Taking the Pill when you’re Over 35

At the GP today, the bloke (‘doctor’) really made me feel my age. Well not quite. I don’t have it hammered home that I’m 35 and don’t think of myself as ‘old’. Usually I just am what I am without thinking of classifications, especially age or gender (I don’t reiterate myself as a woman either, nor do I have that rammed down my throat either professionally or in my private life).

The other point is that ‘being old’ for me always connotes doing the grown-up things, and having responsibility for others, especially, having children. For instance, my next-door neighbours strike me as old even though they are both younger than me – but they have 3 children! And as such, they take the role of parents and are a stage ‘further up’ in the responsibility/growing up/ OLD stage than what I am (no offence intended to any parents who are/feel young. It’s just my own peculiar value system and way of understanding the world).

But I’m rambling. The point is that for some reason, for women 35 and above it’s more dangerous to take the (combined) Pill, especially, if you’re a smoker. Now, I don’t smoke apart from the very occasional social cigarette (which is easy to switch off as I only do it when I have a drink. I’m not a ’sober smoker’ – I hate cigarettes!!). Thus, if I did decide to go back on the pill, even if only for a few months, I’m at greater risk of blood clots and such.

It’s probably not worth it at all. The one good thing about it is that contraception here in the UK is free, at least the pill. So it’s not going to cost anything – I may try it, then, for 6 months or a year, to see what it’s like. I really don’t want any babies and I do want to avoid falling pregnant at all cost! Having kids is not on my life plan

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Going Back on the Pill – pt 2

I have an appointment with my GP this week to discuss whether or not I want to go back on the pill. I think I’ve blogged about this before. The only criteria I will be applying to decide whether or not I should try it are:

- will it make me fat? From what I remember, the Pill (some brands anyway) will make you put on weight. Though this may be untrue – but it’s definitely one aspect I want to ask

- will it  be free? I remember that when I lived in England 15 years ago (!), I got it free from the Family Planning Clinic. This may not be the case any more, or may  not be the case in Scotland.

Thus my decision will be made. I might just go on it for a few months so that I can have ‘unprotected sex’ to see what it feels like (with B. of course – not some random stranger), and then stop it again

lenina’s Scottish Ancestry

Image via Wikipedia

I found out the other day that my wee nephew’s birthday was this Sunday passed (25th January) which is the same as Burns’ birthday (the Scottish National Poet). The funny thing is that my nephew is also a redhead – this gene ‘jumped’ a generation (my dad is a ginger or ’strawberry blonde’).

My BF told me that ginger hair was an indication of potential Scottish ancestry which I quickly googled today. While it’s true that world-wide the greatest percentage of redheads lives in Scotland (13% of all the population), the ‘ginger gene’ is generally considered to be Celtic, not Scottish. And even the Celts didn’t come out of nowhere – some say it originally came from the Scandinavian Hugh hair.

Either way, my dad’s dad is from Prussia (Preussen), which to me is far more  historically interesting. Even my surname is much more common in the East. Plenty of people carrying my surname apparently live in Berlin. If the ‘ginger gene’ did come from my granddad, it may have been through some Scandinavian connection (Scandinavians immigrating to Prussia hundreds of years ago).

So I don’t think I have anything Scottish in my genes – more likely a tiny amount of Viking ancestry, which would make more sense (even my body shape and height etc. is quite Nordic).

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Best British Chippie is in Scotland

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A chip shop in Anstruther, Fife, was crowned best UK chippie last week

This is excellent as I’ve always wanted to eat the best UK fish supper (I’m a sucker for Fish supper but have it very rarely, as it has 1,000,000 of calories!).

It’s actually the second year in a row that Scotland has won this title. Last year, it was a chippie in Biggar – the Townhead Cafe.

I’m planning to go to either of those – or both – some time soon. Naturally, since I live in Edinburgh, I will have to include some other activity on the day too. I don’t want to just drive to Anstruther (in Fife) or Biggar (in South Lanarkshire) just to get a Fish supper – though if I did go to the Biggar one, I could combine it (sort of) with a visit to my friends A&S.

Winner of best UK Chippie 2007/08: Townhead Cafe, Biggar, South Lanarkshire

Winner of best UK Chippie 2008/09: Anstruther Fish Bar, Anstruther, Fife

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Scotland’s Homecoming Year 2009 starts today

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

Today (25th January – 250th anniversary of Burn’s birth) marks the start of Scotland’s Year of Homecoming.

Apparently, it “aims to attract expatriates back to Scotland to celebrate the country’s culture and heritage.” (from Burns Events kick off Homecoming). There are at least 20 million people with Scottish ancestry living outside of Scotland! Amazing, given how small the country is.

There is some controversy regarding this ‘Homecoming’ – it’s considered by some as a thinly veiled attempt by Scotland’s First Minister to promote and strengthen a strong Scottish national identity in its people, with Homecoming being an advertisement for  Scotland’s political independence in the lead up to a possible independence referendum.

