies as possible.

8.35 AM - Gareth confirms he has managed to print 20 copies but says, don't we have a printer at home?

8.40 AM - Dig out old printer that we had shoved into a corner a year ago after it stopped working for no good reason. Commence Operation Fix That Printer.

9.36AM

9.42AM - BREAKTHROUGH.

10.00 AM - Painkillers have kicked in. Commence slow hobble around the streets avec flyers.

11.30 AM - Return home from spamming the immediate neighbourhood.

11.55 AM - Phone call from a kind gentleman who lives down the street.

He got my flyer!

He's found Ziggy in his garage!

12:00 PM - Toddle down the street. Kind Gent opens his garage door. A pair of eyes peer out from the darkness. It is the Striped One!

PRINT IS NOT DEAD AND NEITHER IS ZIGGY.

12:10 PM - After much coaxing out with Dreamies, then a dozen thank yous of wild gratitude to the Kind Gent, I carry a mewling Ziggy back down the street.

12:25 PM - Having scoffed down a tin of Gourmet Gold, Ziggy leaves a fragrant present in her litter tray, lolls casually on the living room floor, then dozes off like nothing bloody happened.

Originally from Germany and now based in the beautiful Pacific Northwest, Kerstin designs gorgeous Squarespace websites and teaches online courses. She recently launched Squarespace Biz Box, a comprehensive course to help people create their own successful and profitable web design business.

I love Kerstin's unconventional path to self-employment. A self-described Jill-Of-All-Trades, she spent years flying around the world as a flight attendant for Lufthansa, managed IT projects in southern England, did corporate sales in the airline finance industry, ran her own online dating site and personal growth workshops in London, worked as a hotel manager in the Pacific Northwest, and was college secretary in Massachusetts and the registrar of an international school in Germany, before "accidentally" starting her own business.

After years of following each other's adventures online, we finally met in Seattle last year and bonded over a shared love of lists, details and peanut butter cups. Our regular Skype chats on all things life and business never fail to leave me inspired and rebooted.I'm so chuffed that she was up for sharing the story of how she built a thriving business that's full of integrity and heart.

1. How did your business begin?
My foray into entrepreneurship happened rather by accident. Since starting a blog in 2005 I have always dabbled with its design, first in Wordpress and for the last 10 years Squarespace. I just loved creating new looks that reflected whichever mood or season I was in, this was (and still is) my perfect idea of R&R!In 2014, when we relocated from the UK to the US, a friend of mine asked me to redesign her business website and it was such a success that, instead of looking for a new job, I decided to start my own business as a Squarespace web designer!I was 51 at the time and had spent decades in corporate employment so this definitely felt like a crazy thing to do! But it also felt very right. I’ve been profitable since day one and my revenue has tripled in the last three years so this is absolutely a viable income source for me.

2. Pick three adjectives to describe your work.

Modern. Stylish. Organised.

3. How do you make your money?

70% web design projects and 30% from Squarespace e-courses (I started these in early 2017).

4. What does a typical working day look like? Do you like structure/routine or are you more a by-the-seat-of-the-pantser?

For someone who likes to be organised (I am German after all!) my work style is surprisingly fluid and dictated by what’s on my plate at any given moment. I am quite good friends with the panic monster, there is nothing like the thrill of a deadline to get me going!

Mind you, most of my deadlines and pressures are self-imposed and I keep reminding myself that I am my own boss these days and can make my own rules! Which means that I generally stick to a Monday to Friday work week with a schedule that is mostly driven by my appointments and a daily to-do list that I write into my bullet journal every morning.

5. What do you typically wear when you work from home? Is there any connection between what you’re wearing and how you feel as you work away?

During my first year in business I rented an external office which meant that I got dressed up and put on make-up every day. This was actually crucial to starting my own business because it made me feel like I still had a ‘proper’ job.

