So I bought an orange. A while ago. It sat in the kitchen for some time, moving between the fruit bowl, by the tea bags, on top of the tea bags, next to the popcorn and then over the sugar. It got around.

The thing is: I don’t eat oranges. I don’t like them. Never have. Not since I wanted one as a child – “ooh, bright, dimply pimply thing” – and my Dad made me eat it, bit by bit by bit, all the while the fleshy pithy orangeness churned around my mouth like cud.

I just hadn’t expected it to be so chewy; so bloody unpalatable. But it was. And I was stuck with it for my childish yearning.

Ever since then the mere hint of anything from the general Family of Orange (clementines, tangerines – how does anyone ever tell the difference?)  has been avoided in general. When people eat oranges near me, or I see their pathetic white peel with its stringy segmentations, I cringe inwardly and scarper.

That was up until last year, when dining in an Indian restaurant, the waiter brought a plate of juicy looking segments with the hot flannels. After the spicy richness of a bhoona there was something so refreshingly zesty about a bright beacon of orangeness. And I quickly realised that under such circumstances, it was quite acceptable to delicately suck a segment rather than attempt to peel the peel with bare hands.

So I gave it a go. I did it. I’d never had a problem with orange juice, and I LOVED it; I wanted it ALL!

Since then, I have cautiously approached the orange aisle in the supermarket, and bought the occasional orange to enjoy after a meal in a palette-refreshing way. And it was in this way I ended up with a stray orange nestled atop the Kilner jars in the kitchen.

I eyed it suspiciously and day after day, decided I would have it the next. I couldn’t remember if it had been there since Dad visited in September, but then surely he would have eaten it himself? Then I started to worry if it was past its best. Gone, over, sour.

The curious thing is it didn’t seem to age. No mould ever formed on its robust and taught skin. Lemons – you know where you are with them because they quickly mould over if you aren’t watching. This orange was different: even after I took its photo, I left it for another week or so. Still nothing. And this time I was counting, scrutinising, supervising the situation.

Finally, yesterday, although it seemed to look ‘OK’, I decided that enough was enough and the consumption of fruit beyond three months old was not decent for 2012.

I threw it in the bin and vowed never to buy another orange ever again.

I should have drowned it in the mulled wine while I had the chance.

2 Comments | In: Lifestyle, Rebecca, Trends | tags: clementines, food fears, orange, oranges, segments, tangerines, zest. | #

In November I have mostly been writing. Writing, and not reading it back or editing or even correcting simple typos and words underlined automatically by Microsoft Word in red or green. No time. NO TIME! I shout to myself. I’m doing the NanoWrimo Novel-Writing Challenge.

Words are my friends, they are my enemy. I need to write more, more, more and the backspace button is not my friend. Pruning is not allowed. Quantity over quality is my aim. I think.

It’s not that I want to write crap and congratulate myself at the end when I (hopefully) have 50,000 words in a document, sitting smugly and boasting about my achievements. The idea is to break down the barriers to writing, to get SOMETHING down on the page, which can then be edited and re-drafted at a later date.

Analysis is the enemy of the novelist; too much agonising over choosing the correct word, crafting the most perfect sentence, or browsing the net in the name of crucial research. These things can be ironed out later. BASH IT OUT NOW and then you have a framework to play with.

I’ve heard some talk of a mass re-draft session kicking off in March each year, post Nano, post Christmas, post the depressions of January and the skurge of sales and diets and misery frozen in window panes nationwide. The re-draft is a challenge for the future.

For now, two weeks in, here are the 10 things Nano has taught me about myself as a writer:

1. I’m not a planner
2. I didn’t need to give up my job to write a novel
3. In fact I NEED TO HAVE A JOB to write a novel
4. I can squeeze writing into small blocks of time, like 500 words between Paisley Gilmour Street and Glasgow Central
5. I don’t need silence; in fact I thrive on background noise. It could be some classical tunes serenading me in the background (thanks Cara!), or my Mother chattering to my Auntie on the phone…
6. I am totally comfortable leaving the research until later (preferably to someone else)
7. I feel like writing is my life and my perfect career…BUT I’m glad I have come back to it at this juncture in my life
8. A novel is like an exam question – your mind is working out the answers while you are doing something else entirely
9. If I sit down to write, ideas channel through my finger-tips: I am a vessel for communication.
10. I have punctuation hang-ups since High School English, when I was accused of being a ‘comma splicer’. These are in the main, unfounded and should be wiped from memory.

Onwards with the journey.

18,000 words is not good enough for day 13….

1 Comment | In: Rebecca, Writing | tags: 000 words, 50, nano, nanowrimo, national novel writing month, novel writing challenge, writing. | #

I’m thirty and panicking a bit. I’m married and have been for just over two and a half years. In my daily life I encounter a stream of questions directed at me asking about babies. When are you thinking of having a baby? Isn’t it time? You’ve got your own house now. Three bedrooms is it? Plenty of room then – what are you waiting for?

Yet my clock is not ticking. Not so I can hear it anyway. What if it’s broken? Is it in ‘silent mode’? What if it never starts ticking? Why isn’t it ticking? Isn’t it ok not to want children at thirty years old, or dare I say it, ever? I feel increasingly like a social outcast; set aside from the pack as the black sheep who won’t follow the herd. My group of friends is splintering down to those who have children, those who are currently pregnant, and those who are trying. I feel panic rising in my throat. “I’m only a child myself!” I wail indignantly to my husband. He just mumbles some superficial soother and turns back to his computer. In many cultures I’d be well past it now, cast out to seed. Or even dead. But I’m not either of these, I’m just thirty.

Read more …

2 Comments | In: Lifestyle, Rebecca | tags: 30, babies, baby, biological clock, career, conundrum, fate, panic, quarter life crisis, thirty, turning thirty. | #

I have started 2011 with a new, slightly dangerous addiction. The events preceding this addiction, that facilitated it really, were set in motion about 10 or 12 years ago, maybe more. See Archives of a Decade for a detailed background.

Totally out of control, and struggling to make sense of how to organise my cuttings and categories into an easily searched, neatly stored ‘library’ of information, I decided to make a cup of tea. A pot in fact. A nice pot of jasmine pearl tea.

After swirling my fragrant and refreshing tea for some time, I realised that the best way to display my favourite fashion and interiors spreads was in a scrapbook. It’s what I did at college, albeit with a purpose in mind, whiling away my afternoons ‘sourcing’ looks from magazines to evoke a particular trend or mood. What a stellar idea!

Read more …

No Comments | In: Lifestyle, Rebecca, Trends | tags: archiving, cuttings, library, paper, scrap-booking, scrapbook, scrapbooking, sorting, sourcebooks. | #