Author: The Magpie at Midnight

New Year Plans

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It’s the beginning of a New Year, I hope everyone is feeling positive about making this year kinder and more inclusive than the last. I don’t tend to make New Year Resolutions as I don’t feel like they work particularly well for me. I tend to see my self as a work in progress, and in need of far more regular check-ins and course corrections. However it is a good time to take stock of what was achieved in the previous year and make some loose (and less loose) plans for what to do in the one to come. On Christmas day I wrote this post about actively practicing kindness and holding onto liberal, pro-diversity principles in the face of what feel like grim times. I feel like this is a pretty important perspective to go into the new year with.

Here in the Magpie nest we have a few other immediate plans:

Dry January – we did this last year (and did dry October too) and found that we felt much better for giving our bodies a bit of a rest from the sauce, so we are going to be doing that again this year. On both occasions we found that our wallets emerged in a better state too, so that’s a bonus.

Money – we are going to try to save up a bit of a financial cushion this year as we feel that we may want to start thinking about making some lifestyle changes of the ‘work less, live leaner’ variety pretty soon – it will be good to go into those with a bit of cash behind us as we work things out. I’ve been inspired by reading some of the posts at Frugal Health for Life in approaching this endeavour and look forwards to reading more of these.

Veganuary – We’ll be trying to go vegan for January. This morning we had our first vegan breakfast of home made baked beans and avocado on toast. It was yummy. I have to be a bit careful about eating well as I have a health condition that could lead to diabetes (I don’t want that), and my partner is gluten intolerant, so there will be some nutritional kinks to work out as we go along. I’m not sure how well we’ll manage this one, and imagine that after January we may well settle into something that looks a lot more like vegetarianism, but my partner and I are doing this together so it feels like a fun project to work on.

We’ve been watching quite a few documentaries on a range of things ranging from global warming, to animal cruelty, to many health issues, to the nutrient poor foods that have become dominant in the market, to antibiotic resistance. When you look at major contributors to all of these problems, the road seems inevitably to lead back to industrialised, factory style farming of animals. We’ve hit the point where we have a stack of reasons to give veganism a try, and only our own laziness as a reason not too. We generally cook lots of vegetarian meals from scratch anyway, so I feel we’ll get on ok with that side of things. We used to eat lots of bacon, and couldn’t imagine not having a bacon breakfast on a Saturday, but we’ve not really eaten that way for a while, and haven’t really missed it. We have been phasing out other types of meat and lots of forms of dairy for some time, but I think I may struggle with not having eggs. I really like eggs. Eggs could be a problem.

Building a creative business – I’m still exploring ideas for this. I’ve not even begun to think about starting trading yet, but I think I have some good ideas now for a set of art pieces, and may be in a position launch something later this year. Until then I’ll continue to highlight any useful resources that I stumble across on my route there.

Other creative stuff – I have a play and a film to finish, and ideas for another play, and another film (that relate to each other) to get going with. And a little animated series. Plus some art. Lots and lots of art. Oh gosh, what a list.

Mental health – I’m going to reduce my hours in the day job in April, I’m really looking forwards to having a whole day a week to myself to work on creative stuff. Let’s see how that works out.

That’s about it for a round up, but who knows what other opportunities may crop up as we go along. What New Year Plans do you have?

Christmas creativity: Something pretty to do with those empty booze bottles

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I hope everyone is enjoying some down time over the festive season. We’ve had some family staying. They left today and we have a night off this eve before another round of family arrives tomorrow. I’ve not had much time for creative things but was able, in an idle moment, to put these beauties together. This is super easy so I wanted to share this with any one who had been working up a recycling mountain, which you can now confidently rename as a ‘stockpile of craft materials’.

So you will need:

Empty glass bottles or jars – you want to wash these out and let them dry thoroughly before you do this. Keep the corks, screw lids or wire cages. You’all need those later.

