I did this test a while back and the results have been sitting on my desktop waiting for me to do something with them.

Some of the things are spot on and some aren't. I put that down to the fact that the test was longer than my concentration span and also there seemed to be a fault which didn't allow all of the graphics to be seen, making it harder to complete it.

You are an Analyst

Your attention to detail, confidence, sense of order, and focus on functionality combine to make you an ANALYST.

You are very curious about how things work, delving into the mechanics behind things.

Along those lines, how well something works is usually more important to you than what it looks like.

You find beauty and wonder mainly in concrete, functional, earthly things. (Cha! Look at my photos!)

You are very aware of your own abilities, and you believe that you will find the best way of doing things.

Accordingly, problems do not intimidate you, as you believe in yourself.

You trust yourself to find solutions within the boundaries of your knowledge.

You don't spend a lot of time imagining how things could be different—you're well-grounded in the here-and-now.

It is important for you to follow a routine, and you prefer the familiar to the unknown.

You're not one to force your positions on a group, and you tend to be fair in evaluating different options. (UM! Don't know about this one!)

Never one to be found in chic boutiques or trendy clothing stores, you take an extremely practical approach to getting dressed.


If you want to be different:

Try to embrace the imaginative, creative part of your personality more often. (Oh, all right then. . .)

Try moving beyond the things that you find comfortable—open yourself up to a broader range of experiences. (Nonononononononono!)


You are Free-Wheeling

Your charismatic nature, liveliness, and independence make you FREE-WHEELING.

You don't mind being in the spotlight, preferring social gatherings to quiet nights at home.

You take a practical approach to people, not getting too involved in their feelings—or their business. (Ooops - definitely not true!)

At the same time, your acceptance of others leads you to be understanding of their life circumstances, even if you don't quite understand their emotional reactions to some things.

Although you have a wide circle of friends, you're very discerning as to whom you can trust. (Not true - I tend to trust too quickly and easily.)

You're not rigid in your beliefs about the world, and you don't want to impose your perspective on others, but at the same time, you know that plenty of people don't always act responsibly. (There are certain times this one would be true and certain times it is most definitely NOT true.)

Engaging with others is a large part of how you live in the world, and most importantly, it plays a role in how you see yourself—you tend to learn a lot about yourself in situations where you are with other people. (For sure.)

You have an understanding of the complexities of situations, and you don't judge others too hastily. (Not anymore.)

If you want to be different:

Your open-mindedness about the world gives you a great perspective on things, but your lack of trust in others limits how close you can get with them. Try opening up to people a bit more without losing your healthy skepticism. (I AM sceptical with some people but think they have it wrong about the lack of trust thing. I have no problem getting close to people - the problem is that I tend to get too close!)

While being the life of the party will occasionally come naturally to you, be sure to reserve time for yourself—see what you can learn by spending some time observing the world rather than just by diving in.


Let me know if you take the test and if it is accurate for you. Let me know, if you know me, if you think this one was accurate for me.

Tags: Memes

We had the funeral today. Iain was so nervous about it all we arrived at the crematorium 45 minutes early!

There was a mighty fine turn out with loads of tears from loads of people. The crematorium is so busy that we weren't always sure that we were looking at *our* crowd! Denis had such a wide range of friends that I don't think anyone there knew everyone there. We identified the family and friends that we knew and huddled together with them.

We were very touched by how many people took the time to go to the funeral - no one likes to go to funerals! There were some surprises - not least the clatter of friends from the town where Denis and his friend David had their boat - they have been fishing from there for years and obviously built up a good base of friends there.

When it was time to enter the building everyone went over the doorstep with a deep breath. I went straight down to the relative's front couple of rows of seats and waited behind Nanna, Papa, Lesley and Bob with Louise beside me for Iain to be one of the four carrying the coffin down the aisle. There were so many people there that the seats were filled and three walls had people lined, standing against them. As soon as I caught sight of Iain I lost the plot and started to bawl my eyes out for him. Everyone was very emotional at this point.

The minister conducted the service, there was a tune played at the beginning which Laura had chosen for her Dad, then Iain read a poem and Amy sang a verse of Tears In Heaven. It was all very touching.

Obviously the service at the crematorium is so fast there wasn't much else to take place, other than about 35 prayers!