However, since I can work from anywhere I decided after one year that I’d rather put the rent money towards our mortgage and set up office in our 3rd bedroom. I love my cozy little home office! And unless I know that I am going out I keep things pretty casual with yoga pants, comfy t-shirts and knits. Being comfortable always makes me feel good and puts me into a good mindset for working.

6. I love your refreshing openness about the way you feel about business life. You’ve written very honestly about having your work plagarized, FOMO and the ups and downs of "the hustle", to name a few. Do you find this honesty has had a positive impact on your business?

Thank you, and likewise — I have always loved your openness and think you’re pretty awesome, too!

Yes, this has definitely had a positive impact! You often hear it being said that to run a successful online business you need to establish trust with your audience. I think being honest about myself and my experiences helps my readers to connect with me and that in turn supports an environment in which trust can flourish. But even without this, being open and direct is simply who I am, it’s how I used to write about my life as a blogger and how I continue to share the joys and perils of entrepreneurship.

7. The word “heart centered” is quite overused in the online biz world (and if we weren't all heart-centered, we’d be dead). But you really do run your business from a place of integrity and heart. Can you tell me what heart-centered means to you, in terms of the way you approach your business?

Totally agree, it’s become a very overused phrase and as such has lost some of its genuine intention and power. You already mentioned the one word that I mostly associate with heart-centered: integrity. Integrity, to me, is about using a more gentle and personable approach that is in line with my core values of awareness and consideration.

I despise the shouty 6-figure marketeers that make running your own business all about how much money you can earn by following their secret seven steps to guaranteed success. I call this ‘the pyramid scheme of the gold rush entrepreneur’ and all I can say is ugh. This is not how I want to ever run my business.

What’s most important to me is simply becoming really good at what I do and delivering a great service and high quality work to my clients. My business has grown very organically, and steadily, as a result and I am able to draw a great income from it as well.

8. Another thing I love about you is that you’re a fellow Attention To Detail person. What details matter most to you? 

OMG. I can drive myself — and others — crazy with this need to make sure all the details are just so and just right! In my designs this means paying close and occasionally obsessive attention to balance and flow, as well as contextual, structural and visual integrity.In my business it means being reliable, accountable and a conscientious communicator. The other day a client outsourced some of the maintenance work on her site to a junior employee and he paid no attention to the date and time format that I had been using, resulting in visually inconsistent updates. Which drove me nuts when I saw it!

They are just small irregularities but I can be quite the stickler for this kind of stuff. Alas, my client outsourced this task because I wanted to be freed up from it and I am learning the important lesson of letting go of those things that are not mine to control anymore.

9. What’s your least favourite task related to your work?

Bookkeeping when I’ve been procrastinating on it. Ironically, bookkeeping is also one of my favourite tasks, once I get into it! I get a lot of satisfaction out of tallying up the numbers, seeing my Excel formulas at work and getting a clear overview of the financial state of my business.

10. What’s the nicest thing a client has said to you about your work?

I am very grateful for the amazing testimonials I get from both my web design clients and e-course participants. Each in their own way has said super nice things about my designs, how easy I am to work with and that I am a great teacher. I also get a lot of positive feedback regarding my openness and honesty, see point 6! I have really good relationships with my clients and consider myself lucky to have worked with so many truly wonderful people.

11. What are your favourite ways to procrastinate?

Facebook. Instagram. Tinkering with my website.

12. Do you have any hopes and dreams or just plain old plans for your business in 2018? :)

I do! 2017 was all about growing my courses while continuing to design websites for clients. I love both but it’s been exhausting keeping up with it all. This is the point where many designers start hiring and expanding but I decided that I prefer to work solo. I am currently working with a great business coach to figure out what this means for 2018 and the way forward. My desire is to create a better balance between my on-screen and off-screen time and to make more space for my health and wellbeing related goals.

13. What is your beverage of choice while working? Do you have a favourite mug/cup?

Water, herbal tea with honey, and Nespresso with a dash of cream!

