I haven’t done one of these since wayyy back in February, and to be honest I kind of miss it. So here’s a long overdue edition of random stuff that happened last week.

Doing

The weather has been absolutely miserable recently, and that combined with dark evenings means I’ve been spending a lot more time at home. It’s been relaxing. And I like having people over.

On Monday we went to a new restaurant/cafe-type place that opened in the city centre recently. It’s a chain called Joe’s Kitchen, and the staff were really nice. The food was a little overpriced, but I think we’ll end up going back at some point.

Wednesday was Bonfire Night, so we went to the local pub for a firework display. We were kind of planning to go into town to see the big display, but the trams were really crowded and we were running late, so we settled for the pub. Despite the drizzle, the atmosphere was great – it’s always been a really friendly pub and we chatted to some (drunk) strangers.

This is more of a ‘not doing’ – I’ve been spending far less time on Facebook recently. It’s kind of a tradition for me to give it up altogether over Christmas, but cutting down the rest of the year helps too. I think it’s more of a subconscious thing because I don’t particularly miss it when I’m away from it, and I mostly use it for messaging. So I’ve deleted the app (but kept Messenger), and spent the time I would normally spend on there on my website and promotion stuff and just life generally. It’s been great.

Recently I’ve been using a few hours on Sunday to plan the upcoming week. We do a meal plan, I update my diary and look at what’s coming up, and yesterday I started planning the next weekend. One of my friends messaged me to say the local gaming shop is running an all-day event, which coincides nicely with two of my now-southern friends coming to visit. On Sunday I’m meeting up with one of my cousins, and it’s pretty far away so we’ve been figuring out the details for that too.

Creating

With The Great British Bakeoff followed by Masterchef Australia followed by Masterchef: The Professionals (yeah, we’re very behind on most of these shows!) I’ve been inspired to bake recently.

https://instagram.com/p/9ywwwKr6Si/

https://instagram.com/p/91yjsar6UH/

Photographing

Cats!

https://instagram.com/p/9qY9ZLL6Wp/

https://instagram.com/p/9t6sZWr6WW/

As it turns out I’m too short to take photos of fireworks in crowded, rainy places, so Joe did the hard work.

Eating

Cat shaped bread, as requested by my inner five year old. And fish cakes at Joe’s kitchen, in case you need any further proof I was a cat in a past life. The drink is rhubarb and vanilla juice. So good.

Playing

Kings of Mithril. First play of a new board game that Joe bought me for our anniversary. For the board game geeks out there, it’s kind of like a cross between Settlers of Catan and Carcassonne. With a dwarfen edge.

Hyrule Warriors. A huge and greatly underrated game.
Victory through defeat:

Buying

A new diary for 2016. There are no good places to buy diaries in this country. My current one is Cath Kidston, and I had to replace the cover because it was so ugly. I was tempted by another Erin Condren planner, but instead I’ve gone for something smaller and more basic. Pics when it arrives (it’s currently working its way to me from Australia).

Other than that, I’m attempting to stick to essentials only. I overspent last month and it’s only one more pay day until Vegas, so I’m trying to save!

Tweeting

I’ve made a conscious effort to tweet more recently. Previously it was too far down on my priority list, so I managed to create more time for tweeting by spending less on Facebook. I think that’s a win?!

40 web, design, dev, social media, marketing, biz & zombie posts I've written that you probably haven't read: https://t.co/Bt2623yGhK

— Jenni (@madebyjenni) November 6, 2015

Reading

I’ve just finished reading a long, intense novel called We Are Not Ourselves. All the way through I was kind of interested in it; it’s well-written – but it wasn’t until towards the end that I started really liking and sympathising with the characters. Emotional.

I’m currently reading Last Kiss, a novel about a serial killer. I’m only a couple of chapters in but it’s proving really gripping so far.

If you’re on GoodReads, take a look at my books and follow me here :)

Bookmarking

• Find the indoor plant you probably won’t kill with this flowchart
• 5 games that teach you how to code
• How to use a $5 Twitter ad to redfine your Facebook strategy
• Use Android Device Manager’s guest mode to find your friend’s phone
• Colour & contrast photo tips

How was your week?