Leaky news

Oh joy! The cause of the leak in the kitchen has been fixed! For weeks we've been puzzled by the seepage of water onto the kitchen floor. In the last week or so it's become a flood, causing the dogs to have to wait for Breakfast while I mopped up a bucketful of water from the floor. This could not go on. Dog Breakfast is supposed to happen on their return from the garden and not be delayed by half an hour of mopping.

It was with some relief that we narrowed down the possibilites to plumbing - the thought of Rob going up on the roof in December was not attractive, nor was digging up the yard at the back of the house. Finally, after hauling out all the appliances and opening the inspection hatches thoughtfully left by the creator of the kitchen, a leak was detected in a hot water pipe right over the other side of the kitchen! The water had been seeping down the pipe, round behind the plasterboard and eventually emerging under the window where it collected in a puddle. That was why we were looking under the window for the leak rather than the other side of the room. Dry floor this morning. Dog Breakfast in short order. Equilibrium restored.

Another small miracle. My kitchen no longer smells strongly of dog - thanks to a small, unlikely-looking gizmo that consists of a round piece of stainless steel, a sponge and not much else! How can this be?

The Pretty

'Tis the season to be jolly, so I'm trying out some jolly writing!

Brokeback Mountain

I'm looking forward to this film - I hope it makes it to Dunoon - although I doubt if I'll be going to watch it with my husband. He, along with most of the heterosexual male population I suspect, cringes at the thought of watching two men in love.

I found an amusing guide for straight men faced with this dilemma here, although even reading that may not have any effect.

So what's the problem?

I adore the idea of two hunky guys in love. After all, we've had plenty of precedents, although they don't exactly spell it out, but it's there: Butch Cassidy and Sundance, Ben Hur and Messala, Napoleon and Illya, the Lone Ranger and Tonto for heaven's sake - although I suspect the LR had something going with Silver too *g*. Women like stories about men, and particularly if there are no extraneous females getting in the way of our adoration. Oh, I like conventional love stories too, but I'm more a fan of action films (Ben Hur etc) and have never really thought until now about why I prefer stories that are essentially about men.

And what do men like? I suspect the fact that my brother has every film Julia Roberts ever made and my son drools over Keira Knightly and my husband adores anything featuring Joanna Lumley speaks for itself. I know it's a huge generalisation, but stereotypes are stereotypes because people make them so. Men like looking at women and vice versa. I bet if there was a film featuring Julia Roberts and Keira Knightly playing two women in love, the men would be dragging us along.

Yes - dragging us along. You see, in spite of myself, in spite of the fact that I'm perfectly accepting of gay love - I'm proud of my gay son and his partner - as a straight woman, I found myself not really wanting to watch when Natalie kissed her nurse pal on 'Eastenders' a few weeks ago, or when Octavia and Servilia got it together in 'Rome'. I doubt if I'm alone in having this gut reaction. I'm not proud of it - in fact I'm really rather shocked - but chaps, I can see your point about Brokeback Mountain.

So I'll not insist my dear old man comes with me to see Brokeback. I'll go myself or with some girlfriends and we'll leave the chaps to watch the DVDs of Absolutely Fabulous.

Here goes

Chris is a blog evangelist! It seems all the best people have a blog and what's more, some only allow those and such as those (by which I mean members of the exclusive Blogger club) to post on them!

In due course I shall have something to say, but for now I must go and decorate the Christmas tree. Perhaps I'll be able to post a picture of it soon.