REVIEW OF POPPY DAY BY THE AMAZING AMANDA PROWSE

This story rocked my world I had a lump in my throat as I read it and sometimes a tear in my eye. To say I loved it does not do this story justice it rocked my world because the story relates to a current events and coming from the East End of London as you were reading it like any good story you, you go into it as it unfolds as though you are there watching it take place like a fly on the wall.

Amanda Prowse is an amazing woman I have got to know her a little through twitter I didn’t read the product description before I read the book which is why for this review I have put it at the end. 

I read the book mainly because Amanda wrote it and secondly because proceeds were going to a Charity close to my heart. Amanda is a fantastic writer her husband, family and the military should be proud of her and women like her who are the backbone of our military without them and their families our boys cannot go off and do their jobs.

This story made me wonder what my fiery little Grandmother did to the person unlucky enough to tell her my uncle had been taken a POW in Korea during his National Service.

Oh yeah if I was Major Prowse’s superiors I would be scared because if they ever lost her husband nothing would stop her from finding him but she would have a lot more support.

Now you can read the product description if you wish or just go buy the book from Amazon it is available in paperback and kindle format and you can buy it in Sainsbury’s.

 

Product Description

How far would you go to bring home the one you love?

This is the question posed in this contemporary love story that takes you from the streets of East London to the plains of Afghanistan.

Poppy Day is a twenty one year old hairdresser, devoted to her husband Martin and blessed with a sunny disposition. Martin is the one constant in her life, her protector and best friend since they were six, making an often difficult childhood easier to bear.

Martin and Poppy are an ‘ordinary’ couple who find themselves in an extraordinary situation. Having joined the British Army in search of a better life for them both, their world is ripped apart when Martin is taken hostage while on his first tour tour in Afghanistan.

Battling against army culture and procedure, Poppy decides to bring her ‘Mart’ home herself. Fuelled by naivety, she feels that nothing is impossible when doing it for the man she loves. Her journey sees her paying a very high price and incurs some heartbreaking consequences…

‘Poppy Day’ gives an insight into life beneath the uniform, a peek at what it’s like to be the one left at home, ticking off the days until your loved one returns and what happens when there is the knock on the door that every forces wife, husband, mother, father or lover dreads…

All proceeds from the sale of Poppy Day go directly to The Royal British Legion to help fund the charity’s Battle Back Centre for injured Service personnel.

Harry Moseley a true inspiration and a hero!

Harry is a wonderful little boy who was taken from us far too early in his short life on Saturday 8^th October 2011 at 11.10pm. He went out fighting we his twitter family like may others whose lives he touched just by being there will never forget him.

I’m not one for award shows like the Oscars TV Award shows, but I will watch real award shows honouring the work of real people, like The Pride of Britain, The Millies etc.

I first saw Harry on TV receiving his Children’s Champion Award from the “The Dragons” I thought what a fantastic little boy even though he is seriously ill, and knows it, he is kicking Cancer’s ass and raising money for Charity.

I joined twitter last year and a few months ago I was having a bad day and someone retweeted Harry’s @harry_moseley  #WowzerWedensday and it turned my day around and his tweets continued to turn my days around.

When I get stressed (or as I have been suffering a bout of depression) sometimes it just takes something for my brain to click back into “the normal me” mode. For me this was it “have a #WowzerWedensday”. This little boy has been an inspiration and when he was too sick to tweet his mum / family tweeted for him.

I cannot even begin to understand how it feels to lose a child. My sister will not even discuss a Will and who will look after my niece if anything were to happen to her and her husband so I know there are conversations in my niece’s life that Aunty C may have to have with her from how to put boy in wrist lock to the subject of dying. So I ordered several bracelets from Harry for me and my niece. For me as a daily reminder that work is just that, and also so that when I have to have that conversation with my niece on dying I can tell her about Harry.

Harry will always have a special place in his twitter family’s hearts, to me he was an inspirational little  boy, a hero, a fighter and a role model to the young and old.

Rest In Peace little man xxx

Exercise & Work

Letting go at work is working, and I didn’t think it would! I still slip back into what the hell when I get an email that makes no sense, but then I think breathe is it asking for opinions if it isn’t be a good girl stay out of trouble do not make waves and keep your mouth shut.

Taking lunch breaks is great as I never did this unless I was meeting up with friends, I just used to sit at my desk and eat my lunch while I worked. Now I’m sort of taking a break by using the time to study so I don’t have to do any at home of an evening.