When we left the room there was a long room to stand in and shake everyone's hands as they left. I stood there for a while, went outside and spoke to a few people for a while, dandered about for another wee while then went back in to the room and was horrified when I saw the line of people coming out and joining our line - there must be another funeral immediately after ours and they had caught up with us . . . . or perhaps this was the same line STILL coming out! That's how many people there were.

Afterwards, we headed over to a local hotel for sandwiches and tea and coffee. This all went very well too - people were a lot more relaxed and a little happier to sit and chat.

We sat there for a long time mixing with family, catching up with some folk we haven't seen for years. I remarked that there were so many friends and family there that this would have been a party that Denis would have absolutely loved - he loved get-togethers like this and would have totally been in his element.

We went home, Iain walked the dog and then we headed back to Nanna's for a chinese meal with the immediate family. Lesley. Andrew, Louise and our lot too. We had a great time - reminiscing with loads of Denis stories - everyone pitching it with their wee piece but also having a de-brief of the day which was very helpful for everyone.

All in all it was a stressful, tiring day but also we all agreed that it had been handled nicely and it ended on a positive note. How we will all feel in the coming weeks, we will have to wait and see.

Here is the poem that Iain read. It very much sums up the day and I think we will remember the sentiment behind it for some time.

He Is Gone


You can shed tears that he is gone

Or you can smile because he has lived



You can close your eyes and pray that he will come back

Or you can open your eyes and see all that he has left



Your heart can be empty because you can't see him

Or you can be full of the love that you shared



You can turn your back on tomorrow and live yesterday

Or you can be happy for tomorrow because of yesterday



You can remember him and only that he is gone

Or you can cherish his memory and let it live on



You can cry and close your mind, be empty and turn your back

Or you can do what he would want: smile, open your eyes, love and go on.

Tags: Denis

Remember Jessica's stuffed dog she got on holiday last year? Jess? Well Jess was absolutely stinking to high heaven the other day and I made her have a bath in the washing machine. She came out much sweeter smelling and several degrees lighter in colour.

Jessica didn't wait for Jess to dry before tucking her under her arm for cuddles again.

After a while Jessica came up to us, stroking Jess' head.

Mummy, did you use Comfort on Jess?

No. Why? (It's too hard to explain that I use a *two in one* liquid - *No* was sufficient.)

It's just that now she has had a bath, Jess is a little bit soft in the head. What? What? What did I say? Why are you laughing? What?

Little things like that are keeping us going at the moment.

Tags: Jess, Jessica

After Denis was rushed to hospital on Tuesday the family kept a constant watch on him by his bedside. It was decided after a brain scan on Thursday that the amount of time he wasn't breathing had damaged too much of his brain and that really the best thing to do was to turn off the machines. They arranged for his two children to be brought to him on Friday morning just after they took off the more frightening of the medical tubes and machines. The children said their goodbyes very maturely and went away from the hospital.

I had managed to avoid being at the hospital until then. Part of me was being a coward. Part of me felt, somehow, that I would be intruding on the immediate family's grief. Of course that wouldn't have been true. Part of me felt that my brand of humour in terrible situations would not be appropriate and I just didn't know how to deal with other peoples' emotion.

Iain rang me in the afternoon to say that if I wanted to say goodbye then now was the time to be there. Again, I said I was happy to stay away and let Lesley, Iain and their Mum and Dad be there on their own. Iain then asked me to go down for moral support for him. It was about then that I realised that he wasn't dealing with it all very well at all.

Some of Denis' friends were in the room when I arrived, Julie came and went, Nanna was in and out, Lesley's children were waiting too. It was all very sad and distressing.

By about 7pm we all decided that we didn't need to stay any more. He was breathing on his own and could continue like that for minutes or days or weeks. We all left except for Julie and Iain who didn't leave until 9pm.

Iain was home by 10pm but by 12.10am he had a phone call from Julie to go back down to the hospital. Julie, Iain and Papa made their way down to the hospital but by the time they got there Denis was already gone.

Because he died in hospital no one is requesting a post-mortem but there are certain things that have to happen before he can be buried, or in his case, cremated. These things will probably not happen until Monday so the funeral wont be arranged before Wednesday. There is a slight possibility that it might not happen until Monday or Tuesday of next week! Such a long time to be waiting for all concerned.

