Blogmas, day 18

Day18!  Eeeeek!

Yesterday was Groove - new festive playlist and good fun routines  - and the the trip into London to have fish and chips followed by the lights.

On the way there, Ray announced that, if enough people were interested, the coach driver had agreed to park somewhere nearby so we could have a short while to look round a Christmas Market at Trafalgar Square to sort of make up for the Rochester one being cancelled.  After a show of hands and a round with the box to tip (bribe?) the driver, it was so.

Fish and chips first though.  The meal was delicious, fresh cooked and very speedily produced, together with a very welcome mug of tea or coffee, followed by an unexpected dessert of cheesecake or apple pie.  So nice.
No photos though - it wasn't really appropriate.

Then it was all back on the coach and we drove through the area of the Lights.  Now, a coach isn't the best place to view that sort of thing and I didn't manage many clear photos but we saw enough to make it enjoyable.

To go with the stalls around Trafalgar Square, there were other things going on - carol singing for example.  One adult choir was singing carols while a large group of children wearing Santa hats were waiting excitedly for their turn
(teacher's nightmare, I should think, in the dark)

When we got back on the coach, the lady next to me offered to change seats (she had the window seat).  Very kind of her.  She got her reward as, in the raffle draw (using our seat numbers), she won!

This was the only other half decent photo I took - the Strand Palace, all decorated up and looking much nicer than the photo indicated.

I didn't buy much at the market, just a couple of 'Radiator Bags' which are just gauze bags filled with scented Christmas potpourri (have I spelled that right?) that you lay or hang on the radiator to make your room smell festive (they work!) and this, a dear little nativity tree decoration made of olive wood and with a quirky mismatched roof!
It's going to take the place of the usual fridge magnet purchase and each year I can remember this trip when I put up the tree.

We weren't late back either - the traffic seemed pretty light once we were out of London. When I got home, I grabbed a coffee and sat down, reached out for my knitting or crochet and - I didn't have any.

So I have started the moss stitch jacket I planned to start around the 27th.

It's an aran weight yarn on size 4 needles so it should grow pretty quickly and I really do need something to do with my hands of an evening.

On to today.

Today's 'beauty' (fat chance!) product from the M&S calendar is a tube of 'hair treatment'  The blurb says 'for smoothness, volume, conditioning, strength and polish.'

Polish!!!???

It's just one of those styling products you add to towel dry hair.  I use something similar already so it won't be wasted.

By the way, I used the shampoo and conditioned on Monday and it was OK - very nice to use but I haven't noticed any difference really so I'll be sticking to my lower budget products!

Here's the puzzle for yesterday and today.

The Advent of Change for today supports Big Change.

'Today you have unlocked a further £12 of funding that will support young people to thrive in the UK.'

That's a bit non-specific, isn't it?  It seems that this charity works with 'partners' to improve the prospects of young people and every pound donated unlocks a further £5 from these partners for a wide range of projects.  
Now we know.

https://www.big-change.org/

This is getting long so I will just say that today is energetic.  Circuits (changed from Monday), lots of housework and back to Lindsey's for personal training in the afternoon.

It should keep me out of trouble anyway.

Today's Advent music is the beautiful 'The Angel Gabriel' sung by the Swingle Singers (not the ones I remember from my youth though)