As you know from earlier blogs I do pretty long days like most commuters. However I have decided to try and work in a bit of an exercise plan during my work day as I’m knackered when I get home and just want to relax. Gym membership in London is expensive and we do not have one close by. So I thought I would try the London cycle scheme rather than do the 45 minute walk to the office in the morning…..

Well what can I say it was an experience I will not be repeating. It was a bad idea, it turns out I do not have any sense of balance and I get that from mum. I can understand why no one steals the damn things it took me two attempts to lift the bike out of the bike holder thingy you lock it into. I managed to get on the bike and fell off and caught my ankle on the pavement, then the bike nearly fell on me it was so funny I was sitting on the pavement laughing and lady stopped and asked if I was OK. I think she thought I was a nutter until I explained whist still laughing.

Hubs was the best - when I called him and said I’m on my way to the underground. “Are you OK?” “Oh yeah but I’m running late, explained what happened and then told him I think I bruised my knee and twisted my ankle on the pavement.”

So now I’ve decided to walk and have to say it was boring as hell but if I keep pace with music on my IPOD it’s not so bad.

All of this is helping with the weight loss and pain management as I’m not feeling so stressed and I’m not getting as many headaches as I was which is brilliant.

Working, Exams and Professional Development

Hands up who thought when they left School, College or University that they would still be sitting exams be it 5, 15 or even 20+ years later? Not many hands up I bet!

As I mentioned in my last blog I commute to and from work. The one thing I wish I could do whilst travelling is study. I’ve tried it a few times, but if I read the book on the train I never feel as though I’ve taken any information in. I have a friend who travelled longer distances than I with work and practically sat all her exams on the train. I also have a friend who cross-stitches on the train but I can’t do that either.

Anyway…as part of my job I have to show that I maintain my knowledge in relation to the work I do and the industry I am in. This is done throughout the year via continuous professional development (CPD). I have to achieve a minimum of 100 credits which are obtained in a variety of ways ie, reading trade publications (for example 12 monthly subscriptions = 15 credits), reading technical guides and attending training seminars.

I also try to sit one exam a year (which counts as credits as well), this has worked out well as I now need to obtain a Diploma and because of the exams I’ve sat over the last few years, they count towards it and I now only have 2 papers to sit.  Each paper takes approximately 75-100 study hours to pass (according to the boffins at examining body).

One a year that can’t be too bad I hear you say? It’s not BUT it takes planning as the exams are usually studied for over a 3 to 6 month period. If you sat down and worked out what free time you really have for yourself after you’ve finished your day at work, you’ve finished with the kids and got them to bed, or cooked and washed up and got everything ready for the next day where would you find the time in your day to find a couple of hours to study? Especially if you are studying something that is similar to what you do day in day out rather than something completely different? I don’t know about anyone else but when I studying for a work exam which is all I have studied for apart from a few OU courses it me feel like I’m working instead of studying, if I study during the week after work. I also find as do friends when studying and working that you have to make time for the studying.

So as I only have 2 exams left to pass, I wanted to get them both done this year (instead of the usual one), firstly because there are other things I want to do now rather than study (until they bring out the next must have qualification) and secondly I’m 42 this year and it would be nice to have a break from studying and try something new that is different that I want to do like write. However as I need if possible to find 200 hours over the next 6 months I need to get cracking.

Like most people who work and study I always start with a study plan, this usually gets thrown out the window after week 2 as although I’m organised if work needs to be done that is a priority for me. I often work on a Sunday afternoon (yes I know I’m a workaholic I can’t help it I’m a control freak). I also have to take into account I also suffer from Chronic Pain in the form of headaches caused by variety of things which I’ll cover in a later blog. Good news is the pain is manageable the majority of the time but sometimes I need to sleep or relax rather than study/work.

So wish me luck I’m going to give it a go and see what happens, as I'll still be blogging and doing my book reviews as well J

The Life of a Commuter

Like many people I commute to work. I live in Essex and work in London. It takes about 1hour 45 minutes each way.

I have a 10 minute walk to and from the station which isn’t bad, a train journey that takes about 1 hour with pretty good views of the sea for 3 stops. Once in London I have either 40 minute walk to/from my office (the girls in my office could do it in 30 minutes but I have short legs and it is a really boring walk). I however usually get the underground which should take about 15 minutes including the walk to my office at the other end and stopping for coffee on the way (I need my Pret A Manger coffee or I’m a bitch). But no…… every morning we get held up at one station being told the train is running early even though some days we wait 10 minutes for the bloody thing to turn up. Considering I use the Circle Life which goes to all the tourist spots I think it’s one of the worst serviced lines we have.