We were talking at lunch time today about how Nanna and Julie don't tolerate each other well. I think they are both handling the situation very well so far but there is a possibility there could be conflict between their two sets of wishes. Julie is Denis' wife and of course her wishes should be taken in to consideration but Nanna is his mother and has been for 51 years. We were thinking about that when I said that it isn't normal to have to take your mother-in-law's opinion into the matter when you are burying your husband.

All in all we are very subdued. Iain is terribly upset to an extent that I wouldn't have imagined or have witnessed before. Our kids are doing well with the two of us being upset and although Jessica cried this morning when we told her Denis was dead I don't think that she had too much depth to her grief.

We are all keeping a good eye on Nanna and Papa. Imagine having to bury your first-born. It just beggars belief and isn't something I ever wish to experience.

That's where we are at the minute then. Not knowing when the funeral will be. Not too sure about whether to go back to work or take another day off. . .

I just want to say a very big thank you to all my friends who have kept in constant touch by email, text or phone, to ask how Denis was doing, to offer emotional support or practical help. I can assure you it has all been very much appreciated.

Tags: Family, Denis

I typed all that last entry out and the next time the laptop was turned on certain keys on the keyboard had stopped working. The letter i and k, the comma and the left and right arrows were all dead. It made for very annoying typing so I gave up trying to keep a record of what we were doing.

On Tuesday afternoon we received a phone call from Iain's sister to say their brother was terribly ill and the prognosis wasn't good. He was rushed to hospital and has been unconscious since. After several phone calls back and forward it was decided that there was "nothing to be gained" by us going home so we stayed put for the night, only to have an early morning phone call to say to come home.

The 7 hour journey TO Killarney became a 6 hour journey FROM Killarney.

Iain is away to sit with the family in the relative's room while I hold the fort here. There isn't much more to say until we hear what the doctors say tomorrow.

Tags: Killarney

It took us HOURS to drive here. The AA had it at 5 hours 15 minutes on the directions print out but, even with NO break for lunch, only one very quick stop at some very dirty toilets and an aborted drive in to the McDonald's car park and back out again, it still took us 7 hours to do the trip.

When we stopped at the toilets Jessica started to run round the car several times, with exaggerated leaps and bounds. When we looked at her she explained "I am just stretching my legs." I don't think I have ever actually seen anyone doing it - normally it is a phrase! Strange child!

We found the house with medium difficulty. The instructions from the roundabout were spot on - we just had to find the roundabout first!

The owner was waiting to show us around one of his two houses. We reckon he is German and I think I can see a non-Irish influence around the house. that may be based on the German books in the bookshelves though!

The house is like the Tardis - looks very small on the outside but has a double bedroom and two singles, two bathrooms, sitting room (complete with Sky yay! that'll keep the kids quiet in the mornings), a dining room with the most thread bare rug you ever did see, a utility/ back door/ room and a kitchen with a dining area made up with a pine table and pew type seats. In the corner of the dining room is a spiral staircase which the owner seemed quite excited about. He literally made us go up them to see what was up there in the attic. Another double bedroom in the cutist wee room. I assumed David would claim the upstairs room and even thought both the kids would want to sleep there together but David claimed the double room downstairs and Jessica instantly fell in love with one of the single rooms. It has compartments under the bed which she earmarked for her stuffed toys. That left the trip up and down the spiral staircase for us. Yay - my favourite thing in the world. NOT.

It is all very nice, everything is pine clad - the doors are all pine with glass (weird in the bathroom!) the walls are pine, the ceilings are pine, the kitchen is pine - it is all very piney! Most of the furniture is pine too. It looks like the furniture has been gathered from various relatives over the years as and when they finished with them. Saying that, everything is very comfortable and will be more than ample for the week we are here.

I loved the box of Cherry Bakewells and bunch of flowers in the kitchen and the milk in the fridge and the tea bags and coffee in the cupboard. This all served to make it feel more like home very quickly.

The kids were delighted with the fish pond in the garden. The garden is fairly large and looks like it has been someone's pride and joy up to recently - there is even a wee secret corner with two areas of vegetables growing. I wonder if the owner comes here regularly to tend it all. The pond is very well stocked with fish of all sizes and has an industrial strength net over the top of it to keep the herons out.

