For the curious

Once upon a time I showed you the interior of my fridge. I have no idea why. I suspect that it had been a quiet day on the birding front, and so in another "filler" move, I picked something random, which at that point in time was a broken fridge and a nice shiny replacement. Today is another such quiet day.....but I have nothing quite as interesting as a new fridge. So in a truly barrel-scraping move, I'm blogging about where it all happens.

Here is my desk. This is where I sit for hours on end, blogging. Oh, and lately, working. In fact, it's mostly working. The computer used to be in the kitchen, so I sat there. With the need to lock myself away in order to concentrate on vast Regulatory Capital spreadsheets, I moved it upstairs. This necessitated turning the whole house upsidedown, and turfing my youngest daughter out of her bedroom under the guise that bunkbeds are really cool. Yes, that old chestnut. We're also calling it a guestroom, as in addition to the desk, we shoved a double bed in there. In fact, bar a personal toilet and the lack of Sky TV, it is remarkably like a prison cell: it is small and cramped, and I spend most of my daylight hours confined in there. Seeing as it is my new abode, in that I do literally live in there - here - I thought I would show you what it's like.

First of all, the desk, with my increasing ancient PC on it, complete with relevant advertising for the purposes of this post. You will note how squished the cushion is - the reason for that is peeking out from behind the monitor - a 150g bag (that's a big one) of Waitrose hand-cooked Texan BBQ flavour crisps. I opened them yesterday, but not even I could finish them in one sitting. I've put that right today of course, but this is very very bad. Crisps are my downfall. I am not a chocolate person, bar the very occasional Double-decker, but crisps, oh dear.  I could easily eat four packets of Walkers in one go, one after the other. I discovered this packet whilst looking for kitchen roll, a huge bonus. I think I completed whatever task the kitchen roll was destined for, but I can't be absolutely certain - it's entirely possible I just sat down on the floor immediately and got to work on the crisps. Also visible is what is left of breakfast - I really should eat breakfast in a nice and relaxed manner downstairs somewhere, but it's a habit I can't get out of. If I'm working, I'm also eating. I mean, not all the time (well, perhaps most of the time....), but I have this complusion to eat meals whilst tapping away. I was always like this in the office, and somehow it has come home too.

The next photo shows my view. Not that see it much, I am always pointed at the computer screen, but if I swivel to my right, this is what I see. Try and ignore the curtains, they're the previous owners'....So, I can see the tops of my neighbours' houses, and a small strip of sky. Sky! Sky-watching? Not really. So far the only birds I've seen from this fairly rubbish vantage point have been Pigeons, Jackdaws, Crows, Black-headed Gulls, Common Gulls, a Lesser Black-backed Gull, a Blue Tit - actually this is sounding rather another list...... Anyhow, listing aside, there is a pair of bins stashed strategically on the window sill - porros that are of no use whatsoever outside. They're placed there deliberately - out of reach. They are but a short leap across the bed if required, but it's best not to have the constant temptation. Next to them is my beloved radio, which I listen to constantly. Radio 2 is the station of choice, perfect for my middle-aged middle-of-the-road tastes. It's tuned in almost all of the time, except from 12-2pm, where if it was tuned to the Jeremy Vine show it would quickly get thrown out of the window in response to the biggoted dullards that phone in every day. I either flip to Radio 4 then, or if I have time, try and find an interesting SW station, ideally in a foreign language with some quality twangy regional music. If there's a test match on, it's on 198 LW. Obviously. In the corner is a nice plant. All rooms in this house have plants in, most more than one, and this one is called a Metallica Palm, Chamaedorea metallica, a relative of the Parlour Palm that the Victorians were besotted with, but more interesting and better able to live in a low-light, low-humidity atmosphere, in case you were interested. And finally, no room would be complete without a life-size King Penguin stuffed toy, so we've put one of those in there too.