Anyway…… I could work local but I would have to take a drop in pay of about a 1/3 of my current salary, which I can’t afford because I would still probably have to pay for parking, petrol, more in car insurance etc. Also for the work I do the jobs which are considered local by agencies can be up to 20 miles away, so it isn’t really worth my while at the moment especially as I like my job most of the time.

So I commute and even though it is a pain in the arse, costs me approximately £400pm, and come 9pm most nights because I’m up at 5.30am I’m usually falling asleep on the sofa watching TV (thank you Sky for Sky +), but call me a nutter I actually don’t mind commuting.

I find that I have to be as organised as possible (which isn’t always the case) I don’t usually get home until 6.45pm at the earliest, so dinners have to be easy to prepare and in my case diabetic friendly. While dinner is cooking I have a quick shower and prepare lunches for work the next day.

When I lived in London I would get the bus to and from work. I could get the bus outside my flat and it would drop me 5 minute from old office. It would take about an hour but it was cheaper and more convenient than the underground even though it took longer. I used to get the same bus every day (assuming it turned up) so I got to meet some great people (and some not so great people) and being a Publican’s daughter I will talk to anyone (except weirdos). We even used to have nights out after work and a Christmas Dinner.

My journey now is longer I usually walk to the station in the morning with my next door neighbour (but we usually get different trains unless I’m running late). I get on the same train carriage in the morning and at night so usually see the same people most days, as they do the same. Sometimes if I bump into people I talk to regularly we have a catch up chat but the time I spend commuting is my down time, I usually read a book, tweet, play my Nintendo or write a review (which can be interesting if it’s for my other blog and someone looks over my shoulderJ).

Although people tend to keep themselves to themselves, usually the journey into and out of London is quite pleasant and I’m lucky as I usually get a seat. The people I have got to know since doing my journey started as usual because the one time people will talk to each other is when they are annoyed with the wait, delays or cancellations of trains and you are left stranded in the middle of nowhere (being diabetic I now carry food with me for that reason always), the inconsiderate yob or passenger who is talking to loud or playing music in the quiet carriage OR maybe a smile or regular good morning/evening.

Although I try to avoid weirdo’s I’m not convinced that some people I talk didn’t think I was their weirdo after all let’s face it as kid we were all told not to talk to strangers LOL.

Twitter Book Club and Book Reviews

This time last year I’d only just joined Facebook and then my phone contract came to an end, and the Blackberry opened up a whole new world for me.

Even though I blog and tweet I am a fairly private person, so I protect my tweets so that if someone wants to follow me they have to ask my permission to do so. For some it’s all about the number of followers and for some they like chatting with people from a variety of backgrounds in different parts of the world. I like to follow back so I check out tweeters bio’s and see if we have anything in common or see if their just plain interesting.

When I first started out on twitter I looked up Diabetes and the Authors who are on my auto buy list on amazon, some of those authors tweet so I can keep up with books coming out and general chit chat. From there I found some new authors and people to chat with via #FF (Follow Friday) #WW (Writer Wednesday) and #MM (Military Monday).

This is how my blog started and this is how the topic of my blog recently came about. A fellow tweeter and I, who have been chatting for quite a while (@pborodors) were discussing World Book Day. I had been away and so hadn’t seen the promotions going on and @pborodors wasn’t well so we had conversation about the books we liked to read on twitter instead.

A few days later @pborodors mentioned she’d bought Man Down by Mark Ormrod who is on twitter and I thought I’d like to read that was when we thought we could set up a Twitter Bookclub and have this as the first book and the idea went from  there.

Then I thought we have a lot of newly published authors on twitter, what if the book club covered authors especially new, unknown or self-published authors who talk to their follower unlike a lot of the established authors on twitter we would be helping twitter friends and then it got me thinking ……

As well as a Book Club how about Book Reviews J I love reading but have only ever written one review and I have to say that because of twitter my reading list has expanded somewhat from romance, crime to biographies and even erotica. So when @52Betty was looking for reviewers for her site I offered my services. 

So now thanks to Rachel Lyndhurst and @52Betty who got me blogging they have now got me reviewing books! But I won’t always review them here as some of the books are considered 18+, so reviews will be posted to bookseller sites i.e., Amazon and on my other blog  Ruby Redfire, yes these ladies have created a monster LOL.