As soon as we got unpacked we headed out at 5.30pm for our lunch! We couldn't believe the hoards of people walking - there had been signs for a concert and we had driven past loads of people parking on the road sides and walking. Later we found out that Pink was in concert for one night - Killarneyhas been having a Summerfest and this was one of the main features of it.

We walked around Killarney to let David look for toy shops - once more Nanna and Papa have given them holiday spending money and David in particular is anxious to get rid of it as soon as possible. We have just realised that it was Jess' birthday last week, remember Jessica bought her with Nanna's spending money last year? I lead the family in a rousing chorus of Happy Birthday there - did you join in?

The owner-guy had told us where to find internet access in the town but when I popped my head in to the two establishments neither had wireless access. I am going to have to work out how to link the laptop up with their ethernet connection - yea - I know it can be done but I am never too clever in setting that sort of thing up - usually relying on someone else to do it for me.

I took some photos around the town - the weather was gorgeous and there are a couple of the shots I am really happy with.

This morning Iain woke and creaked his way across the pine floor, opened the pine door and creaked even more down the spiral staircase. I half opened an eye and then went back to sleep. It is now midday and they want to go out now. The kids are all breakfasted, dressed and Sky-ed up for the day. They have chosen where we are going and all it would take is for me to get dressed and pack up the car and go.

I just need to tell you about the toilets. And their Inspection Shelves. Everyone is fascinated with the inspection shelf. It is all very weird and ummm well - weird! Although I have read about them before this is the first time I have ever seen them. You will be very glad to hear that even I can't bring myself to take a photo of them. Yet.

Off to see a Golden Eagle now - more later!

Tags: Killarney, Holidays

Just in case you aren't aware (for it seems that I have only been informing people on a need-to-know basis!) we are off for a few days to Killarney and will be out of touch for a while. It seems that it was more important to Iain to find accommodation which allowed dogs than it was for him to ascertain if there was internet connection, so I am going with a laptop, not knowing if I will be able to connect anywhere. Some people just don't understand priorities huh?

We have been well informed that Killarney is a beautiful part of Ireland and well worth visiting. We realised today that apart from one weekend in Galway many years ago through Iain's work, we have never actually been further south than Dublin! In a mad rush of blood to the head this afternoon I found myself in the local town in one of the two bookshops looking for tourist books for the area we are going to. It took me ages to find IRELAND - who would know they don't group them alphabetically? They don't even seem to group them by continent! In fact, looking at the photo I took it seems someone made the decision to group them by colours - Ireland falling in to the "Pretty Blues' collection.

Not believing the first shop could possibly be giving me the best value for money, I nipped next door to the second shop and found an equally disorganised array of land masses there and that the first shop had not lied to me. Back to the first shop and at the last moment I found one book that had nicer photos and diagrams than the others - joy of joys - when I got to the till there was 25% off the marked price too!

We are now setting forth at the ungodly hour of 8am (so Iain says - muhahahaha) with a guide book in the glove box and I hope to give it to David to read on the five hour journey. He can glean the information we need while I read some of the 14 magazines that I packed. I actually raised an eyebrow at Iain tonight when he laid two AutoCar mags out to pack and said "Are you taking BOTH of those?" Little did he know what will be under MY feet!

Little does he know that I have a laptop bag AND a camera bag still to be packed. Once the clothes, bags, food and dog are in the car there will be no room for the children.

Oh dear. Never mind. Eh?

Speaking of adorable children. You wanna see my beautiful niece? Isn't she the most gorgeous girl ever? And so blonde! We need more blondies in our family!

Ok ok ok - I give up - she is so adorable I WILL have to go and see her - when I get back from all my galavanting I WILL book a ticket. I promise! So long as the invitation is still open!

Now tell me you didn't stare at that wee cutie unable to drag your eyes away!

Catch you later!

Tags: Holidays, Books

Jessica INSISTED in trawling us all out at the ungodly hour of 10.45pm to go and look at the local bonfire this evening. Unfortunately, David's prediction that it had been lit three times already today proved to be correct (and therefore nothing there to see) so we kept on driving and went to another one about 4 miles away. This was much bigger than our wee village one and as we arrived someone lit the bottom and within seconds the well stacked pile of pallets was alight. There were plenty of people but they must have all walked to the area as we got the car parked immediately in front of the fire.

