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As I left work today I was suddenly overwhelmed by how many things I’m happy and grateful about, even just over the space of this afternoon

• Today was brilliantly sunny, and even though I didn’t get to go out in it, just the knowledge that this is the beginning of the end of winter is enough to make me happy – summer is on it’s way!
• I work with some incredible people, and was reminded of this massively today as we prepare for one of them to go off and have a baby
• I had to take my coat of driving home due to the weather and forgot how freeing that feels
• I’ve rarely been more busy at work but actually it feels good!
• I left work a little late after helping clear up from the baby shower and finishing some bits off, and yet it was still light! didn’t even need headlights on initially
• I have a free evening!
• I have great friends at work who agree that payday is definitely a good enough reason to eat out tomorrow
• I wore a skirt today, and while it looks like something my mum would wear, it was fun 🙂
• For lunch I ate just meat, crisps, a strawberry and three pieces of cake. Oh, and a mini egg later.
• Someone has invented a folding plug!

I’m aware there’s nothing there about a roof over my head, food on the table or God’s incredible love, mainly because today it was just so many little specific things that stood out to me that I thought it’d be fun to share 🙂

People who know me will be aware I can bit a bit of a habitual whinger, so hopefully this makes a change 🙂
Do you see how sunshine lifts my mood a little drastically?

What random things are making you happy right now?

I guess graduation was a pretty good day, the day I got my silver Duke of Edinburgh award was a bit special (especially when my leader announced the the whole church that no one had thought I’d ever even manage bronze!) and the day I passed my driving test was a proud one too. However, one of my proudest moments is definitely less ‘substantial’ as it were, but equally real! …We played a game with the kids at church tonight that reminded me of it!

I’m a bit of a giggler. When I was in my early-mid teens I giggled and squealed in a generally annoying way for most of the time (some may say that nothings changed). Utterly no self control when it came to laughter.

At one of our youth weekends away around that time, we played a game. Everyone sat in a big circle with one person stood in the middle. That person had to go up to anyone in the circle and say “If you really love me honey, then please, just smile”, that person then had to reply “I really love you honey but I just can’t smile”. All. Without. Laughing.

I know what you’re thinking, absolutely no way Ineke would manage that, and normally, I’d totally agree with you. But get this: I did it.

Picked yourself off the floor? Good! A girl said the line to me, and I replied, completely straight faced. The gasp that went round the room was shocking. I think it’s that gasp I’m most proud of. Completely destroyed peoples assumptions about me there!

Could you manage that game?! What crazy little things in your life are you proud of that aren’t so run of the mill?

A few weeks ago I was giving my housemate Arianne the highlights of my Tesco trip, as you do, which included a little anecdote about how I’d bought a couple of 4 packs of 4 finger kitkats, but when I’d rung them up at the self service checkout, they were listed on the receipts as packs of 5.

Arianne then told me just how boring that story was 🙂

Since then, we have started to use the phrase “as boring as the KitKat story” fairly often…
“Did I tell you about such and such? It’s probably as boring as the KitKat story”
“That was as boring as the KitKat story wasn’t it?”

So yea, my aim is to never be as boring as that! But at least I can now laugh it off when I’m boring by referring to the KitKat story!

Do you have a boring story to share?! (Someone suggested to me a story where they left sellotape in the garden overnight. Full stop.) Do you have any bizarre phrases like that that have become common to you?

There are sounds that, strange as it sounds, I sometimes struggle to distinguish…

This hasn’t been the case the past few years, which I think just reflects the areas/house layouts I’ve lived in. But when I was younger, I’d lie in bed at night (this sounds like my previous post!) and hear a noise, and really not be able to work out what it was. Sort of this low rumbling noise, and each time it was one of these things:

• An aeroplane or helicopter overhead (happened suprisingly often – I wonder if helicopters trained over Romsey at nighttime… that or I guessed wrong most times!)… When I was little, I used to be scared it was the beginning of World War Three… I was even more of a wuss then!!
• Someone putting their wheelie bin out
• thunder
• a garage door being opened or closed…

I used to have a massive problem distinguishing between them!

Too weird? What other sounds are really similar?
This post was probably a bit too dull, right?

I like Maths. I think it’s really fun.

There I said it – may I be judged for enjoying something so ‘dull’!

This week at work I actually had to use Pythagoras’ Theorem which I was probably too excited about to be normal anyway, but this then led to a discussion of what fun things we did in A Level maths! Started with differentiation, then integration, then integration with limits, and then even radians in it all! (I may have added the word “fun” in there…)

It honestly made me want to buy an exercise book for some A Level course, either a pure or mechanics one, and go home and do some sums!

But that would make it a hobby wouldn’t it? I don’t think anyone does maths for fun…

Is that too weird? What hobby’s do you have or wish you could have that most people would think you bizarre for?!

How many times a day do you use the phrase “makes life easier”?

I was considering the phrase a month or two ago, and since then have realised just how much I do say it!

• It’ll make life much easier if I just defrost some chicken in the morning
• “I just need to grab a pen” “Do you want to borrow mine?” “Oh yea, that’d make life far easier, thanks”
• and of course, my stupidly obscure thought on twitter last month

Make’s life easier?! Does those with nothing think any of those things would make their life easier? Think of someone who wouldn’t know the word defrost, let alone spotify! Someone who if asked what would make their life easier, I’m pretty sure food, shelter and good health would be near the top, not those things. Maybe they’ll make life a *fraction* easier for us, but I seem to have absent mindedly used words like ‘much’ and ‘far’ in those examples, which are *definitely* out of place!!

Do you say it much? Is there any phrase you use often that you’ve realised is a bit odd?