Evening all,
It’s the last week until the Big Day everyone! It’s also my
last week at work before I officially wave goodbye to the NHS and say hello to
my new job with Travelodge! It hasn’t really sunk in yet but no doubt it will
all just hit me like a tonne of bricks on Friday.
This weekend has been a busy one for me and Matthew. From
watching War Horse in Oxford with Matthew and his colleagues on Thursday
evening, to making Matthew’s house into a festive wonderland and having the
ultimate adult day out visiting Costco and Ikea.
I’ll start with War Horse. I’d not heard that much about it
before apart from people saying it’s good and worth seeing. We met up with
Matthew’s work colleagues first at the pub and mingled with prosecco. It was
here that I discovered my aversion to prosecco and where I tried to convince
his colleagues that the director of his company looks like Rowan Atkinson. The
latter was relatively easy to do and I found someone who thought the same. I’d
seen the resemblance very early on in my ‘+1’ escapades at a gathering in 2016 and
was shocked by the uncanniness. People say all the time that someone looks like
a famous person but this, well this was different. It’s undeniable in fact. I’d
never seen such a striking doppelganger in my life so far and I’m doubtful I
ever will again. Anyway, enough of the
Rowan Atkinson lookalike. After some mingling it was time to leave for the
theatre. I’d not heard anything about the plot or the characters of War Horse
before so I was excited to see what all the fuss was about.
Soon the show started and it wasn’t long before me and
Matthew had the giggles. While we appreciated that real horses weren’t practical
for the stage, we weren’t quite expecting horse puppets. The performers came
galloping on stage, one with their arm up the young fibre glass horse’s bum. Of
course, it was to aid the foal’s movements on stage but still, I was watching a
grown person moving a horse puppet from its anus. This was shaping up to be what
one would call, an ‘interpretive’ show. War Horse tells the story of a young farmer’s
boy Albert nurturing his young horse, Joey from feeble beginnings to become a
bold, striking horse with many talents. The plot then thickens when war strikes
and threatens to turn the villagers lives upside down. With the Nation at war,
tensions run high at the farm and the bond between Joey and Albert is truly
tested. The performance throughout the show was great, especially considering
every aspect of the horse’s mannerisms were man-made. Whether the horse was galloping through the
village fields, or huffing and puffing around it’s paddock, it was all believable
and while yes you can see the people inside and it’s not 100% horse, it’s about
as near as you can get outside of the stables. It’s a spectacle to see but I’m
not sure I would rush back for a second viewing. The performances with the
horses were great, but sometimes the sheer amount of puppetry and props on the
stage made the plot that little bit harder to fully grasp.
Now moving on to Saturday and it was time to bring Christmas
to the Clarke household. The tree had already been bought and was stood
majestically in the front room as a blank canvas ready to be tarted up. First
thing to go on were the lights and they needed careful unwinding before being
strategically and meticulously placed on the tree. Once the tree was adorned
with lights the next thing to be added were the baubles. This is where all 3 of
us got involved picking from copper, gold, purple and Star Wars patterned
baubles to add another dimension of colour. The tree was really starting to
look the part now but there was one thing missing- the fairy for the top of the
tree! Everyone must have this same problem; you put all the decorations away for
the year but when the next Christmas comes around, you can’t find everything
you’d put away! While Matthew’s mum was searching for the fairy, it was up to
me and Matthew to finish off the tree. Tree chocolates and tinsel were all put
on the tree as well as a temporary fairy. The real fairy was later found but
the temporary fairy had made itself very comfortable, so the decision was made
to keep the temporary fairy in place. The tree is also quite tall so I think it
was also a decision fuelled by “I can’t be arsed to climb back up there!” After
the tree was finished and looking festive, it was then time to decorate the rest
of the front room. More tinsel and more lights were strewn across all the
mirrors and bare surfaces until the place looked more festive than Santa’s
grotto on steroids.
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| The Clarke Christmas grotto |
Onto Sunday now, and the day I’d be waiting for since I
found out I could get a Costco membership- an Ikea and Costco day out! To some,
it sounds boring but to me it sounded like a day of excitement. Nothing says
you’re an adult more than lusting over homeware and food and on Sunday, me and
Matthew went on a day of true adulting and I absolutely love it! Costco was an
interesting experience. While there are some very good deals on bulk buys, it
seems to be primarily geared up for huge families with even bigger appetites.
As we walked in, it was like walking into a parallel universe. Trade portions
of everything and anything you could think of from TV stands to Nando’s sauces
lined the shelves and the instinct is to immediately fill your trolley full to
bursting. While we were walking around, I was amazed at the sheer amount of
stuff and the quantity of it all. Then we got to the bakery section and my
mouth hit the floor when I saw the size of the cakes! I’ve never seen an apple
pie as big as the one I saw in Costco, and I doubt I will ever again. From that
humongous apple pie, to muffins the size of my face I was truly lost for words.
Once we’d finished gawping at the huge portions we got back to perusing all the
aisles and it wasn’t long before we’d walked around every aisle and decided to
finish and pay with our surprisingly modest load. We both thought we’d be
coming out with ridiculous hauls of everything! While Costco was an interesting
experience, it’s definitely a place for the serial bulk buyer, the party
planner planning on feeding the 5000, or big the family of 10.
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| The biggest apple pie I'd ever seen |
With our Costco load in the boot, it was time to move on to
Ikea. Every time we visit an Ikea, it’s almost become tradition for us to visit
the restaurant for meatballs either before or after the showroom journey
begins. This time, we stopped off for our meatballs first and then set off
around the Ikea circuit. I got a couple of their peach and orange candles,
while Matthew picked up some rechargeable batteries. We’ve been to Ikea so many
times, it’s hard for us to think of anything we don’t know about Ikea however,
as we walked around we learnt what a “code 99” was. A lost child. You can then
imagine our surprise when we heard over the tannoy “Code 99 has been terminated”.
What on earth did this mean? The child has been terminated?? Surely terminating
a child breaks another code entirely?! No one was panicking or making a fuss
however, so we guessed that it was just the Ikea way of saying they’d found the
child and we soon carried on with our route. In a sensational break with Mulie
tradition, we were out of Ikea within 2 hours and were soon heading back home
with nothing but a pack of cable tidy’s, 2 candles and a few packs of
re-chargeable batteries.
So, on reflection mine and Matthew’s weekend was a busy but
interesting one discovering a few new things. Costco is worth a visit but don’t
get too carried away with the quantities and the prices, War Horse was also a
spectacle worth seeing even if it is just the once- you won’t easily forget the
elaborate horsey antics in a hurry- and decorating while being fun, festive and
pretty can be a messy and time-consuming affair. With only one week to go now,
it’s easy to start losing your head over those last-minute presents and the
food shopping but it’s important to remember to take a deep breath before you
start to panic. Or failing that, read my gift giving tips to help you on the way
out of your Christmas crisis panic-free!
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