Apart from two very drunk and foul mouthed young ladies who decided to entertain me from only a few feet away, I had an uninterrupted view of the bonfire for most of the time. The kids were enthralled by all that fire. I suppose, in their total innocence they just see it as an excuse to warm their hands. It is a real shame that there isn't more of a carnival atmosphere at these things. I saw youngsters as young as 12 with bottles in their hands. . .

There wasn't a tyre to be seen on this bonfire, thankfully, and within no time at all the flames were licking towards the heavens. (Jessica asked this evening "Do you think that when Lorna cut the balloons free from Ethan's party that they would have gone high enough in the sky to go all the way to Heaven?)

Iain took the kids nearer the fire but I stayed in the safety of the car with the camera and snapped away. Dude, there were people there with too much drink in them AND it was raining! *strokes new camera lovingly*

So. I have just finished uploading the photos to Flickr and some kind soul has already favourited a couple and commented on them. I looked at my own favourite and had a flash back to the year I was 13.

I had just arrived back in the country days before the Eleventh Night, after living in Scotland for a year and sat listening to a couple of friends talking about the bonfires that were going to be lit that night. They were full of stories about how big they would be and how many of them and how the whole of Belfast would be covered in thousands of bonfires, maybe even HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of them, such was the might of the loyal match strikers.

I went to bed that night and dreamed of bonfires the likes of which you have never seen.

In the middle of the night I woke and went to the window to see if any of the fires were still to be seen. What a sight met me! Even through the rain drops on the window I could see there were indeed hundreds of orange glows around. We lived slightly up a hill and I could see for miles; these orange dots were everywhere! They must have organised them really well because they seemed to be in regular intervals and there was a distinct possibility that they were in straight lines too.

The weird thing was, they were there the next night. And the next. After a while, I questioned how long the bonfires would continue and received a few blank stares.

Fecking street lamps. Ought to be a law against them.

Tags: Bonfire, Jessica, David, Family

Did you notice the photos I posted of the school sports day this year?

No?

That's because I didn't take my camera.

Some time ago I realised that I was taking photos to show other people things that I should have been witnessing for myself but that I was actually missing out on because I had a camera stuck to my eye. Mummy type things - school plays and such like. Sometimes I look at photos I have taken and can't remember taking them. Worse - I can't remember the event because I have been so focused (sorry) on the taking of the photos rather than the taking part.

Hmm - ok - this may be because I am a photographer and it is hard for me to not be joined to my camera via my index finger at all times but there are some things more important to *experience* than to *document*.

Who am I documenting for anyway?

So, with that theory in my head, it was with interest that I found out about Non Photography Day on 17th July.

Whatever your activities that day, appreciate the life and dimension of the moment you are in rather than documenting the appearance of it.

The idea instantly rang true for me and I felt a sense of relief that someone else felt the same way as I did about it all. When you take as many photos as I do in a year, it doesn't do any harm to stop and take stock of the important things and simply have a day off. I know that some people will think it is a silly idea and will be scornful of it all but I totally understand the sentiment behind it.

On 17th July I will be spending the day with my family on holiday. Thankfully I wont have to cancel any client shoots or abandon a wedding! I will be trying my best to have a day without my camera stuck in front of my face.

Do you think my children will recognise me?

Photo by poppy kay over at Flickr.

Tags: Photography, Photos

Since the Hen Party last weekend, I have had a very busy week. Work has been hectic, I collected my unsold (how surprising!) Art! from the Gallery, went out for a meal with my friend Siobhan to celebrate all the hard work that went in to the exhibition and have a girly evening together. This was proposed quite some time ago but we never set a date for it all until recently.

I then spent a day with the Aussie bridesmaid Suzie at Rathlin Island and then went for a fantastic night of Clay Pigeon Shooting, where once more, I excelled at the whole "pulling the trigger at the right time" malarkey. That would be the Rathlin Island I swore I never needed to go back to after the last time but in the spirit of "showing tourists the country" (read: you never know when I may need a bed in Australia!) I braved the ferry trip and the bus ride and went to see the puffins. Suzie was most pleased to see the Golden Puffin. There is one bird there which is golden instead of black and he was so cute - even I squeed at him!

