One, two, three, four, five...

... senses working o-ver ti-ime.

'Ineffective filtering system'

I've had a little time to myself today - which is a rare treat, and most handy when you have something you want to read. So I got the book I'm trying to read and the book I want to read next (always overly ambitious, me!) and sat in a warm patch in the conservatory.

After two hours, I had read one page.
I had stared out at the garden in different directions about five times, bitten my nails, investigated a tapping noise, got up and got some socks, compared the vision in my left and then right eye, ordered some bits and pieces from an online health food store, ordered some stuff for the dog from Pet Planet, half made a cup of tea and let it go cold - only to remember it an hour later, remembered the two things I'd actually needed from Pet Planet and went back online, made another cup of tea, picked my book back up again (it's about adult attention deficit disorder) and read this:
'It's hard to get things done when you keep thinking about and responding to so many different things.'
Ha ha ha ha ha. No it isn't. I don't know what you mean! I don't think I need this book. It's clearly not about me at all...

Still on page 36, I found myself checking facebook. A couple of people had updated their blipfoto for today. I grabbed my camera and went outside.
Everything I took a photo of looked messy and imperfect. Everywhere I looked there were signs of a family of five and a dog, and things that needed doing. Lots of balls, broken toys, weeds. I started taking shots of mess and rubbish and groups of flower pots that were upside down or growing weeds, next to rusty garden tools, with a cement mixer in the background but somehow they just looked sweet and like something from The Good Life (maybe you're old enough to remember that?) I finally got a nice shot of a reddish-brown wonky sunflower against a blue sky with a bee on it. How many photos of sunflowers do think there are around at the moment, though? I swung slightly to the right and our eldest daughter?s bedroom window came into shot. Not very interesting. But it made me think about her and her impending GCSE results tomorrow. I went inside and braved her bedroom.

Is the room in this photo the result of an 'ineffective filtering system'?

If you look closely you can make out all five of her guitars. Two classical ones on the right, one in a black case next to them and two more electric guitars on the floor.

She'll hate me when she sees this photo but 16-year-olds are supposed to find their mothers excruciatingly embarrassing. So I'm just being a good mother. And at least I kept the underwear out of the shot.