Naked Exams

The Twenty-Eighth of June Two Thousand and Thirteen. Friday.

I have finally applied for the Level 2 British Sign Language Course, something I have been meaning to do for months. And I am terrified. Oh, the brain pod knows I can do it. But the second - the very second - I clicked the 'confirm' button I could feel my heart rate increase and the muscles in my neck knot themselves up. I still have nightmares where I am due for an exam that I have not revised for even twenty years after the last time I was invigilated. I've never imagined that I was naked in any of them, but I put that in the title because, lets face it, nudity sells. Flabby, forty-four year old nudity.

It's anticipation of that anxiety (yes, you read that right. I worry about becoming anxious - all very meta, I'm sure, but not very helpful) that has stopped me from applying before. Bless 'em, the BSL courses website doesn't make it obvious how to go about continuing your studies (I somehow stumbled through level 1) and I experienced the very same feeling that caused me to stop at the first hurdle last time I thought about applying. But this time I persevered. My reward was a course that has gone up in price since when I should have got on with it, so well done me - my feebleness defined in monetary terms.

So as you can see, I am not a newcomer to the world of stress. But it's not a situation without hope. Whenever I feel overwhelmed I turn to the experts, namely fitness spokesperson, author and model Dr Knox.

He is definitely a doctor - that is definitely a stethoscope.

It was his recommendation the led me to waleshypnosis.com (there is also harleystreetclinic.net but I'll have no truck with that Harley Street crowd after my last face lift went south. Mind you the Virtual Gastric Band sounds tempting...) Apparently this guy was taught by the guy who taught Paul McKenna. A man of many talents a quick shufti through the menu reveals that once you have shed the necessary pounds (of weight/cash/delete as applicable) you can go on and revisit your past lives. Dr Martin is 'open-minded' about this controversial subject. Open minded to the tune of £47 a session).

Of course when I heard Dr Knox talk about 'Whale's Hypnosis' I was very excited. The thought of our cetacean cousins practicing mesmerism excited me greatly. I soon realised my mistake, but my research quickly led me to an altogether more deadly marine hypnotist - the cuttlefish.

All of which turned out to be counter-productive. After watching that I was even more anxious than ever! D'oh!

More soonliest.

How To Spell Desiccated

The Thirteenth of June Two Thousand and Thirteen. Thursday. 

I haven't even got one sentence into this thing and I am already desperate for a milk chocolate Bounty and a cup of tea. Bear with me while I put the kettle on. 

That's much better. I'm not actually a fan of dark chocolate, but I do have a soft spot for red Bounties. Nevertheless, that was a blue Bounty and it was still delicious. Me and coconut have always had an understanding. I can still remember Simon Groom getting told off in a viewer's letter that the list of ingredients for his Blue Peter recipe had misspelled the "desiccated" (and I'll confess, I relied on autocorrect there) in desiccated coconut, yet I can't remember what the actual recipe was for. I also remember the amusement on a school trip to the south of France from pronouncing noix de coco ice cream as "knocks di coco". And on one of them there dating sites that, yes, I've put myself out there upon I've mentioned coconut rings among my favourite biscuits. I also smashed one to bits with a hammer on my back doorstep when I couldn't break into it with a drill. I'd say I had a soft spot for coconuts, but clearly 'soft' isn't the word. 

All of which is preamble for me confessing to the fact I've fallen for the hype and gone and bought an iPad. Well, am still buying (will be for the next nine months...) You know, it probably wasn't the most   necessary item on my list of things to get (paging Doctor Washing Machine), but I tell you - comics look blinking amazing on it in HD. So there's that. 

I thought I'd do a test run at blogging on the pesky thing. Hmm, the app doesn't have any handy linky things. Let me try and insert a photo. 

Those are actual rings made out of coconut, accompanied with a spooky disembodied hand. Of course, what I was referring to was this delicious alternative. 

So photos don't seem to be a problem. So when I'm out and about I might just use this although it occurs to me that it would probably be just as easy to use the web page on Safari since the screen's big enough. Blimey, this has been a bit of a dead end, for you and for me, hasn't it? If I am going to get back on the blogging horse I'd better be a bit more lively than this. I wonder if I can save this before I go with something spectacular?

Great - last minute save. Apparently Coconut Crabs are the largest arthropod. 

Come to think of it, I seem to remember reading about them in my 'Man's Conquest' magazine. 

Although I was disappointed that the cheesecake model was just an attractive young woman and not an actual cheesecake - ho-hum.

Here's one on the crabs having a bit of a scuttle. 

http://youtu.be/4DZ0VEjJZs4

More soonliest.