We decided to pay the extra couple of pounds and take the fast ferry. Why? Because when we went to the sales desk for the normal ferry we interrupted the social life of the people behind the desk. It was as much as they could do to tell us the time of the next crossing. After using their toilet we turned and left the building in disgust. We didn't darken their door again - except for the next time we needed the toilet!

There was a wedding rehearsal to go to on Thursday night, where I met a minister who experienced an inconsiderate photographer 25 years ago and ever since has banned photographers from taking photos during the ceremony. He explained all this to me and I took great pleasure in telling him it didn't upset me at all. I still get paid the same money for less work.

I also spent twelve hours on Saturday taking photos at Rosemary's wedding. It was the longest and largest wedding I ever did do and I have just realised, the only one that I didn't cry at during the church. There was a moment during the dancing at the end of the evening when the DJ had everyone doing "Rock The Boat" where I watched Rosemary totally throw herself in to the actions and I remembered the girl I knew years ago - the one with the real sense of fun who energised everyone around her and I teared up at the thought of not having been part of her life for so long. I might do something about that in the future. As Dorothy said to me later "I'm not letting her out of my life again". (Dorothy and I are great buddies now - only met a week ago mind you!) Dorothy was extremely drunk by this time - judging by the photos I have been looking at - I was the only person still sober in the room.

I am slowly getting through the photos and think some of them are good. Am pleased with the performance of the new camera, like what I got last week and am well chuffed with!

Today I spent around 18 hours wishing I had worn different footwear yesterday. My feet are absolutely killing me - in a "I can't actually walk" way.

What else? . . . O O O O o o o O O O O Cagney AND Lacey were on Norton this evening. OMG How I love Tyne Daly. I have seen Sharon Gless interviewed several times but this is the first time I have seen Tyne live. I always loved her in the program but have been watching Judging Amy for the past couple of years too.

This made my night for me!

Lots of exciting things are happening over the next while. For starters David and Jessica have been invited to Ethan's birthday party on Tuesday and David to Joshua's on Friday. I have to put in two full days are work to offset the days we will have to shut over the holiday period.

Am not sure how I will do my shoot tomorrow if I still can't walk - may have to do it on my knees!

Tags: Rathlin, Suzie, Shooting

A long time ago I met a girl called Rosemary through work. I was very young and although she was only a couple of years older than me, she was so much more worldly wise than me and I credit her with kick-starting my grown-up life. She was incredibly important to me for quite a while. She introduced me to her set of friends who were also just that little bit older than me and I started to hang out with them all at parties and get-togethers and then a particular bar-be-que which saw a flame starting between Iain and me (sorry).

Rosemary is probably the oldest friend I have that I am still in touch with.

She has finally found a man good enough for her and is getting married next Saturday. I am doing the photos for her and Stephen.

It was her Hen Party last weekend. Rosemary never did anything the traditional way so why should the Hen Party be anything other than the. best. fun. ever.

She hired a mini bus and picked 10 of her nearest and dearest up along the way and took us all to a place called Todd's Leap for a full day of activities and then a BBQ and over night stay in a log cabin. As official photographer for the event I got loads of great photos which I will post a link to later - these wont be on Flickr but they aren't uploaded just yet either.

We arrived around 11.15am and were quickly handled by the staff. You know how places advertise their staff as "enthusiastic and committed"? THESE people REALLY were. They have a fantastic job and obviously all love being there. The owner, Benny, took control and injected us with some energy and humour, splitting our group in to two teams and introducing us to a Stag Party who were also there for the day. He announced we would be competing for a bottle of Champagne which perked us up rightly!

Once split in to teams we had to pick a team name and theme tune. Rosemary's bridesmaid (and our team leader) is from Australia so we picked "Skippy" not realising that we would be singing it quite so often throughout the day! Chose your theme tune wisely if you go!

Benny gave us a thorough Health and Safety talk and laid down strict (and rather comforting) rules about obeying the staff's commands.

