Days at Chez VintagePretty are manic. This, my dear readers, is an understatement. It has been the strangest two weeks possible, ending in the most frightening event of my life to date. So apologies for not posting or commenting! Hokey dokey, where to start? Well, the whole strangeness started a couple of weeks ago - at least this is where I can remember things starting to get a little weird... Our hoover decides it's going to spew out dust. It is just out of warranty, but so new that even the repair man can't get any parts to mend it! Our second hoover's (one up, one down - hey, I was a cleaner!) tube has an enormous hole in the pipe - which was remedied by duct tape (the saviour of all saviours) and a firm talking-to. Then the toaster, a mere year old, dies...

Last weekend one of the goldfish was looking unwell, so we kept an eye on her and removed her from the tank and nursed her on her own, thinking she was stressed from one too many unwanted advances from her tank-mate. She died a day later from "dropsy", we don't know what caused it but online it is unanimous that it can't be treated. She was given a beautiful burial in the nicest bit of the garden - the herb bed, layered with flowers and scented things, so she may travel sweetly elsewhere.

So, two hoovers, a toaster and the goldfish have all died (or are dying) a death. Then fast-forward to yesterday, driving home in a mild shower from the DIY shop, having purchased paint to enliven our kitchen, when coming slowly off a roundabout my car suddenly swerves and before I know it we've done a 360º pirouette, and have nearly rolled the car over into a ditch. And would you believe it, we weren't the only ones to have done the same. Not 10 metres from the car is another, sportier-looking thing which an hour before had swerved identically to ours and sent its owner to hospital. Thank gods for off-duty police officers, one of which was attending to the first accident when he comes by and sees me do my manic pirouetting act. He rushed over to see if we were ok, and whilst talking to him, another car does the same thing. I kid you not. 3 accidents all within an hour of each other, on the same bit of road. Thankfully no one was seriously hurt - but scary! SO scary. The car is fine, ironically, although we are both completely shaken. Of course, I took my car to a local garage to have it checked over by mechanics, for my own piece of mind, and spend 4 1/2 hours waiting there for them to give me new brake-pads (mine were fine, but "would need changing within the year - why don't we do it for you now?"!). Ugh. The police decided the reason for the accident was the hot weather had caused a coating of rubber to be left on the road surface and with the rain, caused a skid-pan effect.

I come home to a house that looks as though Godzilla has tromped his (her?) way through the place, with our entire kitchen in the dining room, the dog having broken a plate, and the kitchen in a half-greened state of anarchy. I hear punk is coming back into fashion - my kitchen could be a trend-setting Vivienne Westwood affair!

I do have some good, positive stuff, but for fear of laying the jinxes on it, I am keeping Mum until I'm sure ;-) Please excuse my absence, insanity is slowly calling.