TRAVELLING WITH WORK ISN’T ALL FUN

It’s not all glamorous, fun and first class travel like you see on the adverts. In fact I don’t think it ever was or ever will be.  The ads make it look like time travel you’re at the airport then you’re in the hotel in the country you need to be and everything is wonderful……. For the last 5 months I have been working 1 week a month away from home. My week away, starts before I leave. I remind everyone that I will be working out of our other office. The work I do while away differs to my everyday work and includes giving and receiving training, meetings, projects etc.

Then I look at what needs to be done before I leave and what needs to be packed for the week? From books I want to read, a cross-stitch, to books for the exam I’m studying for, treats I take for my team. I have to make sure I don’t go over the allowance if I’m flying with 2 different airlines.

I always travel on a Sunday as it takes most of the day I leave my house at 6.30am arrive in the country at 4pm their time. The Saturday is spent relaxing, food shopping, ironing and packing. On the Sunday when I used to get trains I would be on the first train to London from there it would be both a bus and train or two underground trains to the airport depending on engineering works (this would take approximately 2½ hours).  On my last trip I’m took the car so I left ½ hour later, it only took 1 hour 20 minutes and I was still there earlier than going by train.

Airports - these are interesting places especially In the UK for an international flight check in is 3 hours before the flight leaves and where the airport is busy it can take anything from 45 minutes to just over an hour on a good day to get through check in and security (this is after you have practically undressed and unpacked your hand luggage and repacked it again).

You then have about 2 hours to kill before your flight, this is when I start to relax, (before I get to the airport I’m always worried I’ll miss the flight) and so I go and grab some breakfast (as I’m not a shopper). As I sit and relax, I people watch and write, prep ideas for stories and plots, I catch up on some reading, tweet, chat on Facebook etc.

The flight usually takes just under 3 hours and when I get to the Airport at the other end I have a driver waiting for me with a card with a name on it, unless it’s my usual driver (as I call him) who picks me up and drops me off the most.

I stay in one of the best hotels and they put up with me, so far out of the 5 trips I’ve caused a blackout in my room, broke the bath plug and aircon (couldn’t get it to switch off). But after my 1^st trip it was like going home, the staff are brilliant and look after me, even the waiters tells me to turn my laptop off and relax when I’m eating if I’m working late in the restaurant at dinner time.

A member of the team I work with picks me up in the morning and drops me off at night, and a couple of the locals who see me regularly waiting to be picked up stop and say hello and talk to me now.

I pretty much do a full working week as I leave the office on a Friday to come home around 3pm. My working day starts at 8am and finishes at 5pm and then my time is my own but what do you do in a strange country on your own when travelling? Being a woman and travelling alone I’m always security conscious, more so than I probably have to be, but it gives my family peace of mind when I’m travelling that I don’t wander from the hotel on my own unless I’m with friends from work.

Thanks to skype I get to speak to my Husband everyday so don’t end up with extortionate phone bills if I couldn’t speak to him every day I would go insane he is my rock and safety net. I’m also very lucky, as I’ve made some great friends in my other office so we go out, have dinner and catch up at least 2 or 3 out of the 5 nights I’m working away.  The nights I’m on my own can be boring as hell and I’d probably go insane if I had to spend every night on my own even though I’ve packed enough books to read, Nintendo games to play and cross stitching to do for 2 weeks. I don’t have this problem at home and I think it’s because when you work away from home it is lonely and tiring as you never sleep as well when you’re not in your own bed and even though there is only an hour’s time difference it takes a few days to get used to (like when the clocks go back).

When I get back to the UK and I wasn’t getting home until 11pm if I was lucky with the trains (taking approx 3 hours to get home from the airport) but now with the car 1½ hours.

So could I travel with work all the time?  I think if I needed to 1 week away a month I could do, especially with the company I work for, as I’ve made some great friends, but if I had to do more than a week that would be hard as I’m too much of a homebody and miss my family too much. As much as I love working in our other office as I’m with my team and friends I miss home I miss having my husband to cuddle up to at night, when I’m in a bed that can sleep 6, I miss my cat meeting me at the door when I come home and waking me up at 2am to be fed.

This is when I think of people in the Services who get deployed to war torn countries and how hard it must be for them to be away from their families and friends no comfy hotel room an being away for a minimum of 6 months and then I think my job’s not so bad I can live with a little boredom.