A small/ light weight string of fairy lights. I have been using theses Starry String Lights from YIHONG. I really like these and had them in the house because I bought a load in for a completely different project. They are a 2m strand of tiny LED lights sealed in blobs of glue on delicate copper wire, attached to a battery pack fitted with an on-off switch. The sales info suggests the batteries should last for 72 hours. I’ve not had these going for that long to test that out yet but we’ve had them on for most of Christmas and they are still very bright. The batteries are replaceable. These lights are designed to be worn in clothing so don’t use a high enough voltage to cause a shock. I would avoid using fairy lights that draw power for the mains – I’m not at all sure how you would use these safely with bottles that have metal caps or lids.

What you do:

You want to uncoil the length of the fairy lights and then feed them slowly into your glass bottle. I’ve deliberately let mine coil up in a very uneven pattern as I think this looks quite magical but I’m sure that the more ingenious among you could find a way to get them to sit evenly in the glass. I’ve been really lazy about capping these off, and have just pushed the tops back in or on over the wire – mine stick out a bit. For a better result you probably want to slice a channel down one side of the cork for the wire to sit in before you push the cork back in. You can also screw screw caps over the fine copper wire if you run it down the outside of the neck of the bottle. And that’s it. Done. 

Happy Christmas. 

Practicing kindness: now is our time

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So I’ve been thinking about this post for a few days now, often while ‘slightly’ under the influence, and I’m still not quite sure how to put it, but here goes. I’ve been working and volunteering in mental health type jobs for 4 years. I have spoken with many distressed and suicidal people. I have spoken with many people who’s experience of being a human is radically different to mine. The one thing I have learned is this: Empathy, kindness, the ability to listen well – These are super powers. The kind that cause a slow, incremental, healing kind of change (rather than something save-the-day glamorous like flying), but super powers no less. And the best thing about these particular super powers is that the more you use them, the more you practice them, the stronger and better they get.

This year has felt like a pretty grotty year to me. We have seen frankly irresponsible politicians using frightening and racist rhetoric to get their own way. And they have been pretty effective in this, leaving countries, families, and friends divided. It has been pretty awful to see them speak to the very worst in our natures, and to see people respond positively to that. But I am actually quite hopeful. I feel like this is a backlash against all that is progressive, and liberal, and tolerant, and kind. The backlash has been so petty and vitriolic and aggressive, so peppered with petulant language and poorly thought through arguments, that I actually think these guys are running scared. But scared people, especially scared rich people, can be destructive indeed. I see it as a direct challenge to all of us who practice daily the arts of compassion and kindness and understanding.

It’s Christmas Day as I write this. Traditionally a time, symbolically, of love and respect for our fellow humans. It is a time to reflect on the year gone past, and to think about how we will act in the year going forwards. Those of us who believe in all of this lefty woolly kindness and understanding have to step up to really walk the walk in 2017. Now is our time. It may feel like the best thing to do is hide under a rock somewhere until all the nastiness is over but that too would be irresponsible. In my life time it has never felt more important to stand up and speak out against hate and racism and misogyny. There are lots of tired, frightened people around. If we duck out of this now there will be many more. We need to talk with each other, be kind to each other, understand each other. As a people, a community, it is in our power to heal the mess these politicians have left. 

Now is our time people. Go forth, listen, and be kind.

Avoiding Christmas burnout

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I’ve been trying to do too much over the last few weeks and over the last week have been super tired. My posting here has slipped a bit because of this, but hopefully I’ll have a bit more time after I finish up work for the holidays next week. Having got my self to a state of this kind of tiredness, I’ve been thinking a bit about what people mean when they talk about self care. 

Last weekend I should have been finishing off some art work I’d been commissioned to do (which the paper cuts above are part of) and instead my boyfriend and I decided to go for a long walk and a visit to the pub. We managed to find ourselves walking as the sun was setting into this amazing burning pink orange display, just before it sank over the horizon. In the part of Kent that we live in, excitingly we have wild green parakeets. Just at sunset more and more birds took to the air so that we were treated to the sight of the silhouettes of these lovely birds set against the red sky. I would have missed it if I had been working on my commission.

