All of the above (a verse for the dreamers, the foolish and the clumsy)

Sometimes I dream things I shouldn't
have really long flashbacks
that last for hours
in that time in the morning between asleep and awake.

I have crazy ideas
put them in motion,
or sometimes leave them alone,
when I realise that they really are just bonkers

I'm romantic,
a fool,
imagine all those hopeless scenarios
run after trains when my beloved is zooming away from me
so, so fast.
and hope one day someone will run after me.

I jump through hoops,
I make hoops for others
and if they can't make it through,
I give them a leg up.

I am not strong enough to use my lawn mower,
I am ridiculously scared of most living things
I like making friends
but I hate it when they go away.

A lot of things go away.

But sometimes they come back again.

And if they don't,
I throw my head back onto my pillow
and sleep;
dream exotic dreams...

Sometimes it's daleks
and karaoke
or a fungi funeral
but in my Alice and Wonderland world
it never seems to matter

that I don't look perfect in photos
or that sometimes I eat badly
or if my hair looks rubbish when I get up in the morning
and I can't make it look right
or if I walk halfway to work with my skirt tucked into my knickers
or that I do really bad animal impressions
or that I give people I've just met fashion advice
or that I make mistakes
or set my alarm on weekends
and find it difficult to multi-task...

Because I know that for every mistake,
stupid photo,
TMI tweet,
blabbery blog post,
social faux pas,
accidental flash of underwear,
and the rest,
there is a belly-aching laugh,
a smile,
a skip in my step,
a holiday from real,
a song I know all the words to,
a small kindness I can pay to others,
and a love that is requited.

Whenever that will be.
It will turn up.

And in the meantime,
I will know that it is okay to be,
to do,
to have,
all of the above.

Instant karma, mafia wasps and the famous tainted love controversy of 2014...

Here is a long overdue blogpost on the amazing and awe-inspiring nature of instant karma which has become so, so apparent to me over the past 30 odd days.  (Not that I particularly subscribe to some New Age pick-and-choose-which-bits-you-like Hinduism, rather that 'you reap what you sow' is a central part of my actual belief system)  This will be followed by a couple of mad, rambling anecdotes (naturally)

Currently it is lent, and, as I do every year, I decided to challenge myself to something.  Now, we all know the debacle of when I tried to make everyone on my Facebook friends list smile (lent 2011) and that weird time I was forced, reluctantly, to give up Johnny Depp (lent 2004) but this time it was different.  I wanted something achieveable, but challenging.  The Facebook friends list one was very challenging, but I never managed it (although having a good stab at it counts for something, I'm sure...) whilst the Depp thing was just plain bizarre.  With this in mind, I decided I wanted to do something good, a good deed, if you will, every day of lent.

It started out as something nice.  Just plain, old nice.  I brought double chocolate brownies in for everyone at work.  I got to eat some too!  It was great.  But as the days went by, I started to notice something...

A force that is beyond myself started to pay me back in weird and wonderful ways.  I bought a coffee for someone behind me in the queue, I got a coffee bought for me the following week.  I brought in mini-eggs for people at work who had helped me out at a stressful time, a 'well done' card landed on my desk for getting through the stressful time. And the gifts kept on coming.  Coffee, chocolate, cards, thank-yous, well done, compliments, lifts home etc. etc.

So maybe I just know some pretty awesome and amazing people?  Probably.  And I feel quite guilty, like my efforts mean little compared to all these lovely blessings that keep on coming.  But, onwards I go, because I am quite enjoying doing all these little things, and, hoping upon hope, that I might surprise someone, or make someone's day, or bless someone just when they needed blessing.  Because now, I really need to pay everyone back for what they have blessed me with!  So I guess the quantity and quality of what I do for the remainder of lent will have to increase - I need to up my game!

Maybe you knew about instant karma already, maybe you don't believe in it, maybe you just think I'm plain bonkers.  If that's the case then I hope this post gives you a sense of what the little things can, and do, mean.  And if you were one of the people who blessed me, then hopefully you get a sense of how much it meant to me.

And, to conclude, I now admit that today's blessing comes in the form of my friend, who vows to save me from the mafia wasp in my house (a wasp I think belongs to the mafia, and I don't know why)

Now, I really better go because I need to figure out how to avoid making a mistake in the quiz on Monday like the tainted love controversy of January this year (I must only quiz people on the original artist behind a particular strain of musical genius when I definitely, definitely know that I am right!)

Furthermore, it's worth noting that instant karma works the other way too.  You know, put vinegar in your Dad's wine glass and get attacked by the largest spider you have ever seen...that kinda thing.

Be warned!