Verbal High Fives

I’ve always been a huge fan of Christmas. It’s my favourite time of the year. I love all the lights and decorations, the songs, the ‘goodwill to all men’ and how excited the kids get opening their presents. After all, the true joy of Christmas is giving (gifts, that is, not Covid!) After such a spectacularly rubbish year, what’s on your Christmas gift wish list this December? Are you hoping for the latest iPhone, a pair of shoes, a puppy, the vaccine and life insurance cover - because Christmas is to die for? We were all reminded by Boris this week that Christmas is trying to kill us. OK it was technically Coronavirus that is going to use Christmas to kill us but Boris’ message was clear:- The important thing for all of us to remember is to have fun on Christmas Day in a festive and potentially life-threatening manner.  But did you know that Christmas has been trying to kill us long before Covid came along? According to onlinefirstaid.com , around 80,000 people incur Christmas-rel...

Is there much in this world that is worse than a diet? Sure musicals, Donald Trump, traffic jams on the highway, anyone wearing lycra-based clothing garments in public for purely social activities, and Super Villain attacks are right up there on the list, but only Covid and a few other truly heinous things suck worse than a diet, right?  I only ask because I recently embarked on a new, let’s be generous and call it a “somewhat restrictive” diet in which you try to cut out most lectins from what you eat. As we all know, lectins are a type of really toxic carbohydrate-binding protein that exists in plants so they’re basically lurking in almost everything we eat and cause all kinds of havoc inside our bodies. This means I’ve had to cut out any vegetables that contain seeds, as well as all fruit, beans, soy, legumes, grains, bread, pasta, potatoes, rice, cereal, dairy products made from cow’s milk, GMO foods, seeds, some nuts, sugar, pastries, and anything left that’s even remotely fun...

I visited Stonehenge for my birthday because nothing makes you feel more alive than looking at some immense, ancient mossy rocks that are arranged in a mind-blowing fashion, right? Seeing the Stonehenge World Heritage Site has been on my bucket list for ages so I figured, what with Covid seriously cramping our social lives at the moment, going to Stonehenge would be a fun Covid-approved experience that we could enjoy on my birthday - and by that I mean a safe outdoor-type activity in which my husband and I could spend vast quantities of time totally ignoring Stonehenge because we were worrying about whether or not we were controlling the virus by standing 2 meters apart from all the people surrounding us.   As soon as we parked the car and walked into the bustling Visitor’s Centre, my immediate thought was not, “Wow, let me get my camera to take a photo right now” – it was “Wow, let me get 10 more face masks and some gloves to wear right now” because it was heaving with people an...

Congratulations men, women and children; you have made it to May in The Worst-Case-Scenario Olympics that has been the year 2020! That means you have survived bush fires; multiple floods; the worldwide spread of the Covid-19 Pandemic; the implementation of Lockdown and being forced to spend a sanity-threatening amount of time cooped up at home with your loved ones, and Murder Hornets. And so I’m wondering - as I’m sure you are - what fresh dread awaits us next month in June (also known as the 6th level of Jumanji)?? Maybe it will come in the form of an asteroid, the loss of gravity, a new Teletubbies album, or sharknados .  Oh, you think shark-infested tornadoes converging on land to deliver seawater teeming with nature’s deadliest killers ready to dine on mankind sounds a tad far-fetched, huh? Well, you probably also thought that there would never come a time when humble items such as toilet paper and hand sanitizer would become more valuable than money, and then April ro...

I live on a university campus. The recent February floods cut off all of the university's main access roads to our town, leaving just a single country lane to serve as the only route onto campus for thousands of the students. This same lane has to be traversed by those of us who live on site but work elsewhere. We are the unfortunate souls who must routinely imperil our lives to travel like salmon against the flow of student traffic along this narrow country lane.  The posted speed limit for this lane is 20mph but the students tend to view this as more of an optional, casual suggestion rather than the law. They hurtle down that lane, flooring it as though they have just heard breaking news there is actually toilet paper back in stock at Aldi and they’re trying to get there before it all sells out. My main issue with them speeding on this lane is less about them breaking the law and more about them potentially breaking my face with their car. There are only two places in t...