However, I think that’s a bit far-fetched. I’m quite glad that Scotland does have a strong sense of identity and is not ashamed to promote and celebrate it. That doesn’t mean they, or its people, would vote for a complete separation from the United Kingdom. Culturally and psychologically, Scots will always be independent anyway

Burns Night Sunday 25th January – eat a Haggis :P

Image by Project 404 via Flickr

This Sunday 25th January is Burns night, where traditionally, people in Scotland eat a Burns Supper and recite his famous poem, Ode to A Haggis. I’ll be spending it at my BF’s parents’ house and will all dress up (wearing a tartan scarf and jacket hehe). B’s family is quite nationalistic, which I like

Also this year is the 250th birth of Robert Burns (who is also Scotland’s national poet, i.e. of similar status to Goethe in Germany). Which makes it all the more important to celebrate it and I suppose the Scottish identity, as different to the English or British one (sure, there are common traits and I’m not one to be anti-English, but the Scots’ national identity strikes me as more positive and more distinct, whereas the English still seem to be getting over the fact that they no longer command an Empire. See here for a rather good, albeit somewhat anti-English, take on the matter – what went wrong with the (English) working-class?).

The only problem with this Burns Supper is that Haggis is of course meat, and meatier than meat at that! Whereas I’m a Vegetarian – but my BF has assured me that his mum is going to cook a vegetarian one just for me

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How to Beat the Credit Crunch – i.

or, how to live frugally! Here’s a first tip:

- Buy stuff from supermarkets that’s reduced for quick sale

I do this mainly with bread, and vegetables. Supermarkets in the UK tend to have one section with items ‘for quick sale’ in a refrigeration – section, but the rest, especially the items I’m interested in (bread, veg), are all over the place.

There’s no hard and fast rule to the ‘reduced for quick sale’ ‘refridgeration’ section – it’s always there, even throughout the day, as these goods are more perishable. So I tend not to worry about getting cheap food there, though I do look whenever I go in.

However, with bread and veg and other non-refrigerated stuff, they seem to put these out for quick sale from an hour or so before the shop closes onwards. Thus, if a supermarket (e.g. Morrisons) closes at 8PM, you go there for 7.15PM-7.30PM. That means they’ll have all their cheap bread out (between 10 and 30p for a loaf, or a bag of rolls, or a french stick etc.).

Sometimes I even get ‘luxury items’ that way – or things that I wouldn’t normally buy as they’re ridiculously priced. See below a cake I got from Sainsbury’s. Doesn’t taste that nice btw – far too sweet. But for £2 it was worth a try

Privacy? What Privacy?

The BF and I went to a colleague’s leave-do on Friday night. As always at these type of things, there was one person that had a digital camera and took pictures throughout the evening.

By Monday, they had uploaded said pics onto the work  server, sending round an email to people with a direct link, as well as uploading them to Facebook (they asked me if I had deleted my profile as they had tried tagging a couple of pics with my name).

There are three things wrong here.

1. distributing pics of myself willy-nilly without prior permission

2. attempting to name-tag the pics, without prior permission, thus violating my privacy

3. distributing pics of B. willy-nilly without his permission

Especially the latter is of concern. He is NOT one of the work colleagues and, he went to great lengths to delete any profiles etc. online that he used to have as his online privacy is very important to him (you won’t find any pics/profiles of him if you google his name).

I didn’t pull the colleague up on it this time. There were ‘only’ two photos of me / me and B., and as I’d already deactivated my FB profile she won’t have been able to tag me. Still.

It just means that I won’t allow anyone to take pics of me in the future.

Car Battery Update

I did manage to recharge my car battery and put it back in successfully. It really wasn’t that difficult in fact.

Like with all things that are (or, used to be) traditionally ‘male’ tasks (i.e. DIY, car stuff, etc.) I don’t have anyone around to do it and I’ve always been very capable of doing them myself. I also quite like it that way – whatever new thing can be learnt or done is interesting and stimulating, while often expanding one’s skill-set.

The ‘problem’ is that, as you get older, you’ve already done so much (in my case anyway) that all the everyday stuff is routine and no longer a challenge. It’s more of a task, then, to keep discovering and see and do new stuff, thus keeping the mind active and alive

Deep-fried Mars Bar vs. Pasta with Pesto

Image via Wikipedia

This week-end, I tried deep-fried Mars bar for the first time. For the uninitiated: it’s a Scottish ‘delicacy’ (and not as old as I thought it was!):

The dish originated at selected chip shops in Scotland as a novelty item, but was never a mainstream item. Since various mass media have reported on the practice since the mid 1990s, in part as an ironic commentary on urban Scotland’s notoriously unhealthy diet,[2] the popularity of the dish has spread.

My BF, on the other hand, for the first time tried pasta with pesto (and parmesan cheese). For some reason he’d never had pesto before, and he was sceptical about parmesan cheese. But he loved it – I used red pesto, not the green one, to break him in gently.

I’ll continue to try various Scottish dishes and delicacies, while he’ll continue to expand his ‘food horizon’ – he’s particularly keen on trying various German sausages when we go over in May ;P