Minor disasters

Oh dear... I managed to lock myself out of my room last night, so slept in one of the others. Not a disaster in itself, just the prospect of a night with nothing to do, since all my precious books, cd player and other stuff are in my room. Paul suggested I borrow one of Orla's...sadly I'm not the type of super-human than can learn Polish in an hour! Instead Orla had a better idea and took me to the local pub, which, conveniently, is opposite the house.

That was scary... Are all pubs in Scotland frequented by predominantly 30-40 something males who like nothing better than whispering sweet nothings like "you f*ckin, f*ckin you" to their darts as they stab them with wild abandon through the air, to land like misprogrammed missiles a few inches from my head?! It was hilarious - if a little dangerous! I kept wondering where all these men came from, I haven't seen anyone in the village over the age of about 60.

The surroundings were very peculiar to someone that only really seems to visit quaint Cornish pubs. Not the least disturbing was the brightness of the lights - it meant there was no place to hide from the gaze of curious (but very congenial) locals...and having shut myself out of my room I was still wearing my rather fetching workshop clothes with plaster in my hair. Sitting next to the very much more glamorously dressed Orla, I felt like I stood out like the proveribial sore thumb.

Under the 'spotlights' you could see that they hadn't gone in for any of the usual red flock wall paper here, no it was a rather brash bright blue chinoiserie style, with huge great flowers, complimented with lots of natural varnished pine. I look forward to going back, with Orla obiously (no way I'm going in there on my own!), but Ginny has warned us off the food. She said that she's tried eating there twice and not quite managed it either time - apparently burgers come like rubber and are curled at the edges, and the fish she wouldn't even talk about!

I got a good night's sleep after that and have come into the workshop to my second 'disaster'. Rather more worrying... I went to my studio with the excited anticipation of opening up my first mould, like finding a pearl in a clam shell, only to discover that the release agent I put between the two halves doesn't seem to have worked, and the two halves are stuck together more like a limpet on a rock. Everyone's having a cup of tea together in the bothy at the moment and I didn't much fancy telling of my failure in front of everyone, but I assume I'm going to have to chisel off one of the sides of plaster, if that's even possible. Or maybe I'll just have to start again. I think I can hear someone moving about in the studios, so I'll end this tale of woe for now and will let you know the outcome later...keep your fingers crossed for me!