The first thing our mini team of three did was Off Road Driving in a 4x4 on one of the roughest roads I have ever seen. With just a little drop of mud thrown in for good measure. I had done a fair amount of off-road driving, albeit twenty years ago, and totally loved having a go at this again. I drove first so I could get my turn over so I could photograph the others at it. It is really difficult to trust the instructor when he tells you to turn the wheel all the way in the opposite direction you think it should be going. There is a certain amount of buttock clenching and toe curling to be done when you are the first one over the top of a hill and see, before your passengers do, that there is no ground beneath you as you seem to have reached the very Edge of the World!

There was one part where the left hand side of the road was about 6 feet lower than the right hand side! Now THAT was scary. I never lost faith in the fact that they wouldn't build a track which would break their vehicles and - if the instructor said it was passable - it was passable.

After the others had their drives (during which I provided free sound effects) we met up with the others again and I prepared myself for about 30 minutes of waiting around for the instructors to get themselves sorted. Not to be though! They were spot on with their timings and we never waited more than a couple of minutes between events.

Next up, all the girls went to the clay pigeon shooting area. It has been pointed out to me that I may have previously declared a wish to try this out sometime and I was really excited to see how much fun this would be. There was a possibility it would kick my weak shoulder too much to be fun.

The instructor guy here was different and I was glad to see that he seemed to have been employed for shooting skills. He gave great instructions but made one fatal mistake. He never asked if anyone had ever shot clay pigeon before. Rosemary has done it competitively and I can't remember how far she got with it but I know she was working towards the Olympics at one point met Suzie (her Australian bridesmaid) through shooting too so I knew SHE must have done a little too.

They asked the rest of us not to say anything to the guy - they wanted to see what his patter was like.

We all got two shots each and I hung back for as long as possible to see how the others were doing it. To my very great delight I hit both of my targets! can you imagine my grin? Suzie went next and hit her two - the guy looked at her and said "You've done this before I think." She just nodded and said "A bit."

Rosemary was the same - two hits out of two and by then he was rather suspicious. She turned to him and said "Suzie is the Australian Olympic Gold Medal winner for this sport!"

We then all had a competition with another four shots. I came third after Rosemary, who had an overall score of 6/6 and Suzie who had 5/6. I had 4/6. That means I was only one below an Olympic Gold Medallist!

Not that I am competitive when it comes to things like that. Much. The gun was getting really heavy by the end of it and I'm not sure how much longer I could have kept that up for.

We gathered for coffee and scones and then straight off to Archery. I got some great shots there too and enjoyed having a go at that. I had a flukey start to it but when it came to the competition I failed to hit the balloon that I cockily thought I would bag without any effort at all.

After a bit of a hike we ended up on the top of an exposed hill looking at a JS70 JCB machine. I had never ever ever thought I would be inside the cab of a JCB knocking over tyres and digging and then filling in holes. It was great craic and now I can say I have done it. I can't say I will ever need to do it ever again, however!

Somewhere during the day we landed in to the kitchen area and had lunch - meeting up with the stag party, who seemed to be having as good a time as we were.

Our team found ourselves looking at extremely muddy quad bikes next. The instructor there was very funny and had me laughing at her dry jokes. Her jokes were about the only dry things by this stage as it started to pour while we were riding round the track. The quads were great fun. I am glad I did them, I would like another go on them - but by this time my arm muscles were killing me and when I stopped to take some photos I felt the camera shaking in my hands.

Most of the girls loved the quads.

We headed back to the team building to find they had blown up a bouncy-castle based Rodeo Bull. One of the other girls and I decided to sit this one out - I just knew I wouldn't enjoy it and the other girl was getting past her sell by date by this time too.

The first one up on to the bull was the funniest thing I have ever seen. She simply couldn't get her leg over it. She jumped at it. She tried to clamber up. She accepted help - and - then - as - she - got - on - totally - slipped - off - the other - side!

At one point during this I had to consciously disconnect myself from the scene in front of me as I knew that if I laughed for one second more I was going to vomit. I made eye contact with Rosemary who said "All this for 2.5 seconds!?"

Helen stayed on for exactly 2.7 seconds!!

Rosemary put her boots on and walked out the door at this point. I later found out that she had laughed so much she needed to go to the loo!

The bull was the only thing all day which gave us any injuries - about three of the girls hurt their hands holding on to the rope and one finger was badly bruised and cut.

