Improvised Alarm

Seeing all of the various pictures of snowmen dominating my facebook feed at the moment, I thought I'd jump on the bandwagon and have a go myself. Sadly however, it was not meant to be, the snow in my garden is too powdery and wont stick together very well at all. Apparently that means that it is still too cold so perhaps in a couple of days when the sun has had a chance to melt it a bit, I might have another go. I didn't give up that easily however and managed to make a snow column, not very impressive from an arty point of view and I've ruined the pristine white covering on the lawn but it kept me busy for a couple of hours and thus fulfilled its primary purpose.

In an attempt to re-sync my sleeping patterns to conform more to the local area - what I like to call HMT (home mean time) - I decided to start setting my alarm and putting my radio close to hand so that I can switch it on when the alarm goes off. A poor substitute for my all singing all dancing radio alarm clock currently in Sheffield but I thought it would have the same effect. What I forgot however is that Sara Cox is in for Fearne this week on Radio 1 and therefore I have actually ended up staying in bed for longer than I did before I started setting my alarm. Every time she says 'coming up...' I think, well I can't get up now because I'll miss xxx. The wonderful and slightly childish features she has on her show are a constant source of amusement for me and if it wasn't for the appalling music that appears every other song, it would be brilliant. I often wish they could move the Radio 1 DJs to BBC 6 Music or a commercial indie station and they would create the perfect radio station. That is unlikely to happen anytime soon though so for the mean time I will have to make do with simply turning the volume down (snooze button) for the four or five minutes that the song is playing for.

After Monday's announcement of Delphic as my single of the week, it was today announced that they had come in third place in the Sound of 2010 list which is great news. The final two artists will be revealed tomorrow and Friday so we will soon know who has claimed the top spot.

Lastly, an apology, it seems I failed to mention the return of the Hairy Bikers to our screens yesterday. This series, they are basing the shows on home cooking and recipes that have been passed down through the family. Each week they find a group of mums willing to share their family recipes and this week focused on the family favourites. Some interesting recipes appeared, especially from one mum who had a recipe for haggis samosas. My particular favourite however was Aida who, along with her daughter, had a massive passion for baking. It almost seems to be a necessity for people who live in a country house with a range and all of the mumsy type cooks who seem to be experts at baking and cooking without temperature gauges and measuring implements. Anyway, she produced an amazing assortment of yummy looking cakes and sweet confectioneries and I hope to get the chance to make a couple of them whilst I'm at home because they all looked fantastic.