How I met my Husband

As you know I've been looking at writing a book and i've been thinking of writing a romance that can go any number of ways so I've been thinking about characters and It got me reminiscing - how I met my husband.


It's amazing what you can find in Tesco's! Now I don't want you thinking I went shopping in the frozen food aisle, found a man along with a tub of Hagan Daz Belgian chocolate ice cream (although I'm sure I can put that in a story somewhere that's if it hasn't been done already).

My husband and I originally met in our third year of secondary school, he was my secret crush you know the one you never reveal because you don't want him to ever find out from friends with good intentions who would try and fix you up and find out he wasn't interested.

We had some classes together but never saw each other socially and when we left school I probably bumped into him a couple of time and said hi and as the story goes life went on.

I met him again after 14 years, late one Monday night in September I'd finished work late and headed to Tesco to do my weekly shop it wasn't my usual night, because I was on a Karate course all weekend. As I put the shopping in the boot of my car I look up and see Tony. He was just as I remember except a lot hotter gone was the curly hair and black NHS specs he wore as a teenager standing before me was an older version of my school crush.

He was at Tesco on beer and ice cream run with his flatmate we exchanged numbers and arranged to meet for drink. Now your thinking ahhhh first date but no, I was a bit of dimlow as I wasn't sure when I told the girls in the office the next day about him whether it was a date or two old school friends going for a drink.

I have to say I was a bundle of nerves, he was the type of guy I was attracted to and if I was honest with myself always liked but didn't usually end up going out with, he was tall, with some alpha tendencies, or what I described to the girls in my office who tried to fix me up with anything that was male with a pulse, as a proper bloke with a good heart who I couldn't intimidate. Which is probably why most of the dates I went on never went passed a first date.

So we met for a drink and it ended up being a date and we've been together ever since.

We got married last year and celebrated our first wedding anniversary this weekend. So when anyone asks where did you meet I always start with it's amazing what you can find in Tescos!

Who is Caz Austin?

They say life begins at 40 for me I think it's true.

Every 5th birthday from the age of 25 I wrote a list of the things I would like to achieve in the next 5 years. Writing a book was always on the list but I never did it, all the work goals and other personal goals did get achieved as I always tried to keep the goals realistic and I'm not an over achiever.

I have always been a workaholic, a bit of a stress head and a bit of a perfectionist, work has always been the one thing in my life that I thought would always be there and has been, but I have learnt in the last few years that although work is a huge part of my life it is not the be all and end all of life. I have learnt like others in my industry I can easily be replaced by someone else not necessarily in this country and the industry I work in isn't as secure as it once was and I am luckier than most as I have never been made redundant.

Like everyone I know I work hard, I commute over 3 hours a day to and from work and I love my job but I do not want it to be what defines me as a person.

So here I am now, just over 1 year into my next 5 year plan and on it is writing a book, passing my next set of exams at work, being a better behaved diabetic, losing some weight, finding a Tai-Chi class and complete some cross-stitch projects I have.

So far I am studying for 1 exam to be sat in the Summer, i've nearly finished 1 stitching project but I have to give myself a break as I did get married last year so had a wedding to plan.

I'm a believer in being prepared so on my Christmas List were books on writing (as well as some games for my DS). Since my 41st Birthday a few months ago I have been on a writing course where I learnt about the different types of genres what's hot what's not, plots, planning, characters etc. Last week was the best even though it was only a short workshopI learnt a lot. The workshop was run by Heidi Rice a published author with Mills and Boon and it was brilliant and inspiring we covered characters, conflict the life of a writer and heard how the other people at the workshop were getting on with their writing as they were at various stages of their writing projects.

The subject of promotion came up and Heidi said she liked Facebook but wasn't on twitter! I thought this was strange only because I love Twitter it keeps my commuting hours entertaining and helps me keep up to date on what authors I like to read are working on, the latest news, along with chatting with people i've never met.

So there I was on twitter on Friday during my break chatting with @RachelLyndhurst and @52Betty and realised that other than work stuff, the odd letter etc I haven't actually written anything since school! So Rachel suggested writing a blog and Betty thought it was a good so here I am.

So what will I be blogging about............well a few ideas came to mind including me learning and trying to write a book, combined with the life of a commuter/city worker and my general ramblings. I'm not sure how entertaining I'm going to be but for those who read my blog I hope you enjoy it.