14. Working for yourself can be a lonely business! Do you have any sources of support? 

You are right, working for myself and from home can get lonely and the companionship of colleagues is one thing I miss about corporate life. I am grateful for a supportive husband who is a great listener and always interested in my business and happy to let me bounce off ideas as well as frustrations.I also find support online via Facebook groups, working with coaches (I can highly recommend Sas Petherick and Sophy Dale) and having virtual coffee chats with lovely people like you!

In absence of co-working spaces in our town I also love working out of coffeeshops and try to do this once or twice a week. Just being surrounded by people and good coffee makes me feel good and increases my productivity.

15. When it comes to getting organised, are you a digital or analogue person, or a combo of the two? 

I am a big believer in simplicity. There are so many productivity apps out there and my German brain goes into overdrive at all the possibilities of getting even more organised! But this last year I realized that many of these tools are just another distraction and that I can easily spend more time “getting organised” than actually working. These days I organise myself as follows:

1. I use 17hats for all client related administration, such as proposals, contracts, invoicing, questionnaire, time tracking, bookkeeping and automated workflows. Love 17hats!

2. For scheduling work related appointment and consultation calls I use Acuity and my Apple Calendar. Acuity is embedded into my website so it’s a seamless process from booking to getting into my digital calendar. My calendar has different categories and this is where I keep anything scheduling related as well as important deadlines, both for personal and business use. It’s a pretty important time management tool and I heavily rely on the notifications to remind me of upcoming events!

3. Email can be such a vortex for my time and energy! I dabbled with a few email tools but in the end I came up with this very simple system that works great for me. In my Apple Mail I created three folders:

1. To Do This Week

2. To Do Next Week

3. To Do Bookkeeping

As emails come in I sort them into one of these folders and I only keep in my Inbox what I intend to work on today. Once a task is done I either delete the email or file it, and when I reach Inbox Zero I get more tasks from the “To Do This Week” folder. This simple system has made me a lot more efficient!

4. Apple Notes is my digital catch-all app for notes, ideas, lists, links and anything I want to keep for later use. Folders and sub-folders make it easy to file everything and there are easy at-a-glance overviews of any linked documents, photos and URLs. I sync Notes across all my devices and it’s a wonderful and user-friendly tool for organising lots of information.

5. Last, but not least, I am using my Leuchtturm bullet journal for my weekly organisation, master to-do lists and day-to-day stuff. Every Sunday I create a 2-page overview of all my appointments and a to-do list for that week and then I use the subsequent blank pages to scribble down notes throughout the week, draw doodles and washi-tape down receipts, fortune cookies, quotes and whatever snippets of daily life I wish to keep. My digital calendar sends me reminder notifications but using this analog system helps my brain prepare for the week ahead and deal with day-to-day tasks and events in a creative and organized way.(Please note that Kerstin's links to 17hats and Acuity are affiliate links)

16. What do you see out the window of your workspace right now?

We had a dusting of snow! And I still have my Christmas decoration up on my window sill! (Shauna's note - Kerstin completed this interview back in January!) My office window faces west so I get to see some amazing sunsets and I love seeing the horizon from our 3rd floor condo.

18. Would you mind sharing a photo of your workspace?

I converted our tiny 3rd bedroom into a cozy office, painted one wall turquoise and I love it! I always have candles going and occasionally I am joined by my furry office assistant :)

Big thanks to Kerstin for her time! Find out about Kerstin's offerings on her website. 

"The truth of the matter is that nothing will do it like food... Eating in that way lights up the pleasure centers of the brain. It’s like a freight train pounding into the reward centers of the brain, lighting them up like floodlights at a football stadium. But then, it crashes down and shuts off those lights...

The downside is that at the end of eating in that way comes guilt, shame, disgust, pain. The food works… until it doesn’t. Somewhere along the way, those floodlights came crashing off."

