Number 20: View a house I have no intention of buying

Now I am a fan of Right Move, and I have a little obsession with property porn. I can spend hours pouring over houses I can not afford fantasising about what life would be like to live in mansions with entrance halls the size of my entire ground floor and gardens that look like you'd need a national trust membership to enter them. I am however acutely aware how stressful moving is and would never mess with the emotions of a family wanting to sell, just so I could tick something off my list.

Developers however; that's a different matter.

We have a lot of development going on in our neck of the woods (literally) at the moment. You might have heard about it, Chris Packham has even got in on the argument against it. Our ancient woodland and surrounding green spaces are under threat and I thought that I could be passively aggressive towards said developments by looking round one of their show homes and not buy one.  

I took my husband Tim. This was like torture for him, he had a permanent twitch as we walked around, I reckon he thought I was going to fall in love with it and want to put a deposit on it immediately. Luckily I didn't, and he didn't have to figure out how to get a £300K mortgage. So I posed for a photo with plastic bread and cheese and we left.

Once wasn't enough however; as a few months later I was walking through the bluebell woods with my kids and my parents - aren't the bluebells beautiful? 

As we came out of the woods we came across yet another development site with a show home open (on Easter Sunday, do these guys ever stop?) Now my dear Mum loves a show home; she gets lots of ideas from them, and does love a good nose; so she decided she wanted to get in on the 40th list action and jump in on my Number 20 fun. Here we are posing in the kitchen/ diner/ family room. We know this is a great place to live because it has an oversized clock and a picture frame with a life affirming moto on its walls.

The joy of this show home was the blue plastic foot covers that were at the door. You had to put them on your feet to protect the pristine white carpets that ran throughout the house. Of course who wants to just stop at footwear when they can be used as perfectly good shower caps too.

We decided we didn't like this house either so refused to buy this one too. The shower was very roomy though.

So there we are. Number 20 firmly ticked off the list. Twice.

Things that happened in 1977

As well as it being Queen Elizabeth's Silver Jubilee year; a lot of things happened in 1977.

The Sex Pistols released their 'Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols' album, the very fabulous 'Rumours' album by Fleetwood Mac was released, Morph had his first appearance on Tony Harts 'Take Hart' program, Queen's We are the Champions was released, Red Rum won the Grand National for the third time (probably egged on by Queens catchy tune) and Star Wars premiered in London on the 27th December.

I wasn't able to go to the cinema to see Star Wars when it came out because I was only 6 days old at the time.

1977 was 40 years ago. I'm not great at maths, but the fact that I was born in that year gives me an expert view that it was, indeed, 40 years ago.

So as I am in my 40th year I have put together a list. A list of 40 things.
The plan is to complete the list before the end of the year.

This here, a blog, is number 22 on said list. So here I am. Typing and starting a blog.

I'm not the best at these sorts of things.
I'm the sort of person who buys a new diary and eagerly writes my hopes and dreams for the coming year on the 1st of January. I'll then forget about it for a few days; write a half hearted entry about eating too much over Christmas, forget again look at it and think... I should write in that... I'd then find it sometime during the summer and feel so guilty about not being as enthusiastic about the year as I was in January, (or certainly feeling crap about not doing half the things I promised myself I would do) that I hide the diary at the bottom of a drawer and decide 'I'm not a diary sort of person'. (Only to repeat the experience a few years down the line).

So. This blog is going to be about the list. That way I will have things to write about and a clear end. Therefore no guilt and some structure. Here's hoping...

So the list goes like this:

1. Afternoon Tea
2. Visit a city I've never been to before
3. Do a pottery class
4. Climb a mountain
5. Go to a dance class
6. Mum and Daughter Spa Day
7. Make something out of glass
8. Go to a brewery/ distillery
9. Knit something that can actually be worn
10. Get Strictly Tickets
11. Do a festival
12. Talk on the radio
13. Go to a Sci Fi convention
14. Go to the top of a lighthouse
15. Have a cocktail party
16. Watch the sunset on a beach
17. Watch the sun rise
18. Go diving/ snorkeling with fish
19. Have a Star Wars Movie Marathon
20. View a house I have no intention of buying
21. Get running again and sign up to a race
22. Start a blog
23. Tart up a piece of old furniture
24. Re-live Uni days with a Winchester pub crawl
25. Outside cinema party
26. Safari supper
27. Go to the theatre
28. Go to a WI meeting
29. Touch something that says 'do not touch'
30. Make jam
31. Do an indoor sky dive
32. Go to a film premier
33. Try on wedding dresses
34. Play laser quest
35. Go to Wimbledon
36. Go go-kart in
37. See the London Christmas lights
38. Get a response to fan mail from someone famous
39. Make macaroons
40. Have a birthday party!

Quite a list huh?
Plan is... I'll be updating this blog with my progress.
No pressure.
We can do this.

I may not write another entry until the summer... I have form.