All day there had been talk about the ultimate prize not being the Champagne but a ride in the "V8". It took me a while to work out that this was another open backed 4x4 with 6 bucket seats in the rear with rally style straps. It turned out that Benny gave us all a go on this - not just the "winners".

Those of you who know me well, will know I don't like roller coasters - I don't really like amusement park type rides with sudden jerks and stomach wrenching momentum. I make an exception to all this for the V8. I want to do that again. And again. And again! I want to DRIVE THAT TOO!

Imagine the off road track we had driven earlier - at 0.0005 miles per hour - and then think about it whooshing past you at 60-80 miles an hour. It was absolutely the most fantastic drive I have ever had.

When we got back to base one of the guys pointed out the dents in the roll cage. Seemingly they rolled the V8 last week. EEEEEK.

Rosemary got a ride of her dreams when Benny got out his Lotus Elise and gave her doughnuts and spins and speed and hand-brake turns up and down the yard for quite a few inches of rubber. She was having a ball.

That was more or less the day of adventure over. Now for the FUN!

We retired to the log cabins to compare bruises, the one on my upper arm was the best! Oh, who am I kidding? We retired to start into the drink. And we did. And I did. And I was. And two days later I am still suffering.

Seemingly I became very lovey and declared that this was the best fun I had had for 15 years. I am not sure what the last best day was but this was obviously the best since then. I hit it off with quite a few of Rosemary's other friends. I only knew one other girl there, having known her for as long as Rosemary - we all worked in the same place. For some reason this other girl (also called Rosemary) and I never hit it off and when we bumped in to each other at 'Rosemary get-togethers" I always found her to be a tad aloof. Not this time! We had a great time chatting away.

Rosemary's best friend from school, Dorothy, was there and she is now on my list of "Funniest People I Ever Did Meet". Some of Stephen's sisters were there too. Who else? Oh yes, Rosemary's accountant was there and I really liked her. I talked to her quite a lot, she lives in the town I was born in which gave her instant status. There is a whole story to be told there and I may finish that for you some day - not this time though. it will be about how everyone in Northern Ireland is connected to everyone else. It is, by far, the scariest story I have ever heard, lived through or had to tell.

All in all, we were a great bunch. Rosemary wasn't quite as drunk as me but she still managed to tear up a little when she started to thank us all for coming. Suzie got us all to do a toast to Rosemary and most of the girls managed this admirably but it was all too emotional for me and I ended up having to just start the words that were in my head, gulp and then say "you know" and allow it to pass on to the next not-so-emotional person.

Oh - somewhere during all that Dorothy managed to organise a BBQ for us all. It was pretty damn fantastic. The last lights were finally put out around 2am. For some reason i dreamed of tattoos (Suzie has Olympic Rings tattooed on her ankle which I think are pretty damn cool and some of Rosie's friends shocked her by showing their tattoos that she knew nothing about!). I suddenly had six on my right arm which were being blurred by my bruises!

At 6.00am I woke in a real panic thinking that someone had come in to the cabin and stolen my phone (I was lying on it all night - so *A*dele is lucky I wasn't phoning her the whole night!) and that lead to a panic that they may have stolen my camera too. It took me ages to get back to sleep again. By 8feckingo'clock every fecking person decided it was time to get up. Feckers.

By 9.30am we headed down to the kitchen again for our Ulster Fry and by 11.00am we had paid our bill. Rosemary left everyone home again except for me. I went home with her and Suzie.

The rest of the day was spent with Rosemary, Suzie and Stephen, going round their big-day venues and sussing out where they would like photos taken.

Not the normal, run of the mill Hen Party huh? As my first ever, the next one I go on has a lot to live up to! Mind you, the way things are going, this may be the only Hen Party I ever go to!

So, here's what I would have said to Rosemary had I been able to. I wish I could have said it out loud to her. I know she will read this.

Rosemary, you were a unique friend to me. There is no other person quite like you. You came into my life at a crucial point and made me realise that life could be fun and, more than that, SHOULD be fun. I always tell people that you "woke me up". In recent days we have joked about cheese: not only did you show me there were different types of cheese but you showed me that the cheese existed. You know?

And. No. I am NOT going to photoshop 600 photos for you. I. Do. Not. Love. You. That. Much.

Tags: Fun, Weekend Break, Laugh, Todd's Leap, Rosemary