So if the floodlight is ultimately unhelpful, what is the alternative?

Twinkle lights. Lots of twinkle lights. (That's fairy lights to us UK folks!)

When we string together loads of twinkle lights in our life - small pleasures that gently light up our senses - they're collectively powerful. And unlike the floodlight of a binge, if you lose a light bulb or two, you're not left in the dark.

Apparently, front-loading pleasure is hugely helpful for binge eating recovery. When we engage the senses purposefully and mindfully, it can impact our mood. Also, humans are wired to seek pleasure and connection. If we get a good amount of twinkle lights happening, we're less likely to hit that food floodlight switch in an attempt to get what we need.

Haica, our therapist, had us make lists of our favourite everyday pleasures. We focused on each sense, naming all those little things that make us feel good. That was fun, but I noticed I wasn't doing much of the stuff on my list.

I realised I was on a pleasure pendulum. No, that is not a kinky adult contraption! Instead it's a tendency to swing between very little pleasure to huge bursts of pleasure, with often little time spent in the middle.

Like the hunger pendulum - hitting the snooze button on one's hunger signals - I do the same thing with pleasure. Looking back at my periods of bingeing over the years, the pattern is there, over and over. In most recent years, it's looked like this:

work work work → neglect movement, regular meals, socialising etc. → hit Floodlight A: Overeating/Bingeing

or

work work work → neglect exercise, regular meals, socialising etc. → hit Floodlight B: Awesome Vacation or Social Event

Both Floodlight options feel fabulous in the moment. After all, they usually involve a lot of waiting, planning and plotting, scrimping and saving - I love a slow burn! But after the high, the pendulum always returns to the Cave o' Neglect.

So I appreciated that adding some twinkle lights could be helpful to break this pattern. The first step was to understand why I still resisted the idea. Pleasure seems such a lame thing to struggle with. Who doesn't want to feel good?! I have low barriers to entry. I set my schedule most days. I have a roof over my head and the privilege of leisure time. I have no kids and answer only to one surly cat. Also, I enjoy my work, but work is not something that drives me - so why is it my go-to excuse for putting off the fun stuff?

I got specific about my resistance, and it was a mess of contradictory thoughts:

• Suspicion - what is the point? How could doing a few pleasant things make a dent in the almighty binge beast?

• Cynicism - putting pleasure in the same box as “self-care” - scented candles and all that marketing malarkey.

• Farmer DNA - one doesn't rest until all the work is done. If you've got time to sit around painting your nails, you could be shearing a sheep or putting a crop in! ;)

• Equating it with diet culture - "If you think you want chocolate, take a bubble bath instead!" which fills me with rebellious rage... let me tell you where you can shove your bubbles!

• Fear of overindulgence - what if I start doing nice things, and I won’t be able to stop, like I did with the food? What if my feelings are too big and I want too much, and I won’t get back to work, and I'll end up living in a cardboard box?

• Feeling overwhelmed - when one gets into that really dark and shitty place, finding the oomph even to take a shower feels near impossible, let alone the other stuff.

• Old unpleasant experiences - a tangible fear of getting in trouble, coming from a time when leisure equalled laziness, and you did not want to be caught idle. Even now, if I'm reading a book when Gareth arrives home, I sometimes jump up and start babbling, “I was just about to do the dishes!” (and the poor lad looks very confused).

With all those reasons written down, it made sense why sometimes it felt easier to scoff a big old bag of crisps.

However, understanding the resistance has made it easier to act this time. My Green Mountain motto has been, "Just give it a go and see what happens". If I hope to stop this bloody pendulum swinging, I need to try something different.

So I'm all about adding in the twinkle lights - creating more moments of pleasure, keeping my eyes open, and appreciating the small delights already right before my eyes (hello, mindfulness).