When I was young my granddad used to have this catch phrase; ‘when there is work to be done we must cut out the fun’. I never really identified with it, but have found my self working harder and harder to fit in various artistic projects around a full time day job. I still have my commission to finish off this weekend, and a Christmas party to squeeze in somehow. These feel like difficult times and I am sure that many people are a bit like me just before Christmas – head down, trying to finish things. I think that maybe sometimes, when there isn’t much time, self care is as simple as lifting your head up, and looking at the sun as it dips below the horizon.

Christmas baubles

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We put up our Christmas tree today. I’s a bit earlier than usual for me but this is the first year my partner and I have lived together so rather exciting. I’m not particularly religious but I do like Christmas very much. I think I have manages to surprise the boyfriend by my secret love of sparkles and glitter. I’ve been making some bits for our tree this year as I was enjoying the process of designing and making things that are all about celebration.


These are made from polystyrene spheres. I’ve covered them with black tissue paper and hand cut papers stars or flowers depending on how you see them. I tend to use a combination of recyled papers and arts quality paper. I’ve found there is something quite meditative about slowly building up layers of paper and glue. Anyway, I think they look nice on the tree.


I really like the rituals around Christmas, particularly the traditions that have roots in cold snow bound countries and that probably originate around marking the winter solstice. Somehow for me there is something quite magical about the sparkle of ice and snow. I like having a tree, and sharing warm food and wine with people around them. I hope everyone is enjoying kicking off with their own winter traditions and their winter time making.

Musings on Mark Kermode

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I’ve not felt like writing so much in that last few weeks, I’m not entirely sure what that’s about, but I’ve been doing making type things so maybe I only have so much creative energy. But I have just started reading ‘The Good, the bad, and the multiplex’, by Mark Kermode. It’s a book that has been out for some time. It’s been lurking in my kindle library for some time. I’m not about to do a book review. I have yet to make it past Chapter 2, so have little substance to base any review on. But I am enjoying it so far, and wanted to share a musing prompted by the book.

It’s a little ranty for my tastes. I like to see a skilfully executed rant, and in his film review work he is known for some excellent rant work. But in his description of what sounded like an excruciatingly irritating visit to a multiplex cinema, I feel he may have reached peak rant. That said, the book by very elegantly explaining the role and the importance of the skill the projectionist in the art of cinema, and I liked this beginning very much.

The projectionist, he explains, is a vital part of the art work, not some who presses play on the DVD player. He then goes on to explain how the profession is slowly being wiped out across the UK by the introduction of digital technologies coupled by the arrogance of large multiplex cinema managers. Cinemas are slowly bleeding their projectionists. If you have ever had the experience of sitting in a cinema where half of the picture is slipping off the screen, or freezes half way through the movie never to start again, this is probably the explanation. You have been denied the proper care and attention of a projectionist.

He goes to to begin talking about how the desire to make money has taken over from the desire to make good art in much of commercial cinema. For me this brings together a few themes that have been floating around the news lately. One is the increasing likelihood that robots and machines will replace more and more humans in jobs, and the second is the idea that the thing that is human about artistic work is somehow unimportant, and should be subservient to the thing that makes money (any thing that makes money). As humans we are fundamentally wired to be social, and to connect with other people and understand them. At a basic biological level, we like there to be other humans about, doing things and helping each other. As a species, much of what we are about concerns this. This helping, this tending to each other’s needs is an evolutionary, competitive advantage – we tend to die if we have to do it all on our own. That there is no longer a projectionist taking care of each screen in the cinema may save the cinema money, but it costs them in skill and expertise. With the projectionist disappears it costs the cinema that very human ability to care for and respect the audience.

If going to the cinema begins to feel less special than snuggling up with a buddy on the sofa with a pizza and Netflix, why go to the cinema at all? You only pay (a rather large chunk of cash) to go to the cinema because it is meant to be a special experience. The stripping out of the things that feel human may make things seem more efficient, but it may also make audiences forget why they should show up and pay up in the first place.