I should have done a new journal ages ago because I had two promises I needed to keep, but in my defense, I've been feeling a bit off recently. Still I'm very naughty and I'm sorry. *smacks self*

Something that cheered me up immensly though was a family trip to Manchester to see Eddie Izzard at the MEN Arena last night, curtesy of an early Xmas prezzy from my father-in-law. It's the first time I've had an evening out in about 8 years! Oh but Eddie was fantastic, so funny! You know when you get that ache in your head just behind your ears when you laugh too much?...well I got that and this morning it felt like I had a hangover!...what with slow bears, coughing giraffes, trumpet playing hens and Ancient Egyptian news readers. If anyone gets the chance to see his Stripped world tour then I highly recommend it....£30 well spent! Got the compulsory t-shirts too, a 'cake or death' one each for myself and Dani, my daughter, and an 'I'm Jeff Vader' one for Mike, my son.

News on the Aggie front is that we've only raised about £530 of the £2200 we need for the surgery, so it looks like the surgery won't be happening anytime soon, the vet has her on meds which have made her so much more comfortable and as long as we don't let her go bonkers when we take her out for walks she gets by most of the time without limping. The money that we have raised will still go towards treating Aggie, but as the surgery may not happen, I realise that those of you who donated for that reason might want to use your donation somewhere else so I'll refund your money if you wish.

Right then the promises:

1st of all Liz aka ~Goten0040 was one of the lovely people who helped get the word out about Aggie, now last month her mother lost ger job and the family was hit pretty hard financially so Liz wants to help towards the family coffers by offering commissions. Her prices seem to start unbelievably low so if you want to bag yourself a bargain and help out a fellow artist, then please pop over to her page and send her a note.

here's an example of her work

Secondly, I helped to judge =Cataclysm-X's Couples and Duos contest and offered a prize of featuring the winners, so without further ado, here they all are.
1st place:


2nd place:


3rd place:


4th place:


5th place:


6th place: *fizzymilkshake


With an honourable mention going to


Oh and big wave to all those that managed to read all the way to the bottom.