Another One! (Lovely Blog Award)

Yesterday proved cause for a double bloggy celebration - not only did I hit 150 followers but the charming Anna of the blog Miss Beatrix kindly gave me a One Lovely Blog award.  Thank you, Anna, I'm flattered!

Hello too to all my followers old and new - I hope you're all still enjoying my vintage ramblings.  Now, I'm fully aware that fifty followers ago I promised a giveaway.  I've been a naughtily remiss blogger on that account, but the good news is that I definitely do have something planned for very soon.  The prizes are all set, I have a box in which to send them, so watch this space!

Back to the award, and the same caveats remain for accepting it (although the design seems to have changed since Jennie from It's A Charmed Life munificently gave it back in 2010, unless it's a different "One Lovely Blog" award - "Another Lovely Blog", "One More Lovely Blog", or "Two Lovely Blogs" perhaps? - just joshing, I'm honoured to receive it twice!).

First I of course have to thank the giver and link back to their blog (see first paragraph).  I then have to nominate fifteen other worthy blogs (something that isn't hard) and tell you all seven things about myself (which is!).

Thanks to my prolific use of the "Follow" function in the seven months since my last award, I have many more fine and noteworthy blogs on my list (and more importantly, ones that haven't received this award recently but which truly deserve it).  Here they are (in no particular order, beyond alphabetical!):

1. A Harem Of Peacocks
2. Advantage In Vintage 
3. Gentlemen Prefer Blondes 
4. HATTATT 
5. Joyness Sparkles 
6. Lady Jardin - Vintage Views of the South Coast 
7. La Pépée de Paris 
8. Lil Vintage Me 
9. Love Letter from London 
10. Old Fashioned Susie
11. Ravishing Retro 
12. The Diary of Roxie Roulette 
13. The Lothians 
14. Vintage Secret 
15. Wartime Housewife

Now the hard part - seven facts* about me that I haven't told you before!  I have to admit to pinching some ideas from other nominees who have come before me for this time.  Here goes...

• My favourite blend of tea is Assam.  It has just the right mix of tannins, flavour and strength and makes the perfect cup of char.  I can go for Ceylon sometimes as well, although I tend to find that a bit weaker.  Currently my Assam comes from a certain orange-coloured supermarket but Twinings, Whittards and others have been known to be in my cupboard!
• I've been drinking tea since I was about 6 months old, when I suddenly went off milk (in all forms) and juices.  Following the doctor's advice to "try him on anything, he has to drink something", a warm and milky cup of tea was proffered and the rest, as they say, is history.

Mmmm, tea! ;-P  Check out that cottage suite - nice, huh?

• My favourite dessert (and cake) is cheesecake.  Strawberry for preference, although most varieties are appreciated (not so keen on chocolate/toffee, though).  It takes some not inconsiderable restraint to stop myself eating a whole strawberry cheesecake in one sitting.  Yum!

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• I hate self-adhesive stamps.  On a personal level they make me feel like a child playing with stickers instead of a link in the chain of a traditional and time-honoured postal system.  As a philatelist they annoy me because they're the very devil to remove from paper - even prolonged soaking in warm water is not always effective and sometimes leaves a lumpen mess where the glue has remained and dried.  I've managed to overcome the former objection although not without difficulty.  Almost all British stamps are self-adhesive now due to "overwhelming support in public consultations".  It wouldn't have been quite so overwhelming if they'd asked me, I can tell you!  Sometimes I think these "public consultations" exist only in the mind of the companies who quote them, or are at the very least skewed to favour the preferred outcome (I should know, I used to work in market research!).  After much investigation the only stamps I can find that are still gummed are the Country Definitives, which bear the various symbols of each nation of the United Kingdom.  Over time I have stocked up on sheets of these definitives (the 2nd Class English three lions passant, for preference) until I have now got nearly 300 of them, setting me up for the foreseeable future (and avoiding the Royal Mail's recent extortionate price rise, ha ha!).

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•  My favourite board game is Monopoly, but I'm alone in my liking of it, so I almost never get to play it.   I have to make do with Monopoly Deluxe CD-ROM and play against a computer, while hoping to find someone to play my Nostalgia Edition with.  Another of my favourite traditional games that I picked up from a charity shop many years ago is the card game British Towns.  Great fun, and at least the family enjoy it too so I get more of a chance to play it!

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• My first word was nothing so pedestrian as "cat", "dog" or "car".  No, the very first word I ever said was "butterfly" (or to be precise "utterfly", as apparently I didn't quite make the "b")!  What a bright kid - where did it all go wrong, eh?

• Another of the most highly prized books in my library is a tome entitled Power and Speed: the story of the internal combustion engine on land, at sea and in the air, a 1938 first edition detailing all the latest advancements in engineering in all the disciplines mentioned and with lots of lovey fold-out cutaway drawings of 1930s cars, aeroplanes and boats (including some record-breakers) as seen in magazines of the day such as The Motor and The Aeroplane.  It even has contributions from the likes of Sir Malcolm Campbell and Prince Chula of Siam.  A beautiful book (despite 74 years of age and wear) that I am proud to own. 
  
  
  
   

Well, there we have it again.  Thanks again to Anna for the award, and I hope you've found at least some of this post interesting(!).  Don't forget to keep your eyes peeled for the forthcoming One Hundred and Fifty Followers Giveaway, in the meantime have a great weekend all!  Enjoy the sunshine now that it's here, and before it goes again!

* interestingness not guaranteed