Since getting home, I've added some stuff from the list I made at Green Mountain. Reading an analogue book in bed for ten minutes in the morning (instead of picking up my phone and lurching straight into the day). Actually bothering to moisturise after showers. Switching back to paper and pen for my morning writing instead of the computer and actually doing the morning writing. Getting rid of all my sad and faded knickers and buying cheery new ones! Playing music in the kitchen while chopping veggies. Eating dinner at the table, not on the couch (Ziggy often sits on one of the dining chairs and peers over the top of the table, which is the cutest thing).

It sounds so bloody ridiculous when I write all those tiny things down. But after three weeks back home, I'm starting to feel a little glow from these twinkle lights. The resistance is still there all the time, but I've noticed that the work/home boundaries are a little more defined. I'm getting out and about more, and best of all, I'm not thinking about food half as much because there are a bunch of nice little things crowding out those thoughts. I can see how this will be a useful addition to the recovery toolbox.

I partnered with Green Mountain at Fox Run, in which I received a three week stay at Green Mountain in February 2018, in exchange for writing about my experience. The stay included the Green Mountain core program and Pathway program at the Women’s Center for Binge & Emotional Eating. I covered my own travel expenses. All thoughts and opinions are my own. Browse all my Green Mountain posts here.

Update, January 2019 - Green Mountain has now closed down. 

Maybe I subconsciously paced my scribbles but it's still a pleasing outcome. Even if I hadn't learned a thing, the trip would have been worthwhile just for the fun of writing things down all day long like a big nerd.

But BONUS, I did learn stuff! During my last week, the lovely Jo asked on my Facebook page:

What’s the most valuable thing you’ve learnt during your stay?

My answer:

"... I’m leaving with a deeper understanding of why I do what I do - what’s going on in my brain and body, and the moments/triggers that lead up to a binge or overeating.

And that it’s not one answer but a collection of little tools and practices that collectively can help - mindfulness, consistent movement, mindful eating, self compassion, small moments of pleasure, gratitude etc.

A lot of stuff that I’ve previously thought 'yeah nice idea' but had not realised how important it is for helping us stay more centered and less likely to swing to the darker places."

It was so helpful to gain a deeper understanding of the why after decades of periodically finding myself surrounded by a bunch of food wrappers, totally frustrated and befuddled at how I wound up there again.

The why is a bit of a cocktail - it can be habitual (the brain following old, deep neural pathways... cue > response > reward), it can be a response to stress, it can be a response to restriction, it can be all of those at once.

But when it happens, it's for a good reason. Even though it may not feel that way, it serves a purpose on some level. It might be to soothe, numb, and feel safe, an attempt to fulfil a need. As they said at GM, The food works. Until it doesn't.

As we started to learn about the practices that can help heal this stuff - the mindfulness, the movement, the food stuff, self-compassion, the new habit building etc. - I realised that this will be a sloooooow process. After all, I've been on the diet/binge treadmill for over 30 years. Some of those neural pathways are more like trenches.

It's more like It Never Ends, the soap opera that Mo of The Simpsons briefly appeared on (as Doctor Tad Winslow).

"Like the cleaning of a house... It Never Ends."

But that's actually a more liberating than depressing thought. I've got time! Unlike dieting, I have no arbitrary deadline. I can experiment and play and fail and try and try again.

I thought some background on the Green Mountain approach would be helpful if you're curious.

This post from their website has a nice summary:

"Here is the magic Green Mountain Formula for wellness and well-being: Eating + Moving + Living, with a focus on Feeling Good = Health, of the mind and body.

It may sound scary at first to focus on feeling good. We think that if we allow ourselves to feel good, then we won’t be guilted into what we think are healthy behaviors. If we let ourselves rest because it feels good, how will we ever get to the gym? If we let ourselves eat pizza because it feels good, how will we ever make ourselves eat vegetables?

But here’s the key: When we focus on feeling good – when our goal is to eat, move, and live in a way that gives us more joy, more energy, more life – we’ll find ourselves attracted to those things intuitively.

The truth is: When we aren’t taking care of ourselves, that doesn’t feel good. When our stress isn’t well-managed because we’re taking on too many tasks, that doesn’t feel good. When we restrict or binge because we’re hung up on diets, that doesn’t feel good. When we’re not engaging in joyful physical activity, that doesn’t feel good.

The reality is that Eating + Moving + Living, with a focus on Feeling Good = Health, will bring us more of exactly what we’re after."

Read the full post - If Not Diets, Then What?

I partnered with Green Mountain at Fox Run, where I received a three-week stay at Green Mountain in February 2018, in exchange for writing about my experience. The stay included the Green Mountain core and Pathway programs at the Women’s Center for Binge & Emotional Eating. I covered my travel expenses. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Update, January 2019 - Green Mountain has now closed. 

As someone who made four trips to Weight Watchers before the age of 18, then seven more up until 38, I have thoughts on this topic.

Part of me wants to believe that Weight Watchers had good intentions and didn't just gather around the table brainstorming ways to capture the next generation of Watchers of Weight. Yet there is no getting around it. Weight Watchers is a big corporation seeking a big profit, and their business model depends on repeat customers. They believe the children are the future.

You may be asking, what's the big deal? Aren't Weight Watchers just trying to help kids be healthy? What's wrong with that, eh?

This tweet echoed my thoughts:

Not everyone who diets will develop an eating disorder, but almost everyone who has an eating disorder has been on a diet. Dieting, over evaluation of body, & wt talk are biggest risk factors in ED development. @WeightWatchers #WakeUpWeightWatchers

— Laura Thomas, Ph.D. (@laurathomasphd) February 10, 2018

And this one:

If I had a dollar everyone told me their first diet was @WeightWatchers then went on to have an #eatingdisorder diagnosis let's just say I'd have a nice little beach cottage #wakeupweightwatchers

— Fiona Sutherland APD, RYT (@FionaBodyPosAus) February 10, 2018

I'm not a health professional, so my thoughts are purely those of a teenage WW frequent flyer.

I want to stress that this was my experience and that dieting with Weight Watchers was just one factor in a jolly cocktail of things that shaped that experience.

Like so many folks I've met who have eating disorders or disordered eating, I first went to Weight Watchers as a young teen accompanied by a well-intentioned parent. I have nothing but understanding and compassion for their decision. This was the 90s, and diet culture was all-pervasive. Weight Watchers was seen as The Sensible Option.

Here is what I learned from teenage dieting:

How to spend every waking moment thinking about food, whether in full focus or as an anxious background rumbling.

How to mistrust my appetite and worry about every mouthful.

How to eat less without anyone noticing.

How to eat more without anyone noticing.

How to quietly open the freezer in the middle of the night to steal cookies.How to stop eating after Monday recess because Monday night was weigh-in.

How not to drink anything either, even in an Aussie summer.

How to eat and eat and eat after the weigh-in, then start again on Tuesday morning.

How to stew on my Failure all week long if the number was Bad.

How to dread or completely avoid school trips, birthdays, and slumber parties because they were dens of temptation, and I wouldn't know what I was allowed to eat, so I wouldn't eat much.

How to not concentrate on conversations because I was too busy counting the remaining pieces of pizza and wondering if I could sneak one after everyone was asleep.

How to say no to social occasions, pool parties, sports teams, hobbies and big opportunities (hello, exchange year in Japan) because I was so ashamed of my body and would do anything to avoid letting people see it move.

How to be with my friends but never really be there.

Once I went off to university with unfettered access to food, the binge/restrict cycle kicked into a much higher gear. Almost annually, I'd slink back to Weight Watchers, full of remorse. I'd always been a dedicated student, so it irritated me that I'd still not aced the programme, despite having tried since I was ten. It was a Sensible Plan! Pills and shakes and grapefruit plans were the crazy stuff; this was just common sense! Clearly, I wasn't working hard enough.

So as an adult, I'd rock up with my pencils freshly sharpened, determined to score the elusive Lifetime Membership card finally and WIN at weight loss, dagnabbit!

Of course, there was that one time I managed to stick at it for a good few years and lose a great deal of weight. It took a further ten years of lurching up and down the scale to finally appreciate that dieting was not helpful and that maybe I needed to dive a wee bit deeper.

There was one final trip to Weight Watchers, at Inverness in 2015. I lasted one meeting. They demonstrated how to measure a cup of dried pasta, and every fibre of my being finally screamed, Abort mission!

I want to reiterate that this was my experience as a teenager, and Weight Watchers was only one piece of the puzzle. I also appreciate that some people find Weight Watchers et al. to be very helpful. But this post is not about those people.

I've read so much research about the link between dieting and the development of eating disorders and the long-term effects of weight cycling that I can't ignore the evidence.

Also, as someone who wrote about the pursuit of weight loss publicly for a long period, I want to be open about the reality of my experience over the years.

I recently sat in a room full of dieticians and psychologists who were doing a professional training workshop here at Green Mountain at Fox Run, where I stayed as a guest blogger and had the opportunity to work on my binge eating issues. Weight Watchers was the hot topic du jour, and it was exciting to hear such passionate conversation.

It was also heartening to hear them talk about their work and how they're embracing new ideas to help people beyond the scale. There are more troops on the ground, which is great because the overwhelming majority of teenagers won't grow up to have the privilege and resources to go somewhere like Green Mountain if they find themselves struggling with an eating disorder.

Weight Watchers are now reconsidering their plans in response to the #WakeUpWeightWatchers wave of protest from health professionals on social media. I am curious to hear what this new plan will entail. Dudes, if you need some ideas... step one: change your name!

Again, I'm not a health professional. I can only think of what would have been helpful to hear as a kid and what I wish we could help kids everywhere today hear too.

That humans come in many shapes and sizes.

That your body is smart and can tell you when it's hungry and when it's done; no app required.

That a clunky piece of metal cannot dictate your worth.

That there is joy to be found in food and movement.

That your young, still-growing body is not a problem.

If I had an American dollar for every tear I’ve leaked in the past couple of days, we’d be able to set up the Shauna Memorial Tears And Snot Scholarship to help thousands of people come here to Green Mountain.

I’d figured after 30+ years on the diet/binge hamster wheel, there’d be stuff to work through, but part of me thought I’d rock up in Vermont with my reporter’s hat on and cruise through the weeks, sharing my experience with you awesome people hopefully in a helpful way, while picking up some insights and practical tools to help me with the bingeing.

I didn’t realise there was so much lurking just beneath the surface. It’s like a calm (yet uptight) river is being dredged, and all the bodies, cars, and abandoned shopping trolleys are coming up.

They create such a beautifully safe environment here. They put on all these physical activities that invite you to move and reconnect your brain to your body. They feed you nicely. They guide you through these clever, crafty programs of learning and experiences that seem to have been magically engineered to unlock everything.

To top it off, I've been lucky to make new friends who get it, which is guaranteed to get the tears (and wild cackling laughs) flowing.

And then there is a beautiful big golden doodle dog wandering around with gigantic feet and gentle eyes that seem to speak to your soul and say sweetly, HEY LADY, WHY U SAD?

So I’m raw and red-eyed and unravelled. But at the same time, this is fun and fascinating and genuinely hilarious. I feel alive and hopeful, so it all feels very necessary.

Also: every day starts with the best Greek-style yoghurt in the universe! That alone could make a grown woman cry.

I partnered with Green Mountain at Fox Run, in which I received a three-week stay at Green Mountain in February 2018, in exchange for writing about my experience. The stay included the Green Mountain core and Pathway programs at the Women’s Center for Binge & Emotional Eating. I covered my travel expenses. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Update, January 2019 